Page 113 of Horns of Wicked Ebony (Deathcaller Duet #2)

Six Weeks Later

Silence hung like a bloated cloud in the command center as all the most important players in the Demon Realm slumped around it. The map of Keleti that hogged the center of the table had been replaced with a single unfurled parchment.

A peace treaty.

Yet instead of savoring the triumph, I sucked on something sour.

My attention flicked to Rapp. His hair was a mess, his beard so grown out it nearly covered the rings in his lip. Purple bruises dotted his eyes—the underside from a lack of sleep, the full ring from when Xannirin had landed a heavy blow during their previous brawl.

The Kral looked no better. His regal, arrogant posture had vanished, leaving behind a shell of a male. He didn’t meet my gaze, even as I speared it into him. No, all he could look at was the offering, written in Kiira’s elegant script .

Rokath gripped the back of my chair. I didn’t need to see him to know his fury was on the precipice of boiling over.

Trol, out of all of us gathered, looked the most rested and relaxed. But he didn’t carry the emotional weight the rest of us did. He’d always been a loyal commander, an unyielding force, heralding the army when Rokath and Rapp needed to navigate the complex political web of the realm.

“The Angels call this a peace treaty,” Xannirin spit out, unwilling and unable to disguise his disgust. All our attention snapped to him. “This is a hostage negotiation. One we will win, and after, we’ll strike anyway.”

A growl threaded with violent intent emanated from my mate. “All of this is your fucking fault, Xannirin. You don’t get to determine anything anymore.”

The Kral dragged his gaze past me to Rokath.

Rapp’s fingers tightened over the table before he shoved it away, the stones pinning the parchment swaying and tumbling with a clatter. He paced the length of the room like a cougar trapped in too small a cage. “Sign the fucking treaty, Xannirin.”

“You, of all people, don’t get to talk to me like that,” Xannirin snarled, snatching for Rapp’s sleeve. The Hadvezér jerked out of his way at the last second.

Ice crawled down my spine as I called on the onyx strands of my magic, ready to break up yet another fight between the two males.

“Shut the fuck up, both of you.” I rose, my height nothing to intimidate them with, yet both paused their hateful, heated glares at one another and trained them on me.

“Kiira made her choice. You have to live with it, Xannirin. Are you so fucking selfish that you can’t do this one thing for her? After everything you’ve done?”

A muscle feathered in his jaw. He raked his hands through his greasy hair, tugging on his scalp. “You don’t know what this means for me. ”

A scoff slipped out of me before I could stop it.

“We’ve all had to do things we didn’t want to do.

” Each word was laced with venom. Rokath rested a big hand on my shoulder, a silent reminder that he was there despite how unwanted our bond had been.

I blew out a long breath, surrendering some of the animosity in my tone.

“Maybe something good will come of this for you, Xannirin. Don’t you trust the Fates? ”

I wasn’t sure any of us did any more. But Xannirin was beyond reasoning with his level of distress. Short of killing him, there wasn’t much we could do without his signature on the page.

Rapp had halted mid-wear of the already threadbare rug beneath him. I held his gaze as I spoke my next words, hoping he’d play along with them rather than initiating another fight. “You never know what will happen after. If Kiira will change her mind. You did kill Ollmund Varrir, after all.”

Rapp froze, every muscle in his body stretched taut like he was restraining himself from moving, from speaking, from doing anything but battling for self-control.

Xannirin on the other hand, half-rose from the table, leaning toward me. “Do you think so?” The hope in his tone would have twisted my gut in any other situation.

But fuck him.

The next lie rolled off my tongue with guilt-free ease. “I do.”

Trepidation wound down our bond. “You’re playing with fire, Assyria.”

“I know what I’m doing,” I snapped back at Rokath through our mental connection.

Xannirin’s fingers twitched toward a stick of charcoal. The air in the room ceased moving as we all waited to see what he would do.

Ten seconds passed, the tick of the clock like a death knell.

Then another .

Then more.

Until the Kral picked up the writing utensil and scrawled his name at the bottom of the document. I sagged back into my chair. Rokath wasted no time in signing the parchment next.

Rapp stalked off, through the bone room, without another word.

Before Xannirin could do something stupid, Rokath swept the marker stones aside and rolled up the treaty. “I’ll see this is returned to Vaeron.” He tucked it into his armor, out of reach.

“I’ll go with you,” I said, wanting to get the fuck out of there. I only felt slightly bad about leaving Trol alone with the Kral.

As we emerged into the humidity of the cloud forest, groups of soldiers—both male and female—ceased their conversations.

Maariya tried to catch my eye, but I kept my focus trained on the path in front of us, to where the Korona’s brother, Vaeron, waited.

His ice blue eyes tracked our every step from atop his mount.

“It is done?” he asked, his voice a harsh velvet in the common tongue.

“It is,” Rokath replied, handing the signed parchment over.

Vaeron confirmed it with a perusal glance.

Beside him, the Seer that had falsely predicted the final battle shifted.

The determination that danced in her eyes mirrored my own.

I’d been shocked to see it during our first negotiation meeting, given how docile she seemed atop the wall.

But Vaeron and Ishim had commanded our attention then.

She was the lightning strike none of them had anticipated amid their thunder.

