Page 17

The road to the cathedral stretches long and crooked beneath us, the earth damp and littered with brittle leaves from trees that have long since surrendered to this cursed realm. The Hollow presses close here, the woods whispering with old magic, thick with rot and memories. I let the others go on ahead, their energy loud and impatient, knowing I wouldn’t get a moment with her if they lingered. This isn’t a conversation meant for an audience.

Luna walks beside me, kicking loose stones as if they’re stand-ins for Lucien’s skull. Her breath comes in sharp, annoyed little bursts every time she mutters under it—about him, about how impossible he is, about how she’s not going to waste another second caring what he thinks. It’s endearing, almost amusing, how easily she pretends she doesn’t care when it’s written in every line of her shoulders.

I say nothing at first. I let her vent, knowing she needs it, knowing she’ll burn herself out long before the cathedral towers loom into view. It gives me time to watch her, to study the sharp defiance of her mouth and the flush of frustration in her cheeks. It makes something tight in my chest unfurl.

When she finally quiets, her steps slowing as the weight of everything she’s holding in settles heavier on her shoulders, I speak.

“You waste a great deal of breath on a man who’s not worth the real estate in your mind,” I murmur, voice low, even.

Her head snaps toward me, scowling, but I don't let her interrupt. “I don’t say that to belittle your anger. You’ve earned it, Luna. But you are burning yourself down to ash trying to prove you don’t care. And I don't think you should let him take that from you.”

She rolls her eyes at me, muttering something under her breath about how she doesn’t need a lecture, but she doesn’t look away. She never looks away from me. That, at least, she gives me.

I wait until the path narrows, until the woods peel back to a clearing kissed by light—just enough space between us and the world for me to pull the small velvet pouch from my coat pocket.

“For what it’s worth,” I say, extending it to her, “I see you, Luna. I’ve seen you since the moment you clawed your way into this nightmare of a realm and dared to hold us accountable. I am not waiting for you to fall apart. I am waiting to see how much more of the world you’re going to set on fire.”

Her brow furrows as she eyes the pouch suspiciously, then glances at me like I might be playing some game. But curiosity gets the better of her—as it always does—and she takes it from me.

Inside, she finds a chain of blackened silver, intricate and old, so old the magic clings to it like forgotten smoke. And threaded onto it, a single rune stone—an anchor rune, one of the oldest, etched with protection, belonging, permanence.

Her breath catches, just for a second.

“This is…” She trails off, running her thumb over the rune, her gaze flicking to me like she’s trying to figure out how serious I am.

“It’s the second phase,” I tell her simply. “Of my courtship. If you’ll still have me.”

Luna’s lips part, and for the first time all morning, she forgets to scowl. She doesn’t protest. Doesn’t shy away. She looks at me like maybe—for a second—she wants me to catch her.

And I will. I already have.

She turns without hesitation, her fingers lifting her hair away from her nape, exposing the fragile line of her neck like she’s offering it to a blade. Or to me. And maybe it’s the same thing. The Hollow winds still at the edges of the clearing, whispering, but I only hear the soft cadence of her breath and the quiet demand in her posture.

“Help me put it on,” she says, her voice soft but sure, like this is nothing at all. Like she isn’t baring herself in the smallest, most devastating way.

I step in close enough to feel the residual heat of her, the tension she wears beneath her skin like armor. My fingers brush against the fine strands of her hair as I take the chain, and I swear her breath stutters when my knuckles graze her throat. She smells like salt and wild things and nightfall.

“You shouldn’t be so willing to accept pieces of me,” I murmur, fastening the clasp with deliberate care. “Not when you’re so determined to throw the rest of us away.”

Her shoulders stiffen at that, but she doesn’t move away.

The chain settles against her skin, the rune resting at the hollow of her throat—a mark she doesn’t understand yet but will. The magic in it hums faintly, older than this realm, older than all of us. A promise carved into something permanent.

When I’ve secured it, I don’t step back immediately. My fingers linger at her nape, the barest touch against her pulse, and I let myself be greedy for one moment longer.

“You’ll rage at Lucien until you’re hoarse,” I say quietly, “but you’ll let me put this on you like it’s nothing. You’ll let me court you, let me carve myself into you little by little, and never once stop to question why.”

Her chin tips slightly, defiant, but her voice is a rasp when she answers. “Because you’re not cruel to me.”

