Chapter 2
Cyrus
I’D BEEN PACING THE ROYAL dorm common room for over an hour, and the Persian rug was starting to show scorch marks where my feet had touched.
A month ago, I’d thought I could manage this. Control it. Make it work.
In Elio’s sanctuary—after we saved the wellspring, after Marigold rested her head on my shoulder—I’d believed I could be reasonable about it. Share her attention. Take my place beside Keane and Elio without wanting to tear the whole arrangement apart.
For maybe thirty seconds, it felt possible.
My fists clenched as heat crawled under my skin like it was looking for a way out.
Then she’d left for Albany. And I’d spent the month learning exactly how wrong I’d been.
Fire erupted along the back of the leather sofa without permission.
Shit. I smothered it with a sharp breath and sheer will, my jaw locked hard enough to ache. That was the problem. I couldn’t think about her without my magic answering, without something in me reaching for mine.
Ember lifted his head, fixing me with one amber eye. My phoenix familiar had been watching my internal meltdown with what I could only describe as avian judgment for the past month.
Don’t look at me like that, I muttered. You’re supposed to be on my side.
He ruffled his feathers—his opinion of my current behavior clear.
And because sleep was useless, and restraint was a joke, my mind dragged me right back to it—Marigold’s eyes in the common room when I finally stopped pretending I didn’t want her, the way she kissed me like she’d chosen me on purpose, like she needed me as much as I needed her.
And then Aurora had burst in, catching us naked and offering mortified apologies while we scrambled for clothes, with news that Parker was being moved. Everything had spiraled from there: the rescue, the public confrontation, the conspiracy exposure.
I’d spent the rest of the month knowing my cousin had seen exactly how thoroughly I’d lost control. She’d been carefully not mentioning it, which somehow made it worse.
Parker had disappeared within hours of her rescue through the silver bell to Levon’s library.
She’d apparently been living there ever since, recovering from what Alstone had done to her while working with Levon to track the Lightfords through vampire networks my father’s emergency council couldn’t access.
Smart, actually. Twenty years she’d spent gathering evidence and building contacts. Now she was using all of it.
Still, the thought of her living with a vampire—sharing space with one, trusting one, probably loving one—made my skin crawl reflexively. Eighteen years of training didn’t disappear just because I’d learned the war was manufactured.
Most clans had stopped fighting the moment the council conspiracy went public. But knowing it was fake didn’t make my mother less dead. Didn’t make the years of hatred suddenly disappear.
My mother had been trying to do the same thing Parker was: make vampire allies, share intelligence, build toward peace. She’d had died for it. The thought sat in my chest like an ember I didn’t know what to do with.
Not all vampires. I knew that now. Intellectually.
And the master’s vampires? Those were still out there, proving that even if the war was fabricated, the threat was real enough.
Only Parker was doing it with her vampire lover. Still, I had no room to judge anyone’s complicated relationship situation.
But my night together with Marigold had meant something. I’d been certain of it. What we’d shared felt distinct from what she had with Keane and Elio—not better, just different. Mine.
I’d told myself that was enough. That being the one she came to when she found Keane corrupted—the one who helped her figure out how to save him, who gave her honesty when Elio retreated behind his masks and Keane was too broken to be anyone’s anchor—meant I had a place that held.
But that night, for the first time, I’d been more than just steady. I’d been wanted—not for what I could do or how I could help, but for me.
I’d tried to convince myself it would work, that I could share her. I could be mature about the whole fucked-up situation.
But I’d been lying.
After everything settled, being her rock wasn’t enough anymore. I wanted to be her choice. Not her support system—her lover. Not the one she relied on but the one she wanted.
And I had no idea how to ask for that without sounding like I was demanding she choose me over them. Because I was.
Then she’d left.
And she’d hugged Keane goodbye at the portal. Kissed Elio on the cheek. Smiled at me with warmth but also… uncertainty. Like she wasn’t sure what we were now. Like maybe what had happened between us was just another complication in an already complicated situation.
I’d spent the first week convincing myself it didn’t matter. That what we’d shared was real, that she’d come back and we’d figure it out together. That the sex had meant something more than just physical release.
The second week, doubt had crept in. Had she even thought about me? Had she gone home to mundane Albany and realized how much simpler life was without magical politics and possessive heirs?
The third week turned to jealousy. I imagined her talking to Keane and laughing with Elio over video calls, choosing them even from a distance while I stayed behind burning holes in furniture.
By the fourth week, I’d stopped lying to myself.
