Page 84 of House of Serpents and Slaves

"What in Hades do you think you're doing?" Her voice trembled with barely contained fury, but underneath it, I heard something that gutted me - fear. Not fear of me, this time, but for me. I didn't deserve even that much from her.

I kept my eyes on the sand, on the dark stains where my fellow gladiators had fallen. My silence only fueled her anger.

"Look at me, damn you!" She grabbed my chin, forced my face up. The touch burned like fire. Once, such contact would have been natural between us. Now it felt like sacrilege. "You're trying to get yourself killed. Why?"

I couldn't meet her eyes. "Fighting," I said flatly, watching another body being dragged past. Young Fanius, barely nineteen storms. He'd been so proud when he'd first managed to disarm me in practice.

"Fighting?" She moved into my line of sight, forcing me to look at her. "You call that fighting? I call it trying to get yourself killed!"

Looking into her eyes was agony. I saw anger there, yes, but also confusion, hurt, and something else - something that made me hate myself even more. Concern. Even after what I'd done, some part of her still cared whether I lived or died.

"I'm distracting you," I managed, my voice rough. "You need to focus on the fight, not-"

"Don't you dare!" She cut me off. "Don't pretend this is about protecting me. I saw you out there. You were reckless and stupid and you didn't care if you lived or died."

I said nothing. What could I say? She wasn't wrong.

"Look at me!" she demanded, and against my will, I did. Her eyes burned with something beyond anger - pain, betrayal, fear?I didn't deserve to know what she was feeling. Didn't deserve to care.

"Why?" she asked, and that single word contained volumes. Why was I throwing my life away? Why wasn't I fighting properly? Why had I changed from the man she'd once trusted?

"You know why." My voice came out rougher than I intended.

"No," she snapped, "I don't. I don't understand any of this. The Septimus I knew-"

"The Septimus you knew was a lie," I cut her off. "A facade. This is what I really am - an oathbreaker. A monster who-" I couldn't finish. Couldn't say the words.

"So that's it? You're just going to let them kill you? Take the coward's way out?"

Each word was a knife, but I welcomed the pain. "It's what I deserve."

"Deserve?" She laughed, a harsh, broken sound that hurt worse than any blade. "You think you deserve peace? Death? After what you did?"

I flinched. Of course she was right. I didn't even deserve this much of her attention.

"I broke my vow," I whispered, the words tasting like ash, as I watched another dead fighter being dragged past. "I swore to protect you, and instead-"

"What vow?" Her voice changed, confusion breaking through the anger. "What are you talking about?"

The words came out before I could stop them. "To Tarsus. Before he died. He made me swear to protect you, to keep you safe. And I failed. I became the very thing he wanted to protect you from."

The silence that followed was deafening. I could hear my own heartbeat, the distant roar of the crowd, the scrape of bodies being dragged through sand. When I finally looked at her, the expression on her face stopped my breath.

"Tarsus?" she whispered. "My brother made you swear?"

I nodded, unable to speak.

"All this time..." her voice shook. "Everything you did - training me, watching over me, protecting me - it was because of a vow to my dying brother?"

"Livia-" I started, but she cut me off.

"Was any of it real?" The pain in her voice was unbearable. "Did you ever actually care? Or was I just an obligation? A promise to keep?"

"No!" The word burst from me. "It wasn't like that-"

"Then what was it like?" Her eyes searched mine, desperate for something I didn't know how to give. "Tell me, Septimus. Tell me it wasn't all just duty and honor and promises to the dead."

I opened my mouth, but no words came. How could I explain that the vow had just been the beginning? That somewhere along the way, protecting her had become as natural as breathing? That watching her grow stronger, seeing her smile, hearing her laugh - those moments had become the only light in my dark world?

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