Chapter 23 Some Welcoming Party
Some welcoming party
ZARA
The air outside Varric’s Hollow is thick, clinging to my skin like the calm before a storm. The forest presses in close, each shadow twisting into something sharper, darker. Kade walks beside me, his movements quiet but tense, the silence between us heavier than the mist pooling in the underbrush.
We left the tavern behind hours ago, the warmth of its fire and walls traded for the cold bite of a dawn that promises nothing good.
Ahead, the warlock outpost looms. Varric’s Hollow isn’t what I expected.
Instead of ruins, it’s fortified—wood and stone rising in jagged lines, watchtowers cutting through the fog.
It’s bigger too.
Much bigger.
Less of a small outpost and more of a sprawling, disordered city contained within imposing walls.
“That’s new,” Kade mutters, his voice barely above a growl.
He stops, holding out an arm to halt me.
I follow his gaze. Warlocks patrol the perimeter, their armor gleaming with blood-red glyphs.
Varric’s Hollow isn’t just a temporary outpost or a garrison.
It’s an occupation of the world around it, a declaration that the warlocks living here aren’t going anywhere, anytime soon.
We linger in the shadows of the treeline, staring at the outpost and what lies ahead. I’m trying not to think about what happened yesterday. Or this morning.
Kade’s too close. He’s always too close.
I should feel anger, irritation, anything other than this ache I can’t seem to shake.
When he looks at me, there’s a weight to it—sharp, probing, like he’s trying to peel me apart piece by piece.
He hasn’t asked about the choice he offered me again, or the way my magic nearly burned me out in the fight two days ago, but I know he’s waiting. He’s always waiting.
And then there’s the way he fights. Efficient. Brutal. Terrifying. Yet, part of me had felt safe knowing he was next to me, and I hate myself for it.
The blood weave thrums faintly in my chest, as if sensing my thoughts. His presence irritates me like a grain of sand caught in the weave of a cloak, but it’s also grounding. Like he’s somehow becoming a part of me, and there’s only one reason that thought doesn’t terrify me most of all.
And that’s because what terrifies me most is that I like him.
I’m not starting to like him. I actually do.
Fuck, I’m screwed and I pray it’s the ebon chain pulling us together.
For all his darkness, all his hardness and inflexibility, he gives me something I need.
He’s exhilarating and he sets me free, and I need more.
I want to discover more about myself, what he can give me, and what we could be together.
But I don’t want this to be forced.
Fuck, I want a choice and I don’t know if I have one anymore. Between Kade himself and the goddamn mess we’re in, and the ebon chain pulling us together, the warlock feels inevitable.
“Zara,” Kade says, pulling me from my spiral. He nods toward the patrols.
The guards have spotted us.
Their movements are subtle—shifting into tighter formations, glances exchanged, the faint shimmer of magic passing between them. A warning.
“Reckon they’re expecting us?” I ask dryly, trying to ignore the way my pulse quickens.
Kade turns to me, his jaw tight. “If they weren’t, they are now.”
The blood weave hums louder, a reminder that no matter how much I hate it—hate him—we’re bound. I feel its pull like an itch under my skin, a tangled thread weaving us closer with every step. It makes my magic hum, unpredictable and dangerous.
“Do you feel that?” I whisper.
“Hard not to,” he says, his dark eyes scanning the treeline. “It’s been building since we left the tavern. Are you having second thoughts, kitten?”
I open my mouth to lie, to push back with some biting retort, but I don’t get the chance. The forest explodes around us.
Shadows tear loose from the trees, warlocks spilling out with deadly precision.
They move like a pack—coordinated and silent, their glyphs glowing as they draw their weapons.
We were hoping for a way to sneak in unnoticed or, if luck had been on our side, maybe even a diplomatic welcome.
The truth is, we didn’t have a plan for this.
This is a full-scale ambush and there’s no time to think, no time to breathe.
I barely have time to draw the blades Kade gave me before the first spell hits.
