The door slammed behind them with a crack that shook dust from the frame.
Ariaxa barely had time to suck in a breath before Kaedan’s hand left her waist and closed around her throat, pinning her back against the cold obsidian wall. Her skull hit stone, the shock firing white sparks across her vision. His body crowded hers, all sharp lines and coiled fury, his cloak whipping around them like a living shadow.
Her fingers flew up to grab his wrist on instinct.
“Let—” she started, voice scraping.
“Do not,” he snarled, the word a growl rasping against her mouth, “speak.”
His eyes were not empty now. They burned. Rage, yes—but something else, something hotter and more dangerous, seethed behind the fury.
“You were going to let them,” he hissed, his breath harsh. “You were going to let them put their hands on you.”
Ariaxa’s throat worked beneath his grip.
“I didn’t have a choice.”
His fingers tightened, not enough to choke her fully, enough to make swallowing a struggle.
“You had a choice,” he bit out. “You chose to look at me.”
He shoved her harder into the wall. Her toes barely scraped the floor. One of his knees pushed between her thighs, forcing her to feel the full cage of his body. The collar pulsed between his hand and her skin, reacting to his touch as if it recognized its maker.
Her voice came out thready.
“I was begging you to stop them.”
He bared his teeth.
“No. You were begging me to take you instead.”
Heat shot up her neck, humiliated and wild. “That’s not what I—”
His mouth crashed against hers.
It was not a kiss meant to coax. It was a bite, a punishment, a claim. His teeth closed on her lower lip with ruthless pressure, drawing a small, shocked sound from her throat. His other hand slammed into the wall beside her head, caging her in completely. The world narrowed to his mouth and his grip and the brutal, aching drag of her pulse against his fingers.
She twisted her head away, breath shuddering.
“Kaedan—”
He followed, teeth finding the line of her jaw, then her neck, biting down hard enough to bruise. She gasped, her fingers digging into his sleeve. His fangs did not pierce, only pressed, leaving a ring of pain just below the collar.
“You think I did this to save you?” he demanded against her skin. “You think I broke a law because I care whether you burn?”
His words scalded more than his mouth.
“Then why?” Ariaxa managed, nails biting into his arm. “Why stop them?”
His hand slid from her throat to the back of her neck, holding her in place while he stared at her like she was the one who had upended the empire.
“Because they were touching what is mine,” he said, low and fierce. “And I decide how you break.”
Her heart hammered so hard it hurt. “I am not yours.”
He laughed, bitter and incredulous.
“The collar around your throat disagrees.”
His knee pressed more firmly against her, lifting her the slightest fraction. She grabbed at his shoulders to keep from slipping, her body trapped between bone-cold wall and vicious heat.
“Say it,” he murmured. “Say who you belong to.”
She shook her head, breath ragged. “No.”
The collar flared, a sharp sting that made her arch against him. He caught the movement with a hiss, his fingers spreading against her hip to still her.
“Stubborn little sun,” he whispered, his lips ghosting over hers again. “You throw yourself at wolves and then rage when we bite.”
His mouth brushed hers, slower this time, testing, tormenting. Not soft—never soft—but less purely cruel, as if some part of him couldn’t decide whether to devour or worship. She felt herself respond in traitorous ways—her fingers curling tighter in his cloak, her knees quivering, her breath chasing his.
He dragged his lips away abruptly, breathing hard.
“Enough.”
His hand vanished from her neck. The absence felt like falling. He stepped back just long enough to let her drop fully onto her feet, then spun her and pushed her toward the bed with a shove that made her stumble. She caught herself on the edge of the mattress, lungs burning.
“On your back,” he ordered.
Her muscles obeyed before her mind did. She lay there, staring up at the carved ceiling, feeling his shadow loom over her. He grabbed her ankle and dragged her fully onto the bed with ruthless ease, silks tangling around her legs.
His weight came down above her. One hand caught her wrists and pinned them to the mattress again; the other braced beside her head. He lowered his body until she could feel every line of him, held just barely apart by what little mercy he still clung to.
“You want to know the worst part?” he asked, voice rough. “I should have left you on that table. I should have let them tear into you until nothing of your pride was left.”
