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

by Brigid Kemmerer

“Who do you think has stoked the discord in Syhl Shallow? Who do you think whispers suggestions of assassination to anyone who will listen?” Her tongue touches my ear, and it’s like the kiss of a forge-hot blade. “You were to use it on Grey, not me.” I shudder. She is diabolical. There is no stopping her. It was useless to even try. “I have even sent orders to your troops, Your Highness. Using your seal.” Her fingernails dig into my shoulders. My back is rigid against her touch. “Your soldiers at the border will attack this regiment from Syhl Shallow. They will bring the war into Emberfall, and we will win. I have sent for troops to surround the castle.”

there is truly no one worse than lilith

“Grey will come for you,” she seethes. “The blade is gone. He will kill you, you know.” Yes. I do know. I once thought I needed to kill the heir to protect my throne—and he will have to do the same thing if he wants to claim it. The thought brings an unexpected tightness to my throat. So many things I wish I’d done differently. I would have yielded to him. I would have negotiated for peace. It was Harper’s last request. Almost her dying wish. My breath shudders. Now Lilith has ordered my soldiers to attack. No one will listen to a message about an alliance. “Grey will come for you,” she says, “and I will lie in wait.” A blustering wind blasts through the trees to ruffle my hair and make me shiver, and Lilith closes her arms around my neck. “I will lie in wait so I can kill the one man who still stands in my way.”

i am so shocked and stunned and at a loss for words completely

I’m surrounded by people who seem focused on a common goal for once, but my thoughts keep replaying the moment when Harper looked up at Grey with tears in her eyes and called him “Scary Grey.” Or the moment when he dropped to a knee and said, “Do you no longer trust me?” in that quiet voice I thought he only reserved for me. Jealousy is petty and useless, especially right now, and yet I cannot seem to chase it out of my thoughts. They had a history together, Harper and Grey, and even though it might not have resulted in anything more than friendship between them, it was still clearly … something. She was hurt and she ran here. For him. That is meaningful.

damn lia mara i feel you! i am here for you gf, rooting on you and grey til my final days! i also hate romantic grey and harper vibes lmao

I’m not sure what to say to him. I’m spared the need, because Jake bursts through the doors. He’s never one for much pageantry, so I’m not surprised when he just starts talking.

lowkey if this ain't jake idk what is!!

All along, I’ve wanted peace. I’ve wanted what was best for my people. That doesn’t mean anything if I don’t want it for all people. “Then go speak to her,” I say, and it costs me something to speak the words. “See what she needs.” Grey rises at once, and I wish he weren’t so quick to action. I inhale sharply, and he hesitates, his eyes finding mine. He’s waiting for me to tell him not to. I don’t. I force my lips to close.

their reltionship is truly everything to me

She hasn’t said so, but she’s unsettled by Harper being here. I am too, but likely not for the reasons she thinks. Lilith is back. I don’t know how she survived. I remember cutting her throat on the other side, in Washington, DC. And now she is tormenting Rhen again. I wonder how long it has gone on. I think back to the times I saw Rhen after fleeing to Rillisk. Was she there when he had me dragged back in chains? He was so frightened of magic then. And again when I arrived with Lia Mara to offer him sixty days. He flinched away when I drew near. Despite everything, worry and uncertainty tugs at me. I know what she can do. I know what she’s done.

grey worrying for bby brother rhen will never not make a weeb

Jake’s eyes are fierce, his jaw tight. His devotion to his sister will not help us here. “Wait,” I say to him. “Please.” I watch as defiance swells in his eyes, and I expect him to try to shove past me, my request be damned. When Jake and I first met, he was belligerent and antagonistic, but he’s also brave and loyal, just like his sister. In the moment I asked him to stand as my second, I said, “Taking orders requires trust, Jake. You would have to trust me.” “I can do that,” he said then. This is the first time I’ve ever asked him to prove it. For an eternal moment, he says nothing, and anger clouds his expression. But he finally takes a step back to stand against the wall. “Fine,” he bites out.

i forever ship grey and jake's bromance no CAP

“See if you can find Iisak. He should be made aware of what’s happened.”

okay YA'LL crazy prediction time? what if the creature surrounding ironrose is a scraver - iisak's son?? this sounds unlikely, but i just feel like there's more to be discovered in his backstory before this arc ends

“Please don’t destroy my infirmary,” calls Noah, and both girls go still. He must have gone into the hallway to stand with Jake.

first of all: noah is the true queen tbh second: thank the heavens queen noah is actually getting a moments respite with king jake! i feel like they never see each other!

