Page 83 of Morfran, Dark Lord Reformed

Slowly, like she was an animal in the brush he didn’t wish to spook off, he said gently, “Bronwen—”

She took a step back.

“Let me explain it from the beginning.”

“Tell me he told you that,” she whispered, edging away. “Tell me he told you, and that’s how you know. Please, Bernard. Please—”

But he saw in her eyes that even if he lied, she wouldn’t believe him.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said.

Her fright was quickly verging into panic. “Liar.” She swung her dagger. He grabbed her wrist and pushed it away with ease, but she’d brought the torch up to swipe at his face. He ducked, batting her torch-wielding arm so hard he knocked it from her grasp. It hit the ground, shadows rippling as the flame flickered from the fall. She wasn’t done. The dagger was flying at his throat again, and with each swing he just swerved back, avoiding each slash with such ease he could tell it only inflamed her fright.

“Who are you?” she snapped, her voice trembling. “Tell me who you are. Tell me you aren’t— You aren’t—”

He grabbed both of her wrists and pushed her against the wall, firmly but not ungently, to pin her back. She was crying; his thoughts were fluttering in every chaotic direction, striking at him with the beat of his heart: betrayer, liar, coward.

“Who are you?” she lashed out.

“I’m me,” he said through gritted teeth. “You know me. I’m that stupid man you caught in your net, the same person you had to chase down and force back into the rebellion half a dozen times—”

“The sword,” she murmured in horror. “You had his sword. And there were all the rumors and—and Gueldefore fought you, he said you weren’t who you said you were and—”

“Bronwen.”

“It was you,” she seethed through her tears, struggling to throw him off. Her knee popped up, but he knew her by now, knew she’d try as she had once before. He just blocked it. “Admit it. Say it! It was you this entire time. You joked with us and fought with us and bled with us. You were one of us!”

“I didn’t want to be!” he snapped. “I wanted to leave the kingdom! It was you who dragged me back every time!”

At this admittance she only grew more frightened. “All your knowledge about the cities, the codes, the generals, your strategies that worked every time—” She kicked out again in bitter frustration, more to lash out than to harm him. “You tricked us!”

“Yes,” he spat. “I tricked you into taking back your lands and fighting against my men.”

She sucked in a trembling breath, staring at him as tears dripped down her face. She was terrified of him, he knew, and it gutted him, but there was also a venomous edge in her eyes that was growing rapidly and made him wary. “You killed him.”

At this he paused. He was looking in the scornful eyes of a woman he was beginning to love whose true love he’d murdered, and in that moment he didn’t think anything else could hurt as much as that. Finally, he responded with a quiet, flat tone. “Yes. I killed him.”

She shoved him back. He let her. His shoulder blades pressed against the opposing wall as she placed her dagger against his throat, drawing so close it was practically an embrace. The torchlight exposed the fierce look on her face; it was a cold, severe glare, her teeth bared.

“Do you even remember what his name was?”

He couldn’t stop the humorless, bitter smile from touching his lips. “I’ve killed hundreds of people, Bronwen. That’s a lot of names to remember.”

She pushed the dagger against his skin. The sharp, cold edge cut ever so slightly into his skin.

“It was Arthur,” she whispered.

He swallowed. Doing so caused her dagger to cut more into his skin. “He was very brave.”

That was when he saw it—the dark look in her gaze. She pressed even closer to him until they were chest to chest, and he recalled that this was the Red Rogue, a woman bent on revenge, a woman who’d hunted and killed wicked men not because she wanted to but because she had to.

Yet here she wanted to kill him. He didn’t need to see the look in her eye to know.

“I hated you,” she whispered, and the look faded somewhat to reveal a hint of insurmountable pain. “And I hate you now more than I ever did before. You deserve death.” The dagger pressed deeper.

He released a breath, grimacing. “You want me dead? That’s fine.” He couldn’t help it, taking in her face one last time, studying the fierce and gentle beauty of it. His voice softened as he said, “You can make my death as short or as long as you wish. I’m yours any way you’ll have me.”

Something flashed in her eyes, but it was too quick to see. Then she pushed the dagger’s edge farther up against his throat, readying to drive it in and swipe his neck. He didn’t close his eyes; he kept them on her the entire time.