Page 65 of The Scars of War
He doesn’t blink. “I know what’s waiting on the other side.”
“Then tell me.”
His expression doesn’t change. “No.”
Rage claws up my spine. “Why not?”
“Because you’ll go to it.”
The words hit harder than a scream. “I wouldn’t…”
“You already are,” he says, and there’s no heat in it. Just the kind of sorrow that cuts deeper because it’s true.
I step back, and he doesn’t follow. “I thought you wanted to help me.”
“I did.”
“Then what changed?”
He looks at me like he’s measuring a wound that hasn’t bled yet. “You did.” Silence stretches between us like a wire pulled too tight. He breaks it with a whisper. “They think they’ve claimed you. Riven. Elias. Niko. Even I did, for a time.” I freeze as he takes a step forward. “But you weren’t made to belong to anyone.”
“I’m not theirs,” I snap. “I’m mine.”
Vale nods slowly. “Then act like it.”
My breath catches. “What the fuck do you think I’m doing?”
He looks at me, really looks, and I feel it. The weight of every choice I didn’t know I was making. The way his gaze lands on me like a flame to dry leaves. It’s sudden, consuming, and impossible to ignore. “I think,” he says, voice barely a breath, “you’re still deciding which side you’re on.”
And with that, he turns and walks away. No threat. No blood. Not even a final word. Just the soft echo of his footsteps disappearing into the dark. And I stand there, staring at the mirror that doesn’t reflect me anymore. Knowing that whatever happens next, it won’t come quietly.
23
Her Last Breath
It’s as if the house knows what comes next as it creaks differently. Breathes differently. The walls seem to lean closer, as if they want to watch.
The hallway outside my door is colder than it should be. The sconces flicker with low amber light, too weak to chase the shadows gathering at the edges. I don’t bother wrapping myself in armor. There’s nothing left to protect, because something inside me already surrendered. And something else…opened.
I should go to Riven; he’d stop me. Maybe. Or maybe he’d follow, blade in hand, heart bleeding. That’s not how this ends, not for me. Not for him.
The corridor stretches longer than it should, twisting in on itself, walls shifting like bones beneath bruised skin. This mansion has always been a living thing, but tonight, it feels like it’s either dying or mourning, and every step I take feels like a eulogy written in advance.
The door is already ajar when I reach it. The war gallery. I push the door wide and step inside.
Riven’s trophies glint in the low light, swords dulled by blood, guns retired by time, a tattered war banner that still smells like ash. Helmets lined with claw marks. Medals never accepted. Armor scorched black where bodies once burned inside. Every piece of violence he’s carried, every conquest he’s made, it’s all here.
I cross to the far end. Past the glass case with the broken blade. Past the spiked collar he once wore into battle, back when death was still something he fought toward instead of away from.
And there, in the center, a new space has been cleared. Nothing behind glass. No plaque or pedestal, just a single obsidian dagger resting on dark velvet.
The Blade of Ending.
I reach for it, and the moment my fingers grasp the hilt, the air shifts to create pressure. Like a promise being made in blood.
The blade is light. Too light. The weight of it lives somewhere else, in the part of me that still remembers my scream. My bloodline. The vault.
The banshee inside me doesn’t flinch. She knows this is how it ends. Not with war, not with rot, not even with plague, but with silence.
