“You speak as though you’re not the one who blackmailed Ophelia, the one whose plot ended up with her dead,” Fin says through his teeth.

Az taps his fingers against his side. “Yes, but I’m not the one who touched her, am I? And as much as you’d love to hate me more than you hate him, you just can’t quite burn the image out of your mind.”

I don’t know what I’m expecting, but it’s not Dinah’s voice, piping up for the first time. “Az, stop.”

Az glances at his best friend’s little sister, a softness overcoming his features that I’ve only ever seen him use when referring to Asha.

“Dinah, I know this family has taken you in over the past year. But you have to know, better than anyone, what they’ve done to Asha. She’s changed in the time she’s been with them. I know you know what I’m talking about. They took the Asha we knew and loved and replaced her with…with…”

“With someone who has enough self-respect not to fawn over the likes of you,” Dinah says, each word carefully placed.

Az’s eyes narrow.

“If you wanted me to support you, you probably shouldn’t have kidnapped me and trapped me in a cave with a bunch of mercenaries,” says Dinah.

“We both know I never would have let you come to harm.”

Dinah, sweet, quiet little Dinah, scoffs.

“Though I suppose,” Az says, his sage-green eyes sliding to Fin, “I can see why you feel the need to defend Fin’s hatred of his brother, to change the subject. Does it remind you that you’ll always be the second choice?”

Dinah and Fin both go still, but it’s Lydia who speaks. “Are you going to get around to killing us, or do you have a few more souls you’d like to crush first?” She even has the audacity to sound bored.

“You’re probably right.” Az sighs dramatically, then turns, locking his eyes on me. “Thanks for bringing them to me, Blaise. I never would have known if it weren’t for your message.”

CHAPTER 102

NOX

I watch faces turn toward Blaise, Az’s words replaying in my head, threatening to undo me.

He thanked her.

This monster thanked her.

“You. You tricked me.” It’s Dinah speaking now, her voice trembling with what I first think is despair, but now recognize as anger. The type of anger that usually gets pent up for years before truly revealing itself.

Blaise refuses to look at Dinah. Instead, she keeps her neck long, barely breathing as she looks at Az.

“I thought you might need my help one of these days,” says Az, a smile staining his lips that I’d like to wipe right off of him.

“Blaise.” My mate’s name escapes my mouth, almost involuntarily.

The way she shakes her head is almost imperceptible in the dim torchlight.

Almost.

“I assume this is payment enough,” she says, refusing to look at her friends.

Dinah’s weeping now, mumbling something about her sister. Lydia curses under her breath. Fin still looks stunned from his heart being borne out for all to hear, but he wraps an arm around Dinah all the same, pulling her into his chest while she cries.

All of this, I keep track of with my peripheral senses.

But it’s Kiran who I have my eyes locked on.

Because he’s pinning Blaise with his stare.

I’ve never seen an expression so cold.

His muscles are tensed, ready to pounce, and I can see his fingers flexing, itching to tear my wife apart.

That’s not going to happen.

I don’t let myself consider what she’s done. She has an explanation, I assure myself. She has a reason she’s doing this.

“So much for the two of us understanding each other,” Kiran says.

Blaise turns and looks at him, just long enough. “We both know you would have done the same to me if the situations were reversed. Or have you forgotten the way my heart felt in your hands when you almost ripped it from my chest?”

A shadow falls across Kiran’s face, but Blaise isn’t done. “What you made me feel, what you made me experience down in that cellar, what you made me remember—I knew then you’d never forgive me. That you’d never forget what I’d done to Asha in betraying her.” Blaise turns her head to Dinah. “I’m sorry, Dinah. I truly am.”

Then she turns back to Az, who says, “I would say that’s quite sufficient. I’m assuming you want the curse on your lover removed.”

I stiffen. No. “Blaise, we don’t need—”

But Az interrupts me. “I know how it feels. To know you deserve a certain level of love, only to have magic take it away from you. I can’t force Asha’s magic to do anything, you know that as well as I do, but I’ll ask her to convince it on your behalf.”

Blaise lets out an exhale, slow and steady, visible relief loosening her shoulder blades.

The sight has a knife slicing through my heart.

I thought Blaise and I had shared everything. Our blood, our vows, our bodies, but now as I stare at the woman I love, the woman I’d rip apart the Fabric between realms for, there’s a part of me that wonders if she can’t help but hold some things back.

“Then I assume we’re done here,” Blaise says, her voice utterly devoid of emotion.

Az gives her a smile that reminds me of a serpent. “Take your lover and go. You won’t be hearing from me again.”

“And if the Old Magic needs us present to remove the curse?” Blaise asks.

Az’s lip twitches. “If it’s not gone in a mooncycle, you know where to find me.”

Blaise nods, flinching as Dinah spits at her, Fin holding Asha’s sister in his arms as she fights against him, lunging for Blaise.

Blaise stares at the girl for a moment, then looks up at me, pleading, sorrow filling those beautiful brown eyes of hers.

What have you done? I want to ask her. And why, why was my promise not enough?

She’s holding her breath when she brushes past me and toward the door, where the mere guarding it steps out of her way at a simple tick of Az’s head.