Page 21 of Claimed In Darkness

21

NAIRA

T he blood is gone.

But it doesn’t truly go away.

I press my hands against my thighs, curling my fingers into the silk of my dress, but it doesn’t matter. No matter how hard I scrubbed, burned, clawed at my own skin, I can still feel the warm, wet slick of it between my fingers.

It sprayed on my body.

He gasped under me.

His body jerked.

The stench of blood clings to the back of my throat like a ghost of rot and metal, thick even beneath the perfumed oils that still cling to my damp skin.

I shift my gaze to the mirror before me.

I do not recognize the woman staring back.

Her hair falls in damp, tangled waves, curling over her bare shoulders. Her collarbones are sharp ridges, her lips slightly parted, still swollen from something she shouldn’t have allowed.

Her eyes.

Too dark.

Too hollow.

I exhale, pushing away from the vanity.

I shouldn’t be here.

I shouldn’t still be in his room, in his space, in the same fucking orbit as Zephiran Zacria.

Yet here I am.

I did not run.

I let him touch me.

I let him claim something I should have never fucking given.

The corridors are silent, the halls of his estate stretching out before me like a gilded cage.

I know where the exits are.

I know where the guards stand post, where the hidden tunnels weave beneath the estate, where the weak points in his security could let me slip away into the night.

Yet my feet do not take me toward them.

Instead, I move through the halls like a specter, my fingers trailing against cold stone, my breath too quiet.

I hear him.

Not speaking. Not moving.

But breathing.

I don’t mean to step forward, don’t mean to let my own curiosity betray me, but I do.

I move toward the open doors of his private chambers, toward the glow of the fire flickering against the far wall.

Zephiran is sitting at the corner of the bed, elbows braced against his knees, his hands curled into fists. His tunic is loose, his hair disheveled, strands falling into his eyes as he stares at the floor as if it holds the answers to every fucking thing wrong with him.

He looks?—

Unmade.

Something twists inside my chest, but I ignore it.

I should leave.

I should turn back before he?—

His voice is quiet, too quiet.

"You’re awake."

I stiffen, my body caught in the threshold like a deer beneath a hunter’s bow.

He doesn’t look at me, but his voice is steady, deep, filled with something I can’t quite place.

"You didn’t run."

I hate that my throat tightens.

That my fingers twitch at my sides.

That he says it like he knew I wouldn’t.

Like he always knew.

"Why would I?" I say, forcing my tone into something sharp, something cutting. "We both know what happens if I do."

His shoulders tense, just slightly.

"Because of the poison?" he murmurs. "Or because of something else?"

I stay sient. What can I even say?

I cross my arms over my chest, shifting my weight to one foot. "What are they going to do with me?"

Zephiran leans back slightly, finally lifting his gaze. His eyes are shadowed, unreadable. Dark pools of something dangerous.

"What do you think?" he asks.

A bitter laugh scrapes its way up my throat.

"They want me to kill again," I say, the words too calm, too hollow.

A slow nod. "They will demand more from you. And you will give it to them."

My stomach clenches.

I shouldn’t be surprised. I shouldn’t feel anything at all.

He’s right.

I will because I am past the point of turning back.

But that’s not what lingers in my mind.

It’s the way he says it.

It’s not an order or a command.

But as a fact.

"You think you know me so well," I say, my voice quieter now.

Zephiran exhales slowly, his jaw tightening before he stands, closing the space between us in a single breath.

He stops too close, his presence wrapping around me like a vice, the scent of him thick with spice and something unnameable.

"I do know you," he says, lifting a hand toward my face.

I flinch, but he doesn’t touch me.

His fingers hover, just barely, close enough to make me feel the heat of him, close enough to make me hate that I want him to close the distance.

"You belong to me," he murmurs, voice low, lethal, laced with something unholy.

The air between us snaps too tight, too fast.

The weight of it presses against my core, drags heat through my veins, curls something unwanted and unbearable beneath my skin.

I lift my chin, a silent challenge.

"And yet," I breathe, "you still haven’t figured out what to do with me."

Something in his expression shifts.

Like I’ve struck a nerve.

Like he knows it’s the fucking truth.

No matter how much he threatens me, no matter how many chains he tries to wrap around my body, my throat, my fucking soul?—

He still doesn’t know how to break me.

And that kills him.

His gaze drops to my mouth, his fingers twitching in the empty gap between us, his breath coming in just slightly too uneven.

He wants to take. To own. To ruin.

But he won’t.

I see the hesitation in him. That’s when I know.

He’s afraid.

Not me or himself.

So I do the cruelest thing I can.

I move back, slowly, deliberately, leaving him standing there, waiting for something I will not give him.

I turn. I walk away.

Now, since this nightmare began, I am the one leaving him wanting.