“No,” I murmur, dropping my hand finally. “I’ll never be cruel to you, Luna. But I will not let you lie to yourself either.”

The path stretches empty ahead, the cathedral spire faint in the distance. I motion toward it, my voice low, knowing better than to press further now. “Come. We have a pillar to wake.”

But when she steps past me, I glance once more at the rune against her skin, knowing this isn’t over. She might not want to see it yet, but she’s already mine in ways neither of us can undo.

The path winds narrow beneath our feet, the sky bruising overhead with the onset of dusk. She walks beside me, her mouth tight, her brow knit like she’s holding herself together with sheer will. I don’t speak at first. I let her simmer, let her fill the space between us with that fury and that ache she doesn’t know how to set down.

And then, quiet but deliberate, I ask, “May I hold your hand?”

Her steps falter, just barely—a hiccup in her usually measured stride. She blinks at me like I’ve offered her something more dangerous than a dagger to the throat. “You’re asking?”

I glance at her, the corner of my mouth twitching despite myself. “I’ve lived a long time, Luna. Long enough to know the difference between taking and being offered.”

She huffs, almost a laugh, almost something softer. “No one’s ever asked me that before.”

I lift a brow. “Then it’s long overdue.”

Her fingers hover awkwardly at her side, and when she finally offers her hand to me, it’s tentative, as if she’s still expecting me to snatch it away or turn this into a weapon. I don’t. I curl my palm around hers, slow, deliberate, and interlock our fingers like I’m setting another piece of her back into place.

The Hollow thrums faintly beneath us, this realm always hungry, always listening. But when her hand slides into mine, the noise in my head dulls for the first time in months.

“You don’t have to be afraid to take,” she mutters, her gaze fixed on the horizon ahead. “You all do it so well.”

I shake my head, brushing my thumb across her knuckles. “You mistake me. I don’t want to take from you, little star. I want you to give.”

Her breath stumbles again—small but sharp. She says nothing, but she doesn’t let go. And I don’t release her, not as we continue down the narrow, winding path toward the cathedral ruins waiting like a corpse on the edge of the Hollow.

Her voice is quiet when it breaks the rhythm of our footsteps, the words slipping from her like something fragile and sharp all at once. “…” she says, and there’s something about the way she says my name—like it’s the only safe place she has left to land.

I glance over at her without loosening my fingers from hers. She keeps her eyes forward, chin tilted like she’s forcing herself to sound casual, but I can feel the weight of the question coiling inside her. “What you said when I was running away… about loving me properly. Did you mean that?”

I stop walking. The world hushes around us—the Hollow’s wild, restless breath slowing for just a moment as I turn to face her. She tries to keep her expression even, but it’s unraveling at the edges, her hurt still stitched into the curve of her mouth, her eyes too careful.

“Yes,” I say, simply at first, like the word alone could hold the gravity of what I mean. But it isn’t enough. She deserves more than that. “I meant every damned word.”

Her throat bobs, but she doesn’t look away. So I keep going, because she’s never going to understand if I don’t tell her the truth—the whole truth.

“I’ve loved you since the moment you walked into that academy, chin up, defiant, mouthing off to Lucien like you had no idea what kind of monsters you’d stepped into the den of,” I murmur, my voice low, measured. “You were reckless, arrogant, and too bright to belong to a place like that. But you belonged to us the second you walked in, and I knew it.”

Her lips part like she wants to argue, but I don’t let her.

“I didn’t say anything then because you didn’t need another man circling you like a vulture. You needed a friend, Luna. You needed someone who wasn’t trying to own you or drag you under.” My thumb traces along her knuckles as I breathe out a laugh, dark and rough at the edges. “And I knew, if I so much as hinted at what I wanted from you, I wouldn’t be able to stop.”

I lean in just a little, not enough to crowd her, just enough to let her feel how serious this is. “So I stayed patient. I watched you choose them one by one—Elias, Silas, Riven—and I never asked you to choose me. Because I wanted to be the one who waited, the one who loved you without asking for anything back.”

Her eyes flick to mine, too wide, too soft, and she looks like she’s about to fall apart all over again.

I smile then—slow, devastating, gentle. “You’ve spent your whole life with people trying to own you, Luna. I’d rather burn than be one of them.”

