CHAPTER TWO
Verena
MURMURS STIRRED IN THE TREES AS TWIGS SNAPPED behind me.
I quickened my pace, trying to ignore them.
Still, they followed, trailing every step.
“You’d make a poor assassin,” I muttered.
Fiery waves burst from the path, forcing my legs to halt. The corner of Callum’s mouth twitched into the beginning of a smirk.
“Lucky for you,” he said, gaze never leaving mine, “I’m not trying to kill you.” His steps carried him backward, deeper into the trees. “Besides, did the direwolves in the Firen Forest complain? They never even saw me.”
The grin faded the moment he felt the subtle scrape of scales glide across his neck. His attempt to rip my snake off his shoulder was amusing.
The sound that escaped him was even more delightful.
I slipped past, calling the creature with me. It slithered quickly, winding up my leg, brushing heat over skin, before coiling in a slow caress around my throat.
A collar. A crown. Possession itself.
“That,” I bragged, bowing low, “is how you move unseen.”
When I straightened, he was already eye level with me, too damn close as his lips pressed into a thin line.
“Mock me again, Verena.”
The snake uncoiled with a lazy, satisfied hiss and slid back to my wrist.
“I’ll be fine, truly.” My fingers traced the onyx stone now warm against my skin. “Go watch Rook and Ford. They need supervision more than I do.”
His eyes flitted from my face to the vast reach of the trees beyond, a tug of worry knotted in them.
He wanted to believe me, wanted to hand me the lie and walk away with it. But he was always the guardian. Always my guardian.
At last, he let out a resigned sound, half sigh, half surrender. “We’ll be at the forest’s edge. I’m here,” he pointed to his head, “if you need us.”
I grinned, blowing him a careless kiss that landed somewhere between promise and provocation. Then I turned, each step more pompous than the last, boots striking with rhythm.
“Try not to miss me,” I called over my shoulder, striding away until shadows devoured me.
Every few minutes my head tilted, eyes thinning over my shoulder. Nothing was ever there, only trees crowding together, only branches swaying in the breeze.
I wasn’t afraid, fear was for prey, and I refused to be that.
But as the snake shifted around my wrist, whispering against my skin, my fingers brushed it, steadying.
Like we were keeping each other honest.
I pressed on, weaving between the trunks, letting the forest live around me.
Luamis rarely knew darkness.
The Kingdom of Light liked its skies bright and its shadows trimmed.
So, when dusk finally came, it felt stolen, sacred even. At least to me.
I checked behind me again. Still nothing.
And yet the hairs along my arms rose, a warning crawled beneath my skin.
When I reached the clearing where the fight had ensued, the moon lent its elusive light in judgment.
Silver beams fell upon blood streaking through the grass, blackened in patches where it had already dried. The stench of ash clung to the air, burnt flesh still dense enough to choke.
No bodies remained. Callum had made sure of that.
I crouched low where a neat row of weapons glimmered, exactly where they’d been left. Three swords and two daggers. They were pristine and defined, the blades shining like they were newly forged, untouched from battle.
I lifted one, its walnut hilt smooth, polished too carefully for common steel. The blade itself curved into a near half circle, grooves etched along its edge. Not at all the kind of dagger I expected Obrann’s hidden soldiers to wield.
Resting it across my bent knee, I tested its balance, a trick someone once taught me, a memory flashing at the edge of thought.
The steel held steady, until it tilted when my body jerked at the call of a distant whistle.
My pulse spiked.
The sound drifted from beyond the Indra Mountain. That was the wrong direction, opposite where Callum and the others waited. And it hadn’t been an animal.
No, that note had thought. It was a signal. A calling.
The wind altered, carrying whiffs of stale, rotted air whistling past. All at once, it was lost.
My throat hissed, a wicked, threatening sound as I spun, dagger raised, facing a man several feet from me.
Or what was left of one.
Raindrops threaded through the canopy as lightning tore the sky, and in its flash, I saw him clearly—
His skin was scorched, charred in ribbons, clinging to tendon and bone. The rotten stench hit me next, cloying in a sinful way.
