A Vow So Bold and Deadly (Cursebreakers, #3)(63)

Harper is shouting, but my brain can’t make sense of the words. I don’t know if she’s hurt, if she’s fighting, if she’s running, if she’s dying.

Lilith’s nails drag across my face. I feel my eyelid pull and tear, and suddenly that eye is blind with a wash of blood—or worse.

More shouts fill the room. My guards, led by Dustan and Zo.

“Harper,” I gasp. “Harper, run.”

“Stop!” Lilith screeches. “Stop thinking of her!” The windows shatter, exploding with glass that rattles across the floor. An icy wind sweeps through the room. I swing a fist to strike at her, but she catches my arm, and I feel the bones grind together. The pain is blinding. I try to breathe through it. I try to live through it.

She grips my jaw, and her eyes fill my vision. “You’re going to watch her die,” she says, her breath hot against my lips.

“I’m going to watch you die,” I grit out.

She smiles—but then she’s ripped away from me. I blink through blood and see Dustan bury a sword in her abdomen. She gasps, clutching at the blade. For an instant, he looks viciously victorious, but I know better.

“Run,” I choke out. I can’t watch her harm my people. “Get out. That is—an order.”

Lilith takes hold of the blade bare-handed, dragging it free, the look on her face almost euphoric. Her silk dressing gown has spilled open, revealing a stretch of naked body, the sword bringing blood and other viscera with it. There’s another wound, higher, pouring blood from her shoulder.

Dustan stares at her in horror.

He needs to run. He needs to run. He needs to run.

“Run,” I gasp. “Dustan—”

Lilith tears out his throat with her bare hands.

His body drops, lifeless.

She turns for the guards who were standing at his back, their swords ready. In her fist, she’s clutching the skin and muscle that she tore away from his neck, blood dripping down her wrist.

They blanch. Their swords clatter to the ground. They run.

I’ve seen it all before, when she first issued the curse.

It’s no better the second time.

My eyes finally find Harper. She’s got a bloodied dagger in her hand, but Zo is in front of her. I barely register that Zo has found my bow and quiver in the corner before an arrow is flying.

One strikes the enchantress through the neck. Then another through her shoulder. Another through the leg. Lilith staggers to her knees.

Another through her back. The enchantress is hissing, jerking at the weapons. She pulls one free of her neck and blood spills down her shoulder, but the wound closes just like the others in her abdomen.

That one slice in her shoulder remains unhealed, and blood continues to pulse from the wound. I stare at it, but my eyes don’t want to focus and all I can think about is Harper.

Zo grabs the last arrow from the quiver. Her eyes are wide and afraid, but she takes aim.

“Rhen.” Harper tries to limp past Zo to get to me.

“Go!” I cry. I try to get off the bed, but my knees won’t hold me. “Zo—get her out. Get her out.”

“No!” Harper screams.

Lilith stops jerking at the arrows. She’s braced a hand against the floor, and she’s wheezing now. This won’t stop her, though, I know.

It’ll just make it worse.

She grabs Dustan’s lifeless wrist, pulling one of his throwing blades free. I realize what she intends to do, and I leap for her.

I’m too slow to stop the throw, and all I do is affect her aim. The blade doesn’t drive into Harper’s chest or neck—it buries itself in her upper thigh. She falls.

Lilith scrabbles for another.

“Zo!” I call. “Get her out. Get them all out.”

Zo fires her last arrow, and it takes Lilith in the shoulder, throwing her forward. It puts us eye to eye again. But behind her, I see Zo drag Harper into the hallway. Zo is shouting orders at the guards who must be running to assist.

My body is in agony. I can’t stand. I can’t move. But suddenly it’s silent. I’m alone with the enchantress.

For the longest time, I listen to Lilith’s wheezing breath. I listen to my own.

The world begins to go spotty. Blood is pooling on the marble floor around me. Maybe she’s finally done it. Maybe she’s killed me.

But Harper got away. She got out.

Eventually, I hear a sickening pop, and I realize Lilith is pulling the arrows free, one by one.

Pop. Pop. Pop.

I blink at her. Only one eye works. I reach a hand to touch my cheek and find a mass of broken skin and blood. I try not to whimper, and fail. I wish for death to find me.

Lilith leans down and kisses me. There’s blood on her lips. “I like you better like this,” she whispers.

She got away. I lock my thoughts on that. Only that. Lilith can do what she wants to me. Harper got away. She’s safe. Zo will keep her safe.

“Finish it,” I breathe.

“Oh, no, Your Highness.” She kisses me again, and my body involuntarily shudders. “You know I need you.” She traces a tongue across my lips. “Now wait here while I go rip out her heart, the way you ripped out mine.”





CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

HARPER

There are dead guards littering the castle hallways. Some are pinned to the walls with their swords, while others have terrible slash wounds. Blood coats everything. I remember the first week of the curse, when I discovered a room that represented what Lilith had done to Rhen and Grey. It was horrific.