WRATH OF THE ASHEN TWINS: REBORN IN BLOOD

Reunion From Hell

You know what’s hilarious? Watching a grown man who used to think he owned the world absolutely shit his pants in broad daylight.

Twenty years. Two decades of eating dirt, freezing our asses off in a miserable cave, rubbing numbing root on a beast-rotted leg, and training until our knuckles split open just so we could look this exact moment in the eye. And there he was. Prince Cassian. Except he wasn't a desperate, sneaky prince anymore. He was draped in heavy, expensive furs, sitting tall on a massive white warhorse, wearing the crown of Valen right beside the crest of Cresthaven like he owned the entire continent.

Only, he brought an audience.

Behind him rolled a whole line of shiny velvet carriages and guards wearing polished silver armor that looked way too clean for the border. And sitting on a dainty little horse right next to him was his high-born wife, looking like she smelled something terrible, probably because the wind was blowing straight off the Ashen Wastes.

And then there were the kids. Three of them. All teenagers, right around seventeen or eighteen. Totally soft, totally spoiled, wearing expensive silk tunics under their fur-lined travel cloaks, complaining about the drafty air and the mud. His legitimate little royal heirs. His perfect little happy family.

My stomach twisted into a knot of pure, blazing poison. My right leg—the one with the jagged, black, puckered scar from the beast's venom—flared up with a hot, stinging throb, reminding me of every single freezing night I spent bleeding out in the dark while *this* clown was busy building his little dynasty.

"Is that him?" Cael muttered beside me. His hand was clamped so hard around the hilt of his short sword that his knuckles looked like white stones. His eyes were locked onto Cassian with a cold, terrifying glare. "The coward who threw you off the cliff."

"That's him," I breathed, my voice scraping like gravel over rocks.

Vesper didn't say a single word. She just stared at Cassian’s three teenage kids laughing inside the carriage window. A faint, vicious ring of dark purple magic started spinning lazily around her fingertips, crackling with quiet, dangerous fury.

"Look at them," Vesper whispered, her voice dropping into a low, creepy hum. "They get silk beds, hot meals, and a daddy. While we got scars and frostbite. Let me tear their carriage apart right now, Mama. Let me show him what happens when you throw away the Shield of Cresthaven."

For a second, I wanted to let her. I wanted to watch that whole damn royal procession burn to ash right there in the mud. But I grabbed Vesper’s wrist, pressing down hard enough to snuff out the magic in a puff of smoke.

"Not yet," I warned, my eyes locked dead on Cassian’s face as his horse stopped just yards from where we stood in the mist. "Killing them here is too fast. A clean death is a luxury they don't deserve. We take everything from him first—just like he took everything from us."

Cassian pulled his horse to a halt, frowning as he looked down at the rusted iron gate of the border wall. He had no idea the ghost he buried twenty years ago was standing right in front of him in the dirt.

"My lord," one of his knight captains called out, stepping forward and shielding his eyes from the fog. "Should we clear the perimeter? The Wastes are unstable today. Locals are unpredictable."

Cassian waved a gloved hand dismissively, his voice carrying loud and clear across the valley. "Just inspect the seal. The old garrison commander we threw down here two decades ago made sure nothing ever crawled back out. This godforsaken pit is a tomb. Nothing survives down here."

*A tomb.*

A dark, twisted smile crept across my face. I stepped right out from the shadow of the rocks, letting the freezing wind catch my dark cloak and whip my hair back.

"You'd be surprised, Your Highness," I called out, my voice cutting through the valley like a razor blade. "Some bodies are just too stubborn to stay buried."

Cassian froze dead in his tracks. His horse stepped backward nervously, snorting and tossing its head. He turned his head toward the voice, squinting through the gray fog. And then his eyes widened. They went wide and hollow, staring at the scarred, hardened woman standing in the dirt—and right beside her, the two deadly, glowing-eyed teenagers wearing his exact facial structure and my exact murderous expression.

The color drained completely out of his face. He looked like he had just seen a ghost crawl straight out of hell.

"Sylas...?" he choked out, his voice cracking like dry wood.

His wife reined her horse back, shooting him a sharp, suspicious look. "Cassian? Who is that filthy peasant? What is she talking about?"

And his three teenager kids poked their heads out of the carriage windows, staring at us like we were some kind of circus freaks.

"Dad, what's going on?" his oldest son asked, stepping out onto the carriage step, adjusting his fancy velvet collar. "Who are these weirdos?"

"We aren't weirdos, kid," Cael said, stepping forward out of the mist, letting the sunlight catch the wicked edge of his blade. He flashed a cold, humorless grin that looked so much like mine it made Cassian flinch. "We're your new family."

The panic in Cassian’s eyes was absolute perfection. He opened his mouth to shout for his guards, to scream for someone to do something, but it was already too late. The gates were open, the trap was sprung, and the past had finally come home to collect its debt.