Chapter 14: No Shame Left
949 Words
Chapter 14: No Shame Left
"Finally," Darius Blackthorn muttered, his eyes gleaming with a predator’s thrill.
After dragging that useless failure of a boy along like dead weight through mission after mission, it was finally time to sever the chain.
'I hope he runs. I pray he refuses.'
Because if Aric Blackthorn so much as flinched the wrong way, Darius would have the legal, personal, and deeply satisfying pleasure of ending him — officially.
The grand obsidian doors of the Blackthorn manor swung wide.
Out stepped Aric.
And behind him, silent as snowfall but twice as lethal, Seris.
Back straight. Eyes like twin blades of polished winterglass. Gait fluid and fast, as though he carried not weight, but purpose.
The gathered sentinels, clad in matte crimson armor, bowed as one. Aric did not spare them a breath.
"Ninth Vein," one murmured as he passed.
He said nothing, climbing into the bloodwood carriage without so much as acknowledging Darius.
Normally, such brazen disregard would have ignited Darius’ fury. Today? Today he smiled.
It didn’t matter. The boy was already dead. Just hadn’t accepted it yet.
Darius raised a gloved hand.
With a sharp whistle and a glint of runes, his unit vaulted onto their Equilaters — night-scaled, avian beasts with talon-blades and razor-feathered wings. With a thunderous gust, they launched skyward.
…
"Have them follow. If by some twist of fate he crawls back alive, kill him."
Vira’s voice, soft yet venomous, echoed in the lavish chamber.
She reclined near a lattice of stained glass, her body draped in shimmering chains of gold, her face a canvas of flawless cruelty. Her nails clicked rhythmically against a silver chalice.
Kael knelt at her feet, forehead almost brushing marble.
"Y-yes, Mistress."
He vanished into the hall.
Vira did not move.
Her lips curled slightly, her hand tightening into a fist that made her bangles jangle.
'No chances. No survivors.'
Aric Blackthorn would die. Whether swallowed by beasts or blades, it didn’t matter.
Her mind drifted, as it often did, to the ghost of a woman she could never outrun — white hair, frost-lit eyes, and a voice that never needed to shout to shatter.
Selene Blackthorn.
Her very existence had been a thorn Vira could never extract. Malakai’s mother had stood above her in station, power, and spirit — immune to every jab, untouchable behind the shield of her husband, Valerian Blackthorn.
Valerian — a monster with a poet’s smile.
Now they were both dead.
All that remained was their heir: the final, hated symbol of what Vira could never break.
So she made it her mission to break him instead.
'Let the sins of the mother be the child’s inheritance.'
…
The journey took nearly two days.
Equilaters could’ve done it in one, but the carriage slowed everything. Aric’s presence necessitated chains of protocol. That suited Darius fine. The longer the delay, the sharper the edge of dread.
They stopped at Iron Hold overnight, then resumed flight under the twin dawns of Blackreach’s twin moons.
And at last: The Black Reach.
An iron fortress carved into the very bones of the continent. Its walls — etched with age, smeared with ancient blood — rose like judgment into the sky.
Aric stared from the carriage, expression unreadable.
'Back already,' he mused, without emotion.
His last mission here had been a suicide sentence in all but name. A child thrown into war — 14, unevolved, unwanted — where monsters waited to rend him to ash.
And yet he had returned.
And now, they had the gall to send him again. This time, deeper.
'Don’t react. Don’t give them a drop of satisfaction.'
As they descended into the fortress’s central clearing, the aura shifted.
Soldiers turned. Conversations froze.
The bloodwood carriage was unmistakable.
The ruined heir had returned.
"It’s him."
"He’s back?"
"The Sovereign sent him again?"
"This one’s gonna eat him alive."
Aric ignored the storm of whispers, his focus locked on a figure approaching with measured authority.
Broad shoulders. Crimson eyes. Beard like a war banner. And the weight of memory in every step.
Rowan Blackthorn.
The murmurs died.
"Ninth Vein," Rowan said, bowing his head slightly. His voice was coarse stone wrapped in steel. "Unfortunate that we meet under these terms. You may recall me, but for formality’s sake, I’ll say it again. Rowan Blackthorn. I am your escort."
Aric nodded once.
He remembered. Rowan had been one of the few who didn’t treat him like rotting flesh with a heartbeat. There had been something noble in the man once. But now?
This was ceremony. Illusion. The Pit awaited.
And Rowan was just a leash.
'They’re making sure I don’t run. Not this time.'
His stomach coiled, but his face stayed carved in marble.
Rowan hesitated. "Would you prefer to rest before—"
"No."
Aric’s voice cut through the air like broken glass.
"Take me to the Pit. Now."
Silence. A suffocating silence.
Had he just…
The Pit?
The Pit?
That yawning, cursed wound in the world that chewed warriors like gristle?
Even the guards, forged in fire and old blood, recoiled.
Rowan’s brows knit. He had planned to offer reprieve. A breath before the plunge. Mercy, if only symbolic.
But Aric’s eyes — those ancient, cold, too-old eyes — stole the words from him.
There was no fear in them. No pleading, no protest. Only inevitability.
Rowan’s fists clenched at his sides. Beneath the beard, his jaw trembled.
'Gods help us. This boy… he’s real. More real than we deserve.'
If only.
If only he’d been born into a different name.
What a shame.
What a devastating, beautiful shame.
Rowan bowed lower this time.
"As you command. Follow me."
- Writer
