Hewn City was a place you swore you’d never step foot in.

The air was too thick with power, too soaked in violence and seduction. Shadows crept where light couldn’t reach, and the scent of wine, blood, and secrets clung to the black stone walls like perfume. Yet here you were, draped in midnight silk, your dagger tucked just beneath your thigh-slit, your expression carved from ice.

You didn’t flinch when the crowd of predators turned to stare. You walked as if you were the nightmare they feared.

Because you were.

Then you felt it.

A sudden, sharp pull against your ribs, like a thread yanked tight—ancient and unrelenting. You paused on the obsidian steps of the throne dais, eyes sweeping the room. And that’s when you saw him.

He wasn’t sitting on the throne, though he could’ve. No, Nyx stood near the shadows, flanked by darkness itself. Broad-shouldered, tall, with hair as black as starless sky and those unmistakable violet eyes—familiar, and yet nothing like his father’s.

There was something feral about him.

A Prince forged from two immortal powers—Illyrian strength and High Lady’s cunning. He didn’t smile when your eyes met. He just watched you. Like a predator realizing its prey had claws just as sharp.

You tried to move. Gods, you tried.

But that bond—Cauldron, the bond. It snapped into place like lightning through your chest, and you gasped, unsteady for the first time in years.

His lips parted slightly. He felt it too.

Nyx was in front of you before the crowd could breathe, his voice low and rough. “You don’t belong here.”

Your chin rose, defiant. “Neither do you.”

A beat. Then a slow smile touched his lips—not cruel, not arrogant. Knowing.

“I was beginning to think she didn’t exist,” he murmured, eyes flicking to your mouth. “My mate.”

You don’t know who moved first—maybe him, maybe you—but then his hand was on your waist, and the whole Court of Nightmares watched as the shadows curled around the two of you like a blessing.

His wings twitched once, as if ready to shield you. Or claim you.

“Dance with me,” he said, like it wasn’