“He and his wife live—they have children too,” War says.

I feel myself begin to breathe steadily again.

“So they’re alive?” I ask. “And happy?”

“As far as I know,” War says.

Relief washes through me. War won’t die, just as Pestilence didn’t. He can leave the fighting behind, and we can have a good life together. A mundane and happy and hopefully long life.

I study War’s expression again. “So you’re not worried about leaving your task behind?”

War hesitates. “I wouldn’t say that.”

Like snapping his fingers, my fear returns.

He must see it because he says, “Miriam, do you believe that I can be redeemed?”

“What do you mean? Are you asking if you can right your wrongs?”

The warlord gives a sharp nod.

He’s done so many abominable things. From the very day he arrived, he’s brought death with him. But what he’s done is a different question from the one he’s asking.

“I think you’re already redeeming yourself,” I say. “So, yes, War, I do think that can happen.”

The horseman gives me a soft look. “Then surely every man, woman, and child on earth is just as capable of redemption as I am. And if they want redemption, then who am I to cut them down before their true day of judgment?”

I shake my head, at a loss. “So you’re going to stop the killing?”

He gives a slight nod. “So I’m going to stop the killing.”

I don’t know when the two of us doze off, locked in each other’s embrace, only that I’m pulled from sleep by a phantom voice.

Surrender.

The word whispers along my skin, moving over it like a tender caress.

I sit up in bed, breathing deeply. The memory of the word seems to echo in that tent.

Surrender, surrender, surrender.

I touch my scar. This wound and the word it represents inextricably bound me and War together. He was sure I was supposed to surrender. The proof of it was carved into my flesh.

Like a strike of lightning, realization hits me.

The message wasn’t for me.

It never was for me. After all, I can’t read Angelic.

The message is for someone who can.

War.

Chapter 55

The next morning, I wake to War’s hands on my stomach.

“Mmm, what are you doing?” I say groggily, stretching in bed.

I feel the horseman’s hair brush my bare skin right before he presses a kiss to my belly. “It’s never going to cease fascinating me,” he says, “that you’re carrying my child.”

I blink my eyes open and thread one of my hands through his dark locks, which are mussed from sleep.

“Do you know what it is?” I ask.

I mean, he knows a shitload of other things … maybe he’ll know the baby’s sex.

War draws circles on my stomach, his expression soft.

His mouth curves into a small smile. “Human, I imagine. Or close enough to it.”

I laugh and push at him, though I’m not entirely sure he meant it as a joke. “Do you know what gender the child is?”

He looks at me fondly. “Even my knowledge has its limits. We shall find out together.”

I pull him to me, giving him a kiss on the lips. “Trading death for life,” I say when I break away. “It’s a good look on you.”

He takes my face in his hands. “I didn’t know I was capable of feeling this way, wife. Happiness is a new emotion—”

The tent flap is thrown open, and a phobos rider steps inside, interrupting us.

I yank the bedsheet up over myself, covering my breasts. Just like War, I’ve taken to sleeping in the nude. So shoot me, my clothes are becoming too tight.

War sits up, not at all bothered by his own exposed skin. “Get out.” He sounds just like his old self. Full of confidence and pent up violence.

The rider, a burly, balding man with a thick beard, looks a little unsteady. He gives a quick bow, then rushes in to say, “With all due respect, My Lord, the residents of Karima are riding out to ambush us. If we want to stop them, we must leave now.”

I glance at War, alarmed. Yesterday, the horseman was dead-set on laying down his sword, but what happens when the humans are the ones to attack? Does he stand by his words, or does he make an exception?

War stands, utterly naked and completely uncaring, swaggering across the room to grab his pants.

The phobos rider looks away abruptly. Then, muttering some quick excuse, ducks out of the room.

I sit up, the blankets pressed tightly to me, watching as the horseman pulls on his black clothing, then his armor. Lastly, he straps his massive sword to his back.

At the sight of it, my apprehension heightens. I can’t say what exactly is bothering me—that War might kill as he’s always done … or that he might do something else entirely, something that could have its own set of consequences.

War must see the terrible possibilities playing themselves out on my face because he strides over to me and kneels down next to the pallet.

He reaches out and strokes my cheek. “There is nothing to fear, Miriam. Whatever your worries are, banish them.”

I nod, trying to believe him.

The horseman gives me a kiss, and then he leaves.

The entire camp—or what’s left of it—empties. War is gone, his riders are gone—even most of the horses are gone.

I’m utterly alone, save for the few skeletal guards War brought back to life to guard me. I feel like I’m the last human on earth, my surroundings abandoned, the living nothing but memories.

My surroundings aren’t helping. This part of Sudan is all baked earth and sky. And aside from a few ruins and a handful of buildings I caught sight of during our ride in, there’s nothing to indicate that people have ever lived here.

But it’s not the loneliness that is painful so much as it’s the boredom. I’ve reread my romance novel so many times I could quote entire sections of the book by now. I’ve stared at the photo of my family until my eyes have nearly bled. And the idea of working on another arrow makes me want to pull out my hair.

Maybe that’s what drives me to start snooping around camp.

I’ve never been in any of the phobos riders’ tents. There’s never really been the opportunity or the desire. But now that there’s literally no one to stop me, curiosity gets the better of me.

I step out of War’s tent and cut across the camp, a hot breeze stirring my hair.

The closest tent to me is roughly ten meters away. I head over to it, pausing for only a split second at the tent flaps.

This is rude and invasive. It’s also not the worst thing I’ve done.

I pull the flaps back and step inside.

The place is an absolute mess. There’s already a day’s worth of dirty dishes stacked in a corner of the room, and another pile of bloodstained clothing. Flies buzz around inside the tent, and shit, that should be incentive enough to clean the place up.

The next tent couldn’t be more different. It’s Spartan, and what few possessions its owner has, they are arranged in a nice, orderly fashion. Even the blankets on the rider’s pallet are tucked in.

My brows knit at that. They were all in such a mad scramble to meet their foes, I wouldn’t have thought there’d be time to make the bed …