Page 94

How the hell do I apologize to someone who doesn’t obey?

How the hell do I fix this without losing everything?

Because it’s not just her I’ll lose. It’s all of them. Silas’ frustration, Orin’s quiet disappointment, Riven’s sharp fury—all of it will tear this family apart. And I’ll be the reason. I press my back against one of the cold marble columns, exhaling slowly, deliberately, like I can breathe the weakness out of me. But it doesn’t leave.

I know what I have to do. It will kill me, but I’ll do it. I’ll have to ask her how to fix it. I’ll have to ask her what she needs from me. And then I’ll have to give it to her.

Even if it guts me.

Because without her, none of this holds. I scrub a hand down my face, jaw flexing so hard it aches. I can’t fix this with words. I already tried. And she’s never going to look at me the way she looks at them, like she belongs.

Unless—

The thought creeps in, unbidden but sharp as a blade.

Maybe I can buy her.

Not with money—Luna wouldn’t care about that. But something else. Something she'd hold in her hands and think of me when she touched it.

Silas gave her that necklace last week. Ugly, heavy thing. Looked like he made it out of rusted nails and whatever scraps he could steal from the forge. I almost laughed when he gave it to her. But she didn’t. She wore it like it was gold.

She smiled at him like he'd handed her the fucking sun. Maybe that's what she wants. Something simple. Tangible. Something that doesn't come with strings wrapped around her throat.

A gift. Flowers. Something ridiculous. She’s the kind of woman who would rip me to pieces if she thought I was trying to buy her affection—but she’s also the kind who cried over the battered charm Silas strung together with his idiot hands.

My gaze shifts to the sprawl of the courtyard, the gardens tangled and wild beyond the cracked stone path. There are flowers blooming here no one remembers the names of. Magic-soaked, half-wilted, thorns like teeth. She’d like that. Something that doesn’t fit neatly, something dangerous and alive.

Yes. That will do.

I straighten, already calculating, already deciding. I’ll find her something. I’ll hand it to her without saying anything. No apology. No request. No expectation.

Maybe then she’ll stop looking at me like I ruined her.

Maybe then she’ll come home.

And if not?

At least I’ll have done something other than fail her.

Silas

I’ve known Lucien since the gods spat us out like chewed bones, long before mortals scribbled stories about monsters in the dark. He’s been sharp edges and cold dominion since the start, carved out of stone and pride, and somehow still walking around with those hands that look like they’ve never so much as touched dirt. Pretty hands, I’ve always thought, for a man who’s cracked skulls and commanded armies.

Right now, those same hands are useless. Clenched into fists at his sides as if that’ll stop the bleeding underneath. He’s spiraling, drowning beneath that icy exterior, and I can’t have that—not when the man’s the reason the seven of us haven’t torn each other to pieces a thousand times over.

And certainly not when my feral little flower is the one driving him to it.

So I watch him. Watch the way his eyes cut toward Luna like she’s a storm he’s trying to outpace. He’ll never say it—not without setting himself on fire first—but he’s fraying, quietly beneath the weight of everything he’s done and everything he hasn’t.

Which is exactly why I catch her wrist when she tries to slip past me toward the others.

“Hey, petal,” I murmur, voice pitched low, too sweet. She narrows her eyes at me immediately, already suspicious.

“What, Silas?” She doesn’t have the patience for me today, which only makes me grin wider.

I tug her off to the side, out of earshot from the rest, ignoring the way she huffs. “Before you go brooding over portal pillars and death trials, humor me.”

Her glare sharpens, but she lets me steer her to a quiet alcove beneath a collapsed archway. Sunlight spears in fractured beams through the broken stained glass above us, scattering color across her skin. She looks ethereal like this. Dangerous. Mine.