Only I carry those memories.
And it is this cruel symmetry—this echo of fate repeating itself—that shatters the last of my restraint and sends me into a rage I never believed myself capable of, one born not of anger alone, but of grief that has been waiting centuries to be set free.
She moves fast, faster than I’ve ever seen a woman move before. The rope is clenched tight in her right fist.
Her blade flashes up a heartbeat later as she closes the distance between us. I step into her space instead of retreating, catching her wrist before the knife can find purchase. I drive her backward with my body.
She twists, fast and practiced, the rope snapping out toward me.
It brushes my forearm.
Power drains from me in an instant. It’s disorienting. My breath stutters, my balance falters, and she uses the opening to shove me away, forcing space between us.
I snarl, advancing again, refusing to give up. “Why are you doing this?”
She ducks beneath my reach and slams into me from the side, the impact knocking us both off balance. I catch her mid-fall and turn it into momentum, lifting and forcing her against the wall harshly enough that it cracks. She hisses, but the sound turns into a growl as she fights her way free, never loosening her grip on her weapon.
The rope comes again.
I barely avoid it.
Every near touch is a threat—every brush a reminder of how quickly she can reduce me to something else, a killable and breakable human, what I once was. I crowd her deliberately, pinning her in, forcing her to react instead of plan.
She answers with fury.
The blade scores shallow across my side, just enough to burn. I slam her into another wall, trapping her between it and my body, one forearm braced beside her head.
“Answer me,” I demand, breath ragged now.
With a humorless and breathless sneer, she says, “Because I don’t believe as you do.”
Her knee drives up, catching me hard enough in the groin that I groan and buckle forward.
She takes a step back and glares down at me. “You think this is justice?” Her voice cracks with emotion. “You think ending lives at the whim of any being—even God—is righteous?”
I lunge, catching her around the waist and hauling her against me. I cage her arms down. She fights like she has nothing left to lose, the rope sliding dangerously close to my thigh.
“It’s enough,” she continues, breath burning between us. “What you’ve already done has set things in motion you can’t undo. You’ve left them desperate. Of course, they turn on one another. Of course, they steal and hoard. War will break out over the smallest thing because it’s what they know. They’re just trying to survive.”
She swings the rope.
My strength buckles.
She wraps it quickly around my neck as she pushes me back. The blade is pressed tip-first into my chest, and for one terrifying moment, I’m back there, and it’s Pollock, not her, and the memory of the pain is a shadow pain to her actions.
“This isn’t fair,” she says, quieter now but no less certain. “It’s cruel. The most unjust demand ever placed on the world.”
“Eridessa. Listen to?—”
“No. You listen. Because the way I see it, you either don’t serve the God you think you do,” she whispers, unafraid, “or the one you serve has lost His way.” She practically spits the words at me. My gut churns. Is this what she truly believes? After all the time we’ve spent together throughout the night and this morning—was this her plan all along?
“Humanity should come first,” she says. “The righteous must survive. And there are righteous among them. I’ve seen it. It’s not as you said.”
The room feels too small for what tears through me.
Not just rage.
Not just betrayal—because this one cuts differently.
