I’ll make you regret it in ways you cannot fathom.

Clara’s POV

By the time the afternoon’s endless parade of false pleasantries ended, I was a hollow doll. I was a puppet, smiling when the strings were pulled, my face aching from the effort of feigning a calm I didn't feel. When the last of the pack had dispersed, their cold stares lingering on my back like physical touches, Taehyung’s fingers tightened on my arm. His grip was a silent warning, a possessive, bruising claim for all to see. He had not spoken a single kindness to me all day, and I knew he never would.

The guards slammed the doors of my new chamber behind me, the sound a final, heavy clang of a lock being set. What had once been Lisa’s chamber was now my gilded cage. I was the new trinket on display, a prisoner in a room filled with another woman’s life. Lisa’s scent still clung to the pillows—a soft, floral note that was now a phantom. Her ribbons were draped over the mirror, a testament to her past life, and her journals were stacked neatly on the vanity. I wasn’t allowed to touch a single thing, as if the very air I breathed would desecrate her memory. I sat on the edge of the bed, my hands folded so tight my nails cut crescents into my palms. I was certain the walls had eyes; somewhere, I was being watched.

Twilight fell, the last slivers of gold light slanting through the window. The silence pressed in, thick and heavy, punctuated only by the distant hoot of an owl and the frantic hammering of my own heart. I counted the hours by the slanting gold of the window. My neck throbbed where his canines had bitten down, a searing reminder of the mark I carried. My wrists ached where he had held me, his grip a bruise-in-the-making. I wouldn’t cry. I wouldn’t give him that victory.

The handle of the door turned without warning.

Taehyung strode in, a silhouette against the dim light of the corridor. Shadows followed him, his anger wound tight and quiet now, no longer erupting—just simmering, dangerous as a sheathed blade. The air in the room grew heavy, a pressure that felt like it could crush my lungs. In his hands, he held two items: a silver goblet, ornate and heavy, and a tiny glass vial that caught the last of the day’s light.

"Come here," he commanded, his voice a low thrum that vibrated through the floorboards. There was no room for disobedience. I rose from the bed, my legs shaky, and took a few hesitant steps toward him. He didn’t wait. He poured the contents of the vial into the goblet. The liquid was thick, the color of dried blood, and it swirled ominously inside the silver cup. He held it out to me.

I stared at it, a tremor running through me. "What is it?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper.

"A promise," he murmured, a cruel curl to his lips. He shoved the goblet at me. "Drink it. Without question. If you spill a drop, I’ll make you regret it in ways you cannot fathom."

My hands shook as I took the cold silver. I brought it to my nose, sniffing the contents. It was bitter, sharp—a scent like burnt herbs and old iron. Poison? A sedative? My mind raced, but my body was frozen in place. Whatever it was, the choice was gone. I was a prisoner, and this was my first command as Luna.

I drank.

The liquid burned down my throat, a fire that felt like it was tearing through my very soul. My stomach roiled, a nauseous ache that started deep within and spread through my limbs. I felt a dizziness that made the room spin, a fleeting moment of utter disorientation. Taehyung watched, eyes never blinking, never leaving me. He was a statue of perfect, predatory stillness.

I stumbled back, my hand flying to my throat. "Why are you—" I began, my voice hoarse and raw from the burning, but he cut me off with a sharp, dismissive gesture.

"That was a binding elixir," he said, his voice soft and cold, the words a final, inescapable death knell. "To make sure the Luna mark cannot be undone. Even your death would not set you free now. You’re bound to me in life, and in the grave. You understand, Clara?"

My body shook with horror, a full-body tremor that started in my chest and made my teeth chatter. Revulsion. Hopelessness. The fire in my stomach wasn't fading; it was a permanent, simmering heat, a reminder of the unbreakable chains now binding my very essence to his. I felt the mark on my neck begin to burn, not with the pain of the initial bite, but with a deep, searing ache that felt like it was knitting my soul to his. It was a new kind of terror, a biological certainty that I could never escape.

He stepped closer, the predator closing in on his prey. He brushed my hair from my shoulder, not kindly, but with the ownership of a butcher inspecting his livestock. His fingertips were cold against my skin, a stark contrast to the new, infernal heat of the mark. He leaned in and spoke so only I would hear, his breath chilling the newly scarred spot on my neck.

"Don't ever mistake this for anything but what it is, Clara," he whispered, his voice a silken thread of pure venom. "You are not my mate. You are a tool. A symbol. A warning to all who would defy me. You will live only as long as you are useful, and you will suffer every second of it. This is your forever, Clara. Whatever hell you think you’re in, you haven’t begun to scrape the surface."

He held my gaze for a moment longer, a flicker of something in his eyes—not hatred, not pleasure, but a deep, chilling emptiness that was far worse. With a final, dismissive tug on a strand of my hair, he turned and vanished back into the corridor. The echoing thud of his footsteps against the stone floor was the only sound for a long time.

I slid to the floor, my legs finally giving out. The goblet fell from my numb fingers, rolling across the floor with a metallic clatter. The full, suffocating weight of his words settled over me. I crawled into Lisa’s bed—my cage for the night—still tasting the fire of that elixir, still hearing his threats, still feeling the undeniable, horrifying pull of the bond. I cried silently into the pillow that didn’t smell like me, the scent of Lisa’s ghost mocking me from every corner of the room.

My tears were not for my life, but for the freedom I had just lost forever.

But a new fire began to stir beneath the grief. It was a faint flicker, a tiny, defiant spark of rage. I would not be a tool. I would not be a symbol. I realized I would never be free again. Not unless I fought for it. Not unless I survived long enough to see Taehyung suffer as I did. This was my hell, but I would burn it down around him if it was the last thing I ever did.