Lenko immediately reached for the knife clutched in the child's small hand.

"Give me that," he hissed under his breath, but the girl only pulled back, her fingers tightening around the hilt with surprising strength. Her little claws dug into his wrist as if warning him to back off.

"Hey! It's not a toy!" he growled, trying to pry it away while still keeping one arm looped securely under her knees. The child's tail coiled around his forearm again, rough scales scraping against his skin, and she gave a low, defiant hiss.

"Alright, alright, fine, you keep it, just, don't stab anything else!" Lenko muttered, half out of breath, leaping over what was left of the corpse behind them. The thing's limbs were bent wrong, its eyes dull and glassy, but he turned his head away quickly, shielding the child's gaze with his shoulder.

No way in hell was he letting her see that mess.

Then another whistle split the air.

His boots hit the uneven ground with a jarring thud, and he nearly lost his footing, just barely managing to steady himself before crashing into the wrecked wall.

A knife spun past his ear so close he felt the rush of wind and the sting of air slicing against his skin. It struck the far wall with a crack, embedding itself deep into the stone and sending spiderwebs of fractures crawling out from the point of impact.

Lenko froze.

"Well," a quiet, composed voice echoed from somewhere above, "I suppose I should've expected a dragon child to see through my tricks."

The tone was calm, too calm. Measured. Amused.

"But a lowly vassal?" the voice added, a trace of disdain curling around the words. "That, I didn't anticipate."

Lenko's stomach dropped.

He turned toward it slowly, scanning the shadows until he caught sight of movement, someone crouched atop a rusted iron cage. The faint glow of mana runes carved along its bars illuminated a figure cloaked in tattered black robes.

The mage. The real Seventh.

She wasn't limping anymore. She wasn't even bleeding.

As she pushed back the hood that concealed her face, Lenko's eyes widened.

Long, pale blonde hair spilled down in soft waves, the tips glimmering faintly in the mana light. Her eyes, an icy blue, gleamed like polished glass, sharp, calculating, and cold. Despite the chaos around them, she looked untouched, her pristine uniform and measured posture giving her an almost noble air.

Lenko's chest tightened as the realization hit him like a blow.

He knew her.

He had seen her before.

But standing quietly behind the fourth prince.

The image came unbidden, the way she stood slightly behind the royal, chin tilted up with that same condescending calm, her gloved hands folded neatly before her as she spoke in a tone meant to belittle everyone else in the room.

The realization chilled him to the bone.

"Seventh…" he muttered, more to himself than to her.

She smiled faintly, hearing her title fall from his lips.

"Ah, you know me," she said, her voice lilting like someone commenting on a pleasant surprise. "How flattering."

Lenko swallowed hard, his grip tightening protectively around the child.

Of course he remembered.

She wasn't just any mage.

She was the one who once served under the royal court, the Fourth Prince's mage. The one people whispered about. The one who could manipulate flesh and mana alike.

He saw her glance upward, the motion slow, deliberate, her chin tilting as the faint blue mana light caught the edge of her face. The rusted cage beneath her groaned dangerously, its steel straining and swaying as if about to give way. Yet the mage didn't even flinch.

She only brushed aside a lock of golden hair with the back of her gloved hand, her sharp blue eyes narrowing.

Lenko followed her gaze and instantly knew who she was looking at.

Muzio.

Up on the tilted floor above, the tenth prince was moving across the debris, leaping over shattered tables and broken seats, his cloak flaring with every motion.

The faintest hum of mana trailed behind him, flickering gold and red. Even from below, Lenko could feel the pressure of it, steady, controlled, but dangerous.

The mage's expression hardened.

Before Lenko could even say anything, the child in his arms let out a low, animalistic hiss. He looked down in alarm, startled by the sound, and found her glaring directly at the mage. Her little claws dug into his arm again, the scales along her ears flaring with a faint shimmer of green.

"Screaming blades…" the girl whispered, voice low but full of quiet fury. "They're hurt with your mana."

Her grip on the knife tightened until her knuckles turned pale.

The mage turned her head toward them, her gaze cutting through like a shard of ice.

"Shut it, beast," she muttered, her tone dripping venom, the word 'beast' drawn out with deliberate disgust.

Lenko instinctively stepped back, clutching the child closer against his chest. His heart pounded. The malice in the mage's eyes was something colder, crueler. Like she was looking at a disease that dared to speak.

