Chapter 81
🌙𝐋𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐡
His breath fanned across my skin.
I couldn’t breathe.
“You think you can’t do this?” His grip was not painful, it was somewhere in between anchoring me to this moment and tender enough for my mind to float. “You’re WRONG p>
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“You threw a boulder, Lilith. You crushed METAL. You have power you don’t even understand yet p>
Lilith.
Not Miss Brooks.
“You CAN hit me,” he continued, his voice dropping even lower, rougher. “You just haven’t figured out HOW p>
Something in his tone—
It wasn’t cold anymore.
It was urgent. Almost desperate.
Like he NEEDED me to succeed.
“So stop thinking like a victim,” he said against my ear, “and start thinking like a FIGHTER. A predator. Look for a weakness, an opening, watch my stance, my breathing patterns and the way and why they alter at certain moments. Listen to my heart, how it beats his gaze drifts down for a breath of a second, to my lips, they tingled in response as he held my gaze again. “When it stops, when it skips,” his voices grew husky.
He released me. Stepped back.
Put distance between us again.
But his pale eyes were burning now.
“Come on, Lilith.” His lips curved—sharp, challenging, CRUEL. “MAKE me believe you’re worth the effort I’m putting into keeping you alive p>
The words landed like a physical blow.
A taunt. A DARE.
Heat flooded through me. Anger. Frustration. Something else I didn’t want to name.
“You arrogant p>
I lunged.
He sidestepped—
And the bond FLARED.
Hot and sudden and fierce, exploding in my chest. Not pain. Not quite pleasure.
POWER.
My Lunar Crest blazed against my wrist, golden and demanding.
And suddenly everything CHANGED.
Vladimir moved to block, and I SAW it. Not just the movement—the INTENTION. The shift of his weight. The angle of his arm.
He was slower.
Or I was faster.
Or—
No. Not slower. Just clearer.
Like someone had wiped fog off glass and now I could SEE.
He spun—impossibly graceful, lithe and precise. Too fast. Still too fast for me to actually hit.
But I could TRACK him now. Somehow, I could predict and anticipate.
I threw another strike, stil he blocked.
But I caught it.
The way his breath hitched when I got close. The tension in his shoulders. The way his eyes dilated only slightly, the way the red in his irises seemed to contrast and expand in tandem to the distance between us.
The barely perceptible tremor in his hand when it connected with mine.
I had not been crazy. The tightening in his jaw when he saw me dancing with Dmitri.
Whatever was affecting me, was affecting HIM too.
My mind sharpened despite my exhaustion, Kaia’s growl was crisp, in the chaos of my mind desperately trying to catch up with all that I was reading in the nanoseconds that I was noticing them.
>”He said find his weakness. Exploit it p>
>”Your incomplete bond IS his weakness p>
>”Use it.” She snarled wildly like she had been waiting for so long for me to get it and now that I had, she had no patience. I had to strike now and true before Vladimir caught up.
I circled him slowly. Watching. Learning his rhythm.
He tracked me with those pale eyes, but something in them had shifted. A wary awareness flicked too briefly in the pale azure orbs. Like he knew that I knew.
He knew I’d figured something out.
“You’re stalling,” he pushed, for the first time his jaw clenched since we began this exhausting impossible exercise.
“I’m thinking p>
My voice was steadier now. Clearer.
“Then think faster p>
I feinted left.
He shifted to block—
I darted right. Closed the distance in two strides.
His hand shot out to intercept—
I ducked under it.
And pressed my palm flat against his chest.
Right over his heart. I heard his breath fracture. Something snagged, like a thread on a nail but it was in his chest and it mirrored the tugged that made my chest start to ache.
I felt his heartbeat beneath my palm—racing, wild, alive.
Felt the way his entire body went rigid.
Heard his sharp intake of breath.
For one perfect second, he was frozen.
*Now p>
I twisted. Used the contact as leverage. Swung my other hand toward his jaw—
His eyes flashed red.
He moved—faster than before, faster than possible.
Caught my wrist mid-strike.
Yanked me forward.
I stumbled, off balance—
He stepped back to avoid the collision—
His foot caught the edge of the training mat.
We went down.
I landed on top of him. Straddling his hips.
My hands braced on his chest. His hands locked on my waist.
We froze.
His pale eyes were wide. Shocked.
Like he hadn’t expected THIS.
My heart hammered—not from exhaustion. From the way his hands burned through my training clothes. From the way his chest rose and fell beneath my palms, faster now, uncontrolled.
From the way he was looking at me.
Like he’d forgotten his own name.
“Lilith p>
Rough. Strained. Raw.
Just my name.
The bond thrummed between us, alive and electric.
The bond p>
The incomplete bond from the marriage ceremony was what was doing this. It craved completion even if it tormented me to the point of madness.
“I didn’t mean—” My voice shook.
His grip on my waist tightened. Not pushing me away.
Pulling me closer.
“You used the bond.” Quiet. Dangerous. “As a weapon p>
Not a question.
“You said—” I swallowed. “You said to find your weakness p>
Something flickered in his eyes.
“I did p>
His thumb moved against my hip. Barely there.
But I felt it everywhere and my back involuntarily ached, my hips rocking against his.
His hands lowered to my hips, clenching hard enough for me to feel the roughness of his palm through my clothes. I might as well have been undressed.
My eyes snapped to his, my breath catching when I saw that the red in his eyes had spread, his gaze no longer unreadable but predatory. My skin prickled with unease and a spark that raced to my core. I bit down on my lip as the moment stretched on, too long, yet too short p>
I rocked my hips again the moment I felt something harden underneath me. Hot, almost scalding.
“Lilith he drawled. “Run p>