Page 97 of An Honored Vow

“But it is. I made the only move I could—I pierced that dagger through her chest before you could discover the truth. So that I could live to carry out our promise.”

“Your promise?”

“To end the Crown.”

Damien scoffed but it was airy and feeble. “A child’s dream.”

“Yes, a child’s promise turned into a vow the night you gave me that dagger.” I lifted my chin. “The night you gave me my scars.”

Damien’s black eye flashed with amber at the memory of cutting my back. I let him linger on the joy of it before I revealed the last part of that story.

“But I made a promise to myself that night too.” I grabbed the mage pen from my pocket, magically conjuring it into the dream. “I took the blade you cut me with and carved Brenna’s name intomy arm so I would never forget the vow I made. So I would never stop fighting for our freedom.” I cut the smooth skin of my arm with the pen just as I had all those year ago, my blood dripping onto the floor in a thick pool that Damien couldn’t look away from.

“A fight that spanned thirty years before the battles began?” Damien snorted, finally meeting my gaze. “How much preparation did you need?”

“One Halfling cannot topple what your father built on her own. I needed to learn that lesson. But the resistance never faltered.” I slipped the ring from my finger and reveled in Damien’s gasp. “I never stopped carving names, you see. Every time I was forced to slaughter a family or kill an innocent at the Crown’s behest, I marked their name into my flesh. Reminder after reminder, year after year, of the lives you would answer for when that reckoning came.”

Damien’s eyes widened as he saw me—truly—for the first time. I wore only a simple leather vest with an open back that showed every scar along my torso. The ones he had carved and the ones I had.

I allowed him to see me completely, the decades of treachery carved into my skin.

Finally.

“You traitorous snake,” Damien spat.

I smacked his goblet from his hand. “Attack as many cities as you wish. But I’ve been preparing for this fight for a long time. I will not lose.”

Damien tried to stand but I shoved him back into his chair. It creaked as I leaned over him, lurking like death over a sickbed ready to claim him. I toyed with the dagger at my belt, a quick escape from this nightmare, but there was one question I couldn’t keep myself from asking.

“How does it feel to know that you were bested so long ago?”

“You have not beat me yet.” Damien’s breath fell hot on my neck as he scowled.

I shook my head. “Not me. Brenna.”

“I would hardly call her death a victory,” Damien grumbled.

“And that is precisely why she beat you.” I placed my hand on the back of his chair. “Because she made a play that you never would. That you’re incapable of. She was willing to die to make sure her successor had a chance of winning.”

“A true master does not prepare for a successor.”

“A master doesn’t, but a leader does.”

Damien’s lip recoiled. “Yet Elverath ismykingdom, not Brenna’s. This land is mine.”

I shook my head. “Land does not belong to the person who claims it, but the one who is willing to die for it.” I shoved a knife into his chest, enjoying the way the air wheezed out of the cavity even though it caused him no pain. “And you shall die for nothing.”

CHAPTERTHIRTY-EIGHT

THE SUNS HAD SETby the time we reached the mountain slope outside the city of Volcar. Damien’s men circled the perimeter of the city—the line a dozen soldiers deep. Their ships waited in the channel behind them, stocked and armed.

I stood high along the hill with the Fae lined beside me while Riven and Pimiirth waited in the nearby woods with the rest of the Elverin, ready to attack once the path was clear.

I scanned the ships with my spyglass. My eye caught on a young man with a tiny dagger fastening his black cloak.

Damien had a new Arsenal every week. The new Dagger was the leanest so far, though from the way his dark eyes shifted around the crowd, noticing every hint of movement, I knew he was a sharp shot. His short frame was deceiving, but Gerarda had proven that a Dagger didn’t need to be large to be deadly.

He stood at the top of the tallest mast in the armada, his ship still docked at port. He took out his own spyglass and held it up to his eye. One dark brown, the other black. At least until Damien decided to peer through it.

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