Page 17 of Sweet Venom Of Time (Blade of Shadows #6)

Chapter Eight

AMIR

T he late afternoon sun slanted through the windows of my London townhouse, gilding the mahogany bookshelves and velvet drapes in molten gold. Yet, the light never reached the corners. Shadows pooled there, untouched, as if the walls refused to relinquish their secrets.

I stood in the study, the scent of aged parchment and ink thick in the air, though beneath it lurked something fouler—something steeped in blood and suffering. The broad oak desk before me bore more than ledgers and maps; it was our war table, our battlefield before the real one began.

“Speak,” I commanded, my voice cleaving through the tense silence.

One by one, my men delivered their reports. The words dripped like poison, painting a twisted portrait of the city I had sworn to purge.

“Abandoned factories, Pasha Hassan—littered with the bodies of Timebornes and Timebounds,” rumbled a hulking figure, his voice tight, his eyes still haunted by what he had seen. “Derelict houses, underground chambers... all soaked in blood. Bones scattered like trophies. A graveyard without names.”

A map was unfurled, its crude lines marked with red circles, each one a site of horror. My fingers traced the inked paths, feeling the malevolence pulsing beneath the paper, a vile heartbeat that throbbed through the very streets of London.

Disgust coiled in my gut like a serpent.

“Destroy them.” The order left no room for hesitation. My voice was steel. “Every last den of those depraved Timehunters. If you find any of the Timebornes or Timebounds alive, save them. But make no mistake—the nests of evil must be scorched.”

A murmur of assent rippled through the room, but one voice rose above it.

“Pasha Hassan, are you certain there will be survivors?”

Doubt. Skepticism. The weight of too many horrors seen.

I fixed him with a stare that brooked no argument. “I doubt it. But if souls are clinging to life amidst the carnage, we will not abandon them. Rescue those who breathe. But let the fires cleanse this blight from our streets.”

A moment of silence, thick and heavy. Then, they saluted—a quiet acknowledgment of the burden I had placed upon them.

The study held its breath as if the walls bore witness to our mission’s gravity. The air crackled with unspoken resolve.

Then Ilyas stepped forward.

His rugged features were lined with exhaustion, his broad frame wound tight with something unreadable. His dark eyes, honed by years of surveying enemy territory, fixed on me with cautious intensity. One hand hovered near the hilt of his dagger, fingers twitching—a rare tell of unease.

“Pasha Hassan...” His gruff voice fractured the stillness. “We found something... strange.”

I lifted an eyebrow. “Strange?”

“A small cottage, five kilometers from the Alexander manor. It looks abandoned, but there are signs of life inside.”

A flicker of intrigue cut through my focus. “Signs of life? Explain.”

“Plants, sir. Too many of them. Growing wild, creeping up the walls, choking every inch of the place.” He hesitated, choosing his words with uneasy reluctance. “And inside… rows of vials and flasks. Glass everywhere. The kind you’d see in an alchemist’s den.”

A sharp intake of breath. Alchemy.

“Did you enter?”

“No, sir.” His grip tightened on the dagger. “We suspected poison.”

Smart.

I nodded. “Very well. Spread out. Burn every last Timehunter den to the ground.” My voice was quiet but absolute. Then, after a beat— “But leave the cottage to me.”

Murmurs of assent rippled through my men as they absorbed the directive. But Ilyas lingered, his gaze locked with mine.

“The cottage is well-hidden, buried deep in the western woods,” he said. “It’s strange—close to the Alexander estate, yet nothing like its outbuildings.”

My fingers drummed against my chin. “Indeed?”

Alexander had always denied any involvement with alchemy. He hadn’t just been evasive—he had lied. And now this? A secret lair tucked away on the fringes of his land?

“Intriguing.”

“Pasha Hassan, despite its abandoned facade, the place is active,” Ilyas pressed on. “Jars. Tools for mixtures. Fresh-cut plants and flowers. Whoever tends it isn’t just passing through—it’s a healer’s or an alchemist’s sanctuary.”

I straightened, and the decision was made. “Then it warrants investigation. Leave it to me.”

The room barely had time to settle before rapid, delicate footfalls echoed up the staircase, each step creaking in frantic succession.

Every man in the room went rigid.

Then—the door burst open.

It slammed against the wall with such force that the wood groaned, the crack of impact shattering the silence.

My hand went to my dagger, instinct kicking in before my mind registered the blur of silk, the tumble of wheat-blond hair?—

Elizabeth.

Disheveled. Breathless. Eyes wild with something unspoken.

