Chapter 22
DAIGEN
Daigen
The fire had dwindled to dying embers when I slipped into her chamber.
Cold air poured through the cracked window and dragged the cover from her restless form. She had thrown most of it off in her sleep, leaving only her legs veiled in linen. Pale skin glowed silver beneath the moonlight, a vision too pure for the filth in my mind.
I stood over my mate, my rage turning into need for her, betraying me.
Every curve of her body that the moon touched was mine, yet I was forced to look and not take. It was the cruellest irony: the gods had cursed me with a mate as tempting as starlight yet demanded I keep my hands from their fire.
Need for her clawed through me like a hunger that could never be satiated.
My cock strained, hard enough to split bone, and still I did not move.
I only devoured her with my eyes, imagining the sound she might make if I finally gave in.
On the road I had tasted nothing but glimpses of her form — a pale shoulder here, a breathless laugh there, the infuriating set of her chin.
Riding with her pressed against me every day was torture.
Nights were worse, when she slept close enough to reach but not touch.
I ground my teeth until my jaw ached. If any of my warriors dared look at her this way, I would’ve gouged their eyes out with my bare hands. I would have—
She shifted, her lips parting with a sigh, silver hair spilling loose across her pillow.
The sight alone nearly undid me. She was my mate. My ruin.
My hand went to the hilt at my belt before I realised I’d even moved. The knife whispered free of its sheath, black steel catching the glow of the firelight. I turned it in my palm slowly, watching how the flames shimmered along its edge.
It would be so easy. One slip of the blade and the shift clinging to her would fall off her body. One cut, and I could have what I wanted at last.
I tightened my grip until the leather bit my palm.
The beast in me wanted her, right now, right there. Gods!
I pressed the flat of the blade against the bedpost. The scrape hissed through the silence, the sound just managing to steady me.
I dragged the knife down, imagining it was my own flesh I split as I left a shallow groove in the wood.
Better to scar the bed than to hurt her.
But still I lingered. Still I watched her chest rise and fall, hair sliding over her face as though daring me to brush it back.
The blade tipped with my gaze, inching towards her, not to claim, but to unveil. I used it to brush a lock of hair from her shoulder. The strand slipped free, baring more of her back to the firelight. That was when I saw it.
Not the soft skin I craved, but marks carved deep into her flesh.
Brutal lines etched like scripture across her back, all the way down to the bone.
I froze. The knife trembled in my grip as the fire caught in those scars, turning them into a map of someone else’s cruelty. My lust twisted into rage that grew hotter, uncontainable. A low snarl ripped from my throat. Who had dared?
Who had touched what was mine?
My vision bled red at the thought. The gods might have cursed me with an enemy for a mate, but they had not given leave for another to touch her. Hurt her.
A crime that had been committed long before I found my mate.
Was this why she despised me?
Blood thundered in my ears. My grip whitened around the hilt until the leather creaked. I wanted to put the knife through the wall. Through a throat.
Through every throat.
Who did this to her?!
I clenched the knife until the edge sliced into my palm.
These scars were not random, either. They were deliberate.
Old glyphs carved in the Old Tongue. I had seen their like scrawled on the walls of dungeons, etched into the flesh of traitors and whores alike.
A brand meant to shame them and strip one of their worth in the eyes of gods.
And yet there was one word in particular that stuck out, written in the Old Tongue.
Fateless.
How did they know Narya was one of them? The wounds had clearly healed long before the Stargala, which meant she hadn’t obtained her crystal yet.
Did Narya even know what had been carved into her?
The girl had been trying to translate in my archive, pawing through ancient texts as if the answers might save her. Now it all made sense. No wonder she searched with such desperation. She carried her torment written on her very flesh.
Something else stirred beneath the scars.
Faint lines that twisted against the Old Tongue, like another script had been buried under the brand.
I had lived centuries. I read every tongue the gods had left us.
But this… this I could not read. The curves were wrong, the strokes too deep.
It was older than the Old Tongue, and it did not speak of shame alone.
It spoke of intent.
These lines were not meant to brand or to mark. They were meant to unseal.
A script designed to wake something ancient.
“Is this my punishment?” I spat into the silence, glaring at the ceiling. “You curse me with a mate I should never want, and when I finally find her, she bears the mark of another. For what purpose? My ruin or hers?”
The gods gave no answer. They never did. But they listened.
I sneered at their silence, my gaze dragging back to Narya’s sleeping form.
I wanted to believe she stirred in her sleep, unaware of my presence, but her body shifted, her hair sliding across her face.