The girl's tail tightened protectively around his arm again, rough and tense.

"I'm not a beast," the child said, her voice trembling but defiant. Her green eyes glowed faintly, reflecting the flicker of runes scattered around the room. "I'm Little Flame."

She then lifted her chin, pointing a clawed finger upward. "Ask him. He knows."

Lenko blinked, confused for a moment before following her gaze.

Muzio was now closer to the top ledge, his boots barely touching the floor as he moved, graceful even amid the collapsing structure. He seemed to be making his way toward the princess and Tyron, whose figures he could see faintly through the haze of dust and mana.

Lenko frowned, disoriented, glancing back down at the child still crossing her arms as if she'd just made a perfectly normal point.

"W-what are you even talking about?" he managed, his voice cracking slightly.

The mage let out a sharp, derisive scoff.

"For sure, he'll know," she said softly, the corner of her lip curling into something between a smirk and a sneer.

Then her gaze slid back to Lenko.

It was sharp, deliberate, and unsettlingly curious. Her blue eyes gleamed with an almost playful malice as she studied him.

"You…" she murmured, tilting her head slightly. "Why are you cursed?"

Lenko froze.

The words struck like ice in his veins. His breath hitched, his body instinctively tensing, every muscle locking in place.

How does she know?

He didn't answer, couldn't. His heart pounded against his ribs, his throat tight.

The mage rolled her eyes, exhaling in mock annoyance. "Ah, one of those. Such a typical curse, too."

She waved her hand lazily, as if brushing away dust, or pity. "Death brought by loved ones."

The words hung in the air like a tolling bell.

Lenko's eyes widened, breath catching, the meaning sinking in slowly but heavily, like stone being lowered into deep water.

For a moment, the sounds of the beasts, the shouts, even the distant crack of collapsing stone, all faded into a single ringing silence in his ears.

His mouth went dry. His heart felt hollow.

And somewhere, at the edge of that dizzying stillness, his mind whispered one small, stunned thought.

Oh.

Like what was whispered in stories and scrawled in old tomes, every curse wrought by an elf was a masterpiece of cruelty, tailored, deliberate, and inescapable.

When elves bestowed the death curse, they did not merely take a life, they shaped its end with artistry. Some victims were said to die in slow agony, their bodies failing piece by piece over years.

Others suffered quick and meaningless deaths, falling from steps, choking on a meal, dying from fear itself. There was no pattern to it, no logic, only the malice of the one who cast it.

Lenko used to tell himself those were just tales to frighten humans, nothing more than a way to make the elves sound terrifying.

But that disbelief withered.

He had met an elf. The same one who had marked bargained with him. The same one who had grinned at him through another man's face. And the same one who, by every cursed rule of their kind, had to be present when the curse was meant to unfold.

That could only mean one thing. Tonight was the night of his death.

His grip on the child in his arms tightened instinctively, one arm wrapped protectively around her small body while the other clenched at his side where the pouch hung, where the dragon's heart throbbed faintly with its eerie pulse of heat.

The combination of it all, the sticky blood drying on his neck from his bleeding ears, the dull throbbing in his shoulder where the knife had sunk deep before, and the countless stinging cuts across his skin, blurred his thoughts, but not his decision.

He could no longer tell if the trembling in his fingers was from pain or from fear. Maybe both.

The child looked up at him then, her green, catlike eyes bright even in the shadows. There was confusion in them, but also something else.

Lenko swallowed hard. He felt the weight of every heartbeat in his chest, each one slower and heavier than the last.

He was not alone in this crater.

He still had two people up there, two people who mattered more than his cursed ever could.

His sister. His lord.

He forced himself to lift his gaze.

Up the jagged slope of the crater, through the fractured haze of light and drifting dust, he could see them.

Olga, still struggling against the binding fabric that writhed with runes. Her bow had fallen beside her, but even restrained, she was fighting, biting, kicking, her fury as sharp as her arrows.

And further up near the edge of the ledge, stood Muzio, the tenth prince. His cloak was torn, streaked with blood and soot, yet he stood unwavering, his blade drawn, its runes burning faintly along the steel.

Even from here, Lenko could see the determination in his stance, the subtle tension in his arm. Muzio was already preparing for something, for another fight, for another impossible miracle.

Lenko's heart clenched painfully at the sight.

He knew then, with a clarity sharper than fear, what he had to do.

If the curse demanded his death tonight… then maybe he could decide how it happened.

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