Colson

The Witch I Should’ve Buried Deeper

Colson POV

I should’ve killed her.

That was my first thought.

Not moral. Not dramatic. Just practical.

I should’ve finished it when I had the chance.

Instead, I’d been clever.

Trapped her.

Outplayed her.

Left her tangled in Amaris’s bloodline trap long enough to secure the first piece of the book.

I had assumed that was enough.

Assumed she’d stay buried.

Assumed time would hold her.

That was my mistake.

The city felt wrong tonight.

Not in the usual rotting, morally bankrupt, blood-slick way it always did.

Different wrong.

Intentional wrong.

Ezra had just finished giving me new orders — more digging outside the city, more witch meetings, more names. It wasn’t what he had ordered the first time I lived this life. That alone meant the threads were shifting faster than I liked