Page 133 of Crowned In Venom

VARKOS

The words fall from my lips like ashes, crumbling into nothingness.

"Please."

The great Varkos—warrior, heir to an empire of blood and power—kneels.

I bow before the woman I despise.

Before the monster that made me.

I kneel.

And I beg.

"I don’t want your empire," I rasp, the shackles dragging against my wrists, the iron biting into my skin. "I don’t want your power. I don’t want anything from you."

I lift my head, my body trembling from pain, from exhaustion—from the sheer agony of what I am about to give away.

"Just let her go."

The Matriarch tilts her head, her silver eyes gleaming, hungry.

"What did you say?"

"Take everything." My voice cracks, raw, desperate. "Use me. Kill me. Break me. Do whatever you want."

I bow lower, my forehead pressing to the cold floor.

"Just let her go."

Silence.

A terrible, suffocating silence.

Then—

Laughter.

It starts as a whisper, a low hum of amusement, curling around the edges of the air like smoke.

Then it grows.

Richer. Crazed.

"Oh, my sweet boy."

Her silk robes rustle as she stands, stepping closer.

"I have waited for this moment for so long."

I do not move.

I cannot move.

"Beg me again," she whispers.

I swallow what is left of my pride.

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