Chapter 72

In a bleak vault, Zevander realizes someone freed Theron, just as Cadavros—wearing Alastor’s form—appears and demands Zevander face the truth. A memory surfaces of an ancient black griefcoffer with a puzzle lock, as past voices of Dolion and King Sagaerin urge restraint. The box materializes, and despite Zevander’s refusal, Cadavros opens it.

Memories crash over Zevander: the lid’s click, and inside, Theron’s severed head—mutilated and gnawed—evidence that General Loyce’s beasts and hands tortured him. Spiders pour from the coffer, circling as Zevander shields himself with flame. Cadavros recounts Theron’s prolonged torment after speaking to secure Zevander’s freedom, confronting Zevander with the truth he tried to forget.

A scorpion tears from Zevander’s back and relentlessly stings him within the fire’s ring. As pain overwhelms him, Cadavros claims Zevander “stabbed himself,” triggering a memory of Zevander inflicting his own wounds in Foxglove’s village, driven by guilt and the absence of vivicantem. Cadavros names Zevander’s rot: the father he failed, the family he couldn’t protect, and Theron’s death chosen for Zev’s sake.

Blocking the scorpion’s strike, Cadavros draws the vivicantem from Zevander’s pocket and demands he embrace his flames and sever empathy and guilt, insisting an assassin must not mourn or love. With Zevander broken by revelation and pain, Cadavros redirects him toward their next objective: destroying the ward.