Page 111 of Ballad of Nightmares

And the cold vacancy in his eyes only crushed her soul more.

“You lied to me,” she seethed in a tone so gravely, saliva dripped from her trembling lips. “You’re a fucking liar! Wasanyof it real?”

Rust from the bars scratched her skin as she screamed and writhed. She needed to know. She needed to know if her broken heart was valid or if she’d imagined the last month.

“You betrayed me!” she shouted. “Youmanipulatedme—“

“Tell me you wouldn’t have done the same had you known who I was,” came his darkened words.

Ana started to retort, but she nearly choked.

Because he was right.

She hocked spit at his face, making him grimace. His eyes were shut tight, yet he didn’t move.

“Fuck you,” she managed in a breathless voice.

The raw stone seemed to freeze beneath her bare feet as she took a solid step back, trying to regain her composure.

“This entire time…” she breathed. “Everyday. Everyword. Everytouch… You knew who I was.”

Sam pulled his shirt up and wiped the spit from his face before glaring back at her. “Did you think you could come into my kingdom and I wouldn’t know who you were?”

“And you chose to what, exactly?” she asked. “What was your plan here?”

“To show you how it feels to be seduced and broken as you’ve done to every other king,” he said.

“Every other king I have been with has been nothing more than shit-eating cretins. None ever truly cared for me like they said they did. I did their kingdoms a favor by getting rid of them—“

“You caused chaos and destruction and murder—“

“Says Death himself,” she seethed at the fact that he was accusing her of such things when he was…him. She swallowed, feeling her feet move back. “You’re a coward,” she whispered. “Acoward, Sam. You’re no better than them—”

“Ana, I was prepared to tell you everything,” Sam blurted as he stepped to the bars.

Her heart stilled. She gawked at him, letting the words strum through her depleting body. He had to be lying. Why would he ever reveal who he was when he knew she was after his crown?

“I was prepared togiveyou everything. I was prepared to bring you here and show you why I could not stay with you every night. I—“ But he ran both hands through his hair, stopping himself, and when he looked at her, she felt the world disappear beneath her feet.

Pain. Pain worse than any pain she’d ever thought she’d seen in him. This was pure agony—as though she was dying in front of him and he could do nothing to stop it.

“You chose your greed over me,” he continued, voice faint and dangerous, rising and seething with the next words. “You chose tomurderme so that you could walk away from what we had and go after a fuckingcrown—“

“What would you like me to say?” she cut him off. “Would you like me to tell you I had to do those things because I found myself falling for you? Would you like me to say that murdering you was the only way I knew how to let you go?”

“Don’t try to manipulate me,” he warned.

“Oh, like you manipulated me?”

Sam held her gaze a moment longer as he started descending back into the shadows once more. Ana shifted as she watched, her teeth chattering as she tried to stifle emotion in her throat. Face burning with it. She cursed her breaking heart. How moments earlier she’d felt a string of power and numbness streaking through her, but the moment he said he was going to tell her everything… the moment he admitted how she was so close to having everything she ever desired—power, duty, and love—

She was breaking.

“It hurts, doesn’t it?” he said softly as he paused at the steps.

“What?”

“To fall.”