Page 82 of Sweet Venom Of Time (Blade of Shadows #6)
Chapter Thirty-Four
AMIR
T ime split me open.
The vortex yanked me from the nothingness between seconds, ripping through flesh and thought, until reality slammed back with a sickening jolt.
I landed in the front room of my English home and stepped straight into a nightmare.
The air was thick with ruin.
Fabric lay across the floor like discarded skin, torn and twisted, as though the house had tried to tear itself apart. A shattered vase spilled petals like blood. The curtains sagged from their rods, limp and heavy, like nooses after the fall.
And the silence…
The silence was unnatural. Not peaceful. Not still. But bloated—swollen with grief, too full to breathe.
Then the scream tore it open.
“Roman is dead! My son is dead!”
It pierced the room like shrapnel, raw and unfiltered, a sound born from the marrow of suffering.
Elizabeth stood in the center of the wreckage, a ghost made flesh.
Her skin was pale, her eyes wide with a horror no soul should ever carry. Tears carved down her cheeks, but she didn’t seem to feel them. She was locked in place, frozen in the moment her world died.
In her trembling hand, a letter flailed—fragile, broken, desperate, it seemed, to escape the truth written within.
I moved toward her, each step heavy with the weight of truths I could no longer withhold, secrets I had kept for a grander purpose, for the love that bound me to her in ways words could never capture.
Roman wasn’t dead. But he was far beyond her reach, lost in the sands of Rome.
Gently, I took her by the shoulders, feeling the shivers that coursed through her body.
She was unraveling before me, breaking under the weight of a lie she believed was truth.
I guided her to a chair, my touch firm yet tender, grounding her in the here and now.
“Sit, my love,” I urged, my voice low, every piece of the shattered room fading from my mind as her pain became my sole focus. “It’s time you knew everything.”
Her breath hitched, and she looked up at me, her gaze lost and desperate. “Amir… the Commander of the Army in the New World wrote to me…” Her voice wavered, breaking on the sob that ripped from her chest. “He said Roman is dead.”
The agony in her words tore through me, raw and visceral, leaving wounds I could never allow her to see. She searched my face, eyes brimming with confusion, searching for a hint of deception, a glimmer of hope.
I took her hands in mine, grounding us both in the moment. “Roman… is alive,” I said, each word a fragile lifeline cast into the depths of her despair. “He’s not dead. He has traveled through time… to find his twin brother.”
Her eyes widened, her mouth falling open as disbelief warred with hope. “Alive?” she echoed, the word a whisper, trembling on her lips. “But… the commander said… he’s dead. And his twin… his twin brother died at birth!”
Her words hung between us, heavy with grief and confusion.
“No, my love.” My voice was a low, unwavering rumble against the storm of her grief. “Dancing Fire raised our other son, Marcellious. He has been alive… all along.”
A strangled cry tore from her lips as she lunged at me, her fists small yet fierce, striking my chest with a fury born of heartbreak. Blow after blow rained down, each carrying the weight of her sorrow, betrayal, and disbelief.
I sat unmoving, the stoic Pasha Hassan, weathering the tempest of her anguish, letting her pain shatter against me like waves against a stone. I would take it all—her fury, her heartbreak. I deserved no less.
And when her strength gave out, when her hands trembled and fell against me, I caught her, gathered her into the safety of my arms, cradling her like something sacred, something I had failed to protect.
“Elizabeth…” Her name was a murmur against her hair, my voice breaking where hers had cracked. “You’re right to be angry. But we did it to protect them both. And to protect you.”
She wrenched away, eyes wild, grief-stricken, demanding answers I didn’t know how to give.
Rising from my lap, she stood before me like a storm contained in human form.
“I don’t understand!” she cried, her voice splintering with agony.
“How does protecting me end with breaking my heart?” Her breath hitched, shoulders trembling.
“What will he think of me when he finds out? That I let him go? He was alive all along, raised by another… and you knew?”
Her words stabbed deep, clean, merciless. I stepped forward, gently cupping her face in my hands, holding her like she was the only truth in a world of lies.
“Shhh.” I hushed her, my thumbs brushing her tear-streaked cheeks. “We made choices—harrowing choices. But they were made with love. With fear. With the weight of the world on our backs. One day… You will understand. Trust in that, even if you can’t trust me right now.”
