The silence after the collapse was suffocating. Not peace, but the silence of a wound still bleeding unseen. The nursery lay in ruin—splintered floorboards, shattered toys, the cradle broken like a carcass. The shard was gone, yet its absence was not relief but tension, a missing heartbeat in a body that should be alive.
Adrian sat on the warped floor, breath ragged, skin feverish. The mark on his chest glowed faintly beneath the sweat-soaked fabric, a pulse not his own, threading into his veins. It was not dormant—it was waiting.
Cassia's arms wrapped around him, small but unyielding. Her face pressed against his shoulder, damp with tears. "You scared me… I thought it would take you. I thought you'd be gone forever." Her voice cracked into the silence, raw, unguarded.
Selene stood apart, poised but trembling, her crimson gown a banner of fury and desperation. Her eyes burned on Adrian, not with tenderness, but with possession. "You touched the shard. You let it in."
Her words cut through him like glass. He lifted his gaze to her, chest heaving. "I didn't let it in—it was already there. The moment I opened your damned book, it found me."
The flicker of guilt in Selene's eyes was gone as soon as it appeared. She straightened, voice cold, authoritative. "Then you must master it. Or it will master you."
Cassia pulled back, shaking her head. "No! He doesn't need to master it—he needs to resist it! It's poison, Selene. You saw it. You felt it. It wants to own him."
Selene's lips curved into something sharp. "And what is your answer, child? To cling to him with trembling hands and hope innocence will shield him? Power is not resisted—it is claimed." She stepped closer, the heat of her presence filling the room like fire catching air. "And I will not allow him to waste what he's been given."
Adrian stood unsteadily, shrugging Cassia's hands off—not in cruelty, but in necessity. His body thrummed, his veins alive with a strange hunger. He could feel Selene's fire and Cassia's desperate purity clashing in him, tearing him in two. He raised his hands, trying to quiet them.
"Stop." His voice was hoarse but commanding. Both women froze, startled not by force but by the edge of something new in him. "You're both right—and both wrong. It isn't about resisting or mastering. It's about understanding."
The mark flared in agreement—or mockery.
Selene tilted her head, studying him. "Understanding hunger does not stop it from devouring you."
Cassia, still trembling, whispered, "But it might remind him that he's human. That he's not theirs."
Adrian staggered to the broken cradle, staring at the place the shard had been. Its absence vibrated like a missing limb, but the echo remained, threading through his bones. His reflection in the cracked wood was distorted, but not alien. His own eyes stared back—burning brighter, darker, hungry.
The lullaby returned, faint, curling like smoke through the walls. The toys stirred faintly, twitching with broken limbs, their lives half-spent but not gone. The house had not given up its games.
Selene's heels clicked against the floor as she approached him. "This is only the beginning. The shard was a fragment. What lies beyond is greater still. And if you falter again, Adrian…" Her hand rose, cupping his cheek, nails grazing dangerously close to his skin. "…I will chain you myself."
Her words should have been threat, but the heat in them pulled at him. His chest throbbed, the mark glowing in answer to her nearness.
Cassia's voice broke the spell, firm despite her trembling. "He's not yours to chain, Selene."
The two women's gazes clashed like fire and ice, both anchored on him. Adrian felt his body tighten, as though the mark delighted in their tension, feeding on it, threading their lust, fear, and rage into him.
He clenched his fists, heart hammering. No more games.
The house groaned, its timbers bending like breath. The lullaby deepened, slow, deliberate, a drumbeat beneath the melody. And then the voice—softer now, sly, insinuating:
"Choose. You cannot walk both paths. You are hunger clothed in flesh—decide how you will feed."
Adrian gasped as the mark seared white-hot, forcing him to his knees. Visions poured through him, twisting, seductive:
– Selene, cloaked in fire, her lips against his, her hunger merging with his until they ruled together in crimson flame.
– Cassia, luminous, her trembling devotion binding him, her purity turned fierce, her hands pulling him back from the abyss, grounding him in humanity.
– The shadow, faceless, eternal, offering power beyond flesh, beyond lust, beyond mortality, if only he surrendered himself fully.
Each vision clawed at him, offering ecstasy, offering ruin. His veins thrummed, body convulsing. He cried out, voice breaking. "I—can't—"
Selene dropped to her knees before him, grabbing his face, forcing his eyes to hers. "Yes, you can. Look at me, Adrian. Feel me. You belong here. With me." Her lips crashed against his, hot, demanding, a kiss that burned like a brand.
Cassia screamed, shoving between them, yanking him back. "No! Don't let her take you! Don't let anyone take you!" She pressed her forehead to his, whispering through her tears, "Stay with me. Please. Just stay."
The mark pulsed, caught between fire and light, tearing him apart. His scream shook the nursery, glass raining from windows, toys exploding into splinters. The lullaby reached its crescendo, and the voice thundered:
"One path. Choose—or be unmade."
Adrian surged to his feet, throwing both women back—not in cruelty, but in desperate self-preservation. His eyes blazed with unnatural light. His voice was not his own, layered, resonant.
"I choose…"
The house trembled, walls splitting, shadows writhing like serpents. Selene stared, wide-eyed, lips parted. Cassia clutched her chest, sobbing silently.
Adrian's breath shook. His fists trembled. And then, in a voice raw and defiant, he roared:
"I choose myself!"
The mark exploded in light, blinding, searing. The lullaby shattered into silence. Shadows screamed and recoiled, walls splitting open into raw darkness before sealing shut. The cradle collapsed into ash.
Adrian fell to his knees again, chest heaving, sweat and blood mingling on his skin. The glow of the mark dimmed, but it did not vanish. It pulsed steady, quiet, like a heart that was his and not his.
Selene approached first, shaken, silent for once. She reached for him, her fingers brushing his jaw, tender despite the fire in her. "You defied it." Her voice trembled with awe. "No one defies it."
Cassia collapsed beside him, throwing her arms around his chest. "You're still here. You're still you."
Adrian closed his eyes, feeling both their warmths, the echo of the shard, the hunger in his veins. He whispered, hoarse, uncertain, yet resolute:
"For now."
The house groaned, settling. The lullaby was gone. But its echo lingered, promising it was not finished with him.