Page 111 of Cursed

Craster stumbled and his bare feet scraped painfully against the cold stone as he fell to the floor. “I beg... I beg for mercy,” he gasped, his voice echoed in the silence that had fallen over the council chamber.

But then the low murmur of the Black Council drowned out his words.

They had already passed judgement over him.

It was only a matter of how long they would allow him to believe that he would survive it.

“Mercy?” Lucian laughed; a hollow sound that sent a shiver down my spine. “You plead for mercy at such a late hour? You should have thought about that before your betrayal.”

Craster quivered under Lucian’s piercing gaze. “I-I swear, my lord! I remain loyal to the Necromi!” His voice trembled and cracked under the weight of his panic. “I’ve done everything in service of our cause... I have—”

“Futile.” Lucian raised a hand and silenced the Elder with a dismissive wave. “Your loyalty is as thin as your magic. You have sought to align yourself with those who oppose us— But not for any other purpose than to protect your own investments and enrich yourself… I could have respected you for being loyal to the Sages for some… higher purpose— but you couldn’t even manage that.”

Lucian’s cadence—lazy, dismissive, and dripping with condescension—were clearly meant to be a broader condemnation. From the way some of the other members of the Council shifted and murmured, they sensed it, too. The old man on the floor in front of them wasn’t the only one on trial here.

That was how Lucian kept the power he had over the Necromi.

No one was safe.

“Please!” Craster scrambled forward, eyes wide and pleading like a cornered animal. “My lord, please! It’s not what you think! I only wanted to protect—”

“Enough.” Lucian’s voice lashed out like a whip, cutting through the Elder’s desperate pleas. The chill in the air deepened, and I could sense the Council shifting as their collective hunger grew— Not for justice. There was no justice in these shadows.

But for vengeance.

A scapegoat.

A distraction.

“Do you honestly believe your pathetic excuses will save you?” Lucian sneered. “Even with all of your power and position, you were nothing but a worm squirming in the soil—and now you are drowning in the rain.”

Silence fell over the chambers, and I could feel the violent thoughts and intentions of the Council members as they leaned against the wrought-iron railing expectantly.

Lucian’s eyes were icy—dead and cold—as he glared down at Craster’s pathetic form.

He leaned over the railing. “How has that power served you now?”

“I— I have done everything you asked,” the Elder gasped. “Everything— I gave up my magic—”

That was why he hadn’t fought back when we’d taken him.

A cruel smile tugged at my father’s lips.

“And you thought that would be enough.”

The murmurs of the Council rose and fell like waves and Craster looked to all of them, pleading without words for their intervention—but it would never come. From the slump of his shoulders, I could see that he knew it, too.

Lucian straightened up and turned slightly toward the crowd behind him.

“Death,” he said triumphantly in a voice that was as cold and unyielding as winter ice. “Your betrayal has no remedy, Craster. The shame you’ve brought upon yourself, your house— Upon all of us.” He paused for effect. “Your death alone can atone for this.”

Lucian turned and extended his hand. Pale red smoke wound around his long fingers and trailed across the stone floor to wind around Bastian’s legs.

Bastian’s lips curled into a smile that was both eager and unnerving.

“You will carry out the sentence,” Lucian said.

Bastian inclined his head at the command and stepped forward to perform the task.

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