Chapter 97
🌙𝐋𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐡
I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t process the way my chest was cracking open, the bond screaming in protest at the wrongness of that scent on him.
He moved past me toward the sink, not meeting my eyes, and began washing his hands with mechanical precision.
“Where were you?” The words came out before I could stop them. Quiet. Breaking.
He stilled. Didn’t turn around. “Go back to bed, Lilith. Sleep off the hangover p>
“Where were you?” I repeated, louder this time. My hands were shaking. “It’s—” I glanced at the clock. “It’s almost dawn. You’ve been gone all night p>
“That’s none of your concern p>
The dismissal sliced through me. “None of my—” I laughed, the sound bitter and sharp. “You had your mouth on my throat in front of half the Empire last night. You—we—” I couldn’t finish. Couldn’t voice what I thought had happened between us.
“You were drunk,” he said, still not looking at me. “You don’t remember half of what you said p>
“I remember enough.” I took a step toward him. “I remember you holding me. I remember—” I remember asking you not to leave. “Where did you go, Vladimir p>
He finally turned, and the look in his eyes made me step back.
Cold. Distant. Nothing like the male who’d danced with me, who’d bitten me, who’d whispered moya against my skin.
“You have no right to ask me that p>
The words hit like a physical blow.
“No right?” I repeated, my voice shaking. “After last night p>
“Last night was a performance,” he cut me off. “For the council. For the Empire. Don’t confuse politics with something personal p>
Lies. I could feel them through the bond, taste them in the air between us.
But he kept going, each word carefully chosen to cut.
“This is my home. I come and go as I please. What I do and who I do it with is none of your business p>
Who I do it with.
The implication hung in the air, devastating.
That perfume. His rumpled clothes. The stubble. The hours he’d been gone.
He fucked someone else.
“I don’t get you. I just don’t. I try p>
“Don’t.” He cut me off, sharp as a blade, and began to walk away again.
But something in me snapped.
“No.” I moved, blocking his path. “You don’t get to do this. You don’t get to—to claim me in front of everyone, bite me, hold me, and then act like I’m nothing. Like last night meant nothing p>
He stopped. His jaw clenched so tight I could see the muscle jumping beneath his skin.
“Move, Lilith p>
“Where did you go?” I demanded, my voice cracking. “Just tell me. That’s all I’m asking. Where p>
“Stop talking.” The words came out strangled, desperate.
I blinked, startled by the raw edge in his voice.
For a moment—just a flash—I saw something break across his face. Agonizing regret. Pain so deep it made my chest ache in response.
Then it was gone, buried under ice.
“Can you just—” He ran a hand through his hair, the gesture violent and frustrated. “Can you just not speak? For once? Can you not see what the fuck you’re doing to me p>
The words hit like a slap.
I stepped back, the bread forgotten, everything forgotten except the way he was looking at me now. Like I was a weapon aimed at his chest.
“I’m—I’m sorry, I didn’t mean p>
“I am so close to falling apart because of you.” Each word was forced out through gritted teeth. “So fucking close, and you keep—you keep pushing p>
“Me?” The word came out small, broken.
“Yes, you.” He laughed, but there was no humor in it. Only something dark and desperate. “Nothing has been the same since that day. Everything is upside down. I’m holding on by a single thread and I just want to rest. I just want to forget p>
He cut himself off, jaw clenching again, and I could see it—the way he was holding back. Restraining something massive and violent inside him.
More cruel words, I thought. More ways to tell me I meant nothing.
“It’s the bond,” he said finally, his voice flat again. Controlled. “Making you feel anything like… care. For the man who bought you. Who dragged you screaming, flailing into this world without listening to you begging. Because of his own affairs. His own realm. Problems that were never yours to deal with p>
Each word was carefully chosen. Deliberately cutting.
“I’m selfish. Disgusting. Callous.” He looked at me then, really looked at me, and something in his eyes made my breath catch. “You don’t know half of what I am. What I’m willing to sacrifice. Who I’m willing to hurt p>
“Vladimir p>
“Even now, with you standing there—my brain is splitting. The rut, the bond, you—” He shook his head. “You just have to listen and stop p>
“Speaking,” I finished for him, my voice hollow.
He flinched. Actually flinched, like I’d struck him.
But he didn’t correct me.
I nodded slowly, something cold and final settling in my chest. “I understand p>
“Lilith p>
“No, you’re right.” I forced the words out, keeping my voice steady even as everything inside me was screaming. “I’ll respect your wishes. If it will give you some reprieve from… from whatever I’m doing to you p>
I grabbed the bread from the counter, holding it against my chest like a shield.
“I’m sorry,” I said quietly. “For pushing. For speaking. For—” For existing in your space. For making you bite me. For being the bond you never wanted.
I couldn’t finish.