“Leave us.”

The words were barely out before my men obeyed, slipping from the room without hesitation, vanishing like shadows at dusk.

“Elizabeth! What has happened?”

My voice was a low growl, rough with concern, not anger.

She was frozen in the doorway, her breath shallow, her blue dress reduced to tattered remnants.

The delicate embroidery, once pristine, was now smeared with dirt and something darker.

What had formerly been a symbol of refined elegance—her Caraco jacket—slipped from one shoulder, the lace edging torn and undone.

“Lord Hassan...” Her voice trembled, struggling to hold onto the last remnants of formality. But the weight of fear crushed the words before they could fully take shape.

I stepped forward, my touch light as I held her shoulders. Beneath my fingers, I felt the tremor of her body—small, violent quakes betraying the horrors she carried within her.

“Please, call me Amir,” I murmured, my tone gentler now. “There’s no need for formality here.”

She swallowed hard, her breath hitching as if fighting to hold herself together.

“I need to talk to you,” she whispered.

I let my hands slip from her shoulders, trailing down until they closed around hers. They were cold—trembling like small birds trapped in a storm. I held them gently, as if that could still the fear I felt pulsing through her skin… or mine.

“What happened?” My voice was quiet now, careful, afraid that too much force would shatter her fragile composure.

She hesitated, then exhaled shakily.

“Something happened at… at… at Lord Winston’s.”

Her eyelids fluttered shut as if trying to lock the memory away. But her body betrayed her—the way she stiffened, and her breath hitched unevenly.

The stillness that overtook her was more than fear.

It was petrification.

“What did you see?” I asked, my voice gentle, my thumbs stroking the tops of her trembling hands. A feeble attempt to ground her, to siphon away a sliver of the terror attached to her like a second skin.

Her eyelids flew open, panic stark in the depths of her gaze.

“It’s something I can never unsee!”

Her voice cracked, raw, and uneven, breaking under the weight of her own words.

“Come. Sit down with me.”

I guided her carefully, leading her to the corner chaise nestled beside the bookshelves. My grip was firm but gentle, as though she might collapse from the weight of what she’d seen—shatter like frostbitten glass.

The office, though designed for strategy and statecraft, suddenly felt too opulent for grief.

The warm firelight flickered over war maps and antique daggers mounted along the walls—remnants of a past I once took pride in.

Now, they bore silent witness to a different kind of battle unraveling before me.

But Elizabeth…

She did not belong in such a setting.

She sank into one of the plush velvet settees, yet the opulence did nothing to comfort her. Her hands gripped the armrests as if the solid wood might anchor her, her breath shallow, her eyes darting—searching, pleading for an escape from a prison that wasn’t made of stone but of memory.

“Tell me,” I urged again.

The room’s grandeur made the space between us feel vast, an abyss neither of us dared to cross.

“Talk to me, Elizabeth, darling.” The endearment slipped from my lips unbidden. “You’re safe here.”

A lie wrapped in silk, a promise spoken in a house built on shadow.

But when she looked at me—wide, trusting, searching for anything to hold onto—I felt something stir in my chest.

A flicker of warmth.

Unexpected. Unwanted.

Because in this world, warmth was a weakness.

And I could not afford to be weak.

Elizabeth swallowed hard, her hands still gripping the armrests as if she feared the room might collapse. When it came, her voice was fragile, her words stumbling like a child lost in the dark.

“I went to tea at L-L-Lord Winston’s house with my maid Mary,” she began, her syllables fractured, her breath coming in shallow gasps. “He was called away. I was told to wander… to familiarize myself with his—his despicable, dark home. His butler accompanied me.”

Her fingers clenched into fists, her knuckles whitening, the pearls strung around her neck trembling with her.

“But he… the butler…” Her breath hitched, her chest rising and falling too quickly. “He snatched Mary away. His eyes…”

She shuddered, her hand flying to her mouth, pressing so hard against her lips that I thought she might tear them open.

“His eyes glinted with malice. With… twisted pleasure. He said it was Lord Winston’s command.”

A muffled whimper slipped through her fingers, raw and involuntary—a sound torn from the depths of her breaking.

I leaned in, my voice a quiet anchor in the storm of her trembling.

“You’re safe here.”

Another lie.

It was a hollow reassurance—one monster offering comfort to the only soul he could never see as one.

But she needed something to cling to, even if it was only an illusion.

And so, I gave it to her.

Slowly, she uncurled from herself, but her voice remained a ghost, a whisper drifting on the edge of breaking.

“I stumbled upon this wretched chamber…”