Her steps falter, and she glances at me out of the corner of her eye like she’s fighting herself. Her voice, when it comes, is soft and clipped, but it doesn’t hide the flush crawling up her throat. “What I said about your abs… was a lie. They’re more than average.”

I smile slowly, deliberately, savoring it like a sin on my tongue. “I know.”

She glares at me, predictably, beautifully, like she’s trying to claw the words back, but I don’t let her. I tilt my head, eyes dragging over her like a slow caress. “You’re undressing me with your eyes now.”

“I am not!” she snaps, a little too fast, the flush spreading all the way to the tips of her ears.

“Yes, you are, little star,” I murmur, voice silk-wrapped steel. “You’ve been staring since I took my jacket off.”

Her chin juts up, obstinate and irritated and absolutely enchanted. “Am not.”

“You keep saying that,” I say, falling into step beside her, my hand brushing the small of her back with infuriating ease, “but the color on your cheeks says otherwise.”

She huffs, muttering something under her breath about how impossible I am and starts walking faster, as if she can outrun how visible she is to me. As if I haven’t spent centuries reading people far better at hiding their sins than her.

“It’s perfectly acceptable to love my abs, Luna,” I call after her, my voice a low purr laced with amusement. “I think you might want me to rush through this entire courtship nonsense just so you can finally get your hands on me.”

She whirls around briefly, walking backward, cheeks burning, eyes narrowed to slits. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

I give her a slow, deliberate once-over, letting my eyes linger too long, because she’s baiting me now whether she realizes it or not. “You’re the one imagining me naked, little star. I’m just accommodating your fantasies.”

She huffs again, turning on her heel and practically stomping ahead of me now, like she can walk away from the fact that she’s smiling despite herself, that she keeps looking over her shoulder just to see if I’m watching her.

And I am. Always.

The trees thin in the distance, shadows giving way to the faint shimmer of cathedral spires clawing at the horizon—the spiral they all fear, the one she’s agreed to return to with us. I let her walk ahead, let her pretend she isn’t smiling and flustered, while I tuck my hands behind my back and follow her, patient and deliberate, like I have been since the beginning.

Because she can run, and she can lie, and she can spit venom at every one of us—but I know how this ends.

And it ends with her in my arms.

I let the silence stretch between us, let her stew in the weight of what’s already passed between us, the unspoken promise humming in the air like a storm about to break. Then, casually, deliberately, I say, “Or perhaps I should tell you my fantasies about you.”

She spins, walking backward now, her eyes sharp, suspicious, her lips parted like she wasn’t expecting me to throw that gauntlet down so openly. “You’re not supposed to say things like that.”

I arch a brow, slow and lazy, savoring the flush creeping up her throat. “And why not?”

Her gaze flicks away, then back again, guarded but curious. “Because we’re not sleeping together yet.”

The yet is what makes me smile. Slow, deliberate, wolfish. I close the space between us, not enough to touch, but enough to make her breath catch. “That’s precisely why I should tell you,” I murmur, my voice a low, silken thing. “Because, little star, everything I say to you is foreplay.”

Her breath stutters, and I don’t let her look away.

“When I do bond you,” I continue, my voice soft but cutting, “you won’t just want me. You’ll crave me. You’ll ache for me in ways you haven’t even begun to imagine. And when you finally let me have you—” I lean forward slightly, my voice a whisper she feels more than hears, “—you’ll wonder how you ever thought you could survive without me.”

Her steps falter for half a second before she recovers, spinning back around, chin high, cheeks flushed like she’s been caught stealing. I don’t press. I let her run.

“My favorite part of this walk,” I say casually, letting my voice drop, slow and decadent, “is the view you’re giving me.”

Her steps falter, not enough to stumble but enough that I see the flush rise up the back of her neck. She doesn’t turn around, doesn’t grace me with a reply, but her pace quickens like distance will fix the way her pulse is thrumming in her throat.

I smirk and keep talking because I know her by now. I know she listens even when she pretends she doesn’t. “You don’t even know how lethal you look right now, do you?” I continue, voice like honey laced with something sharper. “The sway of those hips is enough to make a lesser man drop to his knees.”

Her chin lifts, shoulders rising like she’s holding her breath.

“But I’m not a lesser man,” I murmur, just loud enough for her to hear over the breeze. “Which is why I’ll keep walking behind you, little star, and memorize every step you take like it’s an offering.”