The world tilts. A crackling bolt of magic sears past my shoulder, too close. I lunge forward, driving my blade into the nearest warlock. The blood weave flares, the power flooding my veins as if responding to the violence. It’s too much, too fast, and it makes me stagger.
“Zara, focus!” Kade shouts, his voice sharp.
He’s a blur, moving faster than I can track, his magic a dark, crackling force that clashes with the warlocks’ attacks.
But it isn’t just his magic—it’s ours. Kade’s stunning and I can’t take my eyes off him, even though I can’t see him.
He’s stolen my breath and I gush, almost turning into a feeble, star-struck floozy as he unleashes a form of magic that’s as beautiful as it is terrifying.
The blood weave surges, pulling at me, forcing my power to align with his. I don’t have a choice. I don’t have control. I don’t know what the hell’s happening other than heat and warmth and chaos incarnate.
The magic inside me roars to life, wild and untamed.
Fire explodes from my hands, colliding with Kade’s shadowy energy.
It doesn’t cancel out—it fuses into a volatile, pulsing force that tears through the battlefield.
The fire twists and writhes, no longer just flame, but something darker, tinged with streaks of inky black.
The heat of it scorches the earth, leaving jagged scorch marks that crackle with Kade’s shadowy residue.
The ground beneath us groans, split apart by the violent convergence of power, while the air shimmers with oppressive heat and swirling darkness.
The warlocks hesitate, their ranks breaking as the first wave of our combined magic surges outward.
It moves like a living thing, tendrils of fire and shadow lashing out unpredictably.
A wall of flames consumes one of them entirely, while another is dragged backward into a snare of black energy, screaming as it coils tighter.
“What the hell are you doing?” I scream, my voice straining as I try to pull back, to separate myself from him.
“I’m not doing this!” Kade snarls, his eyes wild. “You think I want to share power with you?”
It’s terrifying and beautiful. It’s a storm we can’t control but are somehow feeding, amplifying with every breath, every heartbeat.
I feel the blood weave thrumming between us, a pulse that matches the rhythm of the chaos.
But there’s a pattern to it too, some sort of structure on which the carnage rests.
I don’t understand it and I can’t manipulate it, but in the madness there’s an order that impossibly makes the destruction more potent.
More lethal.
More pleasing.
Kade glances at me, his face hard but his eyes gleaming with something I can’t place. “You’re holding back,” he growls, the words sharp and cutting.
“I don’t feel like dying in a magical explosion,” I snap, though I can feel the heat building in my veins, demanding to be unleashed.
“You won’t die.” His voice is low, a command. “Not if you trust me.”
I want to tell him I don’t trust him, but the battlefield gives me no time for clever retorts.
A spear of crimson light hurtles toward me, and Kade’s shadows lash out, swallowing it before it can pierce my chest. The movement is instinctive, seamless, as though we’ve been fighting side by side for years.
But this is no partnership. This is survival.
Another blast hits, and we both stumble. The weave burns hot, pulling tighter, drawing us into sync whether we want it or not. I hate this—and I want to hate him for being a part of this—but I can’t fight it.
I snatch a breath and make a choice, unsure if it’s real or not, and commit to throwing everything I have at the assholes who dared to threaten us.
And I will burn down the entire city to keep us safe. To keep him safe. The Gods have abandoned me to this insanity, but I will destroy all of Varric’s Hollow and every last soul residing in it to keep Kade alive.
A warlock lunges at me, his blade aimed for my throat. I don’t think. The blood weave thinks for me. My body moves on its own, spinning to avoid the blow while Kade’s magic shoots out like a whip, knocking the attacker aside.
The force of it sends me to my knees. I gasp, clutching the ground as power courses through me. It isn’t just magic—it’s rage, fear, fire, shadow. It’s light and dark, chaos and order. It’s heaven and hell and everything that exists in between. It’s love and hate combined. It’s Kade. Me. Us.
“Zara!” His voice cuts through the chaos.
I look up to see him fighting off two warlocks at once, his movements brutal and efficient. Blood coats his blades, painting them the crimson of a well-trained killer, and his eyes glow with the same dark power that pulses through me.
