This isn’t just any statue.
This is my husband. Oziel.
“No…” The word leaves my lips as a strangled cry. My legs give out, and I fall to the floor, crumpling at my cursed husband’s feet.
Anger is frozen into his expression, as if he saw the curse coming before it took him over. This wasn’t supposed to happen, not to Oziel. He was supposed to be my partner, my husband who stood by my side as we faced this evil together. I didn’t want to care for this damn demon, but he slithered his way into my heart and planted himself there. He’s part of me, just like I know I’m part of him.
And now that he’s gone, I don’t feel whole. Part of me feels as if it turned to stone too. Tears flood my eyes, running down my cheeks. He wouldn’t want me to cry or give up. Oziel would want me to keep going, but how do I do that when the man I love is nothing but a memory in stone?
Consumed by my own grief, I don’t hear the footsteps behind me until a familiar voice whispers, “Queen Isabelle.”
I whip my head up to see Garvan standing by the doorway—with the encased bouquet of roses in his hands.
Chapter 35
Isabelle
“Garvan,” I choke out, my voice a strangled cry. “Oziel, he’s…he’s…” I can’t bring myself to say it. Speaking those words out loud will make them true, and I desperately want to wake up from this nightmare. I want to see Oziel’s teasing face above me and smell his heated scent that reminds me of bonfires and roasting marshmallows late into the night.
“He’s cursed.” Garvan’s voice shatters my delusions like a knife straight to the gut, tearing me apart. It isn’t supposed to hurt this much. It’s not meant to be this way. I never wanted to give a damn about my husband, and yet here I am, crumpled in a heap on the ground, crying over a demon that feels so out of reach.
My legs tremble as I push myself up from the ground, each movement slow and unsteady, as though I am lifting the weight of the world. It definitely feels that way because so much is upon my shoulders now.I will fix this, Oziel. I will fix you.
A sharp ache radiates through my limbs, and for amoment, I fear they won’t hold me. But somehow, I manage to stand. My breath is uneven, shuddering in my chest, and hot tears continue to blur my vision, stinging my already burning eyes. I blink rapidly, struggling to clear my sight.
Through the blur, I can just make out Garvan’s silhouette. He stands, rigid and unmoving, his posture eerily still. He does not rush forward or avert his gaze in deference. He doesn’t even so much as acknowledge his king. Instead, his eyes remain locked on me, unreadable and void of their usual flicker of warmth.
He has never been an overly friendly man, nor one who has shown a full display of emotions, but this…this is different. There is a chill in his stare I have never felt before, a deliberate, glacial distance. It tightens something in my chest, making it difficult to breathe.
Then Garvan takes a step forward, out of the shadows.
My breathing stops.
Those eyes. Soulless and full of malice. I’ve seen those eyes before. Once during the attack in the shower and again by River Hel. There’s also a scar across his cheek, one I missed before. He favors one side over the other, because of course he does. I stabbed him in the thigh, so putting weight on it must be painful.
“It was you,” I whisper, barely audible, but for how quiet it is in here, it may as well have been a shout.
The corner of Garvan’s lips twitches up into a smile, the only indicator of the validity of my statement. It’s enough though.
“This whole time it’s been you.” My voice is loudernow. How did we miss the signs? Oziel trusted Garvan as his closest confidant. He worked beside Oziel as he prepared to defend his people from the Nephilim. And yet, the very person who betrayed the demons was standing right in front of us the whole time.
“In the shower…that was you. And by the River Hel?—”
“I imagine this is quite the shock for you,my queen,” he sneers at my title, like the name personally offends him. Knowing what I know now, it probably does. “You may not believe this, but I didn’t want it to be this way.”
“Fucking classic villain line.” I laugh, but it holds no humor. Only anger that threatens to overtake me. “What are you going to say next? That you tried to make Oziel see your way? That you never wanted to hurt me?”
A crimson glow flares in his normally gray eyes, the unmistakable spark of rage searing through them. My breath catches, and a shiver races down my spine as fear coils tight in my chest, turning my blood to ice. Every instinct screams at me to step back, to retreat from the storm brewing before me. But I don’t. I force my feet to stay rooted, my body rigid with tension, refusing to show weakness. Refusing to move away from Oziel, even if he’s lost to me at the moment.
Garvan takes another deliberate step forward, his presence looming, and the air between us grows thick with unspoken threats. He is close now—too close—but still, I don’t move. I meet his glare head-on, my heart hammering wildly against my ribs, sounding loud in an otherwise silent room.
His voice is low, almost a growl, and laced withfrustration. “I tried to make Oziel understand. Tried to get him to see reason, to open his damn eyes. But he’s so fucking stubborn, so blinded by his own pride, he refuses to listen to anyone.” He exhales sharply, his fists clenched at his sides. Then, his gaze darkens, sharpening as it fixes on me. “No one… until you showed up.”
Something slithers around my legs, and I tear my gaze away from the demon before me, only to see the tendrils of darkness wrap around my ankles, snaking their way up my body. I’m frozen to the spot, helpless to do anything other than watch the shadows overtake me. This magic reminds me so much of Oziel that, for a second, I forget my husband is stone, that this isn’t his gentle shadows pulling me to him.
No, these shadows feel different. Evil. Poisoned. Garvan is the one who has been stealing the shadow magic from the river. The shadows bind me in place until I no longer have control over my body.
“You are the greatest threat to our kind, whether Oziel sees it or not,” he says, his voice edged with certainty. “In time, he will. He’ll understand why I’ve done what I've done when I wake them all up in the new world. Mescos has changed. The time of the six rulers is gone. The Nephilim have risen up, and unlike you, I refuse to watch my kingdom burn because Oziel’s pride stands in the way. The demons deserve a chance to rule alongside the Nephilim!”
