Chapter Twelve The Vow in the Dark #3
Elara’s hand found Morna’s in the dark, squeezing so hard it hurt.
Morna did the only thing she could do. She took a breath as quietly as she could and pressed her mouth to Caelan’s ear.
“Do not,” she whispered. “Not yet.”
Caelan’s breathing shuddered. He was shaking, not with fear, but with the strain of holding back.
Valerius’s voice drifted down again. “You have cost me time. You have cost me reputation. And you have cost me one of my best sources of information.”
Morna realized then what he meant. Fergus. Caelan’s accusation had not only punished a man, it had also removed someone Valerius might have broken for intelligence.
Valerius continued, as if speaking to the cart itself. “When I find you, I will not kill you quickly. I will not kill you at all, if I can help it. I will make you useful.”
The words sank into Morna like cold water.
Then a shout rose from the storehouse yard. “The roof is going.”
A crash followed, loud and brutal. Men screamed. Horses reared.
Valerius’s attention snapped away. The cart jolted as the driver yanked the reins.
Valerius cursed, sharp for the first time, and jumped down from the cart bed.
“Move,” he barked at the driver. “Get water to that corner. Now.”
The cart lurched forward again, rolling toward the gate.
Morna’s lungs burned with relief and terror. She kept her breath shallow as the cart passed between guards.
Someone slapped the barrel. “Go.”
The cart rolled out of Blackwood.
Cold air hit Morna’s face through the straw, sharp and clean compared to smoke. The sound of the camp dulled behind them, muffled by distance and the cart’s creaking wheels.
They kept still for long moments, not daring to move until the cart had traveled far enough that the gate’s shouts faded.
At last, Caelan shifted, lifting the straw slightly. Moonlight spilled in, pale and thin.
Morna blinked, eyes stinging. She pushed herself up slowly, careful not to knock the barrels.
Ewan emerged next, face streaked with soot and straw. Elara followed, coughing softly into her sleeve. Ivor climbed out last, hair full of straw, looking offended by the entire world.
“You realize,” Ivor whispered, “that I will never forgive you for the itching.”
Caelan ignored him. He looked back toward the camp, eyes hard, listening for horns.
Morna climbed down from the cart when it slowed on a rough patch, then pulled Elara down. Ewan dropped lightly. Ivor nearly stumbled, then caught himself.
Caelan jumped last. He grabbed the rope still tied around the barrels and yanked it free, then tossed it into the brush. He moved with the efficient ruthlessness of a man cutting threads.
“Go,” he said.
They left the cart and moved into the trees, away from the road that would lead back to Blackwood.
Morna’s legs shook with exhaustion. Her wet clothes had begun to stiffen. Every step hurt. But when she glanced back and saw only darkness where the camp lay, she felt something loosen inside her chest.
They were out.
Not safe. Not yet. But out of the prison camp, out of Valerius’s walls, out of the worst place Morna had ever known.
Elara stumbled, catching herself on a tree trunk. Morna rushed to her side. “Breathe,” she murmured. “Slow.”
Elara nodded, lips pressed tight. Her eyes were bright with unshed tears she refused to spill.
Ewan watched the ridge behind them, knife still in his hand. “He will follow,” he whispered.
Caelan nodded. “Aye.”
Morna looked at Caelan, at the blood drying on his forearm, at the soot on his face. “You were ready,” she said quietly.
He did not pretend to misunderstand. “Ready to die.”
“Yes.”
Caelan’s throat worked. “I thought it was the only thing left I could give you.”
Morna stepped closer, her voice low. “You already gave too much.”
His eyes flicked to hers. “And you still took my hand.”
Morna swallowed. The memory of her own horror was still raw. But so was the memory of his eyes when she refused to leave him.
“I did,” she said. “Because I finally understood what you did not want me to understand. You were not becoming a monster. You were becoming a man who would do anything to keep others alive. That is a terrible thing, Caelan. It is not clean. It is not easy. But it is not nothing.”
Caelan’s face tightened, as if the words hurt. “It does not make it right.”
“No,” Morna said. “But it makes it human.”
A silence settled between them, heavier than exhaustion.
Ivor cleared his throat. “If the lovers are finished, I would like to remind you that we are still in enemy land.”
Caelan’s gaze snapped to him. “Move,” he said.
They moved, heading into thicker woods, away from the road, away from the camp. Behind them, the glow of fire still smeared the sky.
Morna walked beside Caelan, close enough that her shoulder brushed his arm when the path narrowed. She did not take his hand again. Not yet. But she stayed near, letting him feel her presence as a tether.
The night pressed in. Somewhere behind, a horn sounded again, faint but unmistakable.
The hunt had not ended.
But Morna had chosen, and Caelan had heard her.
Whatever lay ahead, they would face it together.