The battlefield is chaos, but Kade is its unrelenting center. Every strike of his blade is calculated, deadly, and I can feel the echo of each movement as if it’s carved into my own skin. The blood weave pulls tighter, binding us in a way that defies logic and terrifies me.
I scramble to my feet, ignoring the burn of magic coursing through me. Another warlock charges, his hands glowing with a spell I don’t recognize. There’s no time to hesitate. My blades flash, cutting through his defense, and the spell fizzles out before it can reach me.
Kade is beside me now, the space between us collapsing as more warlocks surge forward. “Stay close,” he commands, his voice a growl.
“Not like I have a choice,” I snap, but my body obeys before my mind can rebel.
The weave surges again, and for a moment, the world blurs.
I see Kade through a haze of magic, his movements perfectly in sync with mine, his power augmenting my own.
It’s intoxicating and maddening all at once.
A thunderous crack splits the air, and the earth beneath us trembles.
The warlocks are regrouping, their leaders barking commands from the safety of the walls.
Spells light up the battlefield, a deadly tapestry of fire, lightning, and shadow.
“Kade, we should move!” I shout over the roar of magic.
His gaze locks onto mine, intense and unyielding. “We’re not done yet.”
He raises his hand and the surrounding shadows explode outward, consuming the advancing warlocks.
Their screams are swallowed by the darkness, and the weave burns hotter, pushing me to the brink.
I stagger, my vision swimming. The power is too much, it’s too wild, too uncontrollable, and it’s taking everything I have not to let it consume me entirely.
“Zara.” His voice is low, almost gentle, cutting through the storm inside me. “Focus. I’ve got you and you can do this.”
I want to tell him I don’t need him, that I can’t do this, but the words die on my tongue. He steps closer, his hand brushing mine, and the weave flares so brightly it’s blinding. Our magic collides again, but this time, it doesn’t feel like chaos. It feels like control.
We unleash a final wave of power, fire and shadow entwined in a devastating storm that crashes against the outpost’s walls.
The warlocks retreat, their formation breaking as the gate shudders under the force of our magic.
Stone and wood crumble to the ground, sending a plume of dust into the air as the tattered flags that remain flap uselessly in the breeze.
Silence remains and the battlefield is still, the weight of our destruction hanging heavy in the air. My chest heaves, my hands trembling from the surge of power we just unleashed. The scent of scorched earth and charred wood fills my lungs, mingling with the acrid tang of blood and ash.
The outpost’s defenses lie in ruins—its imposing walls fractured, its towers in disarray.
The surviving warlocks scatter into the shadows, their retreating figures swallowed by the smoke and fog.
Kade’s lips twitch in a ghost of a smirk, but the weariness in his expression dims any triumph.
He steps back, and the loss of his proximity feels colder than I’d like to admit.
“Some welcoming party,” I mutter, mostly to myself.
“Those cunts should have known better than to test me,” he hisses, scanning the wreckage.
“Perhaps they thought you were here to kill them?” I mumble, remembering that Kade’s arrival announces death and destruction on a monumental scale.
Kade chuckles darkly, the sound low and humorless.
“Well, they weren’t entirely wrong, were they?” His gaze flicks to me, sharp and unreadable. “But I don’t recall you caring about whether they lived or died either, kitten.”
His words hang in the air, sharp and cutting, as if daring me to deny it. I want to—Gods, I want to—but the truth digs too deep. I didn’t care. Not about the warlocks, not about the ruins we’ve left behind. My focus was survival, destruction, and my heavy silence says more than words ever could.
“Thought so,” he murmurs, his voice a low rasp that sends an unwanted shiver down my spine. “We’re not so different after all.”
I want to argue. I want to tell him he’s wrong, that we’re nothing alike. But the turmoil in his eyes mirrors something in me I’m not ready to face, so I do the only thing I can and bite my lip nervously.
“Well,” he says, “now we’ve messed up our welcoming party, let’s skip any more formalities and find Malric. Let’s see if he’s as eager to meet us as the rest of Varric’s Hollow appears to be.”