Mine.
Pain.
My ribs are screaming, this deep grinding ache that flares every time I breathe. My throat burns. My face throbs in at least three separate places, maybe four—hard to tell when everything hurts whether I'm counting or not.
I'm not dead. Low bar, but I'll take it.
The ceiling is wrong.
Stone. Not gilded panels, not the elaborate gold-leaf bullshit Coin put me under. Just stone, gray and rough, with iron fixtures holding oil lamps that burn steady instead of flickering.
I turn my head and the room tilts, goes dark at the edges, stabilizes. Slowly. My neck doesn't want to cooperate. Thebruises there pulse hot every time I move, and I can still feel the shape of Kairis's hand.
Kairis. Past tense.
My stomach flips before I can finish the thought. The memory surfaces in pieces—floor shaking, the door exploding inward, white eyes, wet sounds, a body hitting the ground and not moving again.
He's dead. Kairis is dead.
I should probably feel something about that. Relief, maybe. Satisfaction. Instead I file it away with all the other things I don't have time to process and keep looking at the ceiling.
The bed is too soft. Silk against my skin, mattress giving under me in ways I don't trust. When I shift my weight to test whether sitting up is possible, my ribs answer that question with a hard no.
Fine.
Horizontal it is.
The sheets that smell like him. Clean, musky, something underneath that's just—warm. Male. The scent curls into my lungs before I can stop it and my whole body flushes hot.
Ugh, come on.
No.
I'm injured.
I'm confused.
I'm not going to lie here getting worked up over bedding.
I scan the room without lifting my head. Stone walls. A desk in the corner, covered in papers. A chair no one's sitting in. Shelves. A door—heavy, iron-banded, closed. No windows.
No windows.
My chest locks up. Different cage. Same bars. Same—
Fantastic. Really. An upgrade in décor and a downgrade in natural light. Father would be so proud of my trajectory.
Movement. My whole body goes rigid before I locate the source—a shadow in the corner I missed, a figure sitting so still I didn't clock it as alive.
White eyes catch the lamplight.
Discord.
My heart slams once, hard, and keeps going too fast. He's slouched in the chair, long legs stretched out, shoulders loose. Watching me. His jaw is sharp in the low light, his throat a column of shadow, and my eyes track down before I can stop them—the breadth of his chest, the way his shirt pulls across it, hands resting on his thighs.
Calm. Stay calm. Don't stare, don't—
"You're awake." His voice is low. Rough. Not threatening, just present in a way that fills the room.