The sight of her so innocent, so tempting…
I pressed the blade flat to my brow to stop me driving it through the wall.
My eyes closed, and the curse I buried for years echoed in my mind:
‘Hear me!
You stole my sister. You bled my kingdom.
And now you bind me to my ruin.
I curse you all! I curse stars that bore you!
If this is my fate, then you will drown in the blood you spilled.
I curse you all! Do you hear me? I curse you!
Your heavens will burn before I bow to you again!’
Narya’s breath hitched, and her eyes blinked open, darting between my face and the knife in my hand. For a moment, she looked at me as if I were the executioner finally come to end her. The ring on my finger burned with her alarm, her fear searing through me as her lips parted on a plea:
“Please don’t!”
My mouth curled into a derisive laugh. “Do you really think I would waste my blade on you?”
My voice dripped with mockery, but the truth hidden behind it tasted bitter.
She didn’t believe me. She actually thought I intended to hurt her.
She bolted upright, her arms flying over her chest. The straps of her shift slid down, baring skin I longed to touch. I let my gaze rake her deliberately, enjoying her squirm.
The coverlet dangled from my fingers. Her glare fixed on it, desperate, and I dropped it to the floor. If she wanted it, she would have to come to me.
Shame poured off her in waves. She wrapped her arms tighter around herself, drowning in it, and still those silver eyes burned with hate.
I slid my knife back into my belt and leaned against the bedpost, my own arms crossed over my chest, and held her gaze until her breath quickened and a delectable blush rushed to her cheeks.
Her chin trembled. “What… did you do to me?”
The words struck deeper than any blade. My ring pulsed with her humiliation and fear, filling me with a rage I dared not show. Rage at her, at myself, at the gods who had bound us.
I sneered instead. “Do you think I raped you?”
The vile word clawed out before I could stop it, and the taste of it turned my stomach.
For the first time in years, guilt coiled through me, raw and unwelcome.
I dug my nails into my arms until they bit through my clothes, anything to drown the weakness. I was king. I bowed to no one. I answered to no one.
Not even to her.
And yet, I despised myself more than I despised her silence.
Her eyes lifted slowly, glistening with an accusation she did not voice. That was worse than any scream. Worse than any blade. I could withstand those, but this quiet, damning look? It cleaved through me.
“I didn’t,” I forced out, “but get dressed before I forget how close I came.”
I turned, more to hide the war in my expression than to give her decency.
Every instinct screamed to turn back, to seize her, to punish the bond for unraveling me.
I heard her shift from the bed behind me. Linen rustled, footsteps crossed the floor, a door creaked open. Then her voice, too soft for the war it waged in me, whispered:
“I was dreaming again. It’s always the same dream. I don’t know what it means, but this time it felt… heavy. Like it’s trying to tell me something.”
My nostrils flared. I dragged air through my lungs, my knuckles turning white against my arms.
“Tell me of it,” I said, then softer: “If you wish.”
She did, and for the first time in too long, I felt myself listening instead of commanding. Her voice calmed me, eased the pounding in my blood.
“I always dream I’m drowning in flowers,” she said after a pause.
“It never changes. I… always wake before I understand what it means.” Her gaze flicked away, guarded, as if she’d already said more than she wanted.
“I don’t even know why I’m telling you this.
Kaydra used to say it was better to let things out than keep them rotting inside. ”
“This Kaydra,” I said, tilting my head, “your sister?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
I already knew that. I knew everything about Narya I could tear from her past. Everything, except the scars carved into her back.
Those she had hidden. But not anymore. I’d find out how she got them, and then I’d kill the person responsible.
As soon as I killed those on her list. Only four more to go.
I relaxed my grip on my arms. “Your sister is wise.”
“The wisest of us…” She trailed off and the air between us weighed with things unsaid. She thought she had given me enough. She was wrong.
“You hide more than dreams,” I said quietly, letting the words cut intentionally. “Like those markings on your back. Did you think you could keep them from me forever?”
She froze at that, then turned, her eyes glistening despite the lift of her chin. "I have nothing to hide."
I clenched my jaw. She really thought I was foolish enough to believe that.
In two strides, I was behind her, my hand fisting in the fabric at her shoulder. One savage pull ripped it down her back, baring the cruel markings carved into her skin. Did she even know what they said?
Her sharp intake of breath was drowned out by the snarl that clawed from my throat. My voice shook with fury.
“Nothing to hide? Then tell me”—I ripped the fabric from her back, baring every scar carved into her skin—“who did this to you? Who dared lay a hand on my mate?”