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Elena's POV

Cassian woke while I happened to be away.

The doctors had just finished dressing his wound, and while he was still unconscious I went home to pack him a change of clothes.

The call came from the hospital while I was at the house. Cassian himself had sent me nothing.

He used to hate making me worry. Even stepping out while I was napping, he would leave a note first.

Today my phone was silent, and I only knew he was awake because the hospital called.

It puzzled me, but I didn't dwell on it.

Maybe he was afraid I would rush back to him and be too upset to drive safely.

When I got back to his floor and the elevator doors opened, the corridor was full of vampires I had never seen before.

They had taken over the entire floor, watching everyone who passed with wary eyes.

This was the edge of human territory. There was no reason for so many vampires to be here.

Part of me found it strange and interesting. Part of me was uneasy.

Cassian had never recovered his memory, and he rarely met his own kind in human territory.

If he knew this many vampires had turned up, he might want to talk to them.

Still, I couldn't help worrying.

Ever since the hunters nearly killed him five years ago, Cassian had never been able to let his guard down.

This many vampires appearing at once might draw more hunters, and then there would be no peace here for a long time.

Yesterday Cassian and I had only gone out to the forest beyond town for a picnic.

On the way back we ran into hunters.

As a vampire's human wife, I was naturally treated as his accomplice and hunted down alongside him.

But years of trying to carry his child, and miscarriage after miscarriage, had worn my body down. I could not move the way I used to.

Cassian took a bullet for me.

He lost consciousness soon after we reached the hospital.

The doctors told me that if he got through the night he would be out of danger.

So I sat outside his room all night and didn't dare close my eyes.

It wasn't until morning, when the doctors said he was stable and told me to go home for his things, that I left, and I had been gone less than an hour.

Now the hospital was suddenly full of vampires, and perhaps it wasn't safe for Cassian to stay here.

I walked quickly toward his room to see how he was.

Before I got there, I heard two nurses talking in low voices ahead of me.

"They say the one in there is the vampire prince's heir."

"Seriously?"

"Everyone who just came in is a vampire noble. Apparently, the heir went missing five years ago. He woke up this morning with his memory back and contacted the Council of Elders right away."

I stopped in my tracks.

Went missing five years ago.

Woke up this morning.

Every detail matched my husband.

I pulled out my phone without thinking.

The screen was still empty.

No missed call from Cassian.

No message from him.

He was awake.

He had all his memories back.

And I was not the first person he had reached for.

Something in my chest went cold.

The feeling had barely surfaced before I forced it back down.

This was good news.

Cassian finally knew who he was.

When I first met him five years ago, his own name was the only thing he remembered.

Where his home was, who his parents were, why hunters were after him, he knew none of it.

I used to comfort him about it.

It didn't matter if he never remembered.

We were going to be together anyway. I would stay with him, as the person who loved him and as his family.

Now his memory was back.

And he had found his family again.

Perhaps, in all the excitement, forgetting to call me was perfectly normal.

I should be happy for him.

Thinking that, I kept walking.

Two strangers were standing outside his door.

One of them put out an arm to stop me.

"Miss, you can't go in."

"I'm Cassian's wife."

That clearly caught him off guard.

His eyes moved over me for a moment and then slid away.

"One moment."

I stood there and watched him go in to announce me.

In that instant an uneasiness I couldn't name came over me.

Cassian and I had been married five years and had been inseparable the whole time.

Last night I rode with the ambulance the entire way here.

Now I had to be announced to see my own husband.

The strangeness of it left me stiff. I had no idea whether Cassian had panicked when he woke and found me gone. I wanted to look inside, but the door was shut tight.

Before long he came back out.

"Lord Cassian is speaking with the Council of Elders.

"You can go in later."

Lord Cassian.

I repeated the title to myself.

So the name I had said so fondly for five years was supposed to have a title in front of it.

I nodded and went back to the lounge next door.

"All right."

The things I had brought were still piled on a chair.

His charger, the book he liked, and the clean shirt I had gone home that morning to fetch.

I took the shirt out and folded it again, too restless to sit still, my mind running in every direction.

