A Vow So Bold and Deadly (Cursebreakers, #3)

by Brigid Kemmerer

This autumn, I suppose, I am nineteen for the first time. The curse is broken. It doesn’t feel like it.

I bristle immediately. “She’s not running.” “It certainly seems like a retreat.” Wow. Someone certainly seems like a jerk. “Zo is allowed to be mad, Rhen.” “So am I.”

“Please what?” I say softly. “Please stay.” He means right now, but it feels bigger. Broader.

I force myself to be content with her hand on my arm. With the word we.

He doesn’t flinch from my gaze. “I have done nothing to your friends, my lady. And I would never hold them accountable for your actions.” “Is that a threat?” I demand. He blinks, startled. “What? No. I do not—” “Because Grey spent his life doing everything you asked, and the first time he didn’t, you strung him up on that wall.”

INSANE

“I do.” I peek over at him again. My voice is rough. “I do understand your reasons.” I have to look back at the horse. “When you did that,” I whisper, “you were so much more frightening than you ever were as a monster.”

Damn. That is so sad.

I draw back and peer up at him. “It’s like …” I have no idea how to explain what an airplane holding pattern is to him, and it doesn’t even matter.

“Months.” Her voice grows softer. “Rhen. Rhen. Why wouldn’t you tell me?”

me a moment to place Jamison’s. I’ve only ever known him as a temporary guard and then a soldier, as a man who lost his arm in battle and watched the army from Syhl Shallow destroy his entire regiment, but was willing to put a uniform on again to serve Rhen.

i forgot abt that guy

“Dustan. Please. Don’t you see that she’s trying to use me to manipulate him?” “Yes. I do.” “Then we can’t let her—” “I also know that he rules Emberfall.” He pauses. “And you do not.”

lmao facts

This feels like betrayal. It shouldn’t, but it does. It’s no different from the many times I kept information from her, but fury and fear still spin through my gut to wind together.

yeah fr lets not forget you ALSO did this

I kept the truth from Harper because I wanted to keep her safe. I did not want her to recklessly risk her life on my behalf. She keeps the truth from me because she does not think I can handle it. I have to draw a steadying breath. I want to confront her. I want to hide. I’m resentful. Humiliated. Afraid. Angry.

we cant just be worried? concerned? like obviously she did it because you were gonna absorb that worry she's doing it BECAUSE of you

But they forget that Rhen was the one to bring this country back from the brink of ruin.

is it all that impressive if he caused it in the first place?

I laugh under my breath, then draw his hand up from my hip to kiss his knuckles. “Grab my dressing gown,” I say. “Maybe fate is giving us both a breather.”

BOOOOOOOO TOMATO TOMATO TOMATO

and simply acted accordingly.” He pauses. “I wonder if he would see me as a failure—and I also wonder if I would want a man like that to see me as a success.”

damn

Maybe my father thought he was doing the best he could. Maybe my mother thought the same—and that’s why she stayed. Maybe that’s all Rhen is doing.

hey. so. i dont know if that's how i want this to resolve

because when they first chained me up, my imagination ran wild and I thought for sure I’d be raped and left for dead. But it seems like a lot of their officers are women, and while no one is gentle, no one was forcing me up against a wall and ripping my clothes off, either.

What on earth

Tycho blushes, but he reaches out and clasps my hand in his own.

Be gay