The doors to Adrian Westfall’s war chamber shut with a heavy thud that seems to echo inside your ribs.

You stand near the long oak table scattered with maps and iron figurines marking battalions. Your riding cloak is still damp from the night frost, boots streaked with mud from the northern road. The torches along the stone walls flicker, throwing long, monstrous shadows—none taller than his.

He doesn’t sit.

Adrian stands at the head of the table, gloved hands braced against the wood, head bowed slightly as if in prayer. But there is nothing holy about the tension in his shoulders.

“You crossed the Blackwood alone.”

His voice is low. Controlled. Far more frightening than shouting.

“At night.”

He lifts his head slowly, pale eyes finding you. Pinning you.

“Do you have any idea what hunts in those woods after sundown?”

You swallow, but say nothing. You can still feel the trees at your back. The snap of a branch that wasn’t yours. The sense of being followed before his cavalry lanterns cut through the dark.

His jaw tightens.

“Bandits who would ransom you. Soldiers who would recognize you. Wolves who would not care who you are.” His voice sharpens. “And worse.”

He pushes off the table and begins circling slowly, boots heavy against stone. Measured. Predatory.

“You are betrothed to the crown prince. Every rival faction in this kingdom would carve the realm apart to get their hands on you.”

He stops in front of you.

“And you rode out with no escort. No guard. No plan.”

The silence stretches.

You remember trailing after him years ago in sunlit courtyards, when he was already taller, already colder. You used to think his silence was mysterious. Noble.

Now it feels like standing before a winter storm.

“You haven’t changed,” he mutters, though there’s something unreadable beneath it. “Still reckless. Still chasing storms you don’t understand.”

His gaze drops briefly to the mud on your hem, the tear in your sleeve where bramble caught you. His nostrils flare.

“If my patrol had been five minutes later, you would not be standing here.”

The words are blunt. Not dramatic. Simply fact.

He turns away abruptly, walking back toward the table. His gauntleted hand grips the edge hard enough that the wood creaks.

“You think running solves this?” he continues, quieter now. “You think the world beyond those gates is kinder than your betrothed?”

He looks over his shoulder at you.

“It is not.”

The firelight catches the scar along his cheek, the one he earned in his first campaign. Two years older than you. Two lifetimes harder.

“You will remain here,” he says finally.

Your breath stutters.

“I am not handing you to bandits on the road. Nor am I delivering you like misplaced cargo to Noah’s doorstep in the middle of the night.”

His tone makes it clear what he thinks of the prince.

“You will stay until I decide what is to be done.”

He studies you again, and for a fleeting second something shifts—an old memory, perhaps, of a girl who followed him through training yards with ink-stained fingers and starry eyes.

His expression hardens before you can be sure it was ever there.

“You will not leave this castle without escort,” he says. “You will not step beyond the inner walls after dusk. And you will not attempt another foolish escape.”

He steps closer, towering, cold as the northern sea.

“You are under my protection now.”

Not gentle.
Not warm.

But absolute.

“Do not make me regret retrieving you.”