Becoming His Weakness

He narrowed his eyes in suspicion at her words.

"He has no heartbeat," Daphne continued. "Did you really think you trained for all these years only to miss your mark? You saw how much blood had spilled from his wound. We all saw how much blood had been shed."

The cell suddenly turned quiet, and there was only the sound of screaming in the distance, further amplifying the horror and the tension.

It was like the world had suddenly turned clearer for the assassin.

"The rumored deal that he made with the devil… it was real." He croaked, barely able to hide his disbelief. "He really sold his soul for eternal life."

He leaned back, letting his body fall against the chair, not caring of the way he pressed against his wounds. At that moment, all he wanted to do was collapse. How was he ever going to kill a man that could not die?

This mission was doomed from the start, and he had wagered away his life for a goal that could never be reached. Even if he returned now to his master, all that would greet him would be death—the punishment for failing to hit his mark.

No, what he would find back with his master would be worse than death, comparable to the suffering that he was experiencing now.

His heart hit rock bottom, and she seized the opportunity.

"But he has a weakness," Daphne whispered and saw how his eyes had widened at her words.

"What?"

She shrugged.

"Give me the antidote, and I'll tell you."

"What if you're lying?"

"Do you think you are in a position to negotiate? If I wanted to lie to you, I would have never told you this much."

He pursed his lips.

"I guess it doesn't matter that you found out his secret. You and I both can take this to the grave then, I suppose."

Shaking her head wistfully, Daphne heaved a sigh, glancing to check for any chance in his emotions.

"I'll only give you the recipe to half of the antidote. My master has the other half, and if you give me the details, I'll supply you with the other."

This was a game of chess, not to mention the worse type where no matter how either party tried, the end result would be a draw.

"If I let you go, you'll return to your master and bring me the other half?"

He nodded. "I believe he will be interested in your alliance."

"Send me the symbol of a crescent moon to mark yourselves," Daphne repeated the same condition she had given the boy from before.

"You have the power to convince him to let me go?" The assassin confirmed. "And he will listen?"

"Do you not have faith in me?"

Daphne narrowed her eyes, trying to put on her most convincing expression. Perhaps the Northern King will weigh her life above the true identity of his enemy. No, that was impossible. But she couldn't let the assassin know that.

The assassin laughed, a manic look slowly creeping into his eyes. He had been trained for too many years to not know how to tell a lie.

"Princess, you don't know his weakness, do you?" His words spelled nothing but doom for Daphne. Seeing her uneasiness, he continued. "With your abilities, if you had already found it out, I don't believe that he would have lived to see the sun rise yesterday."

Heaving a sigh, Daphne braced herself for the worst as she saw the hope of the antidote blink out of existence.

"I—"

"Deal."

She blinked, unable to hide her blatant confusion.

"Deal?" She echoed, staring at the assassin as if he had gone mad. Now that he had seen straight through her lie, she didn't understand why he still agreed to give her the antidote.

"Did you not hear me the first time?" He flexed his tensed neck muscles. "I said deal."

His words were no longer slurred nor muffled, instead ringing clearly out through the room.

"You're agreeing?" The slight pain throbbing in her stomach made her realize that this was not some dream.

"Princess, why do we need to find a weakness?"

She furrowed her brows, confused at his words. Whatever was in the cup the Northern King had given to this man must have been toying with his mind. There was no way that he was thinking straight anymore.

"Princess, we've already found his weakness." A smile crept up his face, lighting it in a way that seemed to brighten the entire gloomy dungeon cell.

Her mind reeled, and as much as she hated to admit it, she knew what words would come out of his mouth next.

"His weakness is you."

Her eyes dimmed, something inexplicable forming at the tip of her tongue.

"Even if his weakness isn't you yet, we can make it so that you become his sole weakness. So why should we waste time looking for his weakness?"

A tight smile formed over her lips. The Northern King was a man of mysteries, and she was not willing to admit that she didn't have the confidence to unlock them.

The Northern King's alternating moods frightened her, and she never knew what he would do at the next moment. The same man that fed her porridge one moment might slaughter an entire village the next. And she could not bear the thought of the bloodied hand that murdered innocent families caressing her body.

"What makes you say that?" Taking a deep breath, she asked the assassin, surprised at his unwavering words.

He only flexed his body in response, his body no longer limp like before.

"He's already made his decision." In one swift movement, the chains that had been bolted to his arms came undone as his arms tore through the links. "That drank he gave me was his response."

He nodded at toward the direction of the gate.

It was open.

He must have seen the confused expression on Daphne's face because just as he reached the cell's exit, he turned around and told her, "The drink returned my strength back to me, a cure for the toxins they had fed me earlier."

His gleeful expression was short-lived. As he motioned to exit the cell, the assassin ran straight into the Northern King.

"Time's up." The Northern King's amber eyes glinted in the darkness. "Game's over."