Zaph’s eyes bulged as Rokath grabbed a thick-headed hammer. I seated myself again, tucking my legs beneath me like we were lounging rather than torturing.

The Angel clenched his hands. My laugh—wicked and hair-raising—reverberated in the room. “That won’t save you.”

Rokath shoved the sharp silver tip between Zaph’s fingers. His body jerked against the binds.

A heartbeat passed, then another, as Rokath prolonged the moment. Without warning, he swung. Zaph’s hands flew open as the first stake lodged itself between his bones. The second clawed a tear down his cheek.

It was a glorious sight.

Rokath’s destruction didn’t end. He didn’t allot a second for the Angel to adjust to his new decorations. From a sheath at his hip, he drew a bronze dagger. The tip dragged down Zaph’s middle, only deep enough to strip open his tunic. Tufts of white hair appeared, heaving against the musky air. His fearful focus never left the sharp point slicing open the fabric covering his entire frame, until he was bare before us.

“How fitting that I carved an H into his forehead the first time he defied me, and I’ll carve your entire honorific into his chest before I kill him?” Rokath murmured, pressing the blade to the skin above his waistband.

“It’s entirely fitting,” I told him, my tone breathy.

A scream shredded his throat as Rokath carved a jagged S. In the dim light, the A he’d allowed me to cut into his wrists danced. Like the H he’d put into me.

Our mutual claim on one another. The symbol of how we’d looked into one another’s souls and found a mirror. His fractured edges slotted perfectly with mine.

Zaph though? He wouldn’t have time to scar. No, before this day was finished, he’d be broken beyond repair. Our vengeance would be complete. All that would remain was burning Sivy to the ground.

Rokath stepped back and admired his handiwork. “Would you like a turn?”

“I much prefer to watch your violence,” I purred, my thighs growing slicker with each slice of his blade. Our bond hummed with wicked desire.

“Good. I didn’t really feel like sharing.” He proceeded to carve the E. Another muffled cry surged from Zaph at the same time a laugh bubbled from me. Rokath finished carving my honorific with jagged lines, arrogating the entire expanse of the Angel’s torso.

“Don’t forget, he wanted to rape me,” I reminded Rokath. Fury, white hot and violent, blistered from within him.

“That will be the last thing I take from him,” Rokath snarled. Tears leaked out of Zaph’s eyes. “But he dared touch you in the first place, and that demands penance.”

From a smattering of rusting devices, he picked up an axe. Flipping it in his hand, he tested the weight. It hissed through the air before embedding itself in the wood, a hair’s breadth from Zaph’s wrists. The sobs that wracked him sent a cascade of crimson down his ribs.

A smile curved up the corners of my mouth as Rokath pulled it free and raised it again. His miss had been entirely intentional.

How many times would he swing before he finally removed the offending limbs?

I received the answer to my question moments later.

Three in total.

Blood gushed from the stumps, but before Zaph could yank his arms to his body, Rokath pinned them each with a dagger through the forearm. The thick vein that would have had him bleeding out all over the table throbbed against it, unpunctured.

“You are nothing compared to me,” Rokath snarled, leaning his face close to the Angel’s. Lips curling back from his severely pointed teeth, rage burning in his eyes, body vibrating with coiled restraint, my mate had never been more intimidating than in that moment.

And I’d never wanted him more.

“I should have killed you rather than carving up your face and letting you live. You’ve bothered me far too long.” The low, deliberate way he spoke raised the hairs on my arms.

Zaph whimpered, squeezing his eyes shut. Rokath’s hands snapped out and forced them open again. “Do you know what happens to insects who bite and linger?”

He gave the barest shake of his head.

“They get swatted.” Rokath reared back and delivered a resounding blow to his face. Blood sprayed as Zaph’s head whipped to the side. A tooth clattered to the wood beside his shoulder.

Rokath grabbed his jaw and forced his face forward again. Another dagger, pulled from the myriad of places he always kept them on his person, removed his eyelids. I twisted my mother’s ring around my finger as he opened up Zaph’s lower legs and ripped out the bones of his shins.

Each time, my mate knelt at my feet and proffered them to me, like I was the Kralovna and he was presenting me with royal gifts. I accepted them time and time again, until I had a nice pile at my side.

Zaph was barely conscious by the time Rokath was finished. He gave him a few slaps to the face to rouse him. Head lolling, he looked up at the male he’d attempted to best time and time again. Unsurprisingly, he’d fallen short.

No one compared to my mate.

It was like trying to defy one the Fates themselves.

“The time for the finale has come. You’re going to enjoy it,” Rokath sneered at Zaph. Then, he tilted his head over his shoulder, meeting my gaze as he spoke his next words. “You are mine, Assyria. No male will ever touch you again.”

A bronze dagger flashed in the low light, and then, the metallic scent of fresh blood filled the air again as Rokath sliced Zaph’s dick and balls from his groin.

Those lidless eyes went glassy and lifeless a moment later.

Rokath’s hands shook, but not from fear. The carnal need to destroy burned in him. Engulfed our bond. Scorched my veins.

“Rokath,” I whispered, my voice like a boom in the silence.

Yet the thread of his control continued to fray. He was a hound whose bloodlust had overtaken all reason. The only thing he wanted was more.

“Rokath,” I snapped, trying to draw his attention. “You killed him. You avenged me. Avenged us.”

Awareness returned to my mate in slow blinks. His peace was a fragile, tenuous thing. The beast beneath the surface, the one that harbored vast rage, unrelenting fury, was poised to strike again. My voice was his only tether to sanity.

“You didn’t slaughter him for vengeance alone. You did it for undying love.”

He plopped the offending organs on Zaph’s carved-up stomach. Chest heaving, he whirled on me. In two strides, he knocked my knees apart again. Garnet dusted his face, coated his hands, and yet, when his gaze crashed into mine, only aching, arduous adoration remained.

The riot of burgundy captivated me like nothing else ever had. Those orbs called to me, the same as the male who owned them. Every line of ink on his powerful frame was indescribable devotion. One no crown, no vow could command.

Only love. Only me.

Because both of us were grown from seeds of hate. Somehow in that unforgiving garden, we’d bloomed with sharp thorns. My mate wielded his on the battlefield, protecting us all. I wove mine into my words, into my undying will to free the females of the realm.

Together, we were devious ruin, wicked victory.

Together, we were unstoppable.

“Have I won you over today?” he murmured darkly, his tone like rocks rolling down the side of the mountains that surrounded us.

The heat pooling between my thighs offered a resounding yes.

“Not only for today. But always.” I reached out and ran my nails through his beard. “Thank you.”

Those two words shattered the glass behind which he imprisoned his self-control. He captured my waist, pressing his sweat-soaked body against mine. His grip was with the ferocity of a male starved. He claimed my mouth with hot passion. I kissed him back, nipping his lower lip with my teeth, twisting my tongue with his, inhaling the spicy, masculine scent of him.