She met his gaze. Held it.
"I could resurrect every battle you've ever fought from that blade." She went back to working the edge of her dagger, serene. "I choose not to. That's not weakness, Maxx. That's restraint."
The silence that followed was thick enough to choke on.
Maxx opened his mouth. Closed it.
"Well." Maxx's voice was rougher than usual. "Remind me never to piss off the priestess again."
Serenya hummed pleasantly, as if she hadn't just demonstrated that she could unmake any warrior in this camp using nothing but their own past.
Chapter 15
AMARIA
Later that day, I stood before Kaelen's table, chin high, and more importantly, back to Eryndor. Easier to pretend he didn't exist when I wasn't looking at him. My Marks disagreed, but my marks could choke.
Kaelen unrolled a map across the table, its surface crawling with hand-drawn notations—swirling patterns of gray that marked the Nullatheon's spread. More territory consumed sinceyesterday. At this rate we'd run out of map before we ran out of catastrophe.
"Our scouts can't keep up with this," he said. Then his finger traced the boundary.
"Pure Luminars are blinded by its density," Kaelen said. "The mist reflects their light back at them—they can't see past the first ten feet. Pure Shadowmarked fare worse. The Nullatheon drains them. Three scouts lost last month before we understood why."
His gaze lifted. Found mine.
"We need someone who can thread the needle. Someone who can see the truth of its movement and survive its touch." A ghost of a smile. "Congratulations, Amaria. Your dual Marks make you uniquely suited for shadow patrol."
Uniquely suited. That was a creative way to say expendable.
"You'll scout the outer districts," he continued. "Report on the Veil's encroachment. Map the patterns. Find us paths through the decay."
Something loosened in me. Open air. Movement. A mission that didn't involve sitting in this camp pretending I wasn't crawling out of my skin. I'd take rotting edges of reality over another day of rebel politics.
"Not alone, of course." Kaelen's eyes flicked to my left. "Eryndor will accompany you. A Crownforged cuirass opens doors that rebel leathers can't. Consider it... insurance."
Insurance. Wonderful. Every girl's dream—a chaperone who could kill her.
"I can hardly wait," I said, flashing him a cutting smile.
Kaelen smiled like he'd expected nothing less.
We surfaced through a drainage grate on the city's western edge. The sky hit first. Open and endless after days of stone ceilingsclose enough to touch. Wind I hadn't felt in days dragged across my face. Three seconds longer than I should have, I stood there. Just breathing.
Then we crossed into the outer sectors, and the ruined district breathed wrong.
I felt it immediately.
The Veil was bleeding here. The air crackled with a dry, metallic tension, like the moments before a lightning strike.
My hand drifted to my pocket, fingers brushing the rough weave of the Blood-thread charm. It sat cool and quiet against my palm.
Good. That meant Serenya was safe. She was probably buried under a mountain of rotting scrolls in the Archives by now, squinting at dead languages by torchlight and forgetting to eat.
Keep reading,I thought, rubbing my thumb over the crimson thread.I’ll handle the monsters.
I shifted my weight, checking the twin weights at my hips—Voidbringer and Dawnrender. My oldest friends. The only ones that never asked questions.
But gods, it felt likefreedomout here!
