Page 117 of Slaying the Vampire Conqueror

I would be willing to make the same sacrifice.

Atrius was looking at me strangely, his brow furrowed. His thumb swept over my hand and I realized it was shaking.

“Vivi,” he said softly. That was it. Just my name, and in it, the question he didn’t ask.

For one powerful moment, I wanted to tell him all of it. The truth.

That was a selfish desire.

Because if I told Atrius the truth of why I had been sent here, that made me a traitor. And a wartime leader, when confronted with a traitor, only would have one choice. He would need to execute me. Even if he decided I was too important to sacrifice, he wouldn’t trust me, and heneededto trust me if he and his people were going to make it through the Zadra Pass alive.

Or.

Or, even worse, he would try to save me.

And Atrius could not do that. The Pythora King was his enemy. The Pythora King needed to remain his only focus. Not the Arachessen. He couldn’t save meandkill the Pythora King. Trying to might destroy him.

Somehowthiswas the possibility, not my execution, that left me breathless with terror. Strange, because it never would happen that way. Atrius was a ruthless king. He’d kill a traitor.

I told myself this, over and over, as he gazed at me with such concern, thumb rubbing the back of my hand.

I gave him a weak smile. “I just... I can’t think about any of that until that bastard is dead. That’s all.”

He nodded, like this made perfect sense to him.

“Of course,” he murmured.

It was now dark. The sun had set. Atrius stretched, then started to stand. “I’ll let you get dressed. Then we have work to do.”

But I caught his arm and pulled him back down. And before I knew what I was doing, my hands were on either side of his face, my mouth against his in a deep kiss.

After a moment of confusion, his stance softened, pulling me closer.

I kissed him for a long, long time.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

The moment the sun went down, the night was bright with activity. Soldiers and healers crawled from their tents immediately, ready to tend to the wounded or to keep gathering supplies. Vampire healing had done wonders—my own wound was now little more than an afterthought.

I took the long way back to my own tent, walking along the coastline. In the distance, the moonlight caressed the rocks by the shore. I couldn’t help but think about what had happened there last night. Weaver, I wondered if I’d left claw marks on those rocks.

Then I abruptly stopped.

A distant presence caught my attention—a familiar presence. The pain in it left me breathless.

I climbed down to the shore and approached another cluster of jagged stone. The figure was curled up between them, sitting in the damp sand, knees pulled up to his chest. He had a blade that he twirled skillfully in one hand, driving it hard into the damp sand over and over again.THWACK.

“Erekkus,” I said softly.

He heard me. He didn’t look at me.

He yanked the blade from the sand, twirled it, drove it back in.THWACK.

I approached him and sat beside him. Up close, his aura vibratedwith such agony, it tore through me like broken glass. His expression was drawn and exhausted. One side of his face was burned—his flesh purple and slightly blistering. He had not bothered to avoid the sun.

“I don’t need platitudes.” He sounded hoarse, like he hadn’t spoken in days.

“I didn’t bring any.”

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