Chapter 10

SAPHRA'S POV

Lucien’s hand shoots up.

Steel clamps around my wrist before I can even gasp. His eyes snap open, fully awake and fully alert, no haze of the Sleeping herbs, no sluggish confusion. Just sharp, lethal awareness.

Too late.

He twists hard.

Pain explodes up my arm as my balance shatters. The world lurches, and I crash onto the bed, breath tearing from my lungs. Before I can recover, before I can scream or strike or think, he moves.

One fluid motion.

He flips me beneath him.

The mattress dips violently under his weight as he pins me down, both my wrists wrenched above my head in one crushing grip. My fingers loosen in shock, and the knife slips free, clattering to the stone floor with a sound that might as well be thunder.

No.

I thrash instinctively, panic detonating in my chest. I kick, twist, and arch every survival instinct screaming at once, but it’s useless. He is immovable. A wall of muscle and heat and restrained fury pressing me into the bed.

His weight pins my hips. His knees trap my thighs. My wrists burn where he holds them, tendons screaming in protest.

I can’t break free.

I suck in air, chest heaving, heart slamming so hard I am sure it will crack my ribs. He is so close I can feel the heat of him seeping into me, feel the rise and fall of his breath against my skin.

Our faces hover inches apart.

Too close.

His eyes burn into mine, pupils blown wide and black, swallowing the pale ring of colour around them. There’s no softness there. No mercy.

Only awareness.

Only restraint held by a thread.

I freeze.

We both breathe hard, the sound filling the room, loud and raw and intimate in the silence. My wrists ache under his grip. His fingers flex, tightening slightly, not enough to crush but enough to remind me how easily he could.

Terror coils in my stomach.

And beneath it—

Heat.

It floods through me without permission, without logic, shocking in its intensity. I feel every point where our bodies touch. His thighs bracketing mine. His chest hovering just above my breasts. The solid line of his torso pressed along my stomach.

I hate my body for responding.

I hate myself for noticing.

His grip tightens again as my chest rises sharply on an inhale. My breasts brush his chest, and I feel the reaction in him instantly—a barely perceptible shift, a tension that wasn’t there a second before.

Neither of us moves.

The moment stretches, suspended on a knife’s edge between violence and something far more dangerous. The air crackles, thick and charged, as if the room itself is holding its breath.

I feel his heart hammering against my ribs.

Or perhaps it’s my own.

His gaze flicks not away from me but down.

To my mouth.

My breath catches painfully in my throat.

The realization hits me like a blow. He could kill me right now. With his hands or his weight or with a single, brutal decision.

And he doesn’t.

His jaw tightens. A muscle jumps there, pulsing beneath his skin. For a heartbeat, I think he might lean down. Might close the last inch between us.

Instead, he releases me.

The sudden absence of his grip is dizzying. My wrists fall to the bed, numb and aching. He rolls away in one sharp motion, turning his back to me as if proximity itself has become dangerous.

I scramble upright, lungs burning, heart racing wildly.

Lucien sits on the edge of the bed, shoulders heaving as he drags in breath after breath. His hands clench and unclench at his sides like he is trying to ground himself, like he is fighting something internal and brutal.

Without looking at me, he reaches down.

His fingers close around the fallen knife.

My pulse spikes.

Slowly, but deliberately, he slides it across the sheets toward me.

The blade gleams in the moonlight as it comes to rest between us.

An offering.

His death if I want it.

The meaning is unmistakable. My gaze locks onto the knife, the metal suddenly heavier than any weapon I have ever held. My throat tightens until it hurts.

This is it. No struggle, no chase, no sleeping herbs or shadows or planning.

Just a single choice.

My hand trembles as I reach for it. My fingers hover above the hilt, shaking so badly I have to clench my jaw to keep my teeth from chattering.

Kill him.

Avenge my father.

Protect my people.

End it.

I grab the knife.

The moment steel meets my palm, something inside me snaps—not into resolve, but into motion. I don’t think. I don’t hesitate. I don’t look at him again.

I bolt.

I run from the room like fire is at my heels, clutching the knife so tightly it bites into my skin. The door slams open. Cold air rushes over me as I tear down the corridor, heart pounding so violently I can barely stay upright.

Behind me—

Lucien collapses back onto the bed.

I don’t see it.

But I hear it.

I hear the echo of his body hitting the mattress, the weight of the moment crashing down behind me. I feel his chest heaving, his entire body shaking. I don’t stop running till I reach my chambers.​