Page 99 of Stormvein

“No. Death would be a mercy you haven’t earned.”

Relief flashes in her eyes, and Ihateseeing it. She thinks she’s survived something. But she hasn’t even begun to pay for what she’s done. Death would be quick. What I have planned won’t be.

The shadows around me settle slightly, though they continue to attempt to lift and twist from my skin, responding to the storm of emotions I refuse to display openly. Control has always been my strength. Even in the darkest moments of captivity, I maintained it. I willnotlose it now.

“Don’t mistake my restraint for forgiveness.” I take a step back. The floor beneath my feet is scorched where I stood, blackened in a perfect circle as if the stone itself was burned by proximity to the void. “Your betrayal deserves execution. But I’m not giving you the satisfaction of making this about you. Death would only serve your conscience, and not the needs of the Veinwardens.”

She straightens slowly, fighting to recover her composure. Her hand remains at her throat, fingers probing where my grip has left its mark. The darkness beneath her skin has begun to recede, but slowly,reluctantly. “What will you do now?”

“Now?” I bend and pick up her sword. The metal catches the torchlight, gleaming dully. A reminder of how close she still is to death. “Now you’ll stand before the people whose families you sold to slaughter. You’ll look every grieving person in the eye and you’ll tell them what you did.”

The blade feels wrong in my hand. Too lightweight compared with my shadowblade. That responds to intent, to will. It merged back into my body during my last desperate stand at Ashenvale, and I’ve yet to reform it. But I will, and when I do, it will once again become an extension of self in the way steel never can. For now, there’s a certain poetry in holding her weapon, in controlling the instrument she brought to end my life.

“They’ll understand I had no choice. I did what I had to do to protect Stonehaven!”

The defiance in her voice ignites my rage anew. Shadows explode from my skin, ripping outward in a visible wave of darkness. The torch gutters violently, nearly extinguished in the surge of power.

I round on her, my control slipping for a moment. The full force of my fury visible for that one brief second. Not in my expression, but in the darkness that surrounds me like a living cloak. In the void-black of my eyes, pupils expanded to consume iris and white alike.

My arm extends, and the tip of the sword nicks her throat.

“You did what waseasy,” I snap. The words carry physical force, each syllable accompanied by a pulse of shadow that slams into the wall around her, cracking stone, leaving impact craters in a perfect circle that doesn’t touch her. “You made a decision. One man for a thousand. If it were just me, I could forgive yourdecision. But it wasn’t. You didn’t just betrayme, Lisandra. You betrayed every fighter who’s ever fought in this war. Every scout who didn’t come home. You lit the pyre and walked away before the flames touched your feet.”

She flinches as each word strikes her. The shadows pulse with my voice, making the very air vibrate. Her mouth opens, then closes.

What defense could she possibly offer? What justification could possibly suffice?

“I never wanted you to suffer,” she says quietly. The admission is small, pathetic against the enormity of what she’s done.

“And yet I did. Intentions don’t outweigh actions. That’s the part you never understood. Not even back before my imprisonment. Not when there’s blood in the dirt.”

She flinches. The truth of it strikes deep. I’ve known Lisandra for decades. Fought alongside her, planned with her,trustedher with the lives of our people. She was respected.Valued. And yet all this time, she has never understood the most fundamental truth of leadership.

We are judged not by what we intend, but by what we do.

I lean in, lowering my voice. Darkness follows, curling around us both like smoke. “You broke something you can never fix. But that doesn’t mean you’re done.”

Her gaze lifts, confusion and uncertainty filling her eyes. “What do you mean?”

“You betrayed me, and served Sereven. Now, you’ll bow tomypurpose.”

The darkness shifts, coalescing into something that isn’t quite solid, but is more than shadows. Voidcraft weaves through it, a manifestation of power long suppressed but now fully restored with the return of my ring. It takes shape, becomes something with wings, perching on my shoulder. My familiar.

Confusion is followed by understanding, and then fear. “You want me to lead you to him.”

“Not justtohim. To the trap I’m sure he’s planning. The force he’ll have waiting to make sure you do exactly what he told you.”

Her spine stiffens, the last vestige of the commander she once was falling away. The woman who led Stonehaven has gone. Only the traitor who will now become bait remains. “And if I refuse?”

A cold smile lifts my lips. The shadow-raven on my shoulder spreads wings that seem to extend far beyond physical possibility, filling the room with darkness once more. “You won’t. Because you know what Sereven does to failures.” My voice drops. “But you’ve never witnessed what I do to traitors.”

I don’t need to elaborate. The shadows speak for themselves, writhing and coiling with barely contained hunger. Her fear breaks free again, and this time she doesn’t hide it. It’s naked in her eyes, in the trembling of her hands, in the shallow, rapid breaths that make her chest rise and fall like a frightened bird’s.

“He’ll have soldiers waiting. Dozens. Maybe more.”

“I hope so.”

She opens her mouth, perhaps to argue further, but the door creaks open before she can speak. The sound cuts through the tension in the room, momentarily disrupting the cloud of shadows that has gathered around us.