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And I swear the feathers shimmer with menace.
Let the show begin.
The lights dim again, and the feathered horror below us settles into her seat with a sound like a deflating accordion. The scent of whatever perfume she’s weaponized wafts up even from this height—roses, rot, and the souls of men who’ve made very poor choices.
Elias makes a gagging sound beside me.
Luna leans forward slightly, eyes darting toward the stage like she’s trying to pretend she hasn’t witnessedeverything.
But I? Ithrivein this chaos. And as I lean into her, closer than a whisper, I let my words curl in that soft, ridiculous tone she always pretends to hate.
“I loveyourbosom the mostest,” I murmur.
There’s a beat of stunned silence.
Then—“What did you just say to me?”
“I said your bosom is my favorite bosom in the known universe. Possibly the multiverse. Definitely superior to Featherzilla down there.”
“Silas—”
“It’s science, Luna. Physics.Poetry.Your cleavage could writesonnets.Hers could crush small villages. We are not the same.”
She covers her face with her hand, shoulders shaking, and I see the exact second she loses it—her laugh bursts out, sharp and helpless, and she swats at me like I’m a fly buzzing around her halo.
Elias groans like he’s physically in pain. “Why do you say things like that? Why are you like this?”
“Because I’m aromantic, Elias.”
“You’re anembarrassment,” Luna says, but she’s still laughing, and her hand finds mine in the dark, fingers twining like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I glance down at our joined hands. Then up at her.
“Admit it,” I say. “You love me.”
“Ido,” she mutters through a smile. “Gods help me.”
“Boom,” I whisper, smug. “Confirmed. The bosom of my dreams loves me back.”
And in the flickering candlelight, as the stage below us floods with false moonlight and the actors start their performance, I know something truer than anything that script will ever say:
This—this laugh, this touch, this impossible girl—I’d burn the world for her. And I’d do it in rhinestone boots if she asked me to.
Ambrose
I’ve never been a man who values sleep. Rest is a negotiation, a courtesy I allow myself when the world doesn’t require me to be sharper than the blade pressed against its throat. But sleep—the real kind, the kind that steals you whole and returns you softer—I discarded that centuries ago. Still, there’s a difference between choosing not to sleep and being kept from it. And tonight, it’s not Keira’s ghost in my bed or Branwen’s claws at the base of my skull. It’s something far more disruptive.
It’s Luna’s voice.
I can still hear it. The words low and offered like a secret passed between shadows.“The bargain still stands.”Not flirtation. Not seduction. She said it with a clarity that stripped it of pretense—like an equation that only ever solves one way. No tricks. No smile. Just her eyes, and the weight behind them that said:I know you. I know what you need. And I’m still offering it.
And that is what won’t let me rest.
Because she meant it. Which means I have to ask myself why.
I rise, push the sheet off my lap like it’s tangled with thought. The room is still, untouched by time. My boots sit at the end of the bed, polished by habit, not necessity. The hearth remains unlit; I don’t like fire when it isn’t serving a purpose. The wallsfeel closer tonight, or maybe I’m just too aware of what I walked away from earlier.
She didn’t ask for anything. Not a promise. Not a vow. Not even pleasure in return. Just... herself. Her body, her presence, her stillness—offered like she was something I could use until I’d hollowed her out and still not owe her anything.