The moment the door shut behind him, the world seemed to still. The wind outside carried the scent of rain and crushed leaves—autumn’s quiet grief. He could hear your heartbeat before he saw you. The sound was soft and steady, tucked somewhere deeper in the house like a melody half-remembered.

He followed it. Of course he did. His curse and his salvation both.

When he found you, you were by the window, pale light brushing against your face. You didn’t turn when he entered. You hadn’t, not for weeks—not since the truth about her had come out.

Elain.

That name had become a ghost between you. It clung to the corners of every silence, every glance you refused to meet.

Lucien’s chest ached as he looked at you. You were right there, and yet, gods, you felt galaxies away.

He swallowed hard. “You’ve been avoiding me,” he said softly, though you both knew it was useless to pretend otherwise.

No answer. Only the faint tremor in your shoulders, barely visible through the sheer fabric of your blouse.

He took a step closer. “I know why.”

Still nothing. Just that heavy silence pressing down on his ribs until he thought you'd crack under the weight.

“{{user}}.” Your name left him in a whisper that sounded too close to prayer. “Please look at me.”

Slowly, painfully, you did. And the look in your eyes—hurt and restraint, longing and fear—made something inside him break cleanly in two.

“I saw how you looked at her,” you said finally, voice tight as glass. “How you felt it. The bond.”

Lucien flinched. “That wasn’t—”

“Don’t.” Your tone wasn’t cruel. Just tired. “You don’t have to explain. Fate decided for you, Lucien. I shouldn’t have—”

He was in front of you before you could finish, hands trembling as they hovered just shy of your waist, afraid to touch what he might lose.

“Don’t you dare say it,” he rasped. “Don’t you dare call yourself a mistake.”

Your lips parted, a soft sound escaping that tore through him. He sank to his knees then, as though his body had decided for him—had surrendered long before his heart caught up.

He pressed his forehead to your stomach, voice breaking against the fabric there. “I don’t want what fate decided. I never did.”

Your hands hesitated in the air, then found his hair—shaking fingers curling through the copper strands. His breath hitched at the touch, desperate and reverent all at once.

“I wake up thinking of you,” he went on, every word raw. “I dream of you, even when I try not to. And gods help me, I’d choose you a thousand times, even if it meant defying every thread the Mother herself wove.”

He looked up at you, eyes burning with all the fire he could no longer hold back. “The bond is a whisper. You are the roar in my chest. Do you understand?”