Rowena's POV
I didn't want to wake up.
The dream wasn't made of images. There were no faces, no stories—only drifting. A state where the past didn't exist and the future demanded nothing. My body felt weightless, as if I had finally released everything I had been clinging to with aching determination: survival.
The darkness was soft. Muted. Silent. Nothing hurt there. There were no sounds, no memories, no questions. I didn't have to listen to every breath, didn't have to count my heartbeats to make sure they weren't too loud.
I didn't have to be afraid.
This darkness didn't build walls around me. It didn't crush me. It accepted me. Like an embrace that doesn't need to be returned. A place where no one expects strength.
Rowena… Selene's voice reached me from somewhere deep, as if passing through fog.
I didn't answer.
It's time to wake up.
"No," I whispered back. "Please… not yet."
Selene fell silent for a moment. I felt her—present, steady. She didn't rush me. She didn't command me. She simply stayed, as she always had.
"It doesn't hurt here," I said. "It's so… light. I'm not afraid of what comes next."
But this isn't living, she replied softly.
"I know. But living hurts."
I didn't say it aloud as an accusation. It was a confession. Life had always found me like an open wound—careless, rushed, merciless. And I was tired of standing back up again and again.
Memories tried to surface, and I clung desperately to the darkness. Hands. Voices. Confinement. Questions with no right answers. The moment Derek spoke my name—like it disgusted him.
"They caught me," I said, trembling. "The royal guard. I don't know what they'll do to me. I don't want to go back… I don't want to return to where I escaped from."
Captivity wasn't about walls or chains. It was about that feeling—when you already know nothing you do will matter. When your body no longer belongs to you.
My memories weren't images. They were sensations. Cold. Smells. The tone of voices. The weight of helplessness pressing on my chest. And the moment I understood: there is pain you can't scream through. You can only survive it.
Selene's voice was closer now.
Not every prison is the same.
"But behind every door, pain waits," I answered.
I felt Selene wrap around me—not as a body, but as memory, as strength. Like being tucked in on a cold night as a child.
Give it a chance, she said at last. Not the world. Yourself.
I was quiet for a long time.
Then… I let go.
The darkness slowly began to fade.
Sensations returned cautiously, as if they didn't trust me yet. As if asking: may we stay? My body answered for me—with a sigh, a shiver. At first, fragments of light. Then warmth. Scents. Not blood. Not damp stone. Not mold.
A bed.
When I opened my eyes, my breath caught.
It wasn't a dungeon.
Not a cell.
A spacious room surrounded me—high ceiling, vast windows letting in golden light. Pale walls. Light curtains that moved gently in the breeze.
The bed… the bed was enormous. Soft. Comforting. The kind I hadn't known existed.
"This… can't be real," I whispered.
And yet.
The place felt… safe. Disturbingly so. More like home than any room I had ever slept in. As if it didn't want to hurt me. As if it whispered: you may stay.
This space wanted nothing from me. It demanded no name, no rank, no explanation. It didn't watch. It didn't judge. It simply existed around me—quiet, patient.
And that… was more frightening than any threat.
Then I noticed I wasn't alone.
A man sat beside the bed.
My first thought was that he couldn't be real.
He was tall—not imposing, not threatening. The kind of height that doesn't need to prove strength. Even seated, he carried a calm authority.
Chocolate-brown hair fell in loose waves across his forehead, as if he'd never bothered forcing it into place. The light caught in it, warming his features in a way that contradicted everything I imagined a prince should be.
His eyes…
Like the sea.
Deep blue-green, promising calm while hiding depth. He didn't examine me. He didn't search for weakness. He simply watched—patiently. As if he knew one wrong movement would make me close forever.
And perhaps that was why I wasn't as afraid of him as I should have been.
His calm wasn't practiced. It wasn't courtly. It was the calm of someone who knows when to stop. Someone whose strength lies not in stepping closer—but in knowing when to stay back.
It wasn't love at first sight.
But the pull I felt toward him was strong enough to scare me.
"Good morning, beautiful," he said gently. "My name is Prince Mateo. You're in Royal Wolf territory. You're safe here."
He extended his hand slowly.
The moment he moved, my entire body tensed.
Not suddenly. Not violently.
Mateo lifted his hand carefully, measuring every inch of space between us. His fingers were open, empty, non-demanding—and still, it was enough for every alarm inside me to scream.
My stomach twisted.
Cold rushed under my skin as the past outran the present.
My hands moved instinctively. Not because I thought—because I remembered. Hands that didn't ask. Hands that didn't stop. The moment when movement stopped being a promise and became a sentence.
The air grew thick.
My heart pounded so loudly I feared he could hear it. Selene growled inside me—not to attack, but ready to flee. My body wasn't here.
My body was there—on stone, in darkness, in helplessness.
And yet—
Mateo stopped.
He didn't touch me.
He didn't force the space between us. His hand lingered in the air, then slowly withdrew—as if recognizing that this distance wasn't an obstacle, but a boundary.
And boundaries… matter.
The realization wasn't freeing.
It was painfully clear.
Because the existence of a boundary meant that before now, there never truly had been one. And now that it existed… I didn't know what to do with it.
That hurt.
Because it wasn't his touch that terrified me most.
It was the possibility that, for the first time, I had a choice.
"It's alright," he said calmly, pulling his hand back. "I understand. You've been through a lot."
He didn't move closer. He didn't push.
"Would you… tell me your name?" he asked carefully.
I opened my mouth.
And everything came back.
The pain. The confinement. Derek's face. The way he said my name with disgust.
I closed my mouth, drew my knees up, and shook my head.
No.
Mateo didn't look disappointed.
"Alright," he said simply. "Then let's play a game."
I looked at him, wary.
"If I guess your name, you have to talk to me," he continued. "But we'll set rules. Let's say… ten guesses a day?"
I shook my head and raised my hand.
Five fingers.
Mateo laughed.
"Strict!" he said with a faint smile. "But I don't mind. That just means I get to enjoy your company longer."
The corner of my mouth twitched.
A smile.
Small. Uncertain. But real.
"You have a beautiful smile," he added softly. "I hope I get to see it often."
I didn't know what to say.
Mateo stood.
"You need rest," he said. "I won't stay long. But you won't be alone."
At the door, he paused.
"Amira," he addressed the woman waiting outside. "From today on, you're her lady-in-waiting. Take good care of her."
Then he added:
"And notify the royal tailor. She'll need some… beautiful clothes."
When I was alone, the silence no longer frightened me.
Selene watched from within, quietly pleased.
You see? she asked.
I didn't answer right away.
I watched the light. Felt the warmth of the bed. The slow calming of my body.
"Maybe…" I whispered at last. "Maybe there is still hope in this life."
Hope didn't explode inside me.
It didn't shine.
It simply sat there—quiet, fragile—like a small light in a dark room.
And for the first time, I didn't want to blow it out.
And for the first time in a long while…
I believed.