They didn't ask how I felt.
They never do when the decision has already been carved into stone.
The guards escorted me out like I was both breakable and volatile, something that might shatter if jostled, or detonate if left alone too long. Their hands hovered near my elbows without quite touching, as if the bond mark on my wrist might be contagious.
The doors closed behind us.
That sound-heavy wood meeting stone-felt like the period at the end of a sentence I hadn't agreed to write.
Marriage.
The word sat strange in my mouth. Foreign. Like trying to speak a language I'd only ever read in books. I hadn't been chosen because I was loved, or wanted, or even properly seen. I'd been chosen because the curse needed a body, and mine had been conveniently close.
Right place, wrong time.
Story of my life.
They placed me in a room overlooking the east gardens, all trailing vines and moonlight, the kind of beautiful that felt like an apology the palace wasn't actually sorry enough to make. The guards left without meeting my eyes. The door clicked shut with a finality that made my stomach drop.
I stood there for a long time, just... existing in the space. My fingers curled slowly at my sides, nails pressing crescents into my palms. The mark on my wrist throbbed beneath my sleeve, warm and insistent, like a heartbeat that wasn't quite mine.
I pressed my palm over it.
The bond moved.
Not painfully. Not even unpleasantly.
Just... there. Awake. Aware.
My breath caught.
An emotion that wasn't mine brushed against my ribs, low and restrained, anger wrapped so tightly around control that I could feel the edges of it fraying. Heavy. Male. Furious in a way that had nowhere to go.
Oh god.
I spun toward the door instinctively, half-expecting to find Prince Caelan standing in the shadows, watching me with those dark, unreadable eyes.
The room was empty.
Somehow, that made it worse.
You're feeling this too?
The voice wasn't out loud. It came from somewhere inside my chest,低 and rough, like gravel wrapped in velvet.
I pressed my back against the wall, my pulse hammering. "I don't, I don't know what you're talking about."
A pause. Long enough that I wondered if I'd imagined it.
Then: You're lying.
No accusation. No judgment. Just... certainty. Like the bond had reached inside both of us and pulled out every truth we'd been trying to hide.
I moved to the window on shaking legs, pressing my forehead against the cool glass. My breath fogged the surface. "This wasn't my choice," I said quietly, to the night or to him or to no one at all. "If you think I wanted to be dragged into."
Don't.
His anger flared through the bond, sharp enough to steal my breath. My fingers tensed against the windowsill.
They've been trying to control my fate since the day I was born, he continued, quieter now but no less intense. They don't care who gets caught in the crossfire.
The word caught hung between us like smoke.
"I'm not part of some grand royal scheme," I said, and hated how small my voice sounded. "I was just... there. Wrong place, wrong time."
Silence stretched.
Then, so quiet, I almost missed it.
That's the cruel part.
The anger drained away, replaced by something heavier. Wearier. It settled into my chest like stones sinking to the bottom of a river, and I realized with a jolt that I was carrying his exhaustion now. Feeling the weight of years, I hadn't lived.
I slid down to sit on the edge of the bed, my hands clasped between my knees. "They'll expect us to play along," I said. "Stand together. Smile on command. Pretend this is anything other than a curse wearing a wedding ring."
They expect obedience, he replied. I've never been good at that.
Despite everything, despite the fear and the anger and the sheer absurdity of having a conversation inside my own head with a man who'd called me nobody, a small smile tugged at my lips.
"Yeah," I murmured. "I got that impression."
Something shifted through the bond. Surprise, maybe. Or curiosity. A subtle awareness that made warmth bloom low in my stomach before I could stop it.
You don't look like someone who should survive this palace, he said.
I traced the pattern of the bond mark through my sleeve. "And yet here I am. Still breathing. It's still invisible enough to be dangerous."
Invisible.
He said the word like he was tasting it. Testing it.
You're not invisible anymore.
My throat tightened. "No. I suppose I'm not."
The silence that followed felt different. Not empty. Not uncomfortable. Just... present. Like we were both sitting in the same room, even though stone and distance separated us.
They'll move us closer tomorrow, he said eventually. Shared quarters. Shared duties. Shared everything except the things that actually matter.
My chest constricted. "Then we set boundaries. This bond doesn't give you ownership over me."
Another pause. Longer this time.
I don't want ownership, he said, and something in his voice made me believe him. I want distance.
The bond pulsed between us, warm and traitorous, calling him a liar.
I exhaled slowly, fingers finding the mark again. It was warm beneath my touch, almost alive. "Then it seems neither of us will get what we want."
A breath of something passed through our connection, reluctant amusement, dark and dry.
This curse has a cruel sense of humor.
"Yes," I whispered to the empty room. "It really does."
The connection didn't slam shut. It just... faded. Like he'd stepped back from a doorway, still there but no longer filling the frame.
The room felt colder without him.
I lay back on the bed, staring at the ceiling, one hand pressed over my heart. It was beating too fast for someone who'd just declared she wanted distance. hard for someone who was supposed to be nobody.
I had survived by staying small. Quiet. Unseen.
Now, I was bound to the one man in the kingdom who could destroy me simply by knowing me.
And the most terrifying truth of all settled into my bones like winter.
The bond wasn't forcing us together.
It was waiting.
Waiting to see if we'd fight it.
Or if we'd lean into the pull.
I closed my eyes and felt his presence at the very edge of my consciousness, distant but undeniable. Like a candle burning in a window miles away.
Still there.
Still watching.
Still feeling.
And God help me, I didn't hate it as much as I should have.
Because some prisons are made of stone.
And some are made of someone else's heartbeat in your chest.
Guess which one's harder to escape?