Page 37 of Orc's Veil

His jaw tightens. For a moment, I think he’s going to retreat—going to rebuild those walls of discipline and duty that have been crumbling since he arrived at the boundary. Going to be the executioner instead of the man.

Instead, he leans forward and presses his forehead against mine.

“It’s not.” The words are barely a whisper, meant only for me. “It stopped being about protection the moment I felt our blood mix. The moment the Veil settled for the first time in years because we were standing side by side. The moment I realized that killing you would mean killing a part of myself I didn’t know still existed.”

My heart stutters. The chains feel lighter suddenly, the stone warmer at my back. Because he’s here—this massive, brutal, broken man—kneeling in front of me like I’m precious instead of condemned.

“Varkhul.”

“Tell me.” He pulls back just enough to meet my eyes, and the desperation in his gaze undoes me. “Tell me what you carry. The memories, the voices, all of it. I want to know what you’ve given to this boundary. What it’s cost you.”

I should refuse. Should keep the darkness locked away, should maintain the careful walls I’ve built around my own horrors. No one wants to hear about the stolen memories that live in my head, the grief that isn’t mine but feels like it is, the faces I see every time I close my eyes.

But he’s looking at me like I’m the only thing in the world that matters. And the chains around my wrists are cold, but his presence is warm. And I’m so tired of carrying this alone.

So I tell him.

“The first memoryI stole was a mother’s lullaby.”

I stare past him, into the darkness beyond the stones, where the Veil shimmers with its dying light. “I was eighteen. Still learning. A family had wandered too close to the boundary, and their youngest—a boy, maybe five—was dying. The Veil wanted blood. His blood. All of it.”

Varkhul doesn’t interrupt. He stays crouched before me, a solid presence in the dark, listening with an intensity that makes me feel seen in ways I haven’t felt in years.

“The witch who trained me—she’d died the year before. I was alone, untested, terrified. And this boy was looking at me with eyes that trusted me to save him.” I laugh, but it comes out hollow. “So I tried an old technique. A forbidden one. I offered the Veil a memory instead of blood. His mother’s memory of singing him to sleep.”

“It worked.”

“It worked.” I meet his eyes again. “The boy lived. His mother couldn’t remember the song anymore—couldn’t remember the feeling of holding him, rocking him, loving him in that specific way. But they both survived. And I thought… I thought I’d found a way to spare people. A mercy that wasn’t murder.”

“But it wasn’t.”

“No.” The word tastes like ash. “Every memory I take lives in me first. Just for a moment—long enough for the Veil to claim it. But during that moment, I feel it. I become it. That mother’slove, that warmth, that bone-deep certainty that her child was the most precious thing in the world—” My voice cracks. “I felt all of it. And then I watched the Veil consume it, and I knew it was gone forever.”

Varkhul’s hand finds mine—the one that isn’t chained. His grip is warm, grounding, an anchor in the storm of memories threatening to pull me under.

“How many?”

“Hundreds.” I can’t look at him now. Can’t bear to see the judgment that must be forming in his expression. “Hundreds of memories, each one precious to someone. Some days I can’t tell which griefs are mine and which belong to strangers I saved.”

His grip tightens. “Eirene?—”

“Are they wrong?” I finally meet his eyes, and I see—not judgment. Not disgust. Sorrow. Recognition. A man who understands what it means to carry deaths that weren’t your choice. “I’ve stolen pieces of people’s souls, Varkhul. I’ve carved holes in their hearts and called it mercy. The order is right to call me a traitor. The Sovereign is right that I’ve fed it with every stolen moment. I’m not a hero. I’m just a different kind of monster.”

“No.” He releases my hand, cups my face instead, forces me to hold his gaze. “You’re a woman who has given everything—her blood, her peace, her mind—to protect people who will never know her name. That’s not monstrous. That’s sacrifice.”

“Sacrifice that feeds the enemy.”

“Sacrifice that’s kept the enemy contained for eight years.” His thumbs brush my cheekbones, wiping tears I didn’t realize I’d shed. “The Sovereign would have broken through long ago without you. Every memory you’ve taken, every tithe you’ve paid—they’ve held the darkness back. You’ve held it back. Alone.”

“Not anymore.” The words escape before I can stop them—an admission I’m not sure I’m ready to make.

His expression shifts. The sorrow gives way to a fiercer intensity, more possessive. “No. Not anymore.”

TWENTY-TWO

EIRENE

Itell him about the Sovereign.