“I’ve been here for centuries. Longer. I’ve consumed wardens who thought themselves stronger than you, hunters who thought themselves faster, armies who thought themselves numerous enough to overwhelm.” Tharos’s head tilts, that wrong expression studying me. “What makes you think you’re different?”
“I don’t think I’m different.” I circle slowly, looking for an opening I know won’t come. “I think I’m stubborn. And sometimes, stupid determination is worth more than all the strength in the world.”
The King attacks again. I meet it with everything I have left.
Steel rings against root. Blades flash and bite, drawing lines of dark blood that heal as quickly as they open. I’m taking damage too—a gash across my ribs that burns with every breath, a vine-burn on my arm that’s started to blister, bruises blooming across my body from impacts I barely remember. The pain is a distant thing, pushed aside by the desperate focus of survival.
I watch Tharos’s face as we fight. Look for the flickers I saw before—the moments of hesitation, the brief struggles for control. They’re still there. Brief. Getting briefer. But they’re there.
“Tharos.” I say his name between strikes, between desperate dodges. “I know you can hear me. You’re still fighting. I can see it.”
“He’s not fighting.” The King’s voice carries an edge now. Annoyance. “He’s drowning. Losing himself in the current of my will.”
“Then why do you sound worried?”
The next strike comes faster. Harder. I barely block it, feel the impact rattle through my skeleton, taste copper on my tongue. But I also see Tharos’s hand tremble. See his arm pull back a fraction before the blow lands, reducing the force just enough that I’m still standing.
He’s protecting me. Even possessed, even drowning in the King’s control, some part of him is still trying to protect me.
And then the King changes tactics.
Something shifts in the possessed body’s expression—not hunger, not triumph. Grief. A grief that doesn’t belong to the thing wearing his face. Red hair. A woman with green eyes. The shape of a memory I’ve never seen but recognize from what he’s told me.
Seren.
The King is using her now. Reaching into the history he just shared and pulling out the oldest wound.
“Fight it.” I press forward now, not attacking but advancing, forcing him to retreat or strike me down. “Don’t let it have her.”
“Stop.” The King’s voice wavers. “You can’t?—”
“You broke through before. In the ravine, when the King tried to use you against me. You tore yourself free because I was worth fighting for.” I’m near him now. Too near for my blades to be useful. Near enough to see the war happening behind his eyes—hunger and humanity battling for supremacy. “I’m still worth fighting for. I’m still here. Fight your way back to me.”
“Save your strength. The King could try again?—”
“Not yet. Not for a while.” He catches my hand, presses it harder against his face. The gesture is desperate, almost helpless. “The possession takes a toll. On both of us. It will need to recover before it can push that hard again.”
“How long?”
“Hours. Maybe longer.” His thumb traces patterns on my palm, and I have to fight not to shiver. “Long enough.”
“Long enough for what?”
He doesn’t answer. Just looks at me with those fierce eyes, his expression stripped of everything except exhaustion and naked want.
“You should have run.”
“I told you. Running isn’t my style.” My free hand grips his shoulder, feels the tension in muscles that are still trembling. “I also told you I’m not leaving until you come back. And here you are.”
He makes a sound that might be a laugh. Might be a sob. Hard to tell with someone who’s spent years forgetting how to do either.
“You’re impossible.”
“I’ve been called worse.”
“Why?”
The question hangs between us. I think about everything that’s happened since I entered Briargrave. The battles. The conversations. The moments of unexpected intimacy. The way he looks at me like I’m worth protecting.
