Kaelen's POV.
"One... two... three..."
I counted the number of each plunge of the blade into my skin. My vision blurred as the toxin started taking effect in my body
I couldn't shift. My wolf, the pride of the Black Ridge, was a caged, whimpering thing behind the paralysis of the poison.
"Thirty-one," my brother, Valerius, whispered. He leaned in close, his breath smelling of the wine we had shared only an hour ago.
"You were too strong, Kaelen. A king who leaves no room for others to breathe eventually suffocates in his own blood."
He drove the final dagger into my chest.
Thirty-two.
One for every year I had reigned in terror.
I didn't scream.
I didn't have the lungs for it. I simply watched, my soul hovering at the edge of the abyss, as my own generals, men I had led through a dozen wars, stepped forward.
I cursed them with my final thought.
I will come back and kill you all. Not even the gates of hell will hold me.
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