Chapter 39 #3
I watched in terror as their deadly dance continued.
Casimir was weak—Zhara’s lithe attacks forced him onto the defensive.
He couldn’t win on strength alone. But after a few minutes, his strategy became clear.
Casimir would wait until Zhara either ran out of knives or exhausted herself before going in for the kill.
He sidestepped her attacks in the clearing as their battle continued on, silent except for the occasional grunt and the rustle of dead leaves beneath their feet.
When he dodged her a fifth time, Zhara growled in frustration, finally wise to the game he was playing.
Her face began to mutate, melting as if made of wax as she morphed back into her original body, all toned muscle and cascading darkness.
Her eyes were as black as coals as they bored into Casimir.
“After I’ve finished gutting you,” she purred, her tone seductive and cruel, “I’ll see to the girl. But I won’t make it quick. I’ll take my sweet time with her.”
Her gaze flickered to where I stood a few yards away. Casimir did not turn, but I saw his spine stiffen at her words.
“Maybe I’ll sever her head as a gift for Evren,” she taunted. She gave a false little gasp. “Oh! I have a better idea. Perhaps I’ll let her join your dear sister in Carcerus for a few decades—I hear Isolde is lonely these days…”
Casimir unleashed a low, guttural growl deep in his throat, but his eyes never left Zhara’s face.
Zhara paused, balancing on the balls of her graceful feet like a ballerina. “Or perhaps I should kill her now?” She flashed a sneer in my direction. “After all, anticipation can be so overrated—”
Before she could utter the rest of the sentence, Casimir was on her like lightning, striking with astonishing speed and alacrity. Before she could react, Casimir’s knife had punctured Zhara’s arm, and she screamed, staggering back and clutching at her bleeding wound.
Casimir was breathing heavily. He still held the Umbra Noctis, dripping with Zhara’s blood.
His lips curved into a poisonous smile as he glared at Zhara.
“You’ll be interested to know that dagger’s laced with Hydra Datura.
” The Morpher’s eyes went wide with fear as he continued, “Evren inadvertently infused it with Hydra Datura venom when he cut me. It’s really too bad I’ve already taken the last of the anti-venom.
” He laughed. “But I owe you for what you did to Arden at the Yu-Ri Manor. I hope you rot slowly, Zhara.”
Zhara screamed in fury, lunging at Casimir, but he was ready for her.
He redirected her attack with a well-placed kick to the knee, and on her way down, his fist collided with her jaw.
Zhara recovered quickly and retaliated with a vicious kick to Casimir’s ankle, forcing him to the ground.
In the chaos, Casimir dropped his knife.
My heart stuttered painfully against my ribs as I watched them grapple, debating whether I should go over to grab the dagger, but fearing I would only put Casimir in more danger if I intervened.
After a few minutes of struggling, and with a cry of triumph, Zhara managed to force Casimir onto his back, her knees straddling him on either side of his hips, her boneblade held aloft.
Without thinking, I moved, preparing to grab the Umbra Noctis and drive it into Zhara’s back, but before I could reach her, Casimir spat a mouthful of blood into the Morpher’s face.
Zhara cried out in disgust and fury, wiping at her eyes.
From this angle, I had a full view of Casimir’s face as he bared his bloodstained teeth in a savage grin.
“Traitorous, filthy bastard!” she screamed.
Before she could drive the boneblade into Casimir’s eye, he bucked his hips upward, throwing her off-balance.
As Zhara fought to remain in control, Casimir seized the gloved wrist that held the serrated dagger, and for a moment, the pair of them struggled, both weakened by the venom, each trying to push the tip of the boneblade toward the other.
With a sudden movement, Casimir twisted the hand holding Zhara’s wrist and struck out, grasping her throat.
At first, I thought he meant to choke her, but then her eyes suddenly went blank, and she moaned, lashing out blindly.
And then I understood: Casimir had glamoured her so we’d have time to escape. The boneblade fell to the forest floor.
“I should kill her for what she did. For what she tried to do to you,” he growled, panting with exhaustion as he got to his feet to glare down at his opponent.
“Casimir, we have to go,” I said desperately.
He tore his gaze from Zhara’s face and found mine, his eyes blazing out from behind his tangled black curls, his lip curled in a feral expression.
But as he opened his mouth to speak, Zhara snarled and flung something in his direction.
A small, star-shaped knife with cruel, curving edges struck Casimir in the ribs, making him grunt in pain.
I rushed over, lifting his shirt to assess the damage, and found blood leaking from the entry point.
“Do you want me to pull it out?”
He nodded. Willing my hand not to tremble, I gently tugged at the knife, eliciting a sharp hiss from Casimir. I gasped when I saw the fang-like holes the weapon had made in his flesh. “Are you alright?”
“Fine,” he growled. After swiftly recovering both the obsidian dagger and Zhara’s boneblade, he then glanced around, as if expecting another assailant to emerge from the darkness.
In the stark aftermath of so much violence, August’s death struck me anew. I had failed him. I had let so many people down.
Gently, Casimir tugged at my elbow. “Come on, Farrow.”
We were silent on the way back to Casimir’s loft, both too exhausted and drained to bother with the effort of speech.
I hardly cared when it began to rain. The blood ritual was over, and we had survived, though not unscathed by any stretch.
I tried not to think about August and Neha’s blood, dripping over the dais; about the burning pain in my forearm, about the new rune that marked my promise to the Order.
We were a few yards away when my body finally gave out.
“We can’t just leave them there,” I sobbed into the darkness. And Gwen—where was she? If not for Casimir holding me up, I would have crumpled onto the ground.
“We have to go, Arden,” he said urgently, ignoring my protests.
I would not remember how we made it back. My thoughts in the moments before exhaustion dragged me into unconsciousness were consumed by blood and destruction, and the sickening realization that even though we’d stopped the blood ritual, it had been at the cost of two of our friends’ lives.