Chapter 71 Face Your Nightmare
(to Doom the World)
Kazimir
The portal snapped shut behind me, leaving me standing before the gates of Sunspire Palace.
Smoke rose from the eastern horizon where my army still fought—or more likely, stood around wondering where the hell their commander had gone.
Once more, I’d left them just as victory was ours, but I couldn’t bring myself to care about it just now.
I recalled my shadow warriors with a thought that sent spikes of pain through my skull.
One hundred tendrils of darkness raced back across the battlefield, abandoning their posts.
The effort nearly dropped me to my knees.
Without the Heirloom’s amplification, without Arabella’s power feeding into mine, I was just a man with some impressive bone carvings and a talent for dramatic entrances.
Well. That and a fragment of an ancient evil rattling around in my subconscious. But I had locked him away on the battlefield. My internal battle with him was won, and now Arabella was paying the price.
The palace gates hung open, one twisted off its hinges. Bodies littered the courtyard—guards, mages, a few of my own soldiers who’d pushed too far. The Golden Roses that had once climbed every wall were dead, their metallic petals scattered like coins across blood-soaked stone.
Movement caught my eye—a figure emerging from behind an overturned fountain. I had a shadow blade forming before I recognized the ridiculous amount of flowers sprouting from cracks in the paving stones.
“Sebastian?” I let the blade dissolve. “What the hell are you doing here?”
He straightened, brushing marble dust from his formerly pristine jacket. Now it was torn at the shoulder, splattered with blood. But he didn’t look injured that I could see. “I could ask you the same question, Lord Blackrose. Aren’t you supposed to be commanding an army?”
“Aren’t you supposed to be on the Sky Serpent heading back to Skyspire?”
He stepped carefully around a particularly aggressive patch of thorny vines that had erupted near the fountain. “When you recalled the ship, I… disembarked.”
“You jumped off a flying ship.”
“I created a rather impressive cushion of moss.” He gestured vaguely at the palace. “I couldn’t leave without checking on something.”
I didn’t have time for whatever sentimental mission had drawn him back here. But I needed to find Amaryska, and Sebastian knew this palace better than I did.
“I’m looking for someone,” I said. “A sorceress. Gray robes with red stitching, dark hair, about this tall.” I held my hand at shoulder height. “Probably wherever Auremar kept his mages.”
Sebastian’s expression shifted, flowers wilting slightly around his feet. “Why would you—”
“It’s important.” I started toward the palace entrance. “Can you show me where the royal mages work or not?”
He fell into step beside me, careful not to slip on the blood-slicked stones. “I know where the arcanum is. Arabella and I used to sneak in there when we were children.”
“Lead the way,” I said.
The palace interior was chaos. Servants ran past carrying everything from silver candlesticks to rolled tapestries, looting what they could before order returned.
Most fled at the sight of me—the Dark Lord himself, walking their halls like he owned them.
Which, technically, I might. Did killing a king automatically transfer property ownership?
I’d have to ask Vex about the legal precedents.
Nah. My army was at the doorstep. I’d say that was an automatic transfer of power via conquering.
Sebastian navigated the corridors with easy familiarity, occasionally pointing out hidden passages or shortcuts.
“Arabella knew all the secret ways,” he said as we climbed a servants’ stair.
“She had this game where she’d hide and see how long it took the guards to find her.
Once she stayed hidden for three days. They thought she’d been kidnapped. ”
We’d entered a long hall covered with paintings on the wall—all portraits, hundreds of them. “Sounds like her.”
“The king and her father were furious. That was a year before—” Sebastian stopped abruptly, staring at one of the portraits near the end. A young woman with golden hair and kind eyes, holding a book of pressed flowers. “That’s her mother, Lady Iona Evenfall.”
I’d never seen a portrait of Arabella’s mother. The resemblance was striking, though Arabella had a sharpness her mother lacked.
“She was kind to me,” Sebastian said quietly. “When my grandmother died, she’d invite me to tea and let me talk about her. She never told me to stop crying or ‘be strong’ like everyone else did. My own mother was ill by that time, so—”
“Amaryska killed her.” The words came out flat, matter-of-fact. Easier to say it like that—like a tactical briefing—than to think about what it meant. That I was about to ask my mother for help. That I needed her. “The woman I’m looking for. She’s the one who murdered Arabella’s mother.”