When we held a siege in Sivy, she’d become a tempest, but not of violence against the Demons. Who would have thought a pacifist would end up mated to the Issaraeth? And that she’d be the storm that wrecked him, much like I had been the wildfire that consumed Rokath?

My lips twisted into a grin as she dipped her chin to me. I returned the subtle gesture.

After all, the four of us had brokered this peace treaty, spending long hours hammering out all the details. Yet when her attention slid back to her mate, her brows pinched ever so slightly.

“I’ll make the arrangements,” Vaeron stated, picking up his reins. Tension rolled off him in palpable waves. The Angels guarding him closed ranks, preparing to depart the Demon camp.

“This trust is tenuous, Issaraeth,” Rokath warned. “Should you fail to meet your obligations, I have no qualms about attacking again.”

His white teeth flashed in a sinister smile. “Halálhívó, I would expect nothing different.”

He clicked his tongue, and their party set out, Demons regarding them with healthy suspicion until they were out of sight. I couldn’t blame them, not after everything we’d all been through. Despite the cease in battle, the Angels still believed the Goddess wanted them to exterminate our dark magic.

It would take time to unravel those beliefs in their realm, just like it would take time to unravel the beliefs about females in ours.

I blew out a long breath and slipped my hand into Rokath’s. “Let’s go.”

With heavy steps, we returned to the command center, finding it devoid of life. Only time would tell if the Angels were sincere in their promises, but with Sylaira mated to Vaeron, I had hope.

Rokath sank onto his throne of bones, pinching the bridge of his nose. He released a sigh filled with frustration and exhaustion.

I straddled his hips, finding the tight muscles of his jaw and massaging. “What will you do?

His gaze raked up to meet mine. “What do you mean?”

“When it’s all over? When peace reigns?”

My mate let out a low groan as I dug into a particularly tight spot. I pressed harder, relieving the ache that had built with the stress of the last few weeks—Fates, years. We remained like that, blanketed in silence, as I offered him silent comfort.

A gasp slipped out of me when he grabbed my waist and supplanted me on the chair he’d crafted for me to mirror his own. His knees hit the floor as he knelt at my feet. Those burgundy eyes studied my face with potent intensity.

“Little imposter, I will build you the grandest of gardens. Somewhere where only you and I exist. I’ll claim the earth there, like I claimed you. A sanctuary carved from stone and soil, brimming with the beauty you embody. It will flourish and bloom as you help lead us into our future.”

Tears pricked my eyes and the back of my nose.

“Together, we’ll kneel among the plants, tending to them with the same love and care you have shown me, and the rest of this army, all these months. We’ll teach Grem and Zeec to dig too, so that they have purpose in their new lives.”

I pressed my mouth into a thin line to smother a sob. I’d told him—only once—that I’d dreamed of a fated mate who would hold me as his equal and join me in my passions.

He remembered.

Rokath caught my bottom lip with his thumb, as if coaxing my feelings free. “I’m not sure who or what I’ll be when we’re not fighting the Angels.” His lips brushed against mine, the spicy scent of him filling my nostrils. “But I do know that I’ll be your mate. Your protector. And you?”

He smiled—a genuine twist of his lips, rarer than any precious stone. The sharp flash of his teeth rolled a shiver down my spine. The molten heat of his gaze didn’t merely brand me. It was a claim, a possession, against all who sought to take me from him.

“You’ll continue to change our society for the better. You won’t let us settle. Won’t let us slide back into the inequality. Now, more than ever, the world needs you to lead. And I will be by your side, clearing the path for all those who dare to doubt the mighty Szélhámos.”

Salt dripped down my cheeks as I beheld the male I’d first hated, then loved with reckless abandon. Who I craved with shameless desire. Whose reverence left me breathless.

Because he was right. He saw me.

I was no longer the abused wife of a sycophantic Kormánzó.

I had eyes of devious burgundy. Magic that allowed me to become an Imposter.

I was the change. The symbol. The power.

“I am the Szélhámos,” I breathed, my honorific speaking into existence the riot of emotion inside me.

“Yes, you are.” His voice was tumbling ebony. “My perfect mate. My equal in fire and fury. And always,” his mouth closed over mine for the briefest of moments. “Always mine.”

Rokath devoured me with the obsession of a male possessed. His craving insatiable as his tongue slid against mine. A growl vibrated in his chest as he yanked me flush, fingers digging into my hips with beautiful brutality.

I welcomed it. Breathed him in. Drank him down.

Because he was right—the path to pure peace was not one beneath the sun. It would be clawed through darkness. With Demon society in upheaval, with the changes that would follow the treaty too, people were sure to resist.

But despite all that, Rokath and I had defied death. We’d lived through what had killed so many. And someday, long after the war had been laid to rest, the world would know our names. Not as rulers of realms, but as mates made for war and peace.

Beneath a burning canopy, we came together—shadow-cloaked, battle-worn, and alive . In the ashes of what we’d flamed, in the breath between battles, we did the most dangerous thing two people could do in the midst of war.

We chose to love.

You didn’t think I’d give you all the answers to An Age of War and Prophecy at the end of this book, did you?

The war is far from over. The lies run deeper than you can imagine. And the ones who waited on the fringes in the Deathcaller Duet?

Some of them are already sharpening their knives.