Silence stretched between us, thick with the ghosts of what we had lost.
A sudden, searing pain bloomed in my chest, like a dagger twisting beneath my ribs. I had done this to her. I had kept the truth buried, thinking it would save her. And now, I watched disbelief carve into her soul, the shock hardening her expression, turning love into something jagged.
Without a word, I reached for her, gently guiding her to the worn sofa—the very place where I had sat for countless nights, haunted by this moment’s inevitability. The cushions sighed beneath her weight, echoing the heaviness now suffocating the room.
“Sit,” I murmured, far more gently than I felt inside. These were the same hands that had led armies, wielded blades, and drawn blood—and now they trembled beneath the weight of secrets I could no longer carry.
“I don’t believe you!” Her voice cracked like thunder, raw and breaking. The softness in her tone was gone, scorched by betrayal. “Our sons are dead.” The words were a curse, a desperate defiance hurled into the void—as if saying them could will the truth into falsehood.
I sat beside her, but our closeness did nothing to bridge the vast chasm. The air between us felt like an ocean—too deep, cold, and impossible to cross.
My jaw clenched, and I could feel the dark, seething fire of frustration and desperation smoldering beneath the surface.
“I don’t keep things from you without cause,” I growled, the words laced with the fury of a man who’d sacrificed everything to protect the woman who now doubted him.
“Everything I’ve done was to shield you from dangers you can’t begin to fathom. ”
The weight became too much to bear. Abruptly, I stood, unable to sit still, the restless energy inside me threatening to consume me whole. My hand clenched at my side, aching to reach for her—and yet knowing that my touch might harm rather than soothe.
She looked up at me, her sky-blue eyes awash with tears, her entire being trembling. “Are you leaving again?” The question was a cry, a plea, a blade twisting in my chest. “I can’t bear to be alone again.”
“Gods, Elizabeth. No!” I spun to face her, my chest heaving as the words tore from me, raw and unfiltered.
“This time… I’m staying.” The declaration hung heavy in the air, a promise from the depths of my soul, an oath that bound me to her irrevocably.
I had sworn to Lazarus that I would stay away and protect her from Salvatore’s wrath by keeping my distance.
But I couldn’t do it anymore—I couldn’t keep pretending to live without her.
Twenty years had passed since she crafted the Noctyss poison.
Twenty years of exile, watching from the shadows as she raised our son alone.
Surely Salvatore had long forgotten about the poison…
forgotten about her. There was no more reason to hide or deny the truth that had always been inside me.
Nothing and no one could destroy our love.
Nothing would take her away from me again.
I closed the distance between us, my heart thundering in my chest, every fiber of my being drawn to her.
I wanted to comfort her, to worship her, to give her the life we had been robbed of.
All those years apart, I had been nothing but a ghost, slipping in and out of her life just long enough to ensure she was safe, always leaving before Roman could see me.
I watched her from the shadows as she bore the weight of single motherhood and gave him the love and guidance I could only dream of sharing.
She did it all alone, and it broke me. I wanted to be there with her, share the joys and struggles of parenthood, and be the father Roman deserved.
Elizabeth’s shoulders trembled, her face crumbling as tears spilled down her cheeks, each drop a testament to the pain we had both endured.
My resolve shattered. I sank to my knees before her, my heart aching with every sob that tore from her.
Gently, I took her hands in mine, feeling the cool softness of her skin against my own.
Her touch was a balm to the storm raging inside me, grounding me, healing me.
“My darling Elizabeth…” I whispered, my voice fracturing beneath the weight of everything I’d never said.
“When we crashed into each other that day all those years ago, you walked into my world of darkness—and you changed it. You changed me.” My thumb traced slow circles over her knuckles, savoring the feel of her, the woman who had anchored me when I was lost.
Her tears slowed, her gaze falling to where my hands cradled hers as if she couldn’t believe I was real. I held on tighter, a surge of desperation flaring in my chest. I would never let her go again.
A memory surfaced, raw and vivid, one that had haunted me since the night it was born. I breathed, the words tumbling out before I could stop them. “Do you remember… the night we conceived our sons?” My voice was low, rough, heavy with emotion. “You asked me… what my daughter would be like.”