I was about to discover that love and justice were the same thing, and that both would demand everything I had to give.
After Luka's threat, I went to Rios immediately. Fear drove my feet through the palace corridors, past startled servants and through shadows that seemed to reach for me with grasping fingers.
I found him in the Pleasure Gardens, alone, standing in a pool of moonlight like he was waiting for the end.
We sat in the shadows beneath a flowering vine, the scent of jasmine heavy in the night air. For a long while, neither of us spoke.
The silence stretched between us like a bridge I wasn't sure I was brave enough to cross.
Then he started to talk. "I wasn't always called Rios," he said, his voice quiet but steady. "That name was given to me here, in this place. My birth name was Kieran Ashworth, second in line to the Aethelgard’s throne."
I stared at him, trying to reconcile the controlled man beside me with the image of Fae royalty. "You were a prince?"
"Before Aurelion crushed my people, yes." His single wing shifted slightly, catching the moonlight. "This wasn't punishment for some crime, Penelope. It was proof of ownership."
The words hit me like physical blows. "They clipped your wing to show you belonged to them?"
"They didn't just want our obedience. They wanted us beautiful, broken, and silent." His hand moved unconsciously to the scar where his other wing should have been. "The pain was meant to teach us our place. The beauty was meant to make our masters feel cultured for keeping us."
His voice grew quieter, more distant. "I was seventeen when they dragged me from my burning palace. I watched my parents die in the flames while soldiers held me back. They kept me alive for something worse than death." I reached for his hand, but he pulled away, lost in the memory.
"They brought me here and taught me to please the very people who had enslaved my kingdom. Taught me to smile while my soul screamed, to make them believe I was grateful for their attention." His laugh was bitter. "I learned fast. I had to, or I wouldn't have survived."
"Seduction became my shield," he continued, his voice growing harder. "If I could make them believe I was willing, if I could control their pleasure, then I had power. The only power they couldn't take from me."
I listened to every word, and something shifted inside me, something that had been building since the first moment I'd seen the broken Fae boy in Master Elias's demonstration. This wasn't just about love anymore, it was about justice.
"Show me," I whispered.
He looked at me, silver-gray eyes searching my face. "Show you what?"
"How it feels to choose."
This time, when we came together, it was different. Slower, and deeper. No anger driving us, no desperate hunger born from denial. Just fire and pain and tenderness tangled into something bigger than both of us.
"Let me see you," I whispered, my fingers tracing the scars across his chest.
His hands were on my waist, warm and steady. Neither of us rushed, we just stood there for a moment, breathing the same air, close enough to feel each other's hearts pounding.
“Are you sure?” he asked, voice low, rough around the edges.
I answered by reaching for the hem of his shirt, fingers brushing skin as I pulled it over his head. He didn’t stop me. He just watched me, chest rising and falling, eyes fixed like he needed to see everything I was about to give.
I peeled my dress off slowly, feeling the air hit my skin. His gaze followed every movement, reverent but hungry. Like he was trying to memorize me. His hands moved over my skin with reverent care, as if he were mapping sacred territory. Every touch was deliberate, worshipful, sending shivers through me that had nothing to do with the cool night air. When his mouth followed the same paths, along my collarbone, down the sensitive curve of my throat, I arched beneath him, feeling truly seen for the first time in my life.
"You're so beautiful," he murmured against my skin, his voice rough with wonder. "So perfect."
This wasn't about taking or being taken, it was about giving freely, choosing each touch, each kiss, each moment of connection. His lips found mine again, slow and deep, tasting like jasmine and something darker, more intoxicating.
I reached for his waistband, fingers trembling slightly as I unfastened the button. He didn’t say a word, just stood there and let me. His breath hitched when my knuckles brushed against the skin just above his hips.
He was still watching me, chest rising and falling harder now, like he was trying to stay still while everything inside him was screaming to move.
I pushed his pants down his hips. They slid easily, pooling around his ankles. He stepped out of them without breaking eye contact. He was already hard, thick and obvious, making my mouth go dry.
His thighs were solid, powerful, dusted with dark hair. His stomach tensed when I reached up again, fingers slipping beneath his waistband. He sucked in a breath as I slowly peeled them down, revealing him inch by inch, and then he was bare.
My eyes dropped before I could stop them. He was bigger than I expected, thick, heavy, flushed dark at the tip. My stomach tightened at the sight, heat pooling low between my legs. I looked back up. He was watching me now, tense and quiet, waiting for a reaction.
“You’re beautiful,” I said softly, truthfully. My voice didn’t shake, but my body did.
His jaw clenched. “So are you.”
He settled me down on the grass before he went between my thighs, his hands braced on either side of me, caging me in without pressure. His eyes searched mine again, jaw tight like he was holding back something sharp and shaking.
“This okay?” he asked, voice low and rough.
I nodded, breathless. “Yeah. I want this. I want you.”
His hand slipped between us, guiding himself to my entrance. I felt the blunt head of him brush against me, hot, hard, slick with need. My breath caught, every nerve lit up like a matchstrike. My legs tensed, heels pressing against the bench for leverage, instinctively opening wider for him.
“Look at me,” he said, and I did.
His eyes didn’t waver as he started to push in. The stretch was real, and slow. I felt my body resist for half a second, tight around him, adjusting inch by inch as he sank deeper. It burned, just a little, and I gasped, gripping whatever was beneath me.
He froze. “Too much?”
I shook my head quickly, biting my lip. “No… keep going. Please.”
He moved again, inching forward, and I could feel every part of him, thick, heavy, the way my body took him in like it was learning how to fit. The pressure was intense, overwhelming in the best way. I could barely breathe.
“Fuck, Penelope…” he hissed through his teeth, voice barely holding together. “You feel- fuck.”
I clenched around him, and his hips stuttered. He was fully inside me now, and we both just stopped. Letting it settle, letting the reality of it hit. I wasn’t thinking anymore. I wasn’t worried or guarded. I was just there, with him, around him, full of him.
He dropped his forehead to mine, breath ragged. “You okay?”
“Yeah,” I whispered, wrapping my arms around his neck. “I’ve never been more sure of anything.”
And then he started to move.
When he moved inside me, I held his gaze, watching the careful control he wore like armor finally crack. His breath caught, and for once, he let me see him, not the perfect Adept, not the weapon forged from pain, but the man underneath who had somehow found hope again.
"Penelope," he breathed against my throat, and my name sounded like a prayer on his lips. "My love. My only love."
I moaned softly against his mouth, the sound involuntary, pulled straight from my chest. “Oh gods… Kieran…”
His grip on my hip tightened. “Say it again,” he whispered, voice rough and strained.
“Kieran,” I gasped, nails digging into his back as he pushed deeper. “Don’t stop. Please- don’t stop.”
He groaned, low, guttural, like the sound had been punched out of him. “Fuck… Penelope, you feel- I can’t-”
We lost the rhythm for a moment, overwhelmed, and then found it again. I cried out when he hit deeper, the kind of sound I’d never made with anyone else, half shock, half need.
His jaw clenched, forehead pressing harder against mine, like he needed it to stay grounded.
“I choose this,” I breathed, everything in me tightening, building. “I choose you.”
His voice broke. “Always,” he choked out, thrusting once, hard. “Always you.”