Chapter 5 #2
"Fine. Then I'll smile and play the gracious hostess because that's what you need from me, isn't it?" Her voice carries resignation that cuts deeper than rage. "The perfect Shadow Lady. Controlled and protected and kept safely ignorant of whatever games you're all playing."
"I just want you safe—"
"No, you want me controlled." She starts walking away, heading back toward the palace. "There's a difference, Kaan. One day maybe you'll learn it."
Something inside me snaps.
I move before thought, shadows propelling me forward until I'm in front of her, blocking her path. Her eyes widen—not with fear, but with recognition. She knows this look. Knows what happens when I lose control.
"What are you—" she starts, but I cut her off.
"You think I want you controlled?" My voice comes out raw, dangerous. "You think this is about possession? About keeping you like some fucking trophy?"
"Isn't it?" But her breath catches as I step closer, backing her against the garden wall until there's nowhere left to run.
"I chose you," I growl, my hand slamming against the stone beside her head. "When the healers said they could only save one, I chose you. I will always choose you, even if it makes me a monster. Even if you hate me for it. Even if—"
"Stop." Her hands come up to my chest, but she's not pushing me away. Just holding there, fingers curling into my shirt like she can't decide whether to shove or pull. "You don't get to do this. You don't get to make me feel—"
"Feel what?" I lean down until my lips brush her ear, and I feel her shudder. "Feel the way you used to feel when I touched you? When you'd arch beneath me and beg for more?"
"That was before," she gasps, but her pulse is racing beneath my mouth as I trace the line of her throat. "Before everything fell apart. Before I understood what it meant to be yours."
"I know what I am." My other hand slides into her hair, tilting her face up to mine.
Through our damaged bond, I feel it—the spike of her heartbeat, the traitorous heat flooding her body, the desperate ache she's trying so hard to deny.
"But the thought of losing you—to anyone, to anything—it would destroy me. Completely. Irrevocably."
"I don't care about your cousin—"
"Maybe not." My thumb traces her lower lip, and her breath hitches. "But you hate me. I understand that. I deserve it.”
"Good," she breathes, but there are tears streaming down her face now. "You should know what it feels like. To lose something you can never get back."
And then I kiss her. Not gently. Not carefully. I kiss her like a drowning man finding air, like she's the only thing anchoring me to sanity and I'm terrified of letting go.
For one suspended heartbeat, she freezes. Then she kisses me back with a desperation that matches mine. Her mouth opens beneath mine with a sound that's half sob, half moan, and her fingers fist in my shirt.
This is what we used to be. This connection that transcends thought and choice.
I deepen the kiss, my tongue sliding against hers, and she whimpers—that sound she used to make when I touched her just right. My hands tighten in her hair, and hers claw at my back, and for these stolen seconds we're not two people destroyed by loss.
We're just us.
Then reality crashes back. She shoves me away with enough force that I stumble, shadows flaring instinctively to steady myself. When I look at her, she's breathing hard, her lips swollen from my kiss, tears streaming down her face.
"No," she gasps, wiping her mouth. "No, I can't—you don't get to—"
"Nesilhan—"
"I can't do this." Her voice breaks. "Every time I look at you, I see that night. I see the blood, the choice you had to make. And I know—" She presses her hand to her abdomen. "I know you saved my life. But I can't separate you from the loss."
I feel each word like she's carved them into my chest with a blade, but I don't interrupt.
"I don't expect forgiveness," I say quietly. "I just needed you to know that losing you would destroy me. Watching you walk away, watching the light die in your eyes when you look at me—it's killing me."
She's shaking now, her whole body trembling. "I don't know how to move past this. I don't know if I can."
She turns and walks away, and this time I let her go. Because pushing will only drive her further away.
I stand alone in the garden, my lips still burning with the taste of her, my chest aching. My shadows writhe with barely contained desperation, wanting to go after her, to make her stay.
But that would only prove I haven't learned anything.
The distance between us feels insurmountable. But for a monster who's lost everything else, even the faintest possibility of redemption is worth fighting for.
I spend the rest of the evening in the war room, reviewing defensive positions with a council of lords who barely hide their contempt.
Lord Riza is particularly insufferable, making pointed comments about "compromised leadership" and "foreign influence" that everyone knows refer to Nesilhan.
"Perhaps," I say with dangerous gentleness, "you'd like to explain to me exactly what you mean by 'compromised leadership,' Riza? Please. I'm fascinated."
He has the intelligence to look nervous. "My lord, I only meant that these are difficult times. The Light Court invasion, the eastern territories' unrest, your personal... losses. Perhaps a more unified front would strengthen our position."
"A unified front." My shadows creep along the floor toward him. "You mean without my wife. Say what you mean, Riza, or get out of my war room."
"Of course not, my lord. I merely suggest—"
"You suggest nothing. You imply everything and commit to nothing, like the coward you are." I let the shadows wrap around his ankles. "If you have concerns about my leadership, state them clearly. Otherwise, focus on the actual enemy at our borders."
The silence that follows is deeply satisfying.
After the council finally disperses, I find myself on the palace's highest balcony, looking east toward territories I haven't visited in decades.
"You look contemplative," Emir says, joining me.
"I'm calculating how many ways this can end in disaster," I reply. "Current count is fifteen."
"Optimistic tonight, are we?" Emir leans against the railing. "I'd say twenty, minimum."
"The extra five involve Nesilhan discovering exactly how paranoid I've become about threats to her safety and deciding I'm too dangerous to stay with."
"Ah. So certainties, not possibilities."
I don't laugh, but it's close. "She'll leave me, Emir. Not tomorrow, maybe not even this year. But eventually. Once the war ends, once she finds a way to be free of me—she'll go. And I'll have to let her."
"Will you?"
The question hangs between us. Would I? Could I actually let Nesilhan walk away, knowing she'd be safer without me but also knowing that losing her would destroy what's left of my humanity?
"I don't know," I admit. "Which probably makes me exactly the monster she thinks I am."
"Or it means you're terrified," Emir suggests. "Fear makes monsters of us all, my lord."
Erlik. Who whispered fears into Altan's ear until my brother poisoned Isil out of jealousy and ambition.
Who let his sons destroy each other over curses and paranoia he helped create.
Who watched me kill Altan, then refused to lift the curse as "punishment.
" Who now orchestrates from the demon realms, pulling strings and creating schemes I won't understand until it's too late.
"How do I avoid becoming my father?" I ask. "How do I love her without consuming her? How do I protect her without controlling her?"
"You ask her," Emir says simply. "You tell her the truth, all of it, and you ask her what she needs. Then you give it to her, even if it destroys you."
"And if what she needs is for me to not exist?"
"Then you find a way to give her that too."
We stand in silence, watching shadows stretch across the realm as night deepens. Somewhere to the west, Light Court forces are preparing for another assault. In the palace below, Nesilhan is probably reading in our chambers, as far from me as possible while still technically sharing the same space.
Whatever trap Erlik has set will spring eventually.
And I'll have to find a way to protect my wife from my family's schemes without proving her right about every terrible thing she already thinks about me.
"Fifteen ways this ends in disaster," I mutter.
"Twenty," Emir reminds me. "At minimum."
"Right. Twenty."
Though honestly, when you're the monster in every scenario, what's a few more catastrophes among friends?