Wrath of the Extra-Chapter 43: Cruel Mountain II

Leara’s words hang like incense.

Cossa tilts his jaw away from her—refusing eye contact like it’s a concession. "I won’t join your war, Leara," he says, voice sanded flat. "I’ll carve out a third option."

It’s too late for that. The third option is identical to the second. He’s ours. Whether he works in our circle or out of it, the end result will be the same.

"Too little, too late," Leara sighs, echoing my thoughts. "Give up the act, Sebastian. It’s childish."

"Cossa."

"Mental illness..." I mummur.

His gaze flicks to me. Controlled anger. "I’ll remember you, Auren of Ovine." Such an empty threat. I’m so sick of posturing. You can’t do anything to me, fucking mongoloid.

"Don’t get mad at me. You chose shock therapy on your own. But I wonder, was that stoic endurance of pain, or just debauched masochism?"

Cossa wisely chooses not to entertain my toying, returning his attention to Leara. "I refuse."

"The boulder is already tumbling down the mountain at fatal speeds. It’d be quite the feat to stop it," she clicks her tongue. "You’re not strong enough to stop it. There are things outside of your control."

"My sword is not yours," Cossa sneers with righteous anger. "It is for the Barony of Cossa. Not for the Landeskogs, nor the Mateikos."

And what happens when the Landeskogs turn their sword on the ’Barony of Cossa’? Fucking inbred. Untamed power is a threat. The Landeskogs snuff out threats with ease. I would know.

"Only the strong can decide their fate," Leara adds, almost kindly. "But only a fool chooses impartiality."

He flinches at that.

"You had the time. The opportunities. But that’s all in the past. Now it’s time for the future."

Leara’s left hand rises from the lectern. The air itself morphs; it feels strange and sickly.

A soft glow. Then her hand squeezes.

The ropes burst apart, twisting, shredding, ripping, before sliding to the ground. Her Imprint, Pressured, is more fear-inducing and oppressive than I anticipated.

Cossa stretches his body, now freed. He rises from the bench.

He has a mean glare on his face. The typical, tight-jawed, stiff-backed, stoic wrath.

Cossa stares Leara down. Then he makes his way down the center aisle.

Then he stops. He turns to me. His hand gravitates to the sword on his side.

His face twists in pain. Then it scrunches in bottled fury.

Endangered. Misty Step.

SLASH.

The very air itself screeches in pain as the master swordsman slices at me. His draw is strange, muscles tight and unresponsive. Yet it’s still instant.

I should be dead.

Instead, all he cuts at is my after-image. I’m a foot or so further—any more and I might shut down.

Speaking of shutting down, the collar really does not like what Cossa just did. Attacking allies isn’t very befitting of an ally.

ZZZZZTTTTT.

Cossa crumples to the ground, muscles tensing, teeth gritting as he viciously spasms on the floor like he has cerebral palsy.

"ARGGHHHH...!"

I really struggle to hold back from kicking the man as he’s down. After all, I don’t like near-death experiences. I’m normal. But in the end, my self-control wins.

Well, the collar is absolutely destroying him. Rightfully so, but still, this is pretty bad.

Like, it’s still going. Worryingly long, at extremely high levels. It probably would’ve killed a lesser man. Hells, a lesser man wouldn’t have been able to even go against the order, let alone nearly kill me.

Speaking of, why me? Fucking asshole. Valeria is better prey—though I suppose she is a bit further away.

"Hah!" Valeria bellows. "That’s hilarious."

I glance at Leara. She glances back, shaking her head. She wants him to feel the consequences. He will be an ally whether he likes it or not. The only decision left for him is whether or not he wants to die for petty rebellion.

"Val," Leara breaks the quiet amidst his seizing. "Take him to Evan. He’ll get him a cot and some food."

Valeria takes a big, exasperated sigh as she stands. She grabs him by the uniform like a doll, slinging a fully grown man over her shoulder like it’s nothing before making her way down the aisle and out the door.

"And fix your leg," adds Leara, calling out. Leara gives an acknowledging, dismissive wave of her hand.

SLAM.

The doors slam closed. Not just shut—sealed. A punctuation mark. It reverberates through the chapel like a baritone song of old, filling the hollow space, bleeding into the floorboards beneath my boots.

Then it dies.

Everything is tranquil. Calm. Safe. Or as close to safe as you can be while sitting in a room with Leara.

"You’re full of surprises." Leara chirps, sinking into a lean on the lectern.

I rest on the front aisle bench. "I enjoy surprising you."

"There’s no need for that."

"Fantastic," I close my eyes as my head slides back. But I sincerely doubt that she can seriously go a single interaction without playing The Game.

It’s the wall between us. The boundary. We relish it because it’s clear. Defined. We each hold territory, and there’s security in that.

But social animals crumble in isolation. We can never see one another from behind the wall—not truly. Only masks tied to sticks that we hold up and dance over the ramparts.

Never have I wished for things to be different. Not in this way.

I’ll never tear the wall down.

I can’t.

"I wasn’t kidding, you know." Soft words like a euphorically cold breeze cut through my thoughts.

Her voice slices through me. Not loud, not sharp—soft. Too soft. The kind of softness that slips past armor because it doesn’t announce itself as an attack.

And it’s closer.

I open my eyes, and Leara sits on the same bench to my side, a single body length away.

Then she gets even closer.

The air changes before she even moves. It’s heat, pressure, temperature, gravity—all conspiring to make the space between us vanish. My first instinct is to back away and reach for my sword, but I shove that fearful twitch down.

I tense. Unease. Until I peer into those grey-white pupils.

It’s genuine. Sincere. Authentic. True. Whatever adjective to describe what she has now.

That which I lack.

My heart sinks. My stomach churns like batter.

"About...?" I reply. I default to keeping the conversation flowing. Stalling. Defaulting on a mental trick to keep the words flowing, as though continuing the conversation could ever save me from whatever lies at the road’s end. But my mind has gone haywire.

"Needing someone I can trust."

...

Fuck...

This is very, very bad. Like a nightmarish dream indistinguishable from reality.

Because that’s exactly what it is.

Her shimmering eyes. The dying sun that births light, reflecting at a just-right angle.

It paints her in colors she shouldn’t own. Colors that make her look mortal when I know she isn’t.

The shifting, like a tightness in the chest. Apprehension

A distant desire; longing. A twitch of the lips.

Fear. Uncertainty.

Something greater. Beyond fear:

It’s genuine terror.

How can the Mad Raven make such an expression?

And how could I ever buy it?

She’s tried this playbook before. It’s identical. Don’t tell me she’s mastered the craft of deception this quickly?

But I’m equally afraid of the other answer. So I believe neither. Not yet.

"You said the secrets stopped you." I’ll play along.

"I wasn’t in my right mind."

"And you are now?"

"I am."

Heat. A perfect, soft face, so close to mine. It’s intoxicating.

"And I’ll prove it," she says.

Her wall has shattered, the rubble chipping into my own.

Leara presses her lips against mine.