Lila
The sheets smelled like Damon. His arms were wrapped around me, steady and silent, his breath even against the curve of my neck.
If I closed my eyes, I could almost believe this was peace. That nothing outside this bed waited
unravel us. But I let my eyes drift open instead.
Damon held me with a gentleness that made my chest ache, his thumb occasionally brushing against my side in a rhythm that soothed me. It was tender, yes. But guarded. Like if he held me any tighter, I might break.
Or maybe he would.
The silence stretched long between us. It made room for thoughts I didn’t want. Regrets I couldn’t swallow.
He hadn’t asked where I’d been. Hadn’t asked about the strange fatigue clinging to me or why I trembled at odd moments like my body no longer belonged to me.
He simply carried me to bed after I collapsed in the corridor and stayed.
That should have reassured me. It didn’t. Something was very wrong. But not the way I feared. Not anger, not even doubt.
It was the quiet that frightened me. The quiet and the weight of all the things he wasn’t saying.
I turned slightly, just enough to glance at him in the dim light. His eyes were open, staring past me at the canopy above. When our gazes met, i saw only
concern.
“Are you alright?” I whispered.
His hand shifted against my ribs. “You should rest.”
That wasn’t an answer.
I should have told him about Asher. Could have confessed the half–truths I’d carried since the beginning.
But I didn’t. Right now, with whatever hung unspoken in Damon’s chest, I wasn’t sure I could survive what he might say back.
So I nodded. Let my head settle against his shoulder again. I let high think I believed it.
the truth.
I told myself the exhaustion in my limbs was the only reason I didn’t press further. That the ache spreading through my bones was why I didn’t demand
adinb
But the truth was simpler, crueler; I was afraid. Afraid that if I asked what he was hiding, I’d find a shape too familiar to bear.
Guilt. Or worse, regret. So I didn’t ask.
Instead, I memorized the press of his palm against my waist. The warmth of his breath on my skin. I let my body relax in pieces, small and slow, until the shaking stopped.
He kissed the top of my head once. Soft. Lingering
It made it feel like some kind of goodbye.
I closed my eyes then, not because I believed everything was fine–but because I couldn’t hold the weight of what wasn’t anymore. I was too tired. Too hollowed out by questions and fatigue and the echo of Ella’s words.
Ruby had gone quiet again.
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10:38 Sun o
Chapter 132
“I’m here,” he murmured suddenly, voice hoarse.
I wanted to believe him. And I fell asleep in his arms pretending I did.
The sun was already high when I stirred again, filtering through the gauzy curtains in pale ribbons that painted the floor in light. My limbs felt heavy as lead, my joints too loose, like I’d borrowed this body from someone else and it didn’t quite
fit.
The bed beside me was empty. Damon was gone.
The indent where he’d slept was still warm, the sheets crumpled and stretched across to my side as if he’d tried to get as close as he could without waking me.
I laid a hand over the hollow space and breathed in what remained of his scent. He hadn’t slept much–if at all.
And he hadn’t spoken a word of what haunted him.
I sat up slowly, the world tilting slightly on its axis
I moved. The room spun for a moment, a slow carousel of burnished gold.
My temples throbbed with a dull, insistent rhythm. Beneath it, something else pulsed–subtle and sickening. My wolf stirred weakly. Still distant. Still
dim.
My throat felt thick. I reached for the pitcher of water on the table near the bed and poured a small cup. It tasted metallic, bitter. Everything did now.
It wasn’t the exhaustion that bothered me anymore, I had been tired for years. It was the quiet panic that bloomed each time I caught myself forgetting how strong I used to feel.
I had no proof. No mark. No fever. No evidence to bring before Damon and ask plainly what was happening.
Only his silence. And silence, I’d learned, could be its own
kind of lie.
I moved through the motions of dressing like I was underwater. The mirror above the washbasin caught my reflection, and for a moment I didn’t recognize myself.
Pale, bruised beneath the eyes, lips pressed into a line like my mouth was trying not to scream.
I tried to tuck the loose strands of my hair behind my ears. My hands shook.
The dress I’d chosen was soft–woo–lined, easy to wear, warm enough to shield against the cool air that crept into the stone walls of the palace. But even it felt too heavy now.
The corridors outside were quiet. I didn’t go far. My legs didn’t want to carry me far.
Instead, I drifted toward the small garden off the east wing–a private alcove that rarely saw traffic. A sanctuary carved into the bones of the palace, shielded by high hedges and rose trellises still clinging to their last blush of bloom.
I sat on the stone bench, knees tucked up, hands folded in my lap.
Ruby, I thought. Are you there?
Nothing.
Just that same flicker of unease. The same damp fog where her warmth used to be.
I closed my eyes. The birdsong above me was too cheerful. The wind too gentle. It felt wrong, all of it. Like the world was pretending nothing had happened while I unraveled quietly beneath it.
I didn’t know if it was Ella’s words, the tonic, or the weight of everything I hadn’t said to Damon. Maybe it was all of it, stacking piece by piece inside me until something cracked.
Chapter 132
I don’t want to be his burden, I thought.
I was unraveling. Slowly. Quietly. The kind of cracking you don’t hear until the pieces scatter.
And still… part of me ached for him.
I wanted to ask why he hadn’t said anything about the tonic. Why he hadn’t held me apology instead of affection.
tighter last night. Why the gentleness in his touch had felt like
But mostly I wanted him to see me. To
trying to protect me. I didn’t want protection. I wanted the truth.
Even if it hurt. Especially if it did.
The wind picked up slightly. A single petal floated down and landed on the bench beside me–white, soft, whole.
I picked it up and crushed it gently between my fingers.
Just because something looks whole on the outside doesn’t mean it isn’t already falling apart.
And I was tired of pretending I wasn’t.
The pressure in my chest climbed until I couldn’t breathe around it. I stood abruptly, the motion jerky and wrong, and paced the garden’s narrow edge.
Once.
Twice.
My bare feet scuffed against the path. I needed to move. To feel something. Anything but the helplessness clawing at me.
I reached up and tugged a rose from the trellis, thorns biting my skin. I didn’t pull away, I just stared at the blood blooming across my palm—and hated how alive it made me feel.
AD
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