Page 125 of Warlord's Plaything

The second clips my jaw, splitting the skin, sending a slow, warm trickle of blood down my neck.

The people laugh.

The guards drag me forward.

I bare my teeth.

This is nothing.

This is the prelude to their own fucking destruction.

My body burns with exhaustion, with pain, with what’s coming.

But my mind?

It’s somewhere else.

Somewhere darker.

Somewhere hotter.

Somewhere that smells like wild fire and sweat, like skin and sin, like her.

Hira.

Her touch is still on me, still carved into my flesh, soaked into my bones, burned into every part of me that refuses to fucking forget.

The way she took me like she was drowning, like she needed me as much as I needed her.

The way her fingers dug into my back, her body arching, her gasps turning to desperate fucking prayers in the dark.

The way she whispered—I never left.

Which means she’s coming.

The steps leading up to the execution platform in the center of the arena are slick with blood from the last poor bastard who stood here.

The aura of iron and death thickens the air.

A block of black stone waits in the center, stained with the ghosts of a hundred dead men.

The executioner stands beside it, blade already gleaming in the sun, hungry for the next kill.

For me.

Kaelith is already waiting at the top of the platform, watching, his expression that same smug amusement.

"Such a waste."He sighs, shaking his head as I’m forced to my knees before him."You could have been something greater, Xyron. You could have been a god."

I spit blood at his feet."I already am."

The crowd roars.

The guards grab my shoulders, forcing me down, pressing my face to the stone, baring my neck to the blade.

The executioner raises his sword.

Kaelith steps forward, speaking loudly, addressing the people like a fucking king.

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