Kaelen POV

"What if Seraphina returns?" Darius asked. "What happens then, huh?"

The mention of her name felt like a physical blow.

My fists clenched tighter, the skin over my knuckles stretching white with rage.

"She won’t," I replied through gritted teeth.

But Darius just shook his head.

"You don’t know that," he shot back. "You let her go, Kaelen. You had the perfect chance to get rid of a traitor, but you didn’t do it because you still have feelings for her."

The walls seemed to shake.

Darius almost never raised his voice, which only made the raw fury behind his words cut even deeper.

"She is still out there somewhere, living her life," he continued, his chest heaving with every breath. "And the second she comes back, your heart is going to waver. So what then? You just throw your little sex puppet away?"

My expression hardened further until it became a mask of pure, unadulterated steel.

If he wanted to drag the monsters we kept buried into the light, then I was more than willing to oblige.

"Then we’re no different from each other," I said, my voice dropping into a deadly calm. "We’re both just using her."

Darius let out a long, heavy exhale, his shoulders lowering slightly as the anger in his eyes gave way to something much colder.

Pure disgust.

"You’re right about that," he whispered. "We are using her. But there’s a massive difference between us, Kaelen. At least I have a bit of decency. At least I’m not the one who threw her into a cage with a beast, fully knowing there was a very high chance she might die. At least I didn’t stand there and watch her get bullied by the other maids while doing absolutely nothing simply because she has a criminal record."

He took one final step back, looking at me as though I were something wretched.

"At least I actually treat her right," Darius spat, the final words driving straight into my chest. "That alone makes me better than you. And it makes you absolute shit."

With that, he shot me one last glare before turning on his heel and storming out of the office.

The heavy door slammed shut behind him, leaving me standing there alone with nothing but the echo of his words ringing inside my head.

****

That night, I was like a restless beast.

I couldn’t sit still.

I wandered aimlessly through the quiet corridors, my footsteps echoing against the stone floors as the guards stiffened the moment I passed them.

My feet seemed to move on their own, guided by an instinct I could no longer control, until I found myself standing directly in front of Ella’s room.

I hesitated for a long moment before finally pushing the door open and quietly slipping inside.

The room was bathed in soft moonlight, casting a gentle glow over the bed.

I walked over in silence and stopped beside her, looking down at her sleeping form.

For more than ten minutes, I did nothing but stand there, staring at her unconscious face while listening to her agonizingly shallow breathing.

She looked so incredibly fragile.

After seeing that her condition was stable, I finally decided to let her rest.

But just as I turned to leave, my steps faltered when a tiny, choked sniffle broke the silence.

At first, I thought she had woken up, and my heart leaped into my throat.

When I turned back, however, her eyes were still tightly shut.

She was clearly still unconscious.

Yet a single tear slowly slipped from the corner of her eye, tracing a wet path down her pale cheek.

The sight made my fingers twitch.

There were no words that could truly explain the sharp ache that suddenly settled in my chest, but one thing had become painfully clear.

I absolutely hated seeing her cry.

It stirred emotions I hadn’t felt in a very long time.

Leaning forward, I slowly brushed my thumb across her damp cheek, gently wiping away the tear before another could follow.

"How much have you really suffered that you cry even in your sleep?" I whispered.

As though she had heard my voice, another silent sob escaped her lips.

Her delicate features twisted with pain as her unconscious mind undoubtedly replayed whatever horrors had driven her to collapse.

The sight brought the healer’s words rushing back into my mind, and my chest tightened even more.

For most of the night, I remained by her side, continuing to wipe away her tears and simply watching her until she finally stopped crying and settled back into a deep, peaceful unconsciousness.

By the time I finally returned to my chambers, I was heavily drunk.

"Why her?" I muttered as I collapsed onto the floor beside my bed, a half-empty bottle of liquor clutched tightly in my hand.

Why was I suddenly getting so attached to this woman I had just met?

I only wanted to use her to satisfy my sexual needs, to soothe the restless beast inside me. That was the plan.

So why did she suddenly have so much of an effect on me? Why did her tears dismantle me so completely?

"Why? Why?" I growled at the empty room before taking another bitter gulp from the bottle.

This felt like history repeating itself.

I really couldn’t afford to make the same mistake twice.

It was too soon. Too fast.

My heart couldn’t survive another betrayal.

Suddenly, a sharp, piercing ringing exploded inside my ears, causing me to groan in agony.

The unexpected wave of pain made my hand go slack, and the bottle slipped from my grasp, clattering loudly against the floorboards as the remaining liquor spilled across the wood.

Then the maddening ringing was followed by low, whispered chants.

"Not again," I gasped, gripping my ears tightly as a sudden, familiar warmth began trickling from my nose and ears.

My stomach dropped.

Slowly, I pulled my hands away and stared at my fingers.

They were stained with dark, thick blood.

It wasn’t a full moon yet.

Why the fuck was this happening right now?

My groans grew louder and more desperate as the whispered chants became clearer, wrapping around my mind like iron vines and tightening with every passing second.

"Get out of my head!" I roared into the darkness of my room.

I tried to stand, but my balance was completely gone.

The room spun violently around me.

I staggered forward, barely managing two steps before crashing into the edge of a small table. Pain shot through my side as the furniture overturned beneath the impact, and I lost what little footing I had left.

A second later, I hit the ground hard.

The pressure inside my skull felt like it was about to explode, and blood was now streaming from my eyes, blurring my vision in a crimson haze.

"Get out! Get out!" I roared.

But the voices didn’t stop.

They only grew louder, demanding submission.

Soon, a painful, familiar heat tore through my bones. My claws began extending violently, ripping through the skin of my fingertips, and I felt the primal, agonizing pull of my wolf trying to force its way out.

But I wasn’t in my cage.

If I shifted now, out in the open in my chamber, my darkest secret would be exposed.

I couldn’t let that happen.

Fighting against the overwhelming tide of the transformation, I forced my heavy body to crawl across the floor, dragging myself toward a small cupboard on the other side of the room.

By the time I reached it, I collapsed heavily onto the ground. My hands were shaking so violently that I could barely grip the handle. My vision spun uncontrollably, the room fading in and out as the chants grew into a deafening roar inside my head.

I gritted my teeth and pulled harder.

With a final, desperate burst of strength, I yanked the drawer open and grabbed a syringe.

My heart pounded violently against my ribs as I raised it with trembling fingers. Without a second thought, I plunged the needle deep into the side of my neck.

The pain was ten times worse.

It took a few agonizing minutes for the potion to take effect.

Slowly, the chants began to fade. The unbearable pressure inside my skull started to ease, and the violent pull of the transformation weakened little by little.

Then my world went black.