So I just walked past him, careful not to touch, not to get too close, not to make whatever this was any worse.
His scent followed me. That wrongness. That perfume that wasn’t mine.
Evidence of where he’d been. What he’d done. Who he’d—
I shoved the thought away and kept walking.
Up the stairs. Down the hall. Back to my room.
The door closed behind me with a soft click, and only then did I let the tears come.
Silent. Bitter. Ashamed.
Just like everything in my life, I thought, sliding down the door to sit on the floor, bread forgotten beside me. I crossed a line. Stepped on a landmine.
I’d thought last night meant something. Thought the way he’d held me, danced with me, claimed me meant something beyond politics.
But I was wrong.
I was always wrong about these things. Like I had been wrong about Caesar.
From now on, I promised myself, wiping at my eyes with shaking hands, no matter how bad this incomplete bond gets, I’ll tow the line. I’ll do what I’m here to do.
Politics. Performance. Playing the role of his marked mate.
Nothing more.
Even if it killed me.
Even if the bond screamed in protest every second of every day.
I’d be what he needed me to be.
And I’d stop speaking.
💠Dmitri
She moved like a force of nature, ducking, hitting and dodging. Catching her movement turned into a challenge as soon as training started. She progressed exponentially more than the days before.
Those ones had already been record-breaking in their own right. But now, today, it was as if she had been possessed, though her eyes remained mostly… dull.
The gold in her gaze did not glimmer like it normally did when she aced any part of her training. The passion that lit her gaze had fizzled out and I could tell that it had something to do with the High Alpha watching from above.
Normally, she would sneak glances even on days when he was not present and they both knew it. I would still catch her eyes wandering away, hoping to catch his ice-cold gaze.
But today, there was nothing of such with Lilith.
It was as though he did not exist.
And each time I shifted my sights onto Vladimir, he was watching Lilith, his gaze keen on her, burning with a convoluted tangle of emotions where none could be deciphered from the rest.
I had known that Lilith taking the moon wine would not bring anything good, but I could have never foreseen such a fallout. Still, despite the distance, the tension between them was static electricity.
Two souls in a dance both denied but fell into step too easily to be a coincidence.
It had to be fate.
The vision flared to life behind my eye. Lilith with eyes dead, far more than they were now, unraveling—everything.
I shook my head to pull out of the vacuum of my gifted, yet cursed mind.
When I gazed up, I found Vladimir’s eyes already on me.
Like he knew—
“Training is over for the day,” he announced.
Lilith offered me a strained smile before walking off without allowing Vladimir to reach us. She was out the door before Vladimir reached me.
“She will be fine,” I said, though I wasn’t sure if I was trying to convince him or myself.
“Are you sure, High Alpha p>
Vladimir was quiet for a long moment, his eyes still fixed on the door Lilith had disappeared through. When he finally spoke, his voice was carefully controlled.
“Distance is needed. After what happened at the gala.” He paused, jaw tightening. “So as not to give her the wrong impression p>
I watched him carefully, cataloging the tension in his shoulders, the way his bionic hand flexed at his side.
“The message has been sent,” he continued, his tone flat, clinical. “There’s no use pretending at home with no cameras rolling. It’s for the best, considering what will come next p>
The ominous weight of those last words settled between us.
What will come next.
I understood well enough without asking questions. The trials. The political maneuvering. The dangers that came with being the High Alpha’s chosen mate—real or performed and the final phase.
I nodded slowly. “I understand p>
“Good p>
But even as I agreed, I didn’t believe him.
Not about the relationship between Lilith and Vladimir being purely political. Not about distance being “for the best.” Not about any of it.
I’d seen the way he watched her when he thought no one was looking. Seen the way frost crept across the floor at the gala when Veronique threw her. Seen the muscle jumping in his jaw just now when she’d walked away without acknowledging him.
That wasn’t a performance.
That was something far more dangerous.
And Vladimir knew that I didn’t believe him. I could see it in the slight tightening around his eyes, the way he didn’t quite meet my gaze.
But neither of us spoke further about it.
Because some truths were too dangerous to voice aloud.
Even between an Alpha and a beta.
“Keep training her,” Vladimir said finally, turning to leave. “She’s progressing faster than expected. Don’t let her lose momentum p>
“Of course, High Alpha p>
He paused at the doorway, his hand on the frame. For a moment, I thought he might say something else—something real, something honest.
But he didn’t.
He just walked out, following the same path Lilith had taken minutes before.
Chasing something he’d convinced himself he needed to push away.
I stood alone in the training room, the vision still lingering at the edges of my mind.
Lilith. Unraveling. Eyes dead.
Distance won’t save her, I thought. It might be what destroys her. The emptiness in her eyes was worrying.
But that wasn’t my place to say.
So I said nothing.
And hoped I was wrong.