“Stop saying that.”
Her grip tightened as if she could hold me together through sheer force of will.
“I will fight alongside you.If you are trapped here, I will take the battle to them.We will tear those men down together and reclaim our freedom.”
A bitter chuckle rattled through me, tinged with something dangerously close to despair.
“You have no idea what you’re saying.”
The words felt cruel, but they had to be.
I lifted my head, forcing her to see the truth in my battered face, in the blood that stained the floor beneath me.
“They don’t just want to kill me, Elizabeth.They want to make an example out of me.”
My voice was raw, hoarse, laced with something darker than pain—acceptance.
“They want to break me, display my ruin for the world.They want to prove that the Black Wraith is nothing more than a shattered man, a whisper of rebellion crushed beneath their boots.”
The truth was a blade slicing deeper than any of Mathias’ torturous instruments ever could.
But the thought of losing her—of her standing in their line of fire—was a wound I knew I wouldn’t survive.
I needed to make her leave.
For good.
Before it was too late.
ChapterEighteen
ELIZABETH
Ihuddled in the corner of my alchemist cottage, the scent of crushed herbs and minerals thick in the air, clinging to my skin like the ghosts of failed remedies.
Tears streaked down my cheeks, etching clean paths through the grime smudged across my face.I had tried not to cry.I tried to block out the echoes that slithered through the night, but Amir’s cries reached this far—my supposed sanctuary, deep within the woods.
Every sound from the dungeon was a brutal reminder of his suffering, his torment, and his slow unraveling at the hands of my father.
I pressed a shaking palm against the wooden worktable, peeling myself from the wall.Alchemy.I had to focus.I had to do something.
But as I reached for my tools, my body shuddered, a silent rebellion against the horrors unfolding beyond my reach.
My father had become more demanding.
Tasking me with poisons—day and night, new brews, stronger venoms, deadlier weapons.
And now—his latest command chilled me to my very core.
I was to craft a poison stronger than Belladonna—one meant for Amir.
I stared at my hands, at the trembling fingertips hovering over the mortar and pestle.I had the means to obey.
But I also had the means to raze everything to the ground.
The Noctyss flower.
Nestled within my grasp like a death sentence ready to be rewritten.
