After Dying for his Life, I Became the Abyss Queen Chapter 04
Roran’s POV
Drakon clutched Zephyra as he tore through the twisted abyss stones. I stayed right on his heels.
“Hold on! We’re almost clear!” Drakon’s voice was a guttural rasp.
And Megan? I’d just abandoned her to those demons.
We burst through the fog barrier of the Forbidden Abyss into blinding daylight. The Council and their healers were already assembled.
Quickly! Get her to Frostwell!”
Once Zephyra was delivered to the healing springs, I whirled back toward the abyss. Drakon’s hand dlamped down on my shoulder.
“Don’t.” His eyes were hard. “You can’t save her now, oran.”
What are you talking about?” Ice flooded my veins.
The Soulchain Array cannot be undone.” Elder Theron’s voice was flat. “By now, those creatures. have torn her soul to shreds. There’s nothing left.”
The words hit me like a physical blow.
“I gave
her my word!” I shoved Drakon back, my aura flaring wild. “I swore I’d come back!”
“Roran!” Isabella’s voice cracked through the air.
Megan is gone. Her soul is gone. And now, Zephyra needs you. She’s alive because of that sacrifice.”
“And frankly,” Theron added coldly, “risking our Warlord for a halfbreed with corrupted bloodlines was more than she deserved.”
Halfbreed.
She was my destined mate. The woman I’d burned alive in my first life. The one I’d just pushed into a killing array in this one.
I’d killed her twice.
The elders confined me to the temple sanctum.
Guards at every door.
At midnight, I stood alone on the stone terrace when agony ripped through my chest.
“Ahh-” My knees slammed into the ground. I clutched my hand to my heart, gasping.
The golden mate mark on my palm was disintegrating. Flesh bubbling, turning to ash. Megan’s essence was being violently severed from my soul.
“Megan…” I collapsed, convulsing, “No… don’t leave me… please…”
Silence. The soul bond was just… empty.
In my past life, when she died in my flames, I’d felt this same annihilation. Losing a mate is poison in your marrow, needles through every nerve.
I writhed on the ground, howls tearing from my throat.
She was really gone. Dead by my hand. Again.
Soft sobbing drifted from the adjacent chamber. I shoved the door open.
Zephyra was curled in the corner, face buried in her hands.
“It’s my fault… If those demons hadn’t demanded omeone of the same bloodline… Megan wouldn’t have had to take my place…”
“shut your mouth.” My voice came out guttural.“, Save your pathetic act.”
She flinched. “I thought you’d keep your promise. That you’d save her—”
Thought?” I was on her in two strides. “You accidentally wandered into the Forbidden Abyss? Accidentally triggered an ancient blood–exchange
ritual?”
“But…” Her lips trembled. “When the demons gave you the choice, you were the one who begged her to stay. When only one of us could survive… you chose me.
The truth was a blade dipped in acid.
She was right. I’d clawed my way back from death, vowed to protect Megan–and within hours, I’d traded her life for Zephyra’s.
Just like before.
I shifted mid–stride and launched into the sky, my golden dragon streaking back toward the abyss. I tore through the ruins, claws gouging the scorched earth, searching every crevice, every shadow.
Nothing. No blood. No scales. Not even a whisper of her soul.
She hadn’t just died. She’d been erased.
“ROOOOAR-” My anguished cry split the sky.
Megan, do you hate me so much you wouldn’t even leave me your ashes?
“Her mark has vanished from the Bloodstone Archive, Isabella’s voice was clinical as I stormed into the council chamber the next morning. “Soul–tracking detected nothing. She’s gone, Roran.”
Impossible.” I slammed my fist on the table. “Even if her soul was devoured, the mark wouldn’t just disappear. Someone removed it.”
The elders exchanged glances.
“Perhaps the array carries a bloodline curse,” Isabella offered smoothly. “Something that severs the bond entirely.”
“Don’t insult me.”
“Be that as it may,” another elder interjected, “we need to discuss Zephyra. She’s suffered immense trauma. Her soul is unstable. We’ll need to allocate high–grade dragon crystals for her recovery, perhaps. a month at the Celestial Springs-”
Megan’s body wasn’t even cold yet, and they were already showering Zephyra with resources.
In their eyes, she’d been nothing but a convenient shield.
I returned to my chambers at dawn. When I passed the great mirror, I stopped cold.
My reflection stared back—a stranger. My hair, once radiant gold, had turned bone white.
The cost of a severed mate bond.
This is what I deserve…” I laughed, the sound hollow and broken.
My aura erupted, and every mirror in the room exploded into glittering shards.
I walked through the shattered glass, each step crunching, dark flames roaring in my chest.
Ì stormed into the recovery wing and grabbed Zephyra by the arm, hauling her out of bed.
“Roran! What are you doing?! Let go of me!” She clawed at my hand, screaming.
I dragged her down into the dungeons and slammed her against the wall.
“This is your fault.” My voice was dead. “Megan is dead. Because of you.”
I ripped the dragonbane shackles from their moorings and clamped them around her wrists. The enchanted iron bit deep, and she screamed.
Roran… please… I didn’t know the array required a blood exchange, I swear-”
“Every time you played weak, every time you wept, and trembled, you were pushing her toward the edge, weren’t you?” My hand closed around her throat. ” That broken little plea in the array–you knew I’d sacrifice her to save you.”
Since she died for you, it’s only fair you suffer in her place.”
In the days that followed, I made her pay. Dragonfire.
Pain that shattered the mind.
But with each scream, the void inside me only widened.
Revenge was ash. It changed nothing.
I began to unravel. Every decision I’d ever made suddenly felt like a lie.
In my past life and this one, I’d bled for Zephyra,
killed for her, died for hef–but was it love? Or had I been so obsessed with repaying a debt that never truly existed that I’d mistaken guilt for devotion?
And my true soulmate? I’d thrown her into the abyss with my own hands.
The dungeon door groaned open. Vaelin, my chief dragon guard, stepped inside. His expression was stone.
My Lord. We found something.”
He glanced at Zephyra, chained and trembling.
“Her trip to the Forbidden Abyss wasn’t an accident.”
Ice spread through my veins.
In her chambers, we found an ancient tome–open to the exact page describing the blood–exchange ritual. Next to it, a written plan. Every step mapped out. Every word you’d say… predicted.”
Yaelin met my eyes, and his next words were a death sentence: “She used you to murder your mate. And she made you think it was your choice.”