Chapter 74

End him - Aksala growled and retreated to the back of my mind, waiting. Her excited rage was palpable.

I walked up to my father's desk that he had the nerve to sit at. My finger brushed the familiar polished wood and pain clawed at me. This was the last part, I silently promise my mother and father. Grief had no place here, not yet.

I focused instead on the sheets of paper. They started out legible, numbers that might have been accounts, a list of names, but then scribbles drowned in black ink marred the rest of the pages.

I didn’t give him the satisfaction of watching him even out of the corner of my eye. It was an insult to not even watch your opponent. But I didn’t see him as one, and he knew that.

When I looked up, he wasn’t afraid anymore. He was staring at me with the disgust I should have worn for him.

His eyes were black, skin pale and etched with those crawling inky veins.

He looked and felt… wrong.

“You cannot be this shocked to see me standing here,” I started. “I won’