“Sit, Harper.” She doesn’t sit, and she flinches at my use of her given name. That small flinch tugs at something inside of me. “I came here because you were my friend,” she says quietly. “Are you still?” That tugs harder. It must flicker in my expression, because her eyes soften and she takes a step toward me. “Grey. Please. I came here because Rhen was your friend, because—” “He was not my friend,” I snap, and she stumbles back, her eyes flaring wide. My anger surprises even me, as if it waited all this time to surface. “I understand why he did what he did, Harper. But he was not my friend.”

damn!!!! this hits so hard omg.

“We will allow you the privacy you request,” says Lia Mara from the doorway, and I turn, surprised.

a true queen!! bow down peasants!

“Grey once said that kindness and mercy find a limit, and then they turn into weakness and fear.” “Truly?” Lia Mara eases into the room, capturing my gaze with her own. “Do you believe that?” I look back at her. “Not anymore.” The smallest hint of a smile finds her lips, and her cheeks turn the faintest shade of pink.

literally get married already pls

We sit in silence for the longest time. This moment reminds me of another, when she was weary and frightened and in a strange land—and she didn’t know whether to trust me then, either. I rise from the cot to root around on Noah’s workbench until I find a battered deck of cards, then return to sit opposite Harper. I drag a small table between us, then shuffle. “Like old times,” she says, and her voice breaks again. “Like old times,” I agree.

not sure if my emotions can handle this one tbh

I lay down a card on the table. “I do not hate him,” I say quietly.

this brings me to literal tears

It doesn’t matter anyway, because Harper’s eyes flick beyond me, and she screams.

un un honey!!

Jake glances from me to the creature. “Oh.” He looks abashed and amused in the way only a brother can. “Hey, Harp. This is Iisak. He’s a scraver. And a friend.”

i fr thought lilith was here whooo do not scare me like that again thank q!

Noah sighs and seizes a roll of muslin from a supply table. “At least I can be useful with this.” Grey glares at Iisak. “Surely you could have made a smaller example.”

THIS! omg im dying laughing rn omg!!

Maybe I could have played fate’s cards differently anywhere along the line and we could have been more than friends, but I didn’t. He didn’t. I think about that moment in the courtyard behind the Crooked Boar, when he went with Lia Mara and I went back to Rhen. I wonder where we’d be now if I had made a different choice. If he had. I wonder what it would be like to look on Rhen as an enemy, as someone on the other side of a battlefield, and the thought makes my heart stutter.

are you ACTUALLY fucking kidding me with this? again? just stop. it was never going to be you and grey. you're literally here in an effort to save rhen's life and you're still pulling this shit?! incorrigible.

“No, Harper. I will not do that to them.” His eyes darken, his tone sharpening. “I certainly will not do it to her.” I go still. There’s a protective note in his voice that I haven’t heard before. A look in his eyes. I have to draw back farther, shifting into the chair to study him. I was stuck on all the loyalty and strategic talk that reminds me so much of Rhen, but now I’m focused on the last part of that sentence, on the intensity in his gaze. Oh. Oh. He’s in love with her.

We’ve spent weeks and weeks preparing for war, but I never once thought of how it would feel to stand like this, watching the barest glints of their weapons as they ride off the training fields. I never realized that it would feel like I’ve given away a part of myself, a part that Grey now carries with him.

He found me before they left, stealing a few minutes of privacy during which I should have been whispering warnings and promises and telling him all the ways my heart beats for him alone. Instead, his lips were on mine, and I inhaled his breath until I was dizzy with wanting and soldiers were shouting for him. Grey kissed me one last time, then whispered against my lips. “I will come back to you.” I hooked my fingers in his armor before he could pull away. “Your word?” He smiled, took my hand, and kissed my fingertips. “My vow.”

i would straight up sacrifice everything for grey and lia mara. they will go down in history as one of my all time favorite ships. :')