Chapter 3
THREE
RHEA
The grinding starts slow—stone against stone, deep in the abbey’s bones.
I look up from Brother Aldric’s journal, candlelight flickering across the torn pages scattered around me. The crypt doors remain sealed, trapping us in this circular chamber with its broken sarcophagus and binding runes. But something’s changing. The walls themselves seem to breathe.
The abbey is waking.
A doorway yawns where solid stone stood moments before. Black as pitch, breathing cold air that tastes of graves. My candle flame gutters, nearly dying.
Footsteps echo from the deeper catacombs—heavy, deliberate. Krath emerges from the shadows, his massive frame filling an archway. Ash swirls around him, and his ember eyes sweep the chamber before fixing on me.
"The walls hunger tonight." His voice carries undertones I can’t identify. Warning, yes. But something else. "Stay close."
"Close to what?" I gesture at the new passage. "That wasn’t there five minutes ago."
"I know." He steps into the chamber, and I catch the scent of smoke and heated metal that clings to his skin. "The abbey serves him now. It will try to separate us."
Him. The Marshal.
I gather the scattered pages, stuffing them back into the journal. "Brother Aldric wrote about this. About corridors that shift, shadows with wings—"
"Read it aloud."
His tone brooks no argument. I flip through the pages, finding the passage.
"’Beware the Pale Marshal. We are hunted in our own halls.
The corridors shift to his will. He feeds on separation, picks off the isolated.
Brother Marcus was alone for mere minutes before—‘" The words cut off in brown stains.
Krath goes very still. "Separation."
The chamber shudders. Cracks spider across the ceiling, and chunks of stone rain down. But it’s not random destruction—the walls are flowing, reshaping themselves into new configurations. Another passage opens to my left with a sound of grinding bone.
Whispers drift from both new doorways, multiple voices calling my name with false sweetness.
Come alone, little witch. Come and learn our secrets...
"It wants to divide us." Krath circles me slowly, predatory. "Lead us into mazes with no exit. Hunt us one at a time."
"So we stay together." The words come out steadier than I feel. "Simple enough."
"Is it?" He stops directly in front of me, close enough that I have to tilt my head back to meet his gaze. "You wandered into a cursed abbey alone. Bled on a tomb you knew nothing about. Tell me again how good you are at following simple plans."
Heat flares in my cheeks. "I woke a cursed warlord. That takes skill, not stupidity."
"Skill?" His lips curve in what might be a smile. "You cut yourself on sharp stone. Any fool could do the same."
"Any fool could, yes." I take a step toward him, close enough to feel the heat radiating from his scarred skin. "But any fool wouldn’t have had the power to wake you. The knowledge to speak the words that broke your binding." I lift my chin. "I’m more dangerous than you realize."
Something flickers in his ember eyes. Surprise, maybe. His nostrils flare slightly, and I catch him breathing deeper.
He’s scenting me.
The thought sends warmth spiraling through my chest, unwelcome and undeniable.
"Dangerous." He tastes the word. "Perhaps. But dangerous does not mean invulnerable."
The whispers from the new passages grow louder, more insistent. But there’s frustration underneath the false sweetness now.
She will not come alone. The orc guards her too well...
"You hear them too," I say.
"Aye." His jaw clenches. "The monks. What remains of them. He’s been busy while we slept."
A new sound echoes through the chamber—wet, sliding. The walls themselves begin to move, stone flowing into impossible shapes. The passages stretch longer, branching into corridors that shouldn’t exist.
"The abbey lives," I whisper.
"The abbey serves." Krath’s hand drops to his sword hilt. "And it’s hungry."
That’s when the first bone-wight emerges from the original passage—skeletal, wrapped in burial cloth, green fire burning in its empty sockets. Then another. The whispers turn to hissing as more of the creatures shamble into view.
"Stay behind me," Krath growls, but even as he draws his blade, I feel the invisible tether between us pull taut. Whatever magic binds us won’t let me retreat while he advances.
The first wight lunges with claws extended. Krath’s sword sweeps in a horizontal arc, ember-light flaring along the edge. Bone and sinew part, and the creature’s skull goes spinning across the chamber.
But more are coming. Too many.
I try to back away from the advancing horde, but my feet won’t obey. Every step Krath takes toward danger drags me with him, as if we’re tethered by invisible chains.
"I can’t—" I stumble forward as he engages another wight. "The binding won’t let me—"
"Fuck." Krath spins, catching my arm before I fall into reach of gnashing teeth. "I should have realized—"
A bone-wight lunges from his blind side. No time to block, no time to dodge. Claws rake across his forearm, tearing through armor and flesh.
Pain sears up my arm—white-hot, immediate. I cry out, clutching at a wound that isn’t there, feeling his blood flow from invisible cuts in my skin.
His pain is my pain.