She glances back at me then, quick and sharp, cheeks flushed, mouth twitching like she’s fighting the smile threatening to bloom. I see her try to swallow it down, try to bite back whatever smart remark is burning her tongue. But she doesn’t say it.

Because I already know her—know that under all that stubbornness, she likes when I look at her like I do. Like I could devour her whole and still starve.

I lengthen my stride to fall beside her, matching her steps now. “You can keep pretending you don’t like it,” I murmur, voice dipping lower. “But we both know you’d miss me if I stopped.”

She finally looks at me fully, lips parting, and for a moment I think she’s about to argue. But she doesn’t.

She only shakes her head once, and keeps walking.

And I follow.

Always.

Lucien

I see them before they crest the ridge— and Luna walking shoulder to shoulder, her hair loose and wild like she belongs out here, like she belongs anywhere but under my watch. She’s laughing at something says, soft and warm in a way I haven't heard from her since the night I burned her down with words I can’t take back.

The others surge forward the moment they spot her. Silas practically vaults over a low wall, Elias close behind, pretending he doesn’t care when he looks like he might combust trying to get to her first. Riven’s jaw is locked like he’s barely holding it together, Caspian quiet but gravitating toward her like a man starved.

I hang back.

It’s not difficult to do. I’ve spent centuries perfecting the art of making myself invisible when I want to be, even when I’m the most dangerous thing in the room. Especially then.

She’s the sun in this moment—the axis they orbit. I know I ruined it. I know what I said to her wasn’t just cruel; it was calculated, precise, the way only I can be when I want to destroy something before it destroys me.

I didn’t mean to aim for her heart. I was aiming for mine.

And yet here she is, alive and breathing and still lighting them up like they’ve been starved for her. Like they’ve spent years waiting for her return instead of hours. I know Riven stayed the night at that godsdamned tavern. They all pretend I don’t know, but I do. I know every move they make. And still, none of them realize that if something had happened to her—if she hadn’t come back—I wouldn’t have survived it.

I fold my arms across my chest, the weight of my Dominion humming just beneath my skin. It wants me to close the distance, wants me to pull her back in like I do everything else. But she’s the only thing in this world I can’t compel.

And she’s smiling at them like she never smiled at me.

She doesn’t even glance in my direction.

Good. It’s safer that way.

The others crowd her, their voices a mess of laughter and relief. I catch her name on all of their lips. Silas says it like it’s a joke. Riven like a threat. Caspian like a prayer. like a promise.

And I say nothing at all.

Because I know when I am not welcome.

When I am the wolf at the door they’d rather pretend isn’t there.

And still—I can’t take my eyes off her.

The sound of them is maddening.

Laughter. Voices tripping over one another to reach her first. All of them hovering around her like she’s something fragile, a flame they’re terrified will gutter out if they don’t feed it enough attention.

I watch the way she softens around them. Lets Riven lean in too close. Lets Caspian murmur something low enough that it earns a smile. Silas clinging to her like he’s never learned boundaries. And —he walks beside her like he belongs there, like he’s carved out a space next to her and dared anyone to argue with him about it.

I did this. I ripped the foundation out from under her feet and then acted like I was surprised when she ran. The longer I stand here, the more I see it—the distance between us is a canyon now, and every second I let it stretch, it becomes something that can’t be crossed.

And I’m the one who broke it open.

I clear my throat, sharp enough to cut through their noise. The sound echoes off the cracked stones of the cathedral walls, sharp enough to snare their attention. The smiles drop. Caspian’s gaze flicks to me, cool. Riven glares. Silas scowls like I just pissed in his drink. ’s expression is blank, unreadable.

And her.

She doesn’t even look at me.

I force the words out anyway. "A minute. Alone."

The way their shoulders stiffen, the way looks like he’s already debating whether he’ll let me near her, makes me want to flay my own skin off.

It’s Elias who finally mutters something crude under his breath and herds the others toward the cathedral doors, his hand brushing her shoulder in a way I shouldn't notice, shouldn’t resent.

They leave us standing in the courtyard like opponents about to draw blood.

She doesn’t move.

I swallow hard, each word a blade lodged in my throat.

"You don’t have to look at me," I say quietly. "But you need to hear this."

