Lahat ng Kabanata ng Sold To The Ruthless warlord : Kabanata 11 - Kabanata 16

Mariana’s POV There he was.Nicholas stood at the end of the corridor with that same infuriating smirk on his face, slowly making his way toward us. Behind him were the guards from Mountcrest, men I recognized from my father’s household, their weapons drawn and their expressions filled with the confidence of people who believed they had already won. My entire body went rigid. I could feel the rage rising inside me so quickly that it almost made it difficult to breathe. I looked at Zayan, who was still on one knee, one hand pressed against his chest. Blood was slipping between his fingers, staining his clothes, and for the first time since I had met him, I saw something I had never imagined I would see. Weakness. Zayan had taken worse injuries than this. I had watched him return from battles covered in blood and still stand as though nothing in the world could bring him down. So why was an arrow enough to make him struggle for breath?“You?” I whispered, staring at Nicholas. Then m

Mariana’s POV A couple of days passed, and Frostcrest was ready for war.The council chamber was filled that morning with the kingdom’s highest-ranking soldiers, commanders, and council members. Maps of Mountcrest and the surrounding territories were spread across the long table, with markers indicating the Graham mansion, the roads leading into the territory, and the safest places for Frostcrest’s army to camp. Zayan stood at the head of the table, still carrying faint traces of his injuries beneath his armor, but there was no weakness in his posture anymore. He looked every bit like the warlord the entire empire feared. I stood beside him, listening carefully as he went over the plan one final time.“Mariana will travel ahead in the carriage,” Zayan explained, pointing toward the Graham territory on the map. “She’ll enter the mansion alone with only the guards assigned to her. Our forces will remain outside the borders of Mountcrest and establish camp where they won’t be detected.

Mariana pov The library had turned into a battlefield.Books were scattered across the floor, shelves had been knocked sideways, and the large wooden table that once sat in the center of the room had been pushed against the wall. I could barely keep track of everything happening around me. My father and Zayan were moving so quickly that all I could see sometimes was the flash of their swords and the blur of their bodies as they clashed. Master Graham was far more skilled with a sword than I had expected, and although Zayan clearly had the upper hand, he wasn’t fighting with his full strength. It was almost as though he was deliberately holding back, perhaps because this was still my father, perhaps because he wanted answers before he ended everything.I turned my head for a moment and saw Wren still being held by two of Zayan’s guards. She struggled against them, but there was nowhere for her to go. Her face was twisted with anger as she watched the fight unfold. I turned back jus