Lyra
The doors shut behind Tristan with a low, thunderous thud. I didn't follow.
The cold air clung to my skin, but I didn't move—not yet. The estate loomed in front of me like a sleeping creature, half-hidden in the mist curling between trees. It was too quiet. No servants. No lights except for the faintest glow behind the upper windows.
I finally stepped forward.
The front doors were heavy, the kind that didn't like to be opened by strangers. I pushed, and they groaned in protest before letting me in.
The interior swallowed me whole—polished stone floors, dark wood walls, ceilings so high they disappeared into shadow. Everything felt old. Not abandoned, not exactly—but preserved. Like time had been paused inside these halls.
There were no pictures. No flowers. No warmth.
Just echoes.
I wandered past rooms that looked untouched: a vast study lined with shelves, a dining room long enough to seat a dozen powerful ghosts, a lounge that still smelled faintly of expensive smoke.
And still—no Tristan.
I wasn't sure what I was looking for. Maybe space to breathe. Maybe a secret door labeled Exit, if cursed.
Instead, I found a staircase.
It curved like a spine toward the upper floor, and something in me resisted. My instincts screamed don't, but curiosity whispered louder. I started to climb.
The upstairs corridor was narrower. Dimmer. Cold draft creeping beneath the walls like fingers. At the end was a door—different from the rest. Reinforced. Closed.
And locked.
I turned away, but paused as faint voices drifted from the opposite end of the hall. One low. Calm. The other—sharper. Familiar.
Tristan. And Rauterson.
I moved without thinking, pressing myself against the wall just around the corner.
"I told you this was a mistake," Rauterson's voice carried, hushed but heated. "Bringing her here—letting her see anything this close—it's reckless."
"I'm not asking for your opinion," Tristan replied, smooth as steel.
"She's not like the others. She asks questions. She doesn't just accept what she's told."
"She doesn't need to accept it. She only needs to survive it."
There was a beat of silence.
Then Rauterson again, quieter this time: "If she finds out what you really are—"
"I'm counting on the fact that she won't."
Another pause.
"And if she does?" Rauterson asked. "You think the marriage bond will be enough to protect you from her wrath? Or hers from yours?"
Tristan didn't answer.
I backed away, heart thudding so loud I was sure they could hear it. My fingers trembled as I gripped the banister and slipped back down the stairs, the echo of their words chasing me into the shadows.
---
I found a room tucked near the far end of the hall—a guest suite, I guessed, though even that felt too generous a word. It had the bare minimum: a bed, a chair, a vanity with a cracked mirror. No comforts. Just walls and silence.
I sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the floor.
Their voices looped in my mind.
"She doesn't need to accept it. She only needs to survive it."
"If she finds out what you really are—"
What was he?
And why did Rauterson sound like he was protecting both of us?
My thoughts scattered like ash when the pain struck.
It started like it always did—a sharp twist beneath my ribs. A hot coil tightening at the base of my spine. I inhaled sharply and doubled over as it bloomed outward, crawling through my limbs like fire under skin.
No warning. No mercy.
I clutched my sides. The curse had lived inside me since childhood, stitched into my blood—but that didn't mean I understood it. And it never warned me. It never gave me time to prepare. It just took.
My hands trembled violently. My vision blurred.
The room warped around me, darker at the edges.
A glass on the nightstand shattered, sudden and sharp, as if responding to me.
I didn't remember standing, but I must have. My legs gave out halfway across the room and I dropped to the floor, gasping. My reflection in the mirror caught my eye just long enough to show me the thing I feared most.
Black eyes.
Not shadows. Not bruising.
Pitch black. As if the curse had swallowed the whites, the color, the soul.
I heard footsteps—rapid, then still.
The door creaked open.
A pause.
Then his voice, calm but too quiet.
"Lyra."
I couldn't speak. I couldn't move.
Another step.
His presence filled the room, dark and sharp like storm air. I expected taunts. Demands.
Instead—
"Look at me," Tristan said.
I shook my head violently. I didn't want him to see me like this. Not this broken.
"Lyra," he said again, and this time there was steel in it. Command laced with something else—concern, maybe. I didn't know. I couldn't breathe through the pain.
He knelt in front of me. Slowly. Carefully. As if approaching a wild animal.
His hand came to my face—not forceful. Just firm. Grounding.
"Breathe," he murmured. "Stay with me."
It wasn't his words that helped. It was the tone. Cold, yes. But steady. The only anchor in the rising dark.
The blackness in my vision began to recede. The curse loosened its claws, inch by inch.
I collapsed against the floor, breath ragged. My skin damp with sweat. My throat raw from the soundless scream I hadn't realized I'd let out.
He didn't speak.
Didn't mock.
Didn't ask.
He stood, cold as the stone beneath us, and walked to the door.
"I'll have someone bring water," he said. And then, as if none of it had happened, "Try not to bleed on the floor."
The door clicked shut behind him.
And I lay there in the dark, shaking.
The sunlight didn't match the mood.
It streamed through the windows as if nothing had happened—like the night hadn't cracked something open in me. Like I hadn't collapsed on a cold floor while the curse dug through my bones.
I rose before anyone could come knocking, washed my face with trembling hands, and braided my hair too tightly—just to feel something I could control.
By the time I stepped into the hall, I was composed. Not whole. Not okay. But composed.
I found Tristan in the dining room, already dressed, already reading something on a datapad. Not a single glance spared when I walked in.
Good.
I sat opposite him and poured myself tea. My hands didn't shake.
Silence. Long and sterile.
I took a sip. "I'd like to be taken home today."
He didn't look up.
"I can't do that."
I blinked slowly. "Excuse me?"
Tristan finally met my eyes. Calm. Cold. As if we hadn't shared that room, that moment.
"You're staying here. It's part of the bond."
I stared at him. "What bond?"
"The pre-marriage clause," he said, like he was discussing the weather. "Six months of cohabitation before the ceremony. Standard practice for elite bloodlines."
"Standard bullshit," I muttered. "Nobody mentioned this."
"I didn't write the rules, Lyra. But we follow them."
I laughed once. Dry. Bitter. "You drag me to your estate, watch me nearly die on your floor, and now you're saying I live here?"
His eyes didn't flicker. "You should be glad I didn't leave you there."
"And you think forcing me to stay is some kind of favor?"
"No," he said, rising from his chair. "I think it's the law."
I stood too. Chin high, pulse rattling. "Then I hope you enjoy six months of silence."
He didn't smile, but something in his expression shifted—something unreadable.
"I've endured worse," Tristan said. "But if you're going to sulk, at least do it in one of the upstairs rooms. The guest wing isn't soundproof."
With that, he walked out—leaving the rest of his tea untouched, and the air colder than it had been all night.
I stood alone in the dining room long after he left, the echo of his footsteps still lingering.
Six months.
Six months of cold silences and locked doors. Of pretending nothing cracked open last night. Of pretending I hadn't seen his eyes flicker—not with pity, but something worse.
Recognition.
I reached for the teacup he left behind, still warm. Still half-full.
Then I shoved it off the table.
It shattered across the floor like the truth I refused to speak aloud.
I was trapped.
And no amount of pretending would make that untrue.