Page 204 of A Vow of Wrath and Ruin

“Yes?” she said in a voice that was barely a whisper.

“If you’re in here, where is your army?”

She coughed.

“They shouldn’t have been able to come through without your orders.”

A pit opened in my stomach. As much as I wanted to finish what I’d started here. I knew I had to leave.

I ejected myself from her mind. The chamber came into focus. The Scepter of the Dead lay in my right hand and the pit in my stomach filled with lead.

The bodies of my friends were strewn across the sanctuary floor.

Baylis, Kita, and Alwin were nowhere to be found.

A cough echoed through the chamber. I ran to Amolie.

“What happened?”

Deep down, I knew. Erissa touched the knot in my chest, and it unraveled. Not all the way, but enough to kill the two people I loved most. She knew my weaknesses and her ancient magic was enough to loosen the knot.

Tears welled in my eyes.

This was my curse: bound to be alone. Bound to kill the ones I loved. I was the Queen of the Damned, including myself.

“I don’t know,” Amolie said through a whisper. “Your eyes started glowing and then the next thing I knew light came shooting out from your fingertips. The others fled with Erissa’s body, but…”

I looked at Caiden and Tharan lying still on the hard marble floor. My words caught in my throat.

“Amolie, what have I done?”

This was my fate. Why had my mother not warned me? Was she protecting me? Would I have to choose who to save?

“I don’t think you meant to do it,” she said, lifting herself up off the floor.

I went to Tharan. His radiant green eyes flitted up at me trying to make sense of who I was.

“Hey, beautiful,” he said, blood gushed from his mouth.

I had done this. No one else. Only me.

“No, no, no, you can’t leave me.” Tears marred my words. “I don’t know what to do without you. You’re my rock. My life. My?—”

The figure of a man dressed in all white muslin robes appeared before me.

“Aelia, let me take him.”

“No,” I said, pulling him tight to my chest. “You can’t have him.”

My attempts to save him were futile. His breath was shallow, and his eyes were shut. Soon his soul would be gone and there was nothing I could do about it. But I didn’t want to let him go. I didn’t want the only good thing left in my life to be gone. I’d lost everything, and this time, it was of my own making.

Hadron blinked slowly at me.

“You and I both know I must take him, as well as Caiden. I will give you time to say goodbye, but then I must take them.”

My heart wrenched in my chest. How could I say goodbye to these men I loved so fiercely? I took Tharan’s face in my hands.

“This isn’t goodbye. I will bring you back.”

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