Chapter 83: Chapter 83: MAKE THEM SUFFER

VALORIA WILDEROSE

“All I’ve ever wanted was for you to love me… for all of you to love me. I took all the shame and pain, I made myself believe I deserved it. Why couldn’t you just love me, even for a little bit?” I feel tears welling inside me too. Feelings I thought I’d killed resurfacing again.

I hate how easily they come back. How one confrontation can undo years of burying them.

She almost believes me — almost gives in to my vulnerability for a sliver of a moment — before her heart hardens just as fast as it had softened.

“Because of you I never had a mother,” she confesses through bitter tears and clenched teeth. “Because you were born from her infidelity, she was hated and scorned. Even when I came along nothing changed for her. Because of you, she died alone from a broken heart and was labeled a whore. I had no mother.”

The words hit me harder than I expected. Not because they’re cruel — but because for the first time, I hear pain behind them. Real pain.

“It wasn’t my fault… I wasn’t the one who accused her of infidelity without any proof. I wasn’t the one who starved and raped and tortured her. I wasn’t the one who took her away from you. It was all that man’s fault. I’m his daughter — your sister — and I was never accepted because he didn’t want to accept me.”

She looks at me, hateful but speechless. I’ve never stood up to her before, never had the courage to utter the truth to her face, so she would have never known any of this.

She struggles with believing me — the person she’s hated and scorned — forced to wrestle with the possibility of being wrong, and she rejects it instantly.

“You’re lying.” Her frown deepens, refusing to take anything I say.

She’s a lost cause, yet she hasn’t swung the blade again or truly tried to overpower me like before.

“So what? Are you going to kill me again? Finish the job from last time?”

Her brow lifts, looking at me like I’ve suddenly gone mad.

“What are you talking about? I haven’t tried to kill you before.”

At first, I want to doubt her, even laugh in her face.

If anything, she’s made it painfully obvious since I returned home that she wanted me dead — with her hints, her taunting — but her eyes have never looked more honest.

She hates me, but she’s no killer.

It’s confirmed in the way she swings her weapon without ever making contact, despite the countless opportunities she’s had.

Which brings me to the question: if it wasn’t Marcella… then who?

The thought sends a chill down my spine. Someone else wanted me dead. Someone I haven’t even considered.

Just as we stare at each other, confused, she’s suddenly lifted off me — dangling above the ground by the collar of her cloak, held effortlessly by a shirtless and exhausted-looking Azrael.

“Do you have a death wish? Something about needing to die before I get the chance to kill you?” he asks, genuinely peeved, while holding Marcella up with one hand.

She thrashes and kicks like a furious five-year-old in his grasp.

“Let me go! Unhand me right now!”

He raises his hand toward her face slowly, and I imagine the worst.

“Don’t kill her, Azrael… she wasn’t going to stab me.” I cut him off before his hand can reach her neck.

“Are you sure?” He raises a brow, doubting me, but I reassure him.

“I’m sure.”

“Very well.”

Instead of strangling her, he snaps his fingers — and she vanishes in a puff of smoke, leaving the scent of candle wax behind.

I don’t need to ask where he sent her. I know it’s somewhere she won’t be able to reach me or threaten me with a dagger again.

I exhale, relief flooding through my bones.

I finally did it.

I stood up to my biggest oppressor.

I finally faced my trauma.

And I’m still standing. Still breathing. Still here.

Azrael offers his hand, and I take it without a second thought, letting him lift me off the dirt.

“But were you really going to kill her?” I ask, watching his expression carefully.

He flashes a charismatic, mischievous grin my way.

“Relax, Valoria. Even I draw the line at pregnant women.”

Relief washes over me at that — and I can’t help smiling at his childish antics in the process.

“Did you kill my father?” I ask next, needing to know what happened based on Marcella’s ranting.

I have little expectation of feeling anything, no matter his response.

I loved my father for too long — even after he ruined my life and my mother’s on purpose. And I had stopped loving him long ago.

Azrael’s boyish smile fades. He looks at me with complete seriousness.

“Do you want me to?”

“Judging by your response, I guess you didn’t. You spared his life. That’s unlike you. Why?”

“If you want him dead, you only need to say the word.”

Something about that simple offer widens my smile.

My hand lifts on its own, brushing a stray lock of midnight-black hair out of place on his head. He lets me touch him, leaning closer so I don’t have to stretch.

This new side of him is almost adorable.

Almost. If I ignore the fact that he could snap my neck just as easily as he snapped his fingers.

“Does this have something to do with your new… fascination with me?”

“Perhaps.” He muses on it, as curious as I am. “I’m in the mood to grant anything you desire.”

“I don’t want him dead.” I confess. Then, colder: “I just want all of them to suffer and pay for everything they’ve done to me.”

Every hurt. Every pain. Every injustice I’ve faced simply for existing.

He chuckles, pleased — far too pleased — with my answer.

“You almost sound like me—ruthless and cold. Am I starting to rub off on you?”

“Maybe,” I confess, hating to admit it, but a huge part of me had already begun changing long before now.

“If it’s what you desire, then I will grant it, Valoria.”

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