Her eyes burned.
“But you looked at me,” he continued, his jaw clenched. “And I moved.”
His body pressed down, grinding her into the bed, his breath hot against her ear. His teeth found her shoulder, biting hard enough to make her gasp, then harder still until she felt the promise of a bruise.
“Stop,” she whispered, even as her body arched helplessly. “You’re hurting me.”
“Yes,” he said, voice low. “That is the point.”
His hand shifted from her wrists to her throat again, thumb brushing the flutter of her pulse. He held her there, poised on the razor edge between pain and something dangerously close to desire.
Then he froze.
For a long, taut beat, he hovered above her. Every inch of him was poised to continue. Every breath between them crackled with what might happen next.
Then he pushed himself away with a violent curse.
Ariaxa lay panting, stunned at the absence of his weight. The bed dipped as he swung off it, cloak snapping behind him like an angry flag.
She stared at him, dazed. “What—?”
He did not answer her. His eyes were black storms, his chest rising and falling in harsh lines.
“Seren,” he snapped.
The door had not even fully latched behind them earlier. It opened now with a soft hiss.
Seren stepped inside as if she had been waiting just beyond the threshold. Her gaze took in the scene—Ariaxa sprawled on the bed, silks askew; Kaedan standing at the foot, fists clenched; the bruises already blooming beneath Ariaxa’s collar—and satisfaction flashed across her face like sunlight on a blade.
“You called, my Emperor?” she purred.
Kaedan’s gaze did not leave Ariaxa.
“Come here.”
Seren crossed the room with feline grace, climbing onto the bed without hesitation. She slid past Ariaxa, shoulder brushing hers deliberately, then draped herself across Kaedan’s lap when he sat on the edge of the mattress.
Ariaxa pushed herself upright, heat flooding her cheeks. “I don’t need to be here for this.”
Kaedan’s eyes cut to her, sharp.
“You stay.”
Seren’s lips curved. “You heard him. Watch and learn.”
Seren turned her body into Kaedan’s hands with effortless familiarity, fitting herself against him as if she had been carved to fill that space. He touched her with the same hands that had just pinned Ariaxa to the wall—firm, controlling, unapologetic—but his eyes never left Ariaxa’s face.
Every arch of Seren’s back, every pleased sound she made, every desperate little gasp that spilled from her mouth was framed by his unblinking stare at Ariaxa. It felt less like Kaedan using Seren, more like he was using Seren as a language—each touch a word, each sigh a sentence, spoken directly to the trembling girl across the bed.
Seren tilted her head back, laughing breathlessly.
“See?” she managed between sounds. “This is what obedience earns.”
Ariaxa’s hands fisted in the sheets, nails biting fabric. Her whole body burned with confusion—jealousy she did not want, shame she could not swallow, a twisted relief that he had not finished what he started with her.
She looked away, unable to bear the sight.
The collar shocked her.
Pain lanced her throat, making her choke on a cry. She jerked, head snapping back toward them.
Kaedan’s stare hardened.
“You do not look away,” he said, voice low and lethal. “You will understand what you are being denied.”
Her chest heaved.
Seren’s moans grew louder, triumphant now, her eyes fluttering half-shut as she arched into Kaedan’s hands. But even as he drew those sounds from her, his attention never shifted.
It stayed locked on Ariaxa.
On the way her breathing stuttered.
On the way her jaw clenched.
On the way hurt and something darker warred in her eyes.
At last, Seren collapsed against him, boneless and panting, a satisfied smile curling her lips. She pressed her cheek to his chest as if she belonged there.
Kaedan did not look down at her.
He looked at Ariaxa.
“You see?” he asked quietly. “This is loyalty. This is compliance. This is what should have happened tonight instead of your pathetic offering to the Triarchs.”
Ariaxa could not answer. Her throat felt raw.
Kaedan gently shifted Seren aside to the mattress. She sighed, sated, draping an arm over his waist but not daring to speak.
He leaned forward, bracing one hand on the bed, closing the distance between himself and Ariaxa until his face hovered inches from hers. His voice dropped to a whisper that trembled with contained rage.
“You made me break a law tonight,” he said. “And I will make you pay for it.”