The accusation should enrage me. Instead, it breaks something inside because he's right. Gods help me, he's right.
"I hate you," I whisper, and it's not entirely meant for him. "I hate that your father did this to me. I hate that Yasar's touch feels like relief even though I know it's poison. I hate that I'm trapped in this palace, in this realm, in this body that doesn't even feel like mine anymore."
"Nesilhan—"
"And I hate," my voice rises to something close to screaming, "that the only time I feel like myself anymore is when I'm so fucking angry I could burn this entire realm to ash!"
The words hang between us like drawn blades.
Kaan moves toward me slowly, as if approaching something wild and wounded. His shadows have pulled back, leaving just the man—broken and desperate and looking at me like I'm his last hope of salvation.
"Then be angry," he says roughly. "Use me. Hurt me. Whatever you need to feel human again, take it."
"You don't mean that."
"I do." He stops an arm's length away. Close enough that I can see the fine tremors running through him, the way his jaw clenches with restraint. "You need to reclaim something. Prove to yourself the binding hasn't won. That you still control yourown body, your own choices." His voice drops. "So use me to prove it."
The offer should disgust me. Instead, something dark and hungry uncoils in my chest.
Because he's right about that too. My body has been a battleground for months—first with pregnancy and loss, then with Yasar's manufactured attraction. I've had no agency, no control, no choice in what happened to the flesh I inhabit.
But this? This I can choose.
"Take off your shirt," I hear myself say.
Kaan's eyes flash—dark, ancient, feral. For a heartbeat I think he will refuse. The Shadow Lord of the Dark Court doesn't take orders. Not from the Light Court princess he dragged into marriage.
But then he smiles—slow, deadly—and obeys. Not submission. Not compliance.
A warning.
The shirt comes off in one smooth motion, revealing a body carved by centuries of warfare. His scars shift with the movement of the shadows under his skin, as though serpents coil through living flesh, reacting to emotions he never voices aloud.
I step toward him as if pulled by a hook through my ribs. My nails rake down his chest. Bronze skin parts beneath my touch, blood welling up in hot, dark threads. His blood smells like iron and ancient storms—heady enough to make the room tilt.
He doesn't flinch. But his pupils blow wide, turning his irises nearly black. The shadows surge beneath his skin, restless, hungry.
"You want to be used?" I demand. "Want to be the weapon I turn against everything trying to control me?"
"Yes." One syllable. A growl. A promise.
The binding to Yasar tightens like barbed wire around my skull, punishing me for wanting the wrong man. Pain lances through my temples. I shove it aside with vicious satisfaction. This is my choice. Mine.
"Then get on your knees."
Power crackles between us. His jaw flexes. For a second—a terrifying second—he looks like he might devour me whole for the insult alone. Shadows coil up his arms, eager, waiting for his command to remind me exactly who rules this kingdom.
Then something shifts. His hunger eclipses his pride.
He sinks to his knees.
Even on the floor, he looks like a predator lowering himself before the strike. The sight sends liquid heat pooling low in my belly, a dark thrill that has nothing to do with Yasar's binding and everything to do with watching the most dangerous man in the realm submit to my will.
"What do you want?" he asks, voice thick with hunger and something darker. Something of mine.
An idea forms—vicious, perfect. If his shadows can be used as weapons, if they respond to his will, then they can be turned against him too.
"Your shadows," I say, my voice steadier now, edged with command. "Use them. On yourself."
