t like it hadn't just tried to strangle me hours ago. I hadn't moved since Lucien left. I hadn't cried. I didn't e

ainst my skin, the gravity of the way he looked at me before he walked out. Lucien hadn't touched me, n

ad thickened into something suffocating. The villa, usually humming with the quiet mo

know where I was going at first. My body moved before my thoughts caught up. Down the hallway. Past the wings I was a

n's s

r wasn'

even ful

Golden. As if it, too,

weren't small. They weren't clean. These weren't accidents or battlefield stories. They were reminders. Warnings. M

urn. "You d

last night. But something about the quiet way he sai

ow,"

n. You broke the chain.

the room. "He foll

d like glass under pressure. "And you thr

your pr

rned

in his eyes

asured, like the predator he was. He didn't raise his voice. He didn't touch me. Instead,

desk, opened it

was a

ved with something ancient-loo

this?"

n't leave mi

blade. "You wa

used by the simplicity of the q

"Your word isn't good enou

ds are wind, Ava. But b

de against my skin. "Cut me," he said. "Then I'll cut

him. "You'

ican has silence. But me? I want blood. If you stay in this house, if y

wh

kened. "To s

t he didn't expect love. He didn't expect affection. He expec

But instead I took the blade, and before I

dn't

d bloome

my palm next. I gasped, not from the pain, but from the heat of it. The sh

g. My blood mingled with

"You don't run. You don't betray. And you don't d

swear I felt somethin

m

old and burie

thout a word. We drank in silence, the room filled only with the soun

hen h

anothe

the blood pact

ds posted ou

locked

t was a test. A longer leash me

the halls, he would nod or brush past, always in control, always watching.

d vault-like doors. The walls were filled with paintings worth more than m

alked, no matter how quiet the

y

ey

, guards, or Lucien himself,

fter the pact,

pi

low. Me

doesn't come from pract

lling me, barefoot again, wearing a

the piano like he was trying to bleed memories into the keys. I

tless as you preten

't stop

grief for softn

y into the roo

over the keys. "The only per

ne you

in that moment, he didn't look li

ed like

" he said simp

our himself a drink, and after

full of knowledge, surrounded by books neither

at I said,"

t pa

ou're m

s. "I didn't si

d. "You sign

e on my palm. The wound had scabbed over, but it still ached when I moved it. I

emai

ke his

is t

b

k, the pact wasn't th

nt was a

n was found with h

wled on the flo

rst time I saw

scrambled like ants under a magnifying glass. And when his eyes met mine-rage,

our room,"

questions. I

bey

e I was af

e, I was afraid of what he wo

ht, he r

othes

hand

dn't

he owned the o

," he said. His vo

happ

ent a m

nd

ossed

d my

ss to the sc

t one