Night of Masks and Knives (The Broken Kingdoms, #4)

by L.J. Andrews

″Malin.” My name off his tongue came like a plea. As if he were begging me to stop him, to keep him from crossing the line between us. I would do no such thing. He’d stolen my heart when we were young, and I’d never asked for it back.

HELL YEAH

″Damn you.” A harsh curse. It was all I was given before Kase kissed me.

AHHHHHHHHH

″I became a monster to survive,” I told her. “You want me as some stupid boy from your past, and the worst part is, for you, I wish I could be. I told you I hate everything about my past except you, and it’s true. At nights, when I was finally left alone for a few moments of peace, I thought of you. Thought of how it always was together. Thoughts of you kept me alive many times, Mallie.”

“Everything I want is all that you are.”

GOODBYE

Malin Strom was my beautiful downfall. And I would take any pain if it meant more of her. Ruin me. Brutalize me. Just give me her.

I cupped her face. “After this is over, I would leave with you.”

Stop

There were no lengths I would not go. No man I would not kill. I would burn the world to the ground to keep her breathing and in my arms.

The one rune on my body was from Kase. He’d drawn a symbol of protection on the inside of my wrist when no one was near, sealed with his kiss on the pulse point.

I needed to be the Nightrender, not a man right now. Certainly not a man in love.

LOVE????

Before I opened the pouch, I kissed Malin. Slowly. The kiss had meaning and spoke words I could not—I loved her. I had always loved her.

He kissed her knuckles, the same as I had not long ago. Maybe we needed to pivot and cut him down where he stood. Start a bleeding war in the courtyard of the masque.

Should she ask it of me, I would take to battle for her, without question.

romance ain’t dead

″Kase.” Hagen noticed. His face turned to steel. “Kase Eriksson is that my bleeding son?”

IM GONNA SOB OH MY GOD

“I would have guarded the boy as I guarded the rest of you. He made his choice.” ″What choice?” My voice broke, but no tears fell. I was too angry to cry. Too murderous to sob. ″To keep you from the curse of this.” Jens held up the glowing glass ring.

oh my GOD

“You are the heir of the Eastern Kingdom. Malin, your mother was the last heir and murdered for it. She was not my wife.”

“It’s the Lord Magnate, isn’t it? Tell me the truth, Lord Strom. I know he likes to cut throats, and if he’s going after Mallie, I won’t let him. I won’t.”

i’m literally sobbing at baby kase😭

“You love Mal, don’t you boy?” ″I don’t ever want to stop being friends,” Kase said. “I don’t want her dead. Makes me sick in my stomach to think it. Does that mean I love her?” ″I say that is love,” Jens told him.

Kase didn’t blink away. “He can’t have her. I won’t let him.”

″It’s just, if I die, I want someone to tell Mallie not to be sad,” he said, tears in his eyes. “Tell her I was brave.”

GOODBYE😭😭

″W-Will you tell Mallie,” Kase stammered through streaks of tears now. “Will you tell her I didn’t leave her because she was a bad friend? She isn’t. She’ll cry. I don’t . . .” He hiccupped. “I don’t want her to cry.”

″You took my place,” I said in a gasp. “I saw the truth Kase. I was supposed to be taken and⁠—” He silenced me with a fierce kiss. It hurt more than it was sweet. Teeth and lips cut against each other, and it ended too soon. “I would again a thousand times over.”

The girl who first saw me cry, who stayed up with me if nightmares burdened my dreams. She was the first girl to tell me I was brave and strong. Malin was the first, she was the only one, to hold my heart and soul in her hands. I would always choose her life over mine.

“She’ll be nothing but a nightmare in your head, Malevolent. I’ll make you fear her, despise her, wish a torturous death for the girl.”

FUCKING FUCK

With two fingers, Ivar drew the runes he’d use to cast Malin’s face from my mind on my forehead. My grip tightened on the rose. I closed my eyes. He could warp her face, my thoughts, but I prayed to the fates—if they existed at all—that he would not touch where she lived in my heart. Even if it was hidden from my mind, let my heart hold tight to her. I loved Malin Strom. I’d lived my life loving her. If asked, I’d die loving her.