“This is also enough to get us killed.” His voice carries a warning I don’t want to hear. “These aren’t minor nobles with limited influence. Some of these names control armies. Courts. Trade routes that span kingdoms.”
“I don’t care.”
“You should.” He sets the documents on the desk. Turns to face me fully. “Arwen. I will follow you into any fight. Kill any enemy you point me at. But I need you to understand what you’re proposing. This isn’t burning a monastery. This is declaring war on an entire web of power.”
“And if we don’t?” I step closer to him. Close enough to feel the heat radiating from his infected skin. “If we take these documents and hide them, pretend we never found this room—how long before someone else fills the Abbot’s role? How long before another monastery rises, funded by the same patrons, protected by the same officials?”
“You’re asking me to spend the rest of my life hunting powerful people who don’t want to be found.”
“Yes.” I reach for his hands. Find them. Hold on. “I’m asking you to help me make sure no one ever has to survive what I survived. What the people in those cells survived. What the transformation cases in the basement?—”
I can’t finish. The memory of what he did down there—the mercy he delivered, the vomiting that followed—closes my throat.
His hand comes up and covers both of mine where they grip his. Just that — the solid press of his palm over my knuckles, steadying without holding. The way he has of anchoring me without making me feel caught.
“Then we hunt.” His breath is warm against my lips. “Until they’re all dead or we are.”
I kiss him. Not fierce this time—soft, questioning, the kind of kiss that asks for permission it already has. His arms wrap around me, pulling me flush against his chest, and for a moment the sanctum disappears. The memories disappear. There’s just him, solid and warm and choosing to stay.
When we break apart, his eyes hold something that looks like peace.
“The staircase.” I nod toward the door at the chamber’s rear. “The prisoner is down there. We should?—”
A sound from below cuts me off.
A voice. Faint but clear. Calling my name.
FORTY-FOUR
ARWEN
The staircase descends three levels before opening into a corridor I’ve never seen.
The Abbot’s private prison. I knew it existed—heard whispers about special captives kept separate from the general population—but I never found it during my years of careful exploration. The entrance was too well hidden. Too close to the sanctum where discovery would mean death.
The cells here are different from the Confessional Cells above. These have actual doors instead of iron grates. Glass windows for observation. Furniture beyond a thin mat.
The Abbot kept his valuable prisoners comfortable.
The voice calls again: “Arwen? Is that you?”
I recognize it now. Cultured. Careful. The voice of someone who has spent decades in diplomatic circles, trained to project calm regardless of circumstance.
“Lady Marceline.” I stop before the cell at the corridor’s end. The woman inside rises from a cushioned chair, setting aside the book she was reading. “You’re alive.”
“Obviously.” Marceline moves to the door’s window. Studies me with sharp eyes that haven’t lost their intelligence despite five years of captivity. “The Abbot spoke of you often. His prize,he called you. I wondered if you’d ever come back. When you escaped, I assumed you’d run as far as possible and never look back.”
“I tried.” I examine the lock on her door. Standard mechanism—the Abbot didn’t bother with elaborate security for a prisoner who had nowhere to go. “The running didn’t take.”
“No. It rarely does, for people like us.” Her gaze shifts to Zrynok, who has positioned himself behind me with his hand on his sword. “An orc. An executioner, from the look of him. Interesting choice of companion.”
“He’s more than a companion.” I work the lock. Feel it give. “He’s the reason the Abbot is dead.”
“The Abbot is dead?” Something shifts in Marceline’s expression. Not quite hope—she’s too controlled for that—but the careful assessment of someone whose circumstances have just changed dramatically. “You killed him?”
“Zrynok did. In the Garden, after the Crimson Seed destabilized. The whole place tore itself apart.” The door swings open. “Can you walk?”
Marceline steps into the corridor with the dignity of someone attending a formal function rather than escaping captivity. Her clothing is worn but clean—the Abbot provided for his valuable prisoners. Her hair is gray, carefully maintained. Her posture is straight despite the fragility that five years of confinement has carved into her frame.