Sebastian turned to stare at me. “And you’re seeking her out? Why?”
Because she might know how to free the Shadow King. Because I’d promised to save Arabella, even if it meant dooming everyone else. Because I was a selfish bastard who’d choose his wife over the world every single time.
“It’s important,” I repeated.
He studied my face, and I saw the moment he understood something was terribly wrong. Not the specifics—he couldn’t know about the Shadow King possessing Arabella—but he recognized the desperation I was trying to hide.
“This way,” he said simply, and continued down the corridor.
The Royal Arcanum occupied an entire wing of the palace, though most of it appeared abandoned.
Doors hung open on empty workshops and libraries, their contents either looted or carried away by their fleeing owners.
Only one section showed signs of recent use—a suite of rooms at the far end, where the smell of bitter herbs and old blood grew stronger.
“Wait here,” I told Sebastian.
“I’m coming with you.”
“No.” I put enough command in my voice to make lesser men soil themselves. Sebastian was not a lesser man, much as I’d wanted him to be. “This is between me and her.”
Sebastian crossed his arms, and a ring of protective thorns sprouted around his feet. “With all due respect, Lord Blackrose, you look like you’re about to collapse. Whatever you’re planning, you might need help.”
“I don’t need—”
“Arabella,” he interrupted, looking worried. “That’s what this is about, isn’t it? Something’s happened to her.”
Damn him and his emotional intelligence. I missed the days when my problems could be solved by threatening to feed people to void beasts.
“Stay here,” I growled, and pushed through the door before he could argue further.
The workshop beyond was exactly what I’d expected from someone who’d carved runes into her own child’s bones.
Tables covered in anatomical diagrams, jars of preserved organs, and tools that belonged in a torture chamber more than a mage’s laboratory.
And at the center of it all, sitting calmly at a desk as if she’d been expecting me, was my mother.
The sight of Amaryska in a workshop should have triggered more memories and feelings of pain, but I only had one reason for being here. I had no strategies. I wasn’t here to kill her.
I was here to beg.
“Kazimir.” She didn’t look up from the book she was reading. “You always did have dramatic timing.”
“You were waiting for me.”
“I hoped you would come.” She closed the book carefully, marking her place with a ribbon. When she finally looked at me, I saw no fear in her eyes. Only a strange sort of satisfaction. “You look terrible. The burden of power, I suppose. Or is it the burden of love?”
“Don’t.” My voice held an edge I couldn’t quite control.
My hands clenched into fists, and I felt the runes in my bones pulse with heat—not the Shadow King’s influence, just my own barely contained rage.
Hours ago, she’d reduced me to a child counting footsteps.
Now I needed her help. The humiliation burned almost as hot as the fury.
“You don’t get to talk about her. Not after what you did. ”
“What I did?” She stood, moving with the same coiled grace I remembered from childhood.
“You mean freeing her from a life of heartache? Her mother was weak, clinging to fairy tales about redemption and hope. Arabella was better off remembering her mother as she was when the girl was younger, not as being the reason she died.”
“You murdered her.”
“I did what was necessary.” She circled me slowly, studying me like I was one of her experiments. “Just as I opened a door for you when I carved those runes into your bones. Pain is such an excellent teacher, don’t you think?”
“Is that what you told yourself when you sold me to a demon?” The words came easier each time I said them aloud.
She laughed—actually laughed. “Oh, my darling boy. You still don’t understand, do you? I didn’t sell you to just any demon. I sold you to Malphas, Prince of Ambition. I knew you’d either die or become something magnificent. And look at you now—the Dark Lord himself, Terror of the Western Realms.”
“I killed him,” I said flatly. “Tore him apart with his own shadows and used his bones to reinforce my rune carvings.”
“I know.” Her smile was proud, fond, even. “I’ve been following your career with great interest. Every conquest, every cruelty, every step closer to your true destiny. Though I’ll admit, I didn’t understand the full scope of it until recently.”
The thought of her cataloging my conquests like a proud parent made my skin crawl. But I didn’t have time for disgust. I needed answers, and she was the only one who had them.
