Chapter 36
BIMBY BUTTON
Andrik-
I release the bite slowly, careful not to hurt her, lapping over the broken skin.
She’s trembling in my arms, completely spent.
“Easy, thaevi,” I murmur, lifting her from the edge of the tub. Her head falls against my shoulder.
I wrap her in the softest furs I can find, carrying her to our bed. She’s already half-asleep, exhausted from the heat, the claiming... me.
But I can’t let her fall asleep until I apologize for the way I treated her. She looked so small in the bath. Surrounded by the wreckage of what happened, I let my anger consume me. I was supposed to be her calm, not the storm.
"Lumi," I reach out slowly, my hand hovering over hers. "May I?"
She nods, burrowing deeper into my chest.
I take her hand gently, so gently, and press it to my chest, right over my heart.
"This is me," I say, meeting her eyes. "Always. If you ever doubt—if you ever wonder—feel this. The bond doesn't lie, thal'morin. You'll know me. Always."
Her eyes glisten. A tear spills down her cheek.
"I'm sorry," she breathes. "I'm so sorry—"
"No." I cup her face with my free hand, brushing away the tear. "You have nothing to apologize for. Nothing. Do you understand me?"
She shakes her head, more tears falling.
"He tricked you. Violated you. Used my voice—my words—against you." My voice drops to something lethal. "I’m going to find him, Lumi. I’ll find him, and peel his soul out slow enough the gods themselves will look away.”
Her breathing evens out, and her fingers loosen in my fur.
“Vralin’ael serkai...Aem’nar until velorin. (If I shattered you with my edges... I’ll be soft until you heal.) I whisper. “Thrak’mir ael’kae, var?n velrinna etra.” (Let my ribs break before I make you flinch again.)
She stirs at the sound of my language.
My voice is a ghost against her temple. “Etravi’s?n narh velorin. Ael’thr?n vralin, veyl?n.” (I will unmake myself before I ever break you again.)
I press my brow to her temple, lashes wet. “Just... stay. Stay here with me. Where I can keep you.”
I press my brow to her temple, eyes burning. “Serentha vael’s?n. Ael’aen nirae, Lumi.” (Let this pain be mine instead. Dream without sorrow, Lumi)
I watch her face soften as the minutes pass, but his name still haunts my mind. The broken sounds she made for him.
I grit my teeth. Force it down. I thread my fingers gently through hers. “Vael’an kaemorin, Sael?n.” (I failed you. Let me be yours again, soulbond.)
I hold her for a long time, just feeling her breathe.
Eventually, I ease out from under her, tucking the furs around her.
I need to clean the bathroom before she wakes and hurts herself.
I slip the light on, and the window catches my eye. The ghost of our initials is still visible. Something dark and possessive curls through my chest... but then I notice something taped to the outside of the glass—a small package, wrapped neatly in purple ribbon.
A sharp heat sweeps through my blood, boiling until my pulse is nothing but a distant thud. I cross the room slowly, shards of glass crunch and grind under my hooves, leaving a trail of silver powder behind me.
I rip the window open, and frigid air rushes in, grounding me. The sudden drop in temperature crystallizes the rage in my chest, turning it from a messy, hot blur into something cold and precise.
My gaze drops back to the package, and the frost on the glass shudders as my fingers reach for it. The purple silk is a sickening bruise against the white of my world, an insult I can’t wait to tear apart.
A single claw cuts through the bow; it falls to the floor in frozen crumbs. I peel back the paper with painfully slow precision that contradicts the storm screaming in my chest.
Inside is a photograph. My vision tunnels. It’s Lumi in her apartment, head thrown back, lips parted, one hand between her legs, the other holding—
Purple.
That thrahking purple toy.
He watched her in her most private moments and photographed her without her knowledge.
Folded beneath the photo is a note. My hands shake as I open it.
“She’s beautiful when she cums, isn’t she? I’ve seen it so many times. In her apartment. In your forest, Tonight at your window.
She tastes like honey when she says my name.
-T.”
The paper crumples into a tight ball in my fist.
And the last item... a pair of Lumi’s panties. I lift them with a claw. They’re wet, not with her release, but his.
I draw a deep, ragged breath, pulling the air deep into my lungs, searching for a trace of skin, of sweat, of him, but there is only a sterile, mocking void.
The gods haven’t just hidden him from the air itself. The scent of him is being choked out by a chemical silence that makes my fangs ache to sink into something solid.
I can tell he’s male... that he’s wrong. But I can’t track a glitch in the world’s design—I can’t hunt a shadow that refuses to cast itself.
I am a predator with no trail, standing in a room of broken glass while she sleeps, completely unaware that he was just inches away.