Because it wasn’t fine. She’d been mine that night—completely, absolutely mine. For those few hours, I hadn’t had to share, hadn’t had to be mature about it. She was just mine.
And then she’d walked away and spent a month probably not thinking about me at all while I burned holes in everything I touched.
Sharing her wasn’t noble. It was erasure. Being one of three meant being optional.
And I was not optional.
The portal signature rippled through the building—Keane’s magic, unmistakable.
My stomach clenched. They were here. She was here.
In a few minutes, she’d walk through that door, and I’d have to face her. Face the fact that I’d spent the last month building this up in my head into something it probably wasn’t.
I was Cyrus Raynoff, heir to the first council seat—if that even meant anything anymore. The old council was gone, dissolved. My father was leading an emergency governing body now. Elections were coming. Everything was changing.
I didn’t even know what I was heir to anymore.
But I knew what I was. Someone who didn’t share. Someone who didn’t do complicated relationship dynamics. Someone who sure as hell didn’t fall in love with women who belonged to other people first.
Except Marigold had never felt like she belonged to anyone but herself.
And that was the problem. The thought of her in Keane’s arms, responding to Elio’s touch the way she’d responded to mine, made something violent and possessive claw at my chest.
Love is a leash, my father had said after my mother died. The enemy finds what you love and uses it against you. That’s how you lose.
My father had said that when I was six—old enough to understand, old enough to spend the next fourteen years believing him.
But he’d been wrong. I’d watched him realize it just a month ago as he broke down when he learned the truth about my mother. Loving her hadn’t made him weak. Losing her and believing the lies about how she died? That’s what had weakened him.
He’d spent the last month fighting for what she had believed in, leading the emergency council, and hunting the people who’d killed her.
Love hadn’t been his leash. It was his reason.
So why couldn’t I let myself believe that too?
Footsteps on the stairs. Voices—Keane’s measured tones, Elio’s lighter laugh, and underneath it all, her voice. Marigold, talking about something mundane while sounding happy and comfortable and home.
The door opened.
I turned.
She stood in the doorway between Keane and Elio like that’s where she belonged. Her honey-blonde hair hung loose around her shoulders instead of pulled back, and her dark eyes found mine. For one second, I couldn’t lock it down.
Heat exploded through the room. The leather sofa caught fire behind me. The temperature spiked twenty degrees in three seconds.
She flinched.
Good. Let her see what she did to me.
Scout poked his skeletal head out of her jacket pocket, chattering at Ember. My familiar ruffled his feathers in response—apparently the only one in the room capable of normal social interaction.
Hi, she said softly.
Just hi. Like we were friends and nothing more.
I tried to respond, tried to say something—anything—that would make this less awkward. But the words wouldn’t come. Because standing there, watching her look at me with those careful, uncertain eyes, I realized she didn’t know what to say either.
We’d left things unfinished, and a month apart hadn’t made them any clearer.
How was Albany? I managed finally. My voice came out rougher than intended.
Good. Complicated. She took a small step into the room, staying closer to Keane and Elio, like they were safety and I was… something else. How were the holidays here?
Long. The word tasted bitter. Quiet.
Keane and Elio exchanged a glance—too knowing. They’d felt it. Of course they had. I’d been broadcasting my emotional disaster for weeks.
The temperature spiked another few degrees. Sweat prickled at the back of my neck despite the January cold outside.
Cyrus— Marigold started.
I need to train.
I was already moving, already putting distance between us before I said what I was thinking: Choose. Me or them. Make it simple.
Because if I stayed, I’d force the choice. And she’d choose wrong.
Better to walk away first.
Train? Elio’s eyebrow rose. You’ve been training nonstop for a month. Rivera said you’ve practically taken up residence in the combat hall.
Then one more session won’t hurt.
I was already past them, my fire building hotter with every second I stayed.
Cyrus, wait… Marigold’s voice followed me into the corridor.
I didn’t wait. Couldn’t wait. If I stopped, if I had to stand there and pretend I was fine with this, I’d break something. Possibly myself.
Welcome back, I called over my shoulder without looking at her. I’ll see you at dinner.
The corridor outside felt too narrow. My fire licked along the stone walls as I strode toward the training facilities.
I’d believed one evening of acceptance had fundamentally changed who I was. Made me capable of sharing and trusting and all the mature emotional regulation this situation required.
But a month alone had stripped away that temporary clarity, leaving me with nothing but raw truth: I wanted her.
All of her.
In a way that was absolute and possessive and completely incompatible with what she was offering.