She moved to a shelf, pulling down a black leather journal. “After you killed your father, I went looking for answers. How had my son become so powerful? What was the source of this incredible dominion magic that couldn’t be explained by runes? That’s when I found them.”
“Them?”
“The Cult of the Eternal Shadow.” She opened the journal, showing me pages covered in symbols I recognized from my own bones.
“They’ve been preparing for the Shadow King’s return for centuries.
Keeping the old knowledge alive, maintaining the weaknesses in his prison, waiting for the right vessel to be born. ”
My blood ran cold. “You knew. You knew what I was.”
“I suspected.” She traced one of the symbols with her finger.
“The signs were all there—born under a black star, natural affinity for dominion magic, the way shadows bent toward you even as an infant. But I couldn’t be certain until you survived Malphas.
Only someone carrying the Shadow King’s essence could have consumed a demon prince and lived. It explained everything about you.”
“So you joined Auremar.” The pieces were falling into place, forming a picture I didn’t want to see. “Not to help him, but to help the Shadow King.”
“Auremar was a fool,” she said dismissively.
“He thought he could control that kind of power, bind it to his will with blood and roses. But I knew better. The Shadow King cannot be controlled, only unleashed. So yes, I helped weaken the prison. I guided the rituals, selected the sacrifices, all to hasten his return.”
“Why?” The word came out raw, desperate. “What could you possibly gain from releasing that monster?”
Her eyes hardened. “Your father took everything from me. My freedom, my dignity, my soul. I traded it all for power—power I used to create you, to give you the tools for revenge. But it wasn’t enough.
Watching you kill him wasn’t enough.” She closed the journal with a snap.
“I want to watch the world that allowed him to exist burn. I want to see kingdoms fall and heroes weep. I want chaos and darkness and the complete unmaking of everything that let a man like him thrive.”
“You’re insane.”
The words came out flat, but underneath was something more complicated—a twisted understanding I didn’t want to acknowledge.
She’d been violated, broken, remade into something monstrous.
And in response, she’d made me into a weapon.
We were both products of violence, both shaped by men who took what they wanted without asking.
The difference was, I’d chosen to build something with my rage. She’d chosen to burn everything down.
She set the journal aside. “And now you’re here, which means something has gone wrong with your little wife. Let me guess—the Shadow King found a new vessel?”
I didn’t answer, but she read it in my face.
A cold light shined in her eyes. “The First Hero’s descendant, possessed by the very evil her bloodline was meant to contain. The irony is delicious.”
“Tell me how to free him.” The words tasted like ash. “What will it take to release the Shadow King from his prison?”
Her eyebrows rose. “Well, this is an unexpected development. I assumed you’d come here to kill me in some misguided attempt to save your bride.”
“Can you do it or not?”
Asking her for anything made me want to vomit.
Every instinct screamed to wrap shadows around her throat and squeeze until she stopped breathing.
But Arabella was running out of time, and my pride—my rage, my need for revenge—none of it mattered compared to saving her.
So I swallowed the bile and waited for her answer.
Amaryska studied me for a long moment, then smiled.
It was the same smile she’d worn when she’d heated the carving tools all those years ago.
“Of course I can. The prison is already crumbling—Auremar’s ham-fisted attempts saw to that.
One more sacrifice should do it. One more drop of heroic blood, willingly given, and the seals will shatter completely. ”
“One more—willingly given?”
“Oh yes. That’s the trick, isn’t it? The First Hero built his prison on sacrifice and will.
It can only be unmade the same way. But you and I both know certain types of sacrifices are more potent with willing victims. Auremar never asked any of his sacrifices, and it took a great deal more of them than it should have since we didn’t have your wife.
What I could have done with a few misguided but willing nobles or their brats—well.
” She sniffed and moved close enough that I could smell the bitter herbs and old blood that clung to her robes.
“Lucky for you, I know exactly where to find a willing sacrifice.”
“Where?”
She looked past me, toward the door. “Why don’t you ask him yourself?”
I turned to find Sebastian standing in the doorway, his face pale. He’d heard everything. Of course he’d disobeyed a direct order. He was infected with a sense of righteousness that I’d forgotten the last few days, with all the plans and emergencies.
“Sebastian,” I growled.
“I’ll do it,” he said simply.