Chapter 12
AMARIA
Morning came too soon and not soon enough.
I’d spent the dark hours cycling between restless vigilance and a thin trance. Serenya had found me without comment, curling into a bedroll I'd hauled to a shadowed alcove behind the supply stores. She was learning not to ask.
Now, the cavern stirred with the chaos of waking.
The fire had been relit—fresh smoke layered over last night's stale haze—and someone had propped the ventilation grate open, letting a thin blade of grey daylight cut across the far wall.
Rebels stretched, grumbled, passed around stale bread and watered ale like it was a feast. Standards lower fast underground.
It came in increments.
A nod from a rebel I didn't recognize, attention dragging to the satchel where the key's edge bit into my hip. A gap in the crowd that widened when I approached—not fear, exactly. More like... space. Acknowledgment.
Brannick met my eye from across the chamber and raised his cup in a lazy salute. Even Ryla, polishing her blade by the dead fire, inclined her head a fraction of an inch.
"Look at that. You're almost popular." Serenya appeared at my elbow and shoved a hunk of bread into my hand before I could argue.
"They're deciding if I'm useful." I tossed the bread and ripped into my jerky. "Not the same thing."
"It's a start."
Maybe. My muscles still groaned from yesterday's climb, but the tremor in my hands had stilled. For the first time since I'd walked into this place, I didn't feel like I was waiting for a knife in the back.
A horn sounded—low, resonant, echoing off the stone walls.
The rebels moved like they'd been expecting it, setting aside food and conversation, flowing toward one of the larger chambers. Everyone knew what this was except us. Wonderful. Serenya and I exchanged a glance and followed.
The training ring opened before us—a wide, circular space carved from the living rock, its dirt floor worn smooth by countless boots. Kaelen stood at the center, arms crossed, pale gaze sweeping over the crowd like he was deciding which of us deserved to be here.
Whatever came next, he'd summoned the whole camp to see it.
Maxx's words from the night before slithered through my memory.
Tomorrow is going to be deliciously complicated.
No sign of Maxx in the press of bodies though. Convenient.
Serenya's hand brushed mine—brief, grounding. I fixed my eyes on Kaelen.
Whatever this was, I'd face it standing.
The cavern's murmur died before I understood why.
Kaelen stepped onto the raised platform, and the stillness in his body made my back straighten. He was the weighted silence of a hammer poised to fall.
"We have a new asset," he announced, his voice carrying without effort. "One that cost us considerably to acquire. One that will prove... invaluable."
Asset. The word slithered through the crowd, raising hackles. Rebels shifted, exchanging glances.
Kaelen's gaze swept the room. "Some of you will recognize him. Most of you will want him dead." A ghost of a smile. "I'd ask you to restrain that impulse. For now."
The shadows at the far end of the cavern shifted.
And then he stepped into the torchlight.
The Crownforged cuirass gleamed first—dark as obsidian, catching the firelight like a warning.
Then the shoulders, the height, the coiled stillness of a predator who didn't need to prove it.
His helm was tucked under one arm, revealing the brutal cut of his jaw, the grim line of his mouth.
Like he'd walked into an enemy stronghold and expected us to be grateful.
The Crownforged Hunter.
For a heartbeat, no one moved.
Then the hiss started. Subtle at first, building—a thousand whispered curses finding their voice at once. Steel scraped leather as blades cleared sheaths. Someone spat. Someone else snarled a word I didn't catch but understood perfectly.
Him. Here. How—
He looked straight at me, and his smile turned predatory.
Kaelen's voice cut through the murmurs. "Meet Eryndor. The Crownforged Hunter came to us two days ago. Walked right up to our outer sentries and surrendered his oaths."
A ripple of disbelief moved through the gathered rebels. My hand found my knife hilt before my brain caught up. Good. At least one part of me was thinking clearly.
"He claims," Kaelen continued, circling Eryndor, "that his conscience has finally outweighed his oath. That he's seen the King's true nature and can no longer serve it."
Eryndor stood at the center of it all, hands loose at his sides—close enough to the sword at his hip to make a point, far enough to make another. His obsidian armor drank the torchlight, gave nothing back.
"I don't believe him," Kaelen said simply. "Neither should you."
Brannick stepped forward. "Then why is he breathing?"
"Because a Crownforged who might be turning is more valuable than a dead one." Kaelen’s mouth slanted upward, but the hardness in his eyes never wavered. "He's given us intelligence. Patrol routes. The King's plans for the southern quarter sweeps. All verified." A pause. "So far."
