Chapter 136

Chapter 136: Chapter 136

Lysander’s pov

The silver fork in my hand felt heavy, like a piece of lead I was forcing myself to balance between my thumb and forefinger.

I stared down at the seared salmon and roasted asparagus on my plate.

The food looked incredible, smelled incredible, but my stomach was clamped so tight it felt like a fist. I dragged a piece of asparagus through the lemon butter sauce, pushing it to the edge of the plate, trying to make it look like I’d eaten more than three bites.

Across the long teak dining table, Drake was watching me.

He hadn’t said anything for ten minutes. He sat back in his high-backed chair, a dark crystal glass of blood wine held loosely in his long fingers, his eyes tracking every subtle twitch of my shoulders, every uneven breath I tried to hide.

The quiet in the room was suffocating, broken only by the steady, heavy patter of rain against the floor-to-ceiling glass wall behind us.

"You’ve barely touched your dinner," Drake said softly. His low, velvet voice cut through the silence like a blade.

I flinched, my fork clinking sharply against the porcelain. I forced a quick, easy smile to my lips, looking up to meet his gaze. "I’m just not that hungry tonight. I had a late lunch in the studio."

Drake tilted his head, his dark eyebrows pulling together into a sharp, quiet line. He set his wine glass down on the table with a slow, deliberate click.

"You didn’t eat lunch, Lysander," he murmured, his tone devoid of anger, but thick with an unyielding, dangerous focus. "The kitchen staff said your tray came back untouched this afternoon."

My heart gave a sharp, guilty thud against my ribs. I picked up my water glass just to give my hands something to do, taking a small, slow sip to steady my voice.

"I guess I was just absorbed in the painting," I lied smoothly. "You know how I get when I’m trying to lay down the base layers before the oil dries."

Drake didn’t buy it for a second.

He stood up from his chair, his broad, towering frame casting a long shadow across the warm teak wood of the table. He walked over to my side, his bare feet making no sound against the floorboards, and placed a large, warm hand flat against the side of my neck.

His thumb rested directly over my pulse point.

I tried to suppress the instinctual spike of my heart rate, but it was useless. Under the touch of a High Sovereign, every lie, every hidden tremor, was exposed.

I could feel his essence reaching into mine through the mating bond, searching for the reason my mind was screaming behind my calm expression.

"Your heart is hammering," Drake said, his thumb stroking gently over my skin, tracing the dark mark he had left on my collarbone days ago. "Your skin is clammy, and you haven’t looked me in the eye since I came home from the council."

"Drake, I’m fine—"

"Look at me, little bird."

The quiet authority in his command left no room for argument. I forced myself to tilt my chin up, looking straight into his glowing red eyes.

I hated what I saw in them. There was no anger, no suspicion, just a deep, terrifying concern that made my throat tighten with unshed tears.

He was looking at me like I was made of spun glass, like a single sharp movement might shatter me into a thousand pieces.

"Is the house bothering you?" Drake asked gently, leaning down until his forehead rested lightly against mine, his warm breath fanning across my lips. "If the isolation is too much, if you feel trapped up here in the valley, tell me. We can move back to the city estate tomorrow."

"No," I whispered quickly, reaching up to wrap my hands around his broad wrist, holding his palm against my cheek. "No, Drake, I love this house. The studio is perfect. I don’t want to go back to the city."

"Then what is it?" his voice dipped into a raspy, possessive purr, his fingers sliding into my hair at the nape of my neck. "You’re jumpy, Lysander. Every time a door shuts, every time the wind hits the windows, you react like someone is coming for you."

I squeezed my eyes shut, my forehead pressing harder into his.

I wanted to tell him. The urge to break down, throw my arms around his neck, and sob out the truth was so strong it physically ached in my chest.

I wanted to tell him that I was seeing ghosts, that I saw my dead stepbrother standing in art shops and lurking in the dark pine line beneath our bedroom.

But I couldn’t.

I had checked the security logs myself. The cameras showed nothing. The thermal sensors showed nothing. The perimeter wards hadn’t flickered once. If I told him, he wouldn’t see a threat to be fought, he would see a broken, traumatized boy whose mind was fracturing under the weight of his past.

"It’s just... lingering nerves," I murmured, crafting a half-truth that sounded believable. "After everything that happened back then... with Darius, and the mercenaries... sometimes my brain forgets that we’re safe. Sometimes I feel like someone is watching me, even when no one is there."

Drake let out a long, slow breath, his broad chest rising and falling against mine. He pulled me out of the chair, wrapping his heavy arms around my waist, lifting me effortlessly until I was tucked flush against him.

He carried me over to the soft leather couch near the suspended fireplace, sitting down with me in his lap.

"Listen to me," Drake commanded softly, his hands rubbing broad, soothing circles over my back as he held me tight. "This estate is the safest place in the territory. I laid the blood wards myself. They are keyed to my essence, my bloodline, and my authority. Nothing crosses the outer boundary without me knowing. A shadow cannot touch this land without my consent."

"I know," I whispered into his neck, my nose buried in his warm, sandalwood-scented skin.

"No one can reach you here, Lysander," he continued, his voice firm, unyielding, and absolute. "Not Darius. Not the mercenaries. No one. You belong to me, and I do not lose what is mine."

I nodded against his shoulder, letting his warm, heavy presence wrap around me like a shield.

He was telling the truth. The wards were impenetrable. The estate was a fortress.

And that was the most terrifying part of all.

If the house was safe, if the wards were unbroken, and if the cameras proved the perimeter was empty... then the threat wasn’t outside in the woods.

The monster was inside my own head, and no amount of ancient blood magic could protect me from my own unravelling mind.

I tightened my grip on the back of Drake’s shirt, pulling myself closer to him, but deep inside, behind the heavy shield of his mating bond, a quiet, cold chasm was opening between us.

I was hiding from him. I was pulling away, building walls inside my own chest to protect him from the truth of my madness.

Drake kept his arms locked around me, his cool lips pressing soft, protective kisses along my hairline as the fire crackled in the hearth. But as I stared over his shoulder at the dark glass window reflecting the storm outside, I knew the strain in our bond was only going to deepen.

Because as long as I kept seeing Gideon, I was living in a nightmare he couldn’t save me from.