Cassian went looking for Brigid after finishing his talk with squad captain Ronan. There, he learned that her latest assignment had indeed come from him—making his earlier lie almost completely true. She needed people to follow her for that task, not powerful warriors, just lower-circle fighters or mages of equal rank. Which meant if Cassian managed to beat a few of them into submission, everyone would naturally assume she had ordered him to do it as her slave.

That realization gave him a flicker of relief. At least he didn’t have to keep pretending to be some ruthless killer or twisted torturer.

But the relief didn’t last. He soon heard that Brigid had already moved her things into her grandmother’s house.

"For fuck’s sake," Cassian muttered under his breath. "She couldn’t wait until tomorrow...?"

With a resigned sigh, he set off, silently praying he wouldn’t run into Analisa. Skirting the edges of the courtyard, he slipped in through a side door of the village mansion—the temporary quarters of the cardinal.

Fortunately, Cassian managed to slip into Brigid’s room without running into her in the hall. She seemed busy enough not to notice—or, if she had, she clearly didn’t care. Still, Cassian couldn’t shake the worry of ending up on the receiving end of another one of her misfired spells. By the time he stepped inside and let out a loud, relieved sigh, he had already disturbed her.

Brigid glanced up, clearly annoyed, before returning to the mess of magical tools and scattered pages spread out in front of her. "Find anything about that traitor of yours?" she asked casually.

Cassian drew a steadying breath, then smiled. "Not yet—still working on it. But you know that favor you did me this morning? I think I can repay it now."

Her expression shifted into faint amusement. "Oh? And how exactly?" Then, with a disgusted wrinkle of her nose, she added, "Better not be with that dick of yours."

"Hey, that thing’s worth more than some kingdoms," Cassian said, kicking off his shoes as he made himself comfortable on the bed. His body ached with exhaustion—days without proper sleep, nights wasted on endless sex catching up to him. "It’s not just about birthing life... it could even bring someone back from the dead if it had to."

He sprawled out with a long, tired sigh, ignoring Brigid’s irritated glance. "So that tiny favor you did? Not even worth an inch of it."

Brigid’s lips curved into another amused smirk. "So... saving you from being castrated, meaning your whole dick, wasn’t even worth inch of it, then?"

This time, Cassian didn’t bother with a comeback. Instead, he shifted the conversation. "Enough about my dick. I know you’ve been tasked with getting some cultists to follow you on that assignment—only lower-circle warriors or low-ranked mages are allowed to go, right?"

Brigid blinked, genuinely surprised. "How do you know that?"

Cassian only smiled. "Doesn’t matter. Point is, I can help. That makes us even. Though... I can only manage a couple of Second Circle warriors or Firsts, with a few mages thrown in."

Her curiosity piqued, Brigid set her pen aside and leaned in slightly. "How?"

Cassian explained, outlining the method he’d discovered for claiming slaves within the cult, and how Squad Captain Ronan Kael had offered his help in arranging challenges against stronger fighters.

Brigid fell quiet for a moment, chewing on the question. Finally she nodded. "So your original plan was to make them slaves to sniff out the traitor?"

"Sort of," Cassian said, stretching his shoulders. "But it works for you as well — you get a handful of followers who’ll obey orders. Technically they’re mine, but send them death if you want. I don’t mind."

Brigid’s eyes sharpened at that, searching his face. "You mean because they’re cultists? Like me?"

"Yeah," Cassian said, casual and almost distracted.

Brigid’s lips twisted into a small, hard smile. "So you’d even send me to my death without batting an eye, then?"

Cassian froze mid-stretch, then turned to her with an amused smile tugging at his lips. "No, of course not. I’d bat my eyes, curse myself, and regret it wholeheartedly."

"So you would send me to death?" she pressed, her voice calm but sharp.

He only smiled again, offering no words. That silence was its own answer, and she already knew it. Cassian, unwilling to linger on the tension, shifted the subject with a forced ease. "Anyway... what I can’t figure out is how Commander Naset Lawk never wrung it out of you — that you’re the granddaughter of the ruthless Witch of the Snow Mountains, and a member of one of the founding families of the cult."

Brigid’s lips curled into an amused smirk. "So you’ve dug up my grandmother’s name too?"

Cassian nodded, a touch of unease flickering in his eyes. "Yeah, asked around. Didn’t learn much — just titles, stories. The tale that she once erased a northern kingdom in a single night, left it in ruins until it disappeared from the world entirely..." His voice faltered, as if even repeating the rumor felt dangerous. "Though, from what I can tell, she’s not remembered here the way the ’Arstic Butcher’ is."

"Yeah. Cause of after the Great War, when our ancestors were forced into hiding, our family wandered for a long time before settling in the mountains for centuries. It wasn’t until recently that my grandmother descended... wiping out that kingdom. That was nearly a century ago now," Brigid said, her tone calm but carrying weight.

Cassian’s eyes widened, his jaw slack. Wait—what? He had definitely not expected that. "...So I’ve been fucking a woman with a century-old bloodline. Over a hundred years old... pussy," he muttered without thinking.

Brigid’s expression instantly darkened, fury flashing across her face. "That’s my grandmother you’re talking about," she snapped, her eyes cutting toward his crotch with an icy glare. "If she’d heard you—well, you know what would happen."

Cassian swallowed hard, instinctively shielding himself. His nervous gulp only made her lips curl into a smile. Satisfied at his fear, she leaned back and continued, her voice cooler now.

"As for your precious commander, he never asked me about my family. All he wanted was for me to help you, in exchange for freedom. Most of my confinement... he just kept me locked away in a frozen, lightless place. Honestly, I might’ve spilled everything if he’d simply asked. That darkness—" her eyes flickered with something distant, haunted—"it was a torment worse than any blade. Like falling into an abyss without end, unable to move, just sinking deeper and deeper forever."

Cassian mostly tuned out the rest of her description of captivity, though a sliver of pity stuck with him. "Shit," he said, half-laughing, half-serious, "now I really don’t want to let you go once I’m done here."

Brigid snorted. "Hey — you took an oath?"

"Yeah, yeah... I know." He let his fingers drift over her as she rode him, keeping his voice low. "But honestly? I just want to get out of this place. Get me the information on the traitor in the Earldom and I’m gone. You probably don’t want me poking around the cult any more than necessary, right?"

She gave a small, bitter laugh. "Doesn’t matter. Not like knowing more will stop my lord’s ascendence — or save you lot from being sacrificed for it."

Cassian chuckled despite himself. He’d already put the pieces together: this war wasn’t about territory. They needed mass deaths — not symbolic sacrifices, but billions of deaths — to fuel whatever ritual would let their supposed lord, Silas, come down. The thought made his stomach clench, but it also sharpened his resolve.