Her gaze drops to the bundle in my hands. Understanding flickers across her face.
“Treatment supplies. For the Bloom infection, yes?” Her smile widens. “Your executioner must be suffering. The Abbot says the concentrated exposure worked beautifully. Says even now, the orc burns for you. Can you imagine? An executioner brought low by desire for a traumatized cult escapee.” A soft laugh. “It’s almost romantic.”
Rage flares hot in my chest. I shove it down. Rage is what she wants—emotion she can use, leverage she can exploit.
“He’s not my anything.”
“The Abbot says otherwise.” Maret moves closer. Each step measured, unhurried. The approach of someone who has all the time in the world. “He says you chose to return—not just to save the girl but to save him. That you pulled him back from the edge when the spores should have claimed him completely.” Her head tilts, curiosity sharpening her gentle features. “You gave him something to want more than surrender. What was it, Arwen? What did you offer?”
I didn’t offer anything. I demanded he want something real—want me to survive, want to finish the job, want anything that wasn’t the Bloom’s manufactured hunger.
But I’m not explaining that to her. Not giving her ammunition.
“I’m not going back.” I shift my stance, preparing to run. “The Abbot can’t have me. You can’t have me. I’m done being owned.”
“You’re already back.” Maret spreads her hands—welcoming, open, the gesture of someone offering sanctuary. “You came back with a weapon, thinking you could destroy us. Instead, the Bloom claimed your weapon. Now you’re alone, in a place you can’t escape, with a man who will eventually betray you because his body won’t give him any other choice.”
“You’re wrong.”
“Am I?” She takes another step. Close now. Close enough that I can smell the incense in her robes, the faint sweetness of Bloom essence on her skin. “The Abbot wants you alive, Arwen. He’s willing to forgive everything—the escape, the violence, all of it. Come home. Stop fighting.”
Come home. As if this place was ever home. As if anything that happened here was anything other than captivity dressed in prayer.
I run.
Not toward the door—Maret’s positioned to intercept that path. Sideways, into the flower beds, thorns tearing at my legs as I crash through the raised plantings. I know this garden. Know the hidden paths between the rows, the gaps in the trellises, the maintenance access that even long-term residents forget exists.
Maret’s voice follows me, still gentle, still patient: “You can’t run forever, Sister. The Bloom is in your blood too. Maybe not as deep as your executioner, but deep enough. Deep enough that you’ll come back to us eventually.”
I don’t respond. Don’t waste breath on words that won’t change anything.
The secondary exit is ahead—a grate set into the floor, leading to the drainage tunnels that run beneath the gardens. Irip it open, drop through, ignore the stench of stagnant water and worse things.
The tunnels swallow me. I crawl through darkness, herbs clutched against my chest, Maret’s words echoing in my skull.
He’ll betray you because his body won’t give him any other choice.
She’s wrong. She has to be wrong.
But doubt is its own poison. And Maret knows exactly where to inject it.
I emergein the storage chamber shaking, bleeding, triumphant.
The candle has burned halfway down—I was gone longer than I planned. Circe is exactly where I left her, knees to chest, watching me with wide, worried eyes. And Zrynok?—
Zrynok is on his feet. Moving toward me before I’m fully through the entrance, his hands reaching, then stopping, then dropping to his sides as he forces himself to maintain distance.
“You’re bleeding.” His voice is rough. Raw. The words pulled from somewhere primal.
“Thorns. The garden.” I hold up the bundle of herbs, proof of my success. “I got what we need.”
“There’s someone else’s scent on you.” He takes another step, then stops himself. The struggle is visible—every muscle in his body tensed, fighting against impulses the Bloom has amplified beyond reason. “Who?”
“Sister Maret. My old friend. My former torturer.” I move past him, deliberately close, testing his control. He doesn’t grab me. Doesn’t touch me. Just breathes deep, shuddering, and letsme pass. “She knows you’re infected. Knows I came back for you.”
“Came back for me?”
“For these.” I hold up the herbs again. “For treatment. To keep you alive long enough to kill the Abbot.”