My family had been human nobility once, but that had faded years ago.

After my mother died, it was just my father and me, holding on to an old estate and a few small businesses that barely kept us going.

I had never once thought about what kind of life Cassian had lived before he met me.

And I had never imagined that someone so ragged, with nowhere in the world to go, carried a rank like this.

The heir of the vampire prince.

That had to be a world completely unlike mine, and I had no idea how he would balance our small home against his past.

I shook my head and pushed the tangle of thoughts away.

It didn't matter. As long as Cassian and I were together, we could face whatever came.

I sat with the shirt in my arms for a while, then checked my phone.

Still nothing.

Cassian used to be so attached to me that even a short errand meant a stream of messages.

Now it was as though he had forgotten I existed.

After a while one of the guards at the door came to tell me I could go in.

I got up at once.

When I pushed the door open, Cassian was propped against the head of the bed.

His face was still pale and there was a bandage around his shoulder.

He was still in the hospital gown I had changed him into while he was unconscious, but the look on his face was one I didn't know.

That cold expression was nothing like him.

Cassian used to look at nothing but me the moment I appeared, always with that soft smile.

"Elena."

Hearing him say my name steadied me a little.

I hurried over, meaning to sit on the edge of his bed.

A bodyguard put out an arm and stopped me. I was his wife, and I had to stand awkwardly off to one side. It took me a moment to steady myself before I asked, "Why didn't you tell me you were awake?

"I went home for a bit. My father has been worried about you too.

"The doctors said your wound—"

"It's fine now."

Cassian cut me off.

I faltered.

The vampire sitting beside him glanced at me and stood.

"I'll step out."

Once the door closed, it was just the two of us.

I set the bag down by the bed, nervous for reasons I couldn't explain.

The way Cassian looked at me seemed to have changed overnight.

He had never been this silent with me before, so I kept talking, my voice growing more strained with every word.

"I brought you a change of clothes.

"The doctors want to watch you a little longer. If there's nothing wrong you can go home soon."

Cassian glanced down and didn't reach for it.

"There's no need. Take all of it back. I don't need any of it."

After he said it, his eyes went back to the shirt. His brow drew in slightly, and then he looked away.

My hands stopped.

The room was quiet for a few seconds.

Cassian's voice had been perfectly calm.

It still felt like something small and sharp had gone into my chest.

I looked down at the shirt. I had given it to him for our anniversary last year.

He had said it looked good when he opened it.

When I straightened the collar for him, he had bent down on purpose to kiss me.

Now he was telling me to take it away, saying he didn't need it, unwilling even to touch it.

I put the shirt back in the bag.

"All right. Then let your family arrange things for you for now."

My voice came out tight.

This was not how the two of us were supposed to be, and I did not want to be speaking to him this carefully.

I had not slept all night and my head felt foggy, but I pulled myself together and produced a smile.

"It is a bit old, I suppose. I only gave it to you last year. When you're discharged, I'll buy you a new one."

The old Cassian would have laughed and snatched the shirt out of my hands, saying it wasn't old at all, saying that anything I gave him he would keep until it fell apart.

Cassian looked at me, and something like reluctance crossed his face. He started to say something.

Then there was a knock at the door.

"Lord Cassian, the prince's people have arrived."

Cassian looked away.

"Understood."

I stood up.

"I'll leave you to it."

I walked out of the room, but I didn't leave.

There was too much I still wanted to ask him.

Why he hadn't contacted me when he woke.

Why he was so cold to me.

And the betrothal the nurses had mentioned.

The door hadn't shut all the way.

A stranger's voice came through it.

"Miss Seraphina has been waiting for you all this time."

I stopped in my tracks.

"You were missing for five years. His Highness never found you, and he never dissolved your betrothal to Miss Seraphina.

"Now that your memory has returned, the original arrangement should resume as soon as possible."

My hand tightened on the bag.

Inside, there was a pause.

Then I heard Cassian say, "Marrying that human was an accident."

My fingers went rigid.

Then he added, "I'll divorce her. The betrothal stands."