I thought for a moment, wondering if this is who, or what, had watched us earlier. His scent quickly gave him away that this was unconnected.
Because I would know that tainted blood anywhere.
His voice cracked, his body starving for water as he said, “Hand over the weapon, girl... or I’ll tear it from your hands myself.”
The hand he offered was skeletal, bone protruding through mangled grey flesh as he gestured for me to hand it over. He leaned to rip it from my grasp as a rumble broke through the clouds.
I rose measured, clicking my tongue in irritation. “Touch me, and you’ll lose what little you’ve got left.”
My eyes dragged down his crumbling form.
How was he still moving? Still breathing? Perhaps the Bale had found a way to destroy us in our flesh after all.
He didn’t give me time to ponder—the sunken hollows of his eyes flared black and a low vibration shivered through the blade at my hip, dancing along the forest floor, until all the metal surrounding us answered him.
Oh, fuck. A ferrokind, here in Luamis?
“Don’t!”
He did it anyway.
He waved his hand, the weapons I’d collected earlier now hovering in an obedient ring around him: knives quivering, swords angling, daggers pointing with intent.
An eerie smile split his face. “Last chance to run. Or do you hear death calling?”
I almost reached through the bond to Callum. Almost reached for something deeper, into that buried place where true magic should have lived.
But eight years of an unspoken power had proven what I already knew—
Whatever gift the gods had withheld, the curse had claimed.
So, a curse was what I would wield.
My fists unfurled, fingers trembling as I called its name. “Eeva.” Live.
The word itself was haunted, born from a language long dead.
The serpent unlatched from my wrist, unraveling in shadow, climbing the air like smoke, like breath turned tangible, until it loomed above us, waiting.
The black in his eyes widened, some forgotten memory of fear flickering across his face.
The Viper purred in my skull and I tilted my head, words falling sweet as honey. “Last chance to drop my dagger, handsome.”
His stained teeth gritted together. “As you wish.”
The air split when he whistled. Every sword, every dagger I had gathered snapped straight, shivering with purpose, aimed directly at me.
Metal trembled, then surged and all at once, they flew, screaming through the night straight for my heart—
Right as I became unchained.
The serpent twisted through the air, scales shimmering like oil on water as it circled the impending weapons, leaving nothing but glistening black dust in its wake.
It fell upon us like rain as moss melted where he faltered, falling backwards to the ground.
Gods, such a waste of weapons. Still, I did love that trick.
“I told you not to do that.” My fangs slid long, brushing my lip, and I caught one with my tongue.
A promise. A threat.
Recognition flared in his eyes, disbelief rising into terror. “It… it’s you.”
I smiled, blood glinting against my teeth.
Everyone knew the stories, the curse’s reputation had been carved and whispered across kingdoms. Fear was always the first reaction, then the realization came too late.
My fingers curled, aching to ravage. “Run,” I ordered.
And so, he did.
Life and death stomped across the ground. Fleeing and hunting.
The man, if he could still be called one, was on his knees now, dragging himself through the muck.
His little trick, stripping the air of steel, had rattled me for a heartbeat, a single instant when I thought he might turn the tide.
Once, that trace of doubt would have undone me. But not anymore.
Instead, the Viper, for all its charmless, venomous glory, lent me its conviction.
My snake attacked again as I circled him, letting him feel every second of it as he writhed on the forest floor. Black liquid streamed from his mouth, spilling down his chin in rancid rivulets.
He spat some at me, just as it slithered higher, coiling around his chest, bringing his arms in close as it went.
Tighter. Restricting and suffocating.
Bones cracked like twigs underfoot, and his groans turned to ragged howls as I crouched, retrieving an ivory arrowhead from my pocket before rolling it between my fingers.
Its jagged edges bit familiar into my skin.
A relic I’d stolen from this very forest, once buried on my favorite resting rock, used to take down a direwolf just as it had nearly outwitted me.
I’d told myself I would fashion it into a deadlier weapon, but it had become something else instead.
A charm. A reminder. Proof that luck, however cruel, still chose me.
I angled the stone toward his chest, just enough to make him flinch. Then dragged it to his sweat-slick temple.
“Who are you?”