"Now you understand," he snarls, blood dripping from his torn arm onto the stone. "We share everything. Pain. Wounds. Death."
The reality crashes over me. Not just philosophical binding, but physical. Visceral. Every injury he takes, I feel. Every risk he faces becomes mine.
"You should have warned me."
"Would it have changed anything?" He cleaves another wight in half, ash and bone fragments spraying across the floor. "Would you have walked away?"
No.
The honest answer sits heavy in my chest. Even knowing the cost, even understanding the price, I would have made the same choice. The knowledge called to me too strongly. The power was too tempting.
Another wight circles toward my unprotected side. Krath starts to turn, but there are too many directions to guard.
I pull chalk from my satchel, scrawling a sigil in the air with shaking fingers. "Ignis mortuum!"
Blue-white fire erupts from my palm, engulfing the creature and reducing it to drifting ash. The magic feels clean against the necromantic filth, burning away rot and darkness.
Krath spins toward me, shock clear in his ember eyes. "You—"
"Hid my strength?" I manage another sigil, catching a second wight in flames. "The coven teaches defense first. I just never mentioned how good I got at it."
Something passes across his expression—surprise melting into what might be respect. Or admiration. The look sends unwelcome warmth through my chest.
We fall into rhythm without speaking. He clears paths with brutal efficiency while I pick off stragglers with precise bursts of fire. We don’t harmonize—his raw power and my careful magic are too different. But we don’t interfere with each other either.
For the first time since entering this place, I’m not fighting alone.
The last wight crumbles to ash, and silence settles over the chamber. Krath’s breathing is heavy, his torn arm still bleeding. I feel the phantom ache in my own flesh—not painful now, but a constant reminder of our binding.
"You fight well," he says finally.
"You sound surprised."
"I am." He steps closer, and I’m trapped between him and the wall where I’ve backed up. "Most witches I’ve known preferred books to blades."
Most witches. How many has he known?
The question sits on my tongue, but before I can ask, his expression grows grim.
"This was just the beginning," he continues. "A test. He wanted to see how we work together."
"The Marshal?"
"Aye." Krath’s gaze flicks to the new passages, then back to me. "And now he knows."
"Knows what?"
Instead of answering, he reaches out and catches my wrist—the one bearing his mark. His thumb traces the branded spiral, and heat flares between us.
"That you’re stronger than you look." His voice drops to a rough whisper. "That you don’t break easily." His thumb still rests against my pulse, and I know he can feel how my heart hammers against my ribs. "That makes you dangerous to him."
"Why?"
"Because the last witch I knew was strong too." His grip tightens slightly on my wrist. "And he killed her for it."
The words hang heavy between us. Another witch. Another woman who stood beside him, fought beside him. Who died because of it.
What happened to her?
But I don’t ask. The pain in his eyes is answer enough.
"He won’t kill me," I say instead.
"Won’t he?" Krath steps closer, close enough that his breath stirs the hair at my temple. "You think your magic makes you safe? Your books and clever words?"
"No." I meet his burning gaze without flinching. "I think our binding makes me valuable. If I die, you die. He wants you alive—for whatever sick game he’s playing."
"And when the game ends?"
The question hangs in the air between us. When the bell tolls. When one of us must bleed for both. When the Marshal decides he’s had enough of whatever twisted entertainment we provide.
"Then we make sure we’re the ones who choose how it ends."
Something flickers in his eyes—surprise again, or approval. His thumb still traces the mark on my wrist, sending warmth up my arm with each touch.
"You have steel in you, little witch."
"More than you know."
The moment stretches between us, charged with tension I don’t fully understand. His massive frame towers over me, all scarred muscle and barely leashed power. But his touch on my wrist is almost gentle. Almost reverent.
Then his expression shifts, becoming grim again.
"Steel won’t be enough," he growls. "Not for what’s coming."
"What is coming?"
But before he can answer, laughter echoes through the chamber—cold, cruel, entirely too familiar. The Marshal’s voice follows, seeming to come from everywhere at once.
"Such pretty words, little witch. Such brave promises. But steel breaks. Fire dies. And in the end, you all bleed the same."
Krath’s grip on my wrist tightens protectively. "Show yourself, you corpse."
"Soon, old friend. Very soon. But first, let us see how long your courage lasts when the walls themselves turn against you."
The chamber shudders. Not just movement this time, but something else. The walls begin to close in, passages narrowing, ceiling lowering. The abbey isn’t just reshaping itself—it’s compressing, turning our sanctuary into a trap.
"Move." Krath releases my wrist and grabs my hand instead, pulling me toward the least threatening passage. "Now."
We run into darkness that swallows our footsteps, the Marshal’s laughter following behind us as the chamber collapses where we stood.
But even as stone grinds against stone and shadows press close, I feel Krath’s hand warm in mine. Strong. Steady. Real.
Not alone.
For the first time since entering this cursed place, that feels like enough.