Her arms are crossed over her chest, her posture sharp, a fortress.

I deserve it.

"I know," I continue, voice rough, "I said things to you that can’t be unsaid. That’s the point—I made sure they’d stick. I knew exactly how to cut you, and I did it anyway."

Her gaze doesn’t lift. But her fingers twitch against her sleeve.

"I don’t apologize," I tell her. "You know that. I don’t regret. I don’t bend."

I take a breath that feels like razors slicing down my throat.

"But I was wrong."

Her chin lifts, eyes finally cutting to mine. There’s nothing soft there. No forgiveness. Good. I don’t deserve it.

"I need you to come home."

Her lips part, but she doesn’t speak. She’s waiting for the rest. And she should. She’s smarter than all of us.

"I don’t care if you hate me," I say, voice low, vicious in its honesty. "I don’t care if you never look at me again. But this—" I gesture vaguely at the distance between her and the rest of them. "This fracture isn’t you. And I don’t know how to fix it without you."

For a moment, the wind cuts between us, sharp and cold.

And then I say the thing that almost kills me. The thing I shouldn’t need to say but do.

"I shouldn’t have said what I said to you. I didn’t mean it. I’ve never meant it."

The weight of it presses down on me like an executioner’s hand.

"If you don’t want to come back for me," I add, "fine. But don’t punish them because of me."

Her stare is unflinching. The silence between us isn’t empty—it’s full of all the things I never wanted to admit. The way she terrifies me. The way she makes me hesitate. The way she’s the only one who has ever made me want to be good.

Her voice lands like a lash across my spine, deceptively calm but vicious in the way only truth can be.

“No,” she says, and there’s nothing uncertain about it. “You don’t get to say this now like it fixes anything. You’ve never wanted me here—not from the second I walked through those academy doors. You made sure I knew it.”

Her eyes pin me in place, sharp and cold, and it’s not the first time she’s looked at me like I’m a disease she regrets catching, but it’s the first time it cuts all the way through.

“You don’t get to tear someone down piece by piece and then expect them to crawl back to you because you suddenly feel guilty.”

I keep my expression blank. She’s always hated that about me, how little I give away. But inside, every word is a blade twisting deeper.

“I don’t need you to like me, Lucien,” she goes on, voice low but relentless. “You’ve made it clear you don’t. But I won’t keep living in a house where I have to second-guess every breath, wondering when you’ll look at me like I don’t belong.”

She crosses her arms, not in defense, but to hold herself together. Like if she doesn’t, she’ll shatter.

“And maybe the others can pretend you’re not like this, but I’m done pretending. I won’t live with someone who makes me feel like I have to shrink myself to survive.”

I take a step toward her, carefully measured, like she’s a blade pressed to my throat. “You don’t have to shrink yourself.”

Her laugh is sharp and bitter, scraping down my spine. “That’s the problem. You don’t want me to shrink—you want me gone.”

I open my mouth, but she cuts me off before I can speak.

“I don’t need an apology,” she says, and it’s a blade to the chest, the way she spits it like poison. “I don’t even need you to like me. But I’m not going to keep bleeding myself dry trying to prove to you that I deserve to be here.”

Her words hang between us, heavier than any weapon. Because everything she’s saying is right.

And worse—it’s everything I’ve made her believe.

Before I can stop myself, the words tear out of me, low and sharp. “You deserve to be here.”

Her eyes flick up, guarded, unbelieving.

“But I can’t give you what you want from me,” I admit, the words like glass in my throat. “I don’t know how.”

She shakes her head once, a small, fractured motion. “I never asked you to.”

I want to tell her she’s wrong. That from the second she walked into my world, she’s asked everything from me without knowing it. But I don’t. Because she’s right. I’ve never made her feel like she belonged. And now, I’m the reason she’s standing in front of me like a stranger, telling me she’s done.

My stomach twists, and for the first time in centuries, I don’t know how to fix this.

She turns before I can say anything else, walking back toward the others without waiting for me to follow.

And I let her.

Because every instinct I have is screaming at me to drag her back—to force her to look at me, to listen—but I know if I do, I’ll lose her completely. And I can’t afford that. Not when the entire world might fall apart because of it.

Silas paces in front of me, hands shoved into his pockets like he’s trying to hold himself together with sheer will. His mouth twists into something sharp, dangerous—because Silas isn’t good at hiding when he’s pissed. He’s never had to be.

