Page 152 of Eternal Ruin

Blood running down his chin, Samson’s irises were a violent red gold. “What did you see?”

Kidan blinked away her vertigo. “Talaa.”

“He was supposed to protect her.”

Kidan prepared to speak softer, learn more when the contraption’s timer went off.

They both glanced down at the red string. Samson unclasped it, trying to clear the haze in his expression.

“Stay here.”

She tried not to push too soon. “What are you going to do?”

He didn’t answer her as he traveled back downstairs.

53.

SUSENYOS

Susenyos smiled in the dark, touching his stinging cheek.

There was a strange sort of relief in surrendering to Kidan’s blade even if this house left him more vulnerable than Lusidio’s torture. At the thought, the marks on his lower back screamed. His vision couldn’t see through the shadows, nor could his human ears hear what was going on above the basement. Was Samson revealing his secrets or losing his temper? His breathing picked up and died down. The drag of the stone floor on the soles of his feet was dull. He could no longer feel each splinter or dust particle. No different from being submerged underwater.

At least there was no mirror. Nothing to show him how low he’d sunk.

He wouldn’t be able to bear this for long. The longest he used to manage was seven hours, on his knees in the observatory.

When the basement door opened again, Samson’s eyes were devoid of any light. Where that boyish radiance that had always cloaked him disappeared to, Susenyos didn’t know. Sometimes, his memories would play tricks on him, turning the friend he’d known from age seven to the castle ghost, a tale he must have imagined. They’d played too many roles over the years.

The servant and the prince, once. The guard and the emperor. Now vampire and human.

“You finally won.” Susenyos’s voice never failed him, even if his heartbeat did. “You finally get to see the disgraced emperor. I’m truly impressed by your commitment to ruin my life. Is it everything you imagined it to be?”

Samson’s scar tightened whenever Susenyos smiled, which was why he did it often. It was as if his happiness—even a surface-level smile—truly disturbed Samson’s soul. Susenyos’s grin widened, darkening Samson’s expression further.

“You still do it,” Samson barked. “Speak as if the world should bow to you.”

“Don’t forget the angels.”

His words were a snarl. “A spoiled, traitorous prince. Your father was a beast but at least he kept to his word.”

Susenyos’s smile wavered, and Samson latched on to it like a hound, breathing in the petty slight he dealt. This was the trouble with old friendships. They never forgot what they healed in you, and with a single clawed scratch, they could cut the wound again. It was why he had to be rid of Samson quickly. Susenyos would never fight him as he was now—worthy, forged new with incredible strength. To Samson, he would always be a human boy afraid of his father.

And that boy could never win.

“My father always advised me to flay you open with a whip,” Susenyos said, voice cold as a tomb. “I’m not like him.”

Samson’s eyes roamed his face in wonder. “You think you spared me.”

“I did spare you.”

His metal hand clanged as the fingers flexed. “Which time? Did you not find it odd when I stopped racing in the courtyards? I knew you watched me, envied my speed ever since I embarrassed you during Gena celebration. And what of those entire months I could barely carry food on your picnics, did you not wonder?”

Susenyos’s eyes narrowed. “There was no scar on you.”

“My feet,” he snarled, flashing before the bars so the red of his pupils was incredibly vivid, “were torn topieces. Your father’s guards said it was because I wouldn’t stop running and disturbed the castle. But we all knew why. You won the next time we raced, gloated and beamed at your father as if you’d scaled a mountain. You knew what he’d done but you did nothing. Because you have always been a coward. Always.”

Susenyos saw no point in masking his rage now—the room lost its unbearable coldness, walls melting like lava.