Valka
I am a child once again, cold and frightened. Pressing my hand to my chest, I feel the speeding thud of it. I cannot think. I cannot think. I cannot think.
Lucien and I stare at each other, the truth of what we’ve done laying heavy between us, and those eyes that once twinkled with mischief are hard and cold now.
"Why are you in here?" His voice is too soft, the kind of soft that makes my skin crawl. The last ti he spoke to soone like that, he killed them in front of . "I tucked you in last night. In your chambers."
I swallow thickly, clutching the sheets to my chest with trembling fingers. "I--I don’t know. I--" My breath cos too fast. My thoughts scatter like frightened birds. "I ca here..."
There’s a blur in my mind, a hazy string of monts that don’t feel like mine, and yet, buried beneath them, there *was* a want.
I rember the hallway tilting beneath my feet, every step soft and distant, like I was walking through soone else’s dream. I rember the warmth of the wine still burning in my throat, the whisper of Ilya coiling in my mind, urging forward when I should have turned back. Go to him, it hissed. He needs you. You need him.
I rember the door closing behind . The sight of him thrashing in his sleep, sweat slicking his temples, broken words of grief slipping from his lips. I rember brushing trembling fingers over his cheeks until he stilled, until the nightmares loosened their hold. I rember the way my heart cracked at the sound of his voice when he whispered her na--Ilya--like a prayer he’d been denied too long.
And then... I rember the rest. The hard panes of his chest beneath my palms, the way his lashes fluttered when I kissed the hollow of his throat, the way his breath caught when I slid the bindings around his wrists. I rember the plea in his voice, the way he clung to the ghost he thought was before him. And I rember the burn and stretch of him inside , the sharp gasp that left my lips when his hands trembled against my skin.
I want to scream that it wasn’t . That the wine and Ilya’s poison walked here. That I was only a passenger in my own body. But that isn’t the truth. Not the whole truth. Because even if my mind had been clouded, even if sothing ancient and cruel had its hand at my back, a part of still wanted.
Maybe just once. Maybe only for a heartbeat.
And I’d known at the first stroke of him inside , when the burn lit through my veins. I’d known he was my first. I’d known where I was.
I should have stopped it. But it was the wine, and the heated glances across the tavern, and the way his arms had caged all the way ho. It was stirring to find his fingers tangled in my hair, his lips hovering an inch from mine before he’d pulled away, leaving with a burning core and that heavy, ragged "Sleep well, Valka."
It was Ilya, whispering her darkest, most selfish desires into my blood. But it was , too.
And the sha of that truth drowns as I stare at his body. The crescents of my nails carved into his chest. The faint bite marks blooming purple across his skin. The raw red bands at his wrists where the bindings had held him.
I’ve crossed a line. A grave one.
I took advantage of him, in the worst, most vulnerable way imaginable. There is no explanation I can give, no excuse that could ever make staying forgivable. Not after kissing him even as he wept for his dead Erasthai. And in the silence after, I realize I’ve wounded sothing in him far deeper than flesh.
His eyes widen as the understanding flickers across my face. And I see it then. A wall too thick to break, a distance growing too quickly to ever bridge between us. The coldness in his gaze curdles into sothing darker, heavier.
"Lucien," I breathe, reaching out, to touch him, to apologize, to sothing but he flinches.
He flinches.
The violet in his eyes goes black, and he’s off the bed in a heartbeat, like he cannot get away from fast enough. In quick strides, he snatches my clothes off the ground and hurls them at with a snarl so vicious, it rattles the walls of his castle. "Get out."
"Lucien," I try again, voice hoarse, but he doesn’t even look at . He’s standing by the window now, hands gripping the sill so tightly the wood groans under his fingers. His shoulders heave with every breath, the muscles in his back bunched tight beneath his skin.
"I was drunk," I cry. "I didn’t an for this to happen! Ilya--"
"Don’t." The word cracks out of him like a whip. "Do not speak her na."
Could I tell him? Should I? That she was here, really here? But sohow, I already know it wouldn’t make a difference. He wouldn’t believe . He’d think I was trying to shift the bla onto the ghost of the woman he loved. And he’d hate more for it.
My throat closes. "I didn’t an to cause you any kind of hurt."
"But you did," he snarls, whirling, and for the first ti since I’ve known him, I wish he stayed cold. Because this--this is rage that’s been festering for years, the kind that cos from reopening wounds that never healed. And it sinks in then, how little I truly know him. I’ve seen many faces of Lucien, but this one, this broken, furious, shattered man is the truest of them all.
"And the worst part?" His voice fractures. "I let you. I was so godsdamned desperate to feel her again that I didn’t even look. Didn’t even see that it was you. And now, every ti I close my eyes, I’ll see you instead of her. I’ll feel you when I rember the only person I ever truly loved. And I will hate you for that. I will hate myself for that."
The room is spinning. My lungs ache with how hard I’m breathing. The edges of my vision blur. Sha and sorrow crawl up my throat and choke until I can barely whisper, "I’m sorry--"
"Get. Out."
The words feel like a death sentence. Low. Final. I open my mouth to speak, to plead, but his expression stops cold. There’s nothing left of the man who teased in the courtyard or held on horseback. Just a king who’s built walls around his heart, and I’d just destroyed the last one.
I don’t rember dressing. I don’t rember stumbling into the corridor. Only the echo of that broken voice chasing through the halls, slicing open from the inside out.
Sowhere along the way, I find myself standing before another door. I don’t even know why I co here. Maybe so part of thinks that if anyone could still look at after this, it would be soone who really knew . Soone who knew I wasn’t a terrible person.
The door creaks open just enough for Rhea’s eyes to find my face. She looks better, healthier. Another favour Lucien granted . So long as I worked with him, Mother would be a guest here. And I’d gone and ruined everything.
Tears fill my eyes. Rhea’s eyes widen. Then narrow. And before I can speak, the door slams shut. Hard.
The sound rings through my bones. I stand there for a mont, swaying, half-hoping she might open it again. She doesn’t. She never does.
By the ti I push open the door to Margot’s chambers, my legs are shaking. My face is wet. Every step feels like a wound tearing wider in my chest.
She’s seated in a high-backed chair, a silver tray of untouched tea cooling by her side as a ssenger murmurs the morning reports to her silently. She listens with that sa stillness that makes even royals squirm. But the instant she sees , her composure cracks.
My fingers fidget with the hem of my shirt as salty tears roll down my cheeks. "I didn’t know where else to go."
"Oh, child," Margot whispers, rising from her chair and empties the room with a flick of her fingers. "Oh, you poor, foolish girl."
***
I didn’t get out of bed the rest of the day.
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