“So?” His voice cuts through the cathedral’s echo like a blade. “Did you fix it?”

I don’t look at him right away. I stare past him, to the stone arches overhead, the murals of gods and sinners, their faces cracked and fading after centuries of ruin and reverence. All of it feels too familiar.

“No,” I answer finally, voice low but firm, clipped at the edges. No point in lying. They’d know. She’d know.

Silas huffs out a bitter laugh, raking a hand through his mess of dark curls. “Of course you didn’t.”

leans against the cold wall beside me, arms crossed over his broad chest like he’s holding the weight of the world there, quiet but heavy, his gaze pinned on me like he’s peeling back every layer I’ve spent years perfecting. He doesn’t speak yet. He waits—always patient, always letting me unravel at my own pace.

Silas doesn’t have the same restraint. “You had one fucking job, Lucien,” he spits, stepping in, his voice low enough not to carry but venom-laced anyway. “One. Apologize. Fix it. You didn’t even have to mean it.”

My jaw clenches. “I did mean it.”

“Then you’re worse than I thought.” Silas shakes his head, voice dropping into something almost broken. “You mean it and still can’t find a way to stop hurting her.”

finally speaks, his voice quieter but heavier, like it settles beneath my ribs and twists. “You’ve built your entire life on knowing how to bend people to your will. And yet you can’t manage the one person who’d give you the world without being asked.”

“She doesn’t want me,” I bite out, harsher than I intend. It’s not a lie. It’s just not the truth either.

’s eyes flick to mine, ancient and knowing. “No,” he says carefully. “She doesn’t want the version of you that makes her bleed.”

Silas snorts, stepping back, shaking his head like he can’t even look at me. “You’re the only one who doesn’t see it, Lucien. She’d give you everything if you stopped trying to tear her apart first.”

I don’t respond. Because every instinct inside me is twisted backward when it comes to her—because the moment she stepped into my world, she cracked me open, and I’ve been bleeding out ever since.

Silas lets out a rough breath, turning toward the doors where the others disappeared. “Fix it. Or you’ll lose all of us, not just her.”

Then he’s gone, following after them like he can’t bear to be near me any longer.

lingers a moment longer, quiet, unreadable.

“She’s not afraid of you, Lucien,” he says softly. “You’re the one who’s afraid.”

And then he leaves too, the weight of the truth trailing behind him like a ghost.

How the hell am I supposed to fix this if she won’t even listen to me?

The question beats against the inside of my skull like a drum, louder than the sound of the cathedral doors slamming shut behind Silas and . Their footsteps fade down the corridor, but I’m still standing in the hollowed space they left behind, alone with the taste of my own failure.

I drag a hand down my face, jaw tight enough to crack bone. I said I was sorry. I meant it. I swallowed every ounce of pride I had and gave her the one thing I’ve never given anyone—admission of guilt. And it wasn’t enough.

Not for her. Because it was never about the words. She wants something I don’t know how to give.

My pride is a living thing, wounded and snarling inside me. I’ve commanded kings to kneel. I’ve made entire realms bend to my will with a whisper. But her? That damn girl who doesn’t bow, who doesn’t flinch, who looks at me like I’m not a god, but a man?

She’s the only one who has ever made me powerless.

And I hate her for it. I hate her because I want her. Because no matter how cruel I’ve been, how deliberately I’ve driven her away, the pull still coils under my skin, thrumming like it belongs to her. Because when I watched her walk past me, hair tangled by the wind, her smile cracking for the others and never once turning toward me—I wanted to fucking beg.

Is that what she wants? Me on my knees?

I scoff under my breath, the sound hollow in the cathedral’s empty air. It’s ridiculous. I don’t grovel. I don’t beg. I don’t chase after anyone.

But she’s not just anyone, is she?

My gaze drifts toward the archway where they disappeared, where she disappeared, walking ahead with the others like she belonged to them now. Like I was the shadow she left behind.

The truth is a bitter thing to swallow.

She was never afraid of me. Not like the others. She wasn’t seduced by my power, wasn’t pulled by Dominion. She saw through it, through me, and it’s the one thing I couldn’t stomach. The one thing that makes me dangerous to her, and her dangerous to me.

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, ’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.