Page 21

KAIA

I haven’t seen the sun in a week.

Elias keeps the place dim on purpose, says too much light fucks with the wards—but I think he just likes the shadows. Fits him. Broody bastard.

At first, when I stumbled across him in the ruins, there’d been this pull between us—something low and wild, whispering at the edges of my sanity. I told myself it was just adrenaline, or magic, or hell, even trauma. Something explainable. Something I could bury.

But after a week of being stuck in this half-collapsed safehouse with him, training until I’m dripping sweat and raw nerve endings, that stupid pull hasn’t gone away. If anything, it’s gotten worse. Sharper. Hotter.

I twist the dagger he gave me between my fingers, the blade catching the faint lantern glow. My whole body hums like a livewire, energy thrumming under my skin in a way that’s not normal, not right.

I’m not human. Not fully.

And I sure as hell can’t go back.

I don’t even know if there’s a back to go to.

Maybe they think I’m dead. Maybe my father’s planning a fucking manhunt. Maybe Mira is sitting in her quarters, sipping whiskey and lying to herself that her daughter didn’t just light up like a goddamn supernova.

Hell, maybe no one saw.

Either way, it doesn’t matter.

If they see what I am now... I'm done.

Burned. Bagged. Buried.

And the fucked-up part?

I’m relieved.

I flex my fingers, feeling the energy crackle at the edges, barely held in check. It's like something inside me is waking up, something ancient and hungry and wild. It’s terrifying. It’s thrilling. It’s... intoxicating.

We’ve been training every day since I’ve been here, trying to control my emotions and this power inside of me, and it’s getting me nowhere besides being more irritated with more questions. Elias pushes me hard. He doesn’t let me whine or fall apart or think myself into paralysis.

And it drives me absolutely insane.

He’s so damn smug about it, too. Standing there with that infuriating calm, like he’s seen this shit a thousand times before, like nothing rattles him.

And every time he shoves me to do better, every time he levels those glacier eyes at me and dares me to lose control, it scrapes against something raw inside my chest.

I hate that I notice the way his mouth twitches when I curse at him.

I hate that I notice the way the veins pop on his forearms when he spars.

I hate that when I fall into exhausted, restless sleep at night, it’s his face that haunts my dreams.

Not bloody.

Not broken.

But close.

Too close.

Mouths brushing. Hands sliding. Bodies pressed tight enough to burn.

I don't know him. Not really.

But something deep inside me howls for him anyway.

And that scares me more than my magic ever could.

"Focus, Kaia," Elias says from across the room, voice low and rough like gravel.

He leans against the cracked wall, arms crossed over his chest, his long black hair falling loose around his shoulders.

His ice-blue eyes pin me in place, sharp as blades.

The bastard always looks like he stepped out of some ancient nightmare—lethal, half-feral, carved from storm clouds and blood.

"You’re leaking magic again," he adds.

"No shit," I mutter, trying to breathe through it. Trying to breathe through him.

"You’re thinking too much."

"Gee, thanks for the fucking wisdom, Obi-Wan," I snap, even though my pulse skitters wildly under my skin just from the way he’s looking at me.

His mouth twitches, almost a smile, almost—but he pushes off the wall and stalks toward me, that predatory grace making my heart stumble in my chest like it forgot how to work.

I back up a step without meaning to, and his eyes flash molten for half a second, like he likes that I flinch. Like he wants me on edge.

"I mean it," he says, voice dropping lower, rougher. It strokes along my spine like the whisper of claws. "You can’t just think your way through this. You have to feel it. Control it."

"Control it?" I snort, desperate to keep the conversation anchored somewhere safe, anywhere but the heat curling in my gut. "It’s like trying to leash a damn hurricane."

He stops a few feet in front of me, hands loose at his sides, close enough that I can smell the leather and smoke on his skin. Close enough that the air seems to shudder between us.

"Then be the fucking hurricane," he murmurs.

The world narrows down to this single heartbeat—me and him and the thrum of power between us, thick and electric and inevitable.

And I don’t know what snaps in me, frustration, fear, something hotter and more dangerous—but I lunge.

The dagger flies from my hand without me even thinking, propelled by a surge of raw power that cracks the air like lightning.

Elias moves fast, but not fast enough.

The blade stops an inch from his throat, frozen midair by some invisible force— my force—and the pressure in the room spikes, heavy and charged.

We stare at each other across the trembling space, breathing hard, the air between us practically vibrating.

He looks at me like I just stripped naked and bared my soul, like he can see every broken, desperate part of me. And for once, he doesn’t flinch.

"You’re stronger than you think," he says quietly.

The words hit something deep in my chest, a place I didn’t even know was empty until now.

And then the tension snaps.

Not slow. Not careful.

It explodes.

One second we’re standing there, locked in some kind of electric standoff, and the next, I’m crashing into him, fists grabbing his jacket, mouth finding his with a rough, angry kind of hunger.

He growls low in his throat, fuck, that sound—and then he’s kissing me back, just as desperate, just as reckless, his hands fisting in my hair, pulling me closer until there’s no space left between us.

It’s not sweet.

It’s not gentle.

It’s fire and fury and all the fucked-up emotions we’ve both been choking on for days—loneliness, rage, fear—igniting at once.

When he lifts me, I gasp into his mouth, legs wrapping around his hips without thinking. He pins me against the wall, his body solid and hot against mine, and I feel alive for the first time in what feels like forever.

"Kaia," he breathes against my lips, like he’s trying to stop, trying to be good.

But I don’t want him to be good.

I want him real.

I want this.

"Don’t you dare fucking stop," I whisper back.

I’m tired of trying to control everything and right now, I need to let loose. With him. Because nothing makes sense, so why should this?

His control shatters.

He kisses me harder, like he’s trying to brand me, claim me, and gods, I kiss him right back because I’m just as fucked, just as desperate.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, a tiny voice screams that this is wrong—that we barely know each other, that he’s dangerous, that I’m broken—but I crush it under the heel of my boot.

Because in this moment, with his hands on my hips and his mouth on my throat, I feel more me than I ever have before.

I feel free.