"He nearly killed her," someone spat. "In the plaza. He hunted her."
"And now he claims that's finished." Kaelen's attention moved from the crowd to Eryndor. "He says he found a way to sever the King's hold. That he's no longer bound by his orders."
A murmur rippled through the rebels. I felt Brannick shift beside me, his hand white-knuckling his sword.
"The Crown's leashes aren't subtle," Kaelen continued, circling Eryndor with slow, deliberate steps.
Studying him with eagle-eyed attention. "We've all seen what happens when one of the King's creatures strays too far from their orders.
The convulsing. The bleeding. The way their bodies turn against them.
" He stopped directly in front of Eryndor, near enough to share breath.
For a moment, neither moved. When Kaelen's expression sharpened, it was all edge.
"If you've truly broken free, you should be able to prove it."
Eryndor's expression gave nothing away. "How?"
"Get close to her," Kaelen challenged. "The Rupture.
The King's most wanted prize." He gestured lazily toward me.
"If you're still his creature, proximity to your target will trigger every tell we know to look for.
And we know them all, Crownforged. Every twitch.
Every micro-expression. Every sign that the King's chain is still wrapped around your throat. "
Kaelen bared his fangs.
"You want me to spar her," Eryndor said. Not a question.
The room went silent. I could feel the weight of every gaze shifting between me and Eryndor.
"I want you to fight her." Kaelen's eyes glittered. "Blades in hand. Close quarters. The kind of proximity that would make any bound soldier's shackles snap." He clasped his hands behind his back. "If you're free, it should cost you nothing. If you're not..."
He let the silence finish the sentence.
Brannick stepped forward. "And if he's lying?"
"Then our Scar-Bearer will put him down and we'll have lost nothing but a liability." Kaelen's eyes cut to me. "Unless you're not confident you can take him?"
The challenge hung in the air, barbed and deliberate.
I clamped my fangs together ruthlessly. Serenya grabbed my wrist, whispering furiously, “You don’t have to do this. You don’t need to prove yourself to them.”
I met her gaze briefly and gave a quick shake of my head. This was not the time to back down.
I knew what he was doing—trapping me into a corner where refusal looked like fear. And maybe it was. Maybe some part of me was still in those tunnels, pinned to the wall, breathing his air, carrying his grief on top of mine.
But the rest of me wanted to make him bleed.
"Fine," I said. My knife already in my hand. "Fifty heartbeats."
“One hundred,” Kaelen countered. I rolled my eyes. "Not what I meant. Count as long as you like. I’m ending him by fifty."
Eryndor looked at me for the first time since Kaelen began speaking. An unreadable shadow crossed his wintry eyes before his mask fixed back into place. Calm. Exacting. The perfect soldier.
But I had been inside his head. I'd felt what lived beneath that mask.
And I knew exactly how much it cost him to wear it.
“Choose your weapons,” Kaelen bellowed.
Eryndor moved to the weapons rack bolted to the far wall—practice blades, staffs, a row of dulled short swords hanging from iron pegs.
He bypassed all of them. Of course he did.
Selected a live blade with the same precision I'd watched him use in the tunnels, like practice steel wasn’t good enough for him.
He drew a cloth from his belt and began working it along the edge—measured, exact strokes that splintered the light. Each pass identical.
Maxx leaned forward, his grin wide. "Darling," he drawled, "even for a defector, that armor screams 'still trying to impress daddy.' A touch of velvet, perhaps?"
The cloth didn't pause. Eryndor's gaze lifted—found mine across the hall—then returned to the blade.
"Imperfection spreads."
Two words, flat and quiet, and definitely not aimed at Maxx.
My grip locked on my own weapon. He hadn't looked at my stance, my blade, my form. Hadn't needed to. The judgment was there anyway, settling into the space between us.
Kaelen turned to me. "And you, Scar-Bearer?"
I locked eyes with Eryndor. Teeth gnashed.
"Already armed."
Kaelen swept his arm toward the circle the rebels had formed. "Then by all means."
The crowd parted. I stepped into the ring first, boots scuffed against packed earth. Eryndor followed a moment later, that polished blade held loose at his side, posture easy.
We faced each other across ten feet of torchlit ground, and the hall went silent.
I shifted into a side stance—left toward the Crownforged, right hand hidden. My fingers found the familiar grooves of the throwing star tucked against my forearm.
He was still adjusting his grip when I let it fly.
And it hit its target.