POV: Francesca
King Cassian stepped closer to Rosalinda, close enough that their sleeves brushed, but his attention was no longer on her. His gaze slid back to me, slow and deliberate, and what burned in his eyes had nothing to do with affection or pride. It was an obsession—raw, possessive, and ugly.
“She is my slave,” Cassian said flatly. “And she will remain so until the day she dies.”
Rosalinda’s smile faltered, then twisted into a sharp glare as she turned it on me. Hatred flashed openly in her eyes now, unmasked and venomous. I shrank back instinctively, but there was nowhere to go.
Cassian did not look at Rosalinda again. He reached for me.
His hand closed around my arm with bruising force, fingers digging into flesh that was already sore and weak. I cried out as he yanked me forward, my feet stumbling to keep up as he dragged me across the great hall.
Gasps rippled through the servants, quickly swallowed into silence. I didn’t fight. I had learned, painfully, when resistance only made things worse.
Again. Again, this tyrant has tormented me every single day. He will remind me that my body is not mine. Again, he will use my son as a leash.
But I had to endure it, just to be near my son.
That single thought was the thread I clung to as we passed stone walls and torchlit arches, as my arm burned where his fingers crushed it, as my breath came in short, silent gasps. Somewhere behind those walls, Luka existed. He breathed, waited for me.
And as long as he did, I would survive.
Cassian flung open the doors to his chambers and dragged me inside. The door slammed shut behind us with a final, echoing thud.
The room was lavish and suffocating all at once. Heavy curtains blocked the daylight. Candles burned low, casting shadows across silk sheets and carved furniture. This room had been the site of too many nights I tried desperately to forget.
Cassian shoved me forward. I stumbled and fell onto the bed, the soft mattress doing nothing to soften the humiliation of being thrown like an object. My palms sank into the embroidered coverlet as I tried to push myself up, but his weight came down hard beside me.
The breath knocked from my lungs as the mattress dipped beneath my weight. The silk sheets were cold against my skin, unfamiliar and suffocating, and before I could scramble back, his hand came down on my shoulder, forcing me flat.
“Behave,” Cassian said coldly, looming over me. “And I’ll let you see your son.”
I froze, every muscle locking in place as hope and dread twisted together in my chest until I could barely breathe. My heart hammered so violently I felt dizzy.
Slowly, I lifted my face toward him, searching desperately for anything— anything—that might mean this was not another lie, another trap meant to break me.
“You promise?” The question slipped out before I could stop it, small and broken, the voice of someone who had nothing left to bargain with.
Cassian smiled. It was not a kind smile. It was the smile of a man who knew exactly how much power he held, how completely I was trapped beneath it.
“That depends entirely on you,” he said.
Tears burned in my eyes as he leaned closer, bracing one arm beside my head. His weight pressed down on me, pinning me into the mattress. I couldn’t move. The scent of him—wine, leather, and something sharp and possessive—filled my lungs and turned my stomach.
I turned my head away instinctively as his lips brushed my cheek, then slid along my jaw, lingering there deliberately. His mouth sought mine, claiming space I did not give him.
“No,” I whispered, my voice shaking. “Please…”
His hand caught my wrists and wrenched them above my head, holding them there with crushing force. Pain shot through my arms, sharp and immediate, and I cried out, struggling uselessly against his grip.
“Please,” I sobbed. “Please, no—”
He ignored me. Cassian lowered his head again, pressing his mouth to my neck, kissing skin already marked by someone else. The touch made my stomach twist violently, revulsion flooding through me as he lingered there, deliberately invading what was not his.
I turned my face into the pillow, choking back a scream as his hand slid down my arm, then lower, his fingers digging into my thigh with possessive intent. I trembled beneath him, every nerve screaming danger, my body rigid with fear as he began to gather the fabric of my skirts.
“Stop,” I begged, the word breaking apart between sobs. “Please… stop…”
He did not slow.
My hands clenched helplessly where he held them, my body trapped, my voice ignored. I stared at the dark canopy above me, my vision blurring as I tried desperately to leave my body, to go anywhere else.
I closed my eyes. I thought of Luka’s tiny fingers curling around mine.
I thought of his first cry, the way his warmth had filled the hollow in my chest for that brief, stolen moment. I thought of the weight of him in my arms, of the love that had been ripped away and used against me.
My chest heaved as silent sobs shook me. I endured. I always did. Because there was no one coming to save me. Then—
The doors flew open.
The sound was violent, explosive, wood slamming against stone hard enough to rattle the walls. Cold air rushed into the chamber, carrying with it something wild and electric that made my skin prickle instantly.
Cassian froze. I gasped and twisted my head toward the doorway.
A man stood there. Dark hair falling around a face carved with fury and command. His presence filled the room so completely that the candles flickered as if bowing to it.
Wilhelm.
For one stunned heartbeat, my mind refused to accept what my eyes were seeing. He was real. He was here. Not a memory, not a dream I clung to in the darkest hours of the night.
His golden eyes burned like fire.
From his outstretched hand, a bright red thread stretched across the room, taut and glowing, binding straight to my chest like a living thing that had finally found its way home.
Wilhelm’s gaze flicked over me in an instant—my tears, my position beneath the king—and something ancient and lethal surged in his expression.
His lips curled back, not in a smile, but in a snarl that sent a chill through the room”
“Get your hands off my mate!”