I look at Jason, yet I do not truly see him. His face blurs, fading into the background as flashes of my past burn through my vision. They mingle with that conversation from the night when I told Estella about the only serious relationship I ever had and how it collapsed under its own weight. Back then, fragments returned to me—small, disjointed pieces. A blurred face. A voice that once lulled me to sleep but eventually scraped across my nerves like metal on bone.
You are a psychopath. You are broken. I could never love you.
The words echo again, sharper now, and all of it floods back. The memories fill me, illuminate me from within, reminding me of exactly what happened. My love had been too much, yet somehow never enough.
Estella saw straight through me. From that moment onward, something ignited. A single spark that struck the match, a match that only grows hotter and brighter the farther it burns. Sparks that blind anyone who wanders too close to us.
She never spoke of it. She kept her silence, not because she wanted to hide, but because she did not yet understand what she felt. I had not understood either. We were both stumbling toward something inevitable.
But she chose to act. And that choice sends a storm of feelings through me, too many to untangle. It feels as if my lungs expand, stretching wider than they should, letting in more air, yet I still struggle to breathe because the intensity presses down on me from all sides.
Adrenaline floods my bloodstream, drowning me, yet my muscles remain heavy and slack. Something dangerous roils beneath the surface, heating my blood until it almost stings. Every thought, every pulse, every breath drags her image back into sharp focus.
The more I learn about Estella, the more I see that she understands me in a way no one else ever has.
And the more my obsession deepens.
Even if I stripped her from my life, erased every trace of her, it would be me who vanished in the aftermath.
Rain and cold iron cling to the stone, filling the air with a sharp, grounding scent. Below, the city stretches out in muted gold—copper roofs, tramlines jagged as broken teeth, and a river catching the last stubborn shards of evening light.
From up here, the castle sits like a weathered tooth set against the sky: squat towers, battered statues, a ring of crenellations that have watched empires march and crumble like storms. The wind steals at the torches’ flames, scattering them into splinters of trembling light.
I turn, electric anticipation coiling inside me, nearly delirious with a need to crash, to burn, to tear apart. My gaze settles on thetarget below, walking the parade ground in a heavy coat, each step measured, ceremonial, deliberate.
An art smuggler who hides relics behind the piety of churches.
Dante cradles the crossbow in his hands, the stock pressed tight to his shoulder, his eyes narrowed as he calculates. Behind the target, a line of officers marches in precision, muskets glinting like jagged teeth. They adhere to the courtyard’s geometry—a procession arranged not just to move but to declare power, to remind anyone watching who holds it.
The courtyard itself is a study in deliberate beauty. Cobblestones slick with rain form a broad square, framed by arched walkways that echo faintly with distant footsteps.
The castle rises above it all, a slab of authority carved from dark stone, each block saturated with centuries of damp, whispers, and human ambition. The walls are broad, capable of bearing mounted patrols along their tops without fear of a fall.
Gargoyles jut from the stone like frozen predators, their mouths twisted into silent warnings that have survived centuries. The towers rise squat and heavy, built from an age when architecture meant endurance, when beauty was measured by weight and the promise of defense.
I pause, letting the gothic grandeur wash over me. This place feels almost sacred in its brutality. It feels even better to realize that it already holds a few of the dead guards we and Dante left behind.
And soon, right in the middle of this perfect courtyard, blood will be pooling—a human stain on ancient stone.
Goosebumps bloom along my arms as I step closer to the edge of the castle wall, looking down at the people milling about. They move like ants emerging from their burrow, chasing something fleeting before scurrying back into the dark they came from.
My attention shifts, drawn inevitably to Dante. He stands a few paces away, shoulders steady, preparing to send a bolt straight into the man’s heart. I bite down gently on my lower lip, the thrill inside me flaring, hot and insistent.
He has grown so confident, and I swear on everything I have—it’s one of the sexiest things I’ve ever witnessed. Everything about this moment feels like foreplay: the way his hands curve around the weapon, the poise in his stance, the concentration darkening his eyes as he studies the target. He scans the courtyard with the precision of a predator.
The sensation returns to me as I watch him—the one that always sneaks up on me. It starts with a single heartbeat, then grows heavier, sinking into my stomach, sliding deeper until it settles low in my core. I never quite know what to do with it at first. It unnerves me, simply because I’ve never felt anything like this before, and the unfamiliarity shivers its way up my spine.
But the discomfort dissolves the moment he glances at me, and I see myself reflected in his gaze.
Nothing compares to that feeling. The recognition. The undeniable connection. Two people who were lost in this world for so long, finally finding each other—finally finding perfect solace in the arms of someone just as ruined, just as hungry.
And I want to keep him. I want him with me, around me, inside me, above me. It’s an obsession that came out of nowhere, but now it clings to me with claws, refusing to loosen its grip.
Happiness has always been fleeting for me, a trick of light. But Dante manages to hold it in place, keep the vapor from dissolving. Especially with the flowers he keeps bringing me. Even here, far from home, I woke this morning to a bouquet of spider lilies in a vase beside my bed at the hotel—blood-red petals curled like secrets waiting to be spoken.
Before I do anything stupid—like hurl myself onto him right here—I force my gaze to the world around us. Light from thecity below bleeds upward in molten copper, pooling along the undersides of the archways and tracing the edges of iron-grated windows. Soldiers march across the courtyard in precise, ceremonial paths, their movements sharp and mechanical, like pieces sliding across a chessboard.
“Ready?” Dante’s voice cuts through the hum of the night, snapping me out of my spiraling thoughts.
