A Vow So Bold and Deadly (Cursebreakers, #3)(103)

Tycho is at his side, holding his hand.

I drop to a knee beside the scraver. His blood has formed shallow, glistening pools on the stone floor. I expect his eyes to be closed, his chest no longer rising with breath, but he blinks at me, too slowly.

“Iisak.” I touch a hand to a wound without thought, reaching for my magic, but his eyes close and he shakes his head fractionally.

My magic does not heal him. The wounds continue to bleed.

The magic-resistant dagger is lying on the ground in a puddle of blood.

He’s been stabbed at least a dozen times.

Iisak squeezes my hand.

“Help me,” I say, and my own voice wavers. “Help me help you.”

He shakes his head again, a minute movement. “Save him,” he says, and his eyes flare with desperation—before they fall closed.

I squeeze his hand back, but his goes limp. His chest doesn’t rise again.

“No. No!” Tycho sniffs and looks at me. “Can you …,” he begins, but he must see the tormented look in my eyes, because he falls silent.

I can’t. All this magic, and I still can’t save one of my friends. So much loss, and yet there’s always room for more. My chest is tight, and I have to force myself to breathe through it.

Jake kneels beside me and puts a hand on my shoulder.

You didn’t have anything else to live for, he said earlier. The words feel full of foreboding now.

But then I remember what Iisak said, and that pierces my sorrow. “Save him,” I repeat. I look at Tycho and frown, then at Rhen, then at Jake and Solt. “Save who?”

Captain Solt steps forward and sheathes his sword. “The other one, I imagine. It came at us through the trees. We brought it down with an arrow through its wing, but Iisak stopped us. He spoke to the other one, but he seemed enraged. When he took off into the sky, we thought you were in danger, so I changed course and came here.”

There are too many startling revelations in that statement.

The other one.

We brought it down with an arrow.

You were in danger, so I changed course.

I remember the distant screeching in the woods when we approached. Harper said she was chased by something like Iisak.

Lilith’s words, when Iisak attacked her.

Nakiis?

Not Nakiis. His father.

Iisak crashed through the window to attack the enchantress. He’s always patient and insightful, taking time to evaluate a threat before acting. But today, he leapt into the room and threw himself at her. He didn’t care about magic, he didn’t care about politics or armies or anything but unbridled rage.

I remember a conversation I once had with Iisak, when we first saw how terrible Karis Luran could be. I asked why he risked a year of service under her control, with the faint hope of ever finding his son.

I would have risked a lifetime, he said. Would you not?

I hesitated, and he said, You would. Were you a father, you would.

Tycho is a second faster than I am. He shoves himself to his feet. “You said he’s in the woods? Take me to him.”



The injured scraver lies in a pile at the base of a tree, his wings limp and splayed against the ground. He’s almost invisible in the darkness, his eyes closed, his chest barely rising, reminding me of the day I first saw Iisak, curled up and lifeless in a cage at Worwick’s Tourney. Here, though, ice coats the ground around him, glistening in the moonlight. An arrow seems to have gone through his wing and into his rib cage. As we approach, I realize there’s someone with him, someone human, crouched in the darkness in a cloak.

I stop short, my hand falling on the hilt of my sword, and the others stop behind me.

The cloaked individual notices us at the same time, rising to his or her feet and drawing a blade. The scraver on the ground emits a low growl, his eyes flicking open. Clawed fingers dig into the frosted ground.

The soldiers at my back murmur in Syssalah, and they draw blades as well.

“Hold,” I say.

Tycho appears at my side. “He’s hurt,” he says. “Grey. He’s hurt.”

The cloaked figure seems to straighten in surprise, then strides toward us, shaking back the hood of the cloak.

At my side, Harper gasps, then starts running forward. “Zo? Zo!”

Completely heedless of the blade, she tackles her friend in a hug. She’s speaking in a wild rush. “How did you—what did you—what—how—”

Zo returns the hug, but she’s looking over Harper’s shoulder at me, at Rhen, at the other soldiers. She hasn’t dropped her sword, and I can imagine how this looks, the crown prince surrounded by soldiers from Syhl Shallow. “What—how … how did you?”

“Stand down, Zo,” says Rhen. “Much has happened.”

She’s staring at him, at the ruination of his face. “I see that.”

The scraver behind her growls again.

At my side, Tycho’s breathing has gone shallow. “Grey. Help him.”

I hesitate. I know what Iisak said, but I know what Solt said, too. This scraver attacked our soldiers. He attacked Harper. He was clearly working with Lilith if those things were true.

Tycho doesn’t wait for my answer. He sheathes his sword and strides forward.

The scraver’s growl turns into an ear-splitting shriek, and he puts a clawed hand against the ground, his wings fluttering as he tries to get to his feet. But then he coughs, and it’s a rough, terrible sound. Blood appears on his lips. His eyes are cold pools of black, very different from the warm-yet-ironic gaze that Iisak always had.