A broken sound tears from my throat.
He’s been in her apartment, watched her pleasure herself, stolen her clothes... and I can’t even find him.
I vault through the open window, my heavy frame clearing the sill with a grace that defies my size. The moment I hit the snow, the walls of the cabin fall away, replaced by the silence of the forest.
The first tree snaps like kindling in my hands. Then another.
He watched her.
Another tree. Bark splinters under my claws.
He has pictures of her.
Wood cracks and falls.
He touched her things, marked them like a dog. Left them for me to find.
I tear through the forest like a hurricane. Destroying everything in reach.
Trees older than civilizations. Gone.
Branches. Roots. Anything I can get my hands on.
Mine. She’s mine. And I can’t protect her from someone I can’t find.
By the time the rage burns itself out, there’s a clearing where there wasn’t one before.
The scent of raw sap and slaughtered pine is thick enough to choke on.
I board the windows—one by one. Blood smearing the edges like a sacrifice.
He’ll never watch her again. Never see her through the glass. Never get close enough to—
My claws sink into the wood as I hammer another board in place. The sound of them striking iron nails echoes like a death knell through the valley.
I’m not sealing her in, I’m sealing him out. A thrahking tomb for anything that dares whisper to her again.
The sun is rising by the time I finish, but every window is sealed. It’s finally safe.
I lean my forehead against the rough timber of the last window and let out a long exhale.
If I can’t see the world, the world can’t see her.
Lumi-
I wake to glowing blue eyes staring at me.
“Good morning,” I rasp.
“Lumi...I-I’m so sorry for earlier.” His voice is broken. Not the gravelly way it sometimes gets when he’s holding himself back—no, this is soul-crushing.
For a moment, I don’t move. I study his face in the warm glow of the fire. He looks so fragile right now. I wonder how long he’s been kneeling beside the bed like that.
My voice comes out scratchy, “I didn’t know it wasn’t you, Andrik.”
He flinches, eyes squeezing shut.
“It’s not your fault, Lumi. It’s mine,” his voice is strained. “I’m your sael?n. I’m supposed to make sure you’re satisfied. Instead, I left you to burn alone.”
“You didn’t leave me; you passed out,” I whisper. “You were exhausted. You obviously needed sleep.”
His head dips low onto the bed. The blue crystals at the tips of his antlers catch the light, casting tiny reflections across the walls like little rainbow crystals.
“That’s not an excuse. I should’ve felt it sooner. I should’ve—”
“Stop,” my voice cracks. I reach out, pressing trembling fingers to his jaw. His skin is colder than I’ve ever felt it. It soothes the lingering heat pulsing through my body. “You didn't know. Neither of us did. We can’t let this tear us apart.”
His breath stutters as he fists the blankets beside my leg. “He used my voice, Lumi. He made you—”
“I know what he made me do,” I cut in softly. “But it was only because I thought it was you. This has nothing to do with him.”
He opens his eyes, and they pierce through the shadows, filled with a storm of emotion. “You were reaching for our soulbond,” he says quietly, pain threading through every word. “That’s not wrong. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
Guilt twists in my gut. I can’t shake the nagging feeling that I was reaching for more than just Andrik.
I even told him he sounded funny, and instead of opening my eyes and confronting the truth, I allowed my instincts to take over.
Was it really Andrik I craved... or the way the words felt against my skin?
A strange ache builds in my chest, one I can’t quite name. Maybe it’s shame. Maybe it’s hunger still trying to claw its way out.
Andrik watches me like he’s afraid I’ll fade if he blinks.
“I don't know what’s wrong with me,” I whisper, my voice shaking with the weight of my emotions. “Part of me wanted it to be you so badly that I didn’t care if the game—or the nickname made sense. I felt so compelled to listen.”
He reaches for my hand, “That’s the bond, Lumi. It’s supposed to pull you toward me,”
“But what if it’s not just that?” I ask. “What if there’s something broken in me? What if I’m so desperate to feel wanted now that Anna’s gone, I’ll accept any voice that promises it?”
He shakes his head immediately, but the words are spilling out faster than I can catch them.
“I thought I was strong,” I say, forcing a shaky laugh. “That I was healing. But last night—” I press a hand over my chest and try to slow my breathing. “I realized I’m still so easy to reach. So easily fooled.”
He moves slowly, placing his hand over mine where it trembles over my heart. “You’re not easily fooled, Lumi. How could you have known someone could steal my voice?”
“If this bond is so sacred,” I whisper, “shouldn’t I have just known that something was wrong?
His thumb drags lightly over the inside of my wrist.