Page 97 of Bride of Ash & Dust

Great. I close my eyes and force myself to breathe.

“You could always go back to the castle of Marion,” I whisper. “Back to Father.”

My hand drops to my waist, then my pockets. My right hand brushes the cold metal tube that once hung around my husband’s neck, and my left pushes through the hole I cut in that pocket, in what already feels like another life.

And then I feel the dagger. I wrap my fingers around the hilt of the blade Zarek gave me. And then, for the first time, I tug it free of its sheath.

I clench my jaw as I imagine what Zarek’s friend Petrys would say about how long it took me to free my weapon. Probably something about how much time I’ve just generously given my opponent to kill me.

But I’m not in a fight. And my opponent doesn’t even know I’m here.

All I need to do is hide.

My heart is still racing, but the cool weight of the dagger in my hand gives me a strange sense of calm. With my head held high, I walk back into the moonlight, take the only remaining torch, and enter the kingdom of Marion’s newest gold mine.

Chapter 53

Zarek

BEST IF HE KILLS ME

That elven asshole could have unlocked me.

I grit my teeth against the bite of pain in my wrists as I tug at the manacles pinning me to this stupid chair. Weirdly, that’s the only part of my body that hurts. I don’t know if I’m in shock after whatever just happened to me, if I was knocked unconscious long enough for my body to heal, or if there’s something stranger at work here.

Given my night so far, I think it’s safe to assume it’s something stranger.

“Fuck,” I grunt.

The chair isn’t moving, no matter how frantically I throw my weight against it. Panting, I let my head collapse on my chest and glare at the motionless corpse of Fyrris. The key to these manacles is somewhere in those blood-stained robes.

It’s just a matter of getting there. Preferably before the remaining torches burn out.

I sigh, then grit my teeth against the burn of the manacles. I managed to attack Syvan from a chair, damn it. I can do this. I press my feet against the floor, ready to rock forward.

If only that arrogant piece of shit had unlocked me. Of course, what did I expect from the elves? The stories describe them as twisted creatures who use their magic for trickery, violence, and war.

Still. After I shared everything I could about King Malrik and the inner machinations of Vsenrog, I thought the strange, tall elf would at least set me free.

Nope. Lord Varitan Fenfyr, if that’s actually his name, just nodded at me, like I’d given him the time of day or directions to the river, and then he took the torch from behind me, turned, and walked away.

“Hey!” I called. “How about letting me go?”

Varitan stopped, looked over his shoulder, and smiled. In the shifting light from the torch, he didn’t look anything like a human man.

Then he left. I opened my mouth to scream after him, but I was too damn stunned to think of anything sufficiently insulting. By the time I yelled that he was a waste of blood and bones, not worth the sunshine it took to grow the food to sustain his worthless body, he was probably well out of earshot.

That didn’t stop me from continuing to insult him.

“Eat shit,” I mutter under my breath as I glare at the darkness that swallowed Varitan. “Your pecker’s as useless as tits on a billy goat.”

I strain against the stone floor, pushing my muscles until they scream. The chair finally moves, then settles. I am now one hair’s breadth closer to Fyrris’s dead body. I pant as sweat stings my eyes.

“If I had to choose between saving your life or eating horse shit,” I mutter at the long-gone elf as I rock the chair forward again. “Horse shit that’s on fire⁠—”

Something echoes down the passageway. I shut up. The sound comes again, the steady drum of boots on stone. I hold my breath, listening. Just one set of boots, I think. Moving quickly, like they know where they’re going.

Maybe Varitan had a change of heart?