His teeth gnashed, fists clenching uselessly against the serpent’s hold. “Rot, you bitch.”
My grin spread as the arrowhead stayed just above his racing pulse. “So rude.”
The strike was too quick for him to see.
One heartbeat, he had a hand, the next, a stump gushed red, spraying the dirt in a frantic rhythm.
He didn’t cry out. Didn’t so much as twitch. His eyes stayed dull, mouth slack. For a moment, I thought maybe he hadn’t noticed.
Until he looked down and laughed. “You think you can harm me?” His breath stuttered, but still he said, “I don’t fear pain or death. You monster.”
Shame. That’s exactly what I offered.
I pressed the slick arrowhead to his face, trailing it along his cheek until blood welled, dripping into his mouth. His lips stayed parted, his face eerily calm, expectant. As if he wanted this. As if he was waiting for it.
Not fear. Not even defiance. Just… surrender.
“New question.” The stone turned in my hand, more red drawing up while I leaned in close. “What are you?”
His blood answered before he did, the scent of it striking us like a match. Not the serpent winding around his throat, but the one buried deeper—the master in my mind.
It purred, flooding my chest and my head tipped back, eyes rolling, as the feeling consumed me.
It was wicked, it was vile, and gods, it felt so fucking good.
The moment I surrendered, the thrill rippled outward, licking across my flesh. The forest dimmed, sounds collapsing into nothing as drums roared against all thoughts.
The only thing sharp in my vision was him, the heat fading fast from his body, the blood spilling too quick, too much.
“Death comes for us all,” he spoke. His mottled flesh had gone waxen, pallor settling in like frost. “Even itself. Even you.” A hollow crackle of laughter. “Soon, I hear.”
As if prophecy could rattle me.
Then he began chanting.
Not words for me, but the kind the dying spill when they think the gods are listening. Pleas for guidance. For light. For deliverance to the Aureveil.
But no gods ever come. They never extend their hands to the rotting. They never will.
I had always counted on that.
His voice cut off, as the snake climbed higher, scales kissing his throat.
Then he spoke again, louder, until the chant reshaped into a cadence no prayer should hold. This time he made certain I could hear.
“Deep... deep... deep it goes…”
His voice was gutted, rattling with blood.
“Running black within their soul. Innocence and purity must be traded, as a whole.” The snake coiled tighter.
“For a monster lurks…” His breath hitched, wheezing.
“…within them—” Another gasp. Another squeeze.
“Not of soul. Or mind. Or blood.” The serpent constricted, ribs straining until I heard the crack.
“But one who whispers—” His words broke.
“—kindly, let me in and come undone.” Gasp.
Constrict. Crack. “Deep… deep… deep it digs—” Another rib gave way with a sharp snap.
“—laying claim within their mind. Until, finally, it’s all they see. And the darkness... marks them blind.”
Silence.
It wasn’t a song or poem. Not even a vow. But fate, twisted into a reminder. The words lingered, striking somewhere I had no shield for, prying open a seam in my chest I’d thought sealed.
His shadowed eyes lifted to mine, triumphant even as black blood poured over his grin. “She’s coming for you. Tick, tick, tick.” The words were forced between each strenuous breath. “Death remembers its debts, and it already told her where you sleep.”
My snake wound higher, claiming the last stretch of his throat.
He clawed, tore, fought. But my curse was untouchable.
His frantic motion caught nothing but mist, every desperate grab slipping through air. His eyes rolled back, a gurgle rattling from his throat as he convulsed.
Tighter. I clenched my fists and the serpent obeyed.
Warm liquid slicked my palms, dripping down my arms as I poured every ounce of myself into its choke.
He had called me a monster. Perhaps I was.
Or maybe I was only what the world demanded of me.
Either way, I would not disappoint.
Before his last breath sang free, I lunged, fangs splitting through the shadow, sinking deep into flesh, venom surging into his veins.
He stiffened, jerking, body convulsing under the curse’s cleansing. Black lines slivered down his throat, etching across his skin.
I ripped free, spitting rot, my face painted in his spoiled gore.
He crumpled at my feet, rigid.
I bent low, voice reminding him still, “I am death.”