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VEYLAN

T he fortress breathes with silence.

Not the silence of peace.

The kind that creeps too deep, too still, curling through the stone corridors like a whisper before a scream.

I sit in my chair, a book open in my lap, though my focus has long since drifted from the words inked across the pages.

She is asleep.

Across the chamber, beneath the heavy silken covers, Sera’s chest rises and falls in slow, measured rhythm.

It should not be.

Not after what happened last night.

Not after I felt her trembling fingers hover over my throat, steel catching moonlight, hesitation thick between us.

She could have done it.

Should have.

But she didn't.

I should punish her for even thinking about it.

Yet, I sit here instead, watching the way the soft glow of the dying embers casts long shadows over her face, carving light across the delicate features that have unraveled something deep and vicious inside me.

Something I should crush beneath my heel before it festers.

Something I won’t.

The silence deepens.

The coal in the hearth burn lower, their glow receding against the stone, retreating into the dark.

The shadows shift.

The book in my hands is forgotten.

I remain still and wait for what’s about to come.

There’s a soft movement along the farthest wall. The faintest hint of steel sliding from its sheath.

Someone is here.

No. Several.

The stench of dampened magic, masked footsteps, death barely restrained.

Assassins.

House Velkiron.

They have come as expected.

They think I will allow it.

The first dies before he even breathes.

I am on my feet in an instant, my blade slicing through flesh before his shock registers. A wet gurgle, a body slumping to the floor, blood pooling around the kill as the others spring from the shadows.

Three more.

One lunges.

I sidestep, grab his wrist, and twist. A snap. A scream cut short. His dagger is mine now.

Then there’s a blur of movement—another comes from behind.

I drop low, sweep his legs out from under him, and drive the stolen blade into the space beneath his ribs.

I tear it free, his blood warm on my fingers.

The last man hesitates and that is his final mistake.

I grab him by the throat, slamming him against the stone wall, my grip tightening, tightening—until his struggling stops.

His dagger clatters to the floor.

But he is not the one I should be focused on.

I am not the only one fighting and one of them slipped past me.

I hear her gasp.

I spin.

Rage consumes me.

The final assassin stands over the bed, a blade pressed against Sera’s throat.

She is awake.

Her eyes are wide, breath frozen in her lungs as cold steel presses against delicate skin.

A rush of pure, unfiltered wrath surges through me.

He dares.

The moment his grip shifts, I move.

The world narrows.

The distance between us vanishes.

I grab the assassin by the back of the head and drive his skull into the stone wall.

He stumbles.

He falters.

And I tear him apart.

The first strike shatters his ribs. The second crushes his windpipe.

The third is only for me.

For daring.

For touching what is mine.

For trying to take what I have not decided to break yet.

His body crumples to the floor, useless, ruined.

The dagger he held against her throat falls from his fingers.

I barely hear the sound of it hitting the ground.

She is still there.

Still staring at me.

Still breathing.

My chest heaves, blood slick along my forearms, my own pulse pounding, deafening, savage.

I turn to her, silver meeting blue.

She should be shaking.

She should be afraid.

But she isn't.

She is staring at me.

And there is something in her gaze that I cannot name.

Not relief.

Not gratitude.

Something darker.

My jaw clenches.

I wipe the blood from my blade, slow and deliberate, the tension between us pressing like a dagger against a throat.

She is waiting for what I will do.

That alone is why I can’t lose her.