“And you’re bleeding,” I snarled, unable to ignore the steady flow of my own essence.
“Superficial,” he crooned, digging his thumb into the cut to gather a glob of his tainted life force. With one flick, it splattered against the once-pristine street, a mark of the corruption that lurked within the walls of Serevalen. “Unlike you, considering you’re leaking everywhere.”
I allowed my gaze to shift, and he proved his claim by attacking again. It was a feint so subtle I almost admired it—lifting his saber for an overhead cut, I raised my smallsword to meet it, only for the real strike to come from below.
His curved blade carved across my thigh, and while the laceration wasn’t deep, it was deep enough for my leg to buckle. I dropped to one knee before I could stop myself, the world narrowing to nothing more than affliction and breath.
Instead of rushing in to finish what he started, he stepped back just out of my reach. Saber poised, he watched me with the patience of a man who knew he’d already won. “Are you ready to yield, Syoran Kao?”
I spat blood on the ground instead. “Over my dead body, you fucking piece of shit.”
He sighed. “You realize such a request puts your captain in a rather precarious situation, considering we are here for him anyway. Your deathwill serve as great leverage in his torment.” Clicking his tongue against the roof of his mouth, he huffed a laugh. “Well, and the good-for-nothing prince.”
Knowing he liked to talk, I lunged from my knee, desperation leading my speed. My shortsword thrust forward toward his knee, the angle just as low and vicious as he was.
The saber flashed down with anticipation in an efficient arc. I felt the impact before my mind could wrap around understanding it: a shocking blow that knocked my blade from my hand. Hilt slipping between my fingers, his weapon reversed in the same motion, and the tip sank into my side.
It wasn’t a clean stab. No, the curved steel punched between my ribs until it settled inside me completely. Dragging back as he pulled it free, heat tore through me, and I gasped, the sound stolen from somewhere deep and primal.
With a wheeze, I brought a shaky hand to my side. Warmth greeted me, and I barely caught myself as my body swayed forward. Palm colliding with the ground, the force of the movement rattled my frame with anguish, a bout of coughs serving as my response.
His booted feet came into view, and I struggled to lift my chin. Stabilizing myself in a feigned sense of impenetrability, I caught my warped reflection in his blood-soaked, polished blade.
Lips parted, crimson painted them in its vibrant hue. Sweat beaded on my brow, and the paleness of my skin confirmed my loss, myfailure.Soaked through, my lightweight linen shirt did nothing to staunch the flow of my ancestry, lively scarlet blooming across it in a sick display of life’s fragility.
“Seems you’re not as impenetrable as your captain claimed you were. Have you ever considered that maybe he trained you with minor flaws to keep youjustweak enough so he could hold the advantage? You have to recall that Alastair Seridean, his supposed best friend, attempted to betray him, and Vayne would be stupid to assume that even his new right-hand had his best interests in mind.”
My vision blurred, and the irrefutable tang of copper climbed upthe back of my throat. “You have no right to lay claim to a man you hardly know.”
“Maybe,” he goaded, adjusting his grip on his saber. “But I can say the same to you, Syoran Kao. There is little to nothing you know about your Captain Vayne except for the mirage he’s curated, the image he wishes you to see.”
Unable to form a rebuttal of my own fast enough, the pommel of his blade greeted my temple, and the world went sideways. The ground greeted me faster than I could react, my skull cracking against the cobblestones as a resounding white noise replaced my hearing. Before the abysmal cataclysm swallowed me whole, I watched as he sheathed his weapon in one smooth, victorious motion, my blood lining its sharpenededge.
CHAPTER 37
Spiteful Undertones
ROHEN
Boot colliding with the center of my chest, I stumbled, and a handful of curses followed suit. I’d clashed with many men in the past, men who hadn’t stood a chance against me. But Caspian Vayne? He was holding his ground with the wounds I’d left behind and against Alastair and me—two opponents who were more than equipped with dueling and not unfamiliar with the God of Death.
The arc of Caspian’s blade caught the rays of the sun, fractals of light splitting in warning of my impending doom. Wasting no time, I rolled to the left, and the sharp song of metal joining erupted above me.
“Vayne,” Alastair snarled, hooking his sword in the curve of Caspian’s saber. With a sudden yank, he ripped him forward, granting me enough space to get back onto my feet. “Seems your new crew has been able to keep you on your toes. I was expecting your…expertiseto have dimmed with age.”
Cackling with mania, Caspian took advantage of the short distance, driving his forehead into the center of Alastair’s face. Scarlet bloomed immediately, trickling from the strawberry blonde’s nose. With a quick adjustment in stance, Caspian drove his heel into the back of Alastair’shand just as he stepped back to press it to the rushing dam of blood. Without time to blink or breathe, Alastair hit the cobbled street.
“Bold, considering only two years separate us.”
Spinning the pommel in his hand, he adjusted his hold, sharpened tip angled down at Alastair’s throat. The teeth of the saber seemed to gleam with a ravenous hunger, the desire to consume a bountiful lineage carving its way through every edge of the finely crafted steel. But just as it began its descent, I moved.
Feet light beneath me, I closed the gap in seconds, praying to whatever god would listen that I could prevent Alastair’s approaching end. Driving into Caspian’s towering frame, I sent both of us to the unforgiving ground. As we stumbled, my body greeted cobblestone yet again, but the impact didn’t register. Instead, an immediate trail of searing anguish lashed its way from just below my collarbone to the side of my shoulder—another scar of his influence that I would live with for the rest of my life.
Biting my tongue to keep myself from crying out, I hissed in my prior captain’s direction. “You’re enraging.”
“Enraging because I am a formidable foe or because your mind can’t seem to unlatch itself from me?” Caspian taunted, a smile fueled with knowing lacing his infuriatingly gorgeous features.
“Your ego speaks of how small?—”
