Page 194 of A Vow of Blood and Tears

My whole life… what had I feared? First, the pain of the Eldest Sister’s cane cracking across my fingers. Then the lonely isolation of being alone, unable to speak, unheard and uncared for by all. And after that… the monstrous appetite of my husband, the terror of his fangs.

With Hakkon’s punishment, I came to understand that none of those things meant anything. They were false fears, lies I had chained around my own ankles to hold me back. I could have grabbed the cane, I could have forced others to read my words, I could have stood my ground instead of running from Bane.

For all of those fears, I’d had options. I just hadn’t seen them clearly at the time.

But this…

There had been no options. No fighting the arms of the wargs who held me down, no words that could stop Hakkon from doing what he’d done, no way to fight back. This was genuine fear, true terror.

I hiccuped, choking on another sob as I cradled my hands close to my chest, wanting the soothing comfort of my ownarms around myself and unable to get that close without sending another wave of blinding, sickening agony through my body. My scalp ached, hair torn away from where he’d brought down the hammer and ripped it back up, uncaring of what he tore away from me.

Hakkon was gone.

That was my only comfort now.

My stomach lurched again, bringing up nothing but acid that burned the back of my throat. I’d thrown up when he was done, my entire body revolting against the pain, wishing desperately I could either descend into the welcoming void of true unconsciousness or die, but I’d been granted neither.

Hakkon had carried the hammer out with him, only after showing me the head, clotted with gore. Left me alone in the tower, slumped under the window, my hands nothing more than shattered twigs, blood-slick gloves of flesh wrapped around broken glass.

I couldn’t look at them. I couldn’t stand to see what he’d done.

There would be no more words for me, ever.

Please, I mouthed to the ceiling. Who was there to hear me? No one. At this moment in time, alone in the tower, I didn’t believe there was a Lady of Light, nor a Mother Blood. No one who cared at all.

I wasn’t even sure what I was asking for.

My mind drifted, wandering aimlessly—wandering anywhere it could where there was no pain radiating through my arms, making my heart pound unevenly and my stomach churn.

But the sounds of battle outside brought me back to real life. Back to the terrible consciousness of agony and blood, of knowing I was silenced forever.

The screams of wargs. The squelch of metal through flesh. The shouts of vampires and men…

When had it started? While Hakkon was gleefully bringing the hammer down on my hands, or after, while I floated in a sea of dizzying pain?

I licked my lips, tasting my own blood—I vaguely remembered the wet splatter of it across my face, my mouth stretched in a silent scream so wide my jaws ached now—and fumbled to get to my feet, keeping my mutilated hands in the air.

The floor swayed under me, the entire tower tilting sideways, back and forth—I closed my eyes, trying to take deep breaths through my raw throat, trying to steady to the world around me. Another dry sob escaped me, and I swallowed the next one whole.

This was the end for me. I couldn’t cry; I had to see, to do something.

I didn’t look at the blood-soaked table. Instead I forced my gaze past it to the window, where dawn was just brushing its long, pale fingers across the barren land.

Where wargs boiled from the earth, rising by the hundreds, the thousands, dragging down the legions and tearing them apart.

I slumped against the window frame, panting for breath as I looked at it all, wishing Hakkon had simply killed me so it wouldn’t come to this.

From my window, I saw it all.

The land, soaked with blood. Rose, the wargs tearing at her. A storm of crimson petals swirled across the fields, scattering across the mud slurry all around the tower.

I stared down at the ground far below, at the petals fetching up against the stone in a bloody drift.

The wargs and the vampires, their faces so similar in some ways, blind with fury and bloodlust. But gods… the legions were losing. I shook my head, wishing I could scream for them toback off. To let the wargs have this—it was better than my people dying in the burrows beneath the earth.

And yet… there werethingsout there among the legions.

I gulped down another breath, another sob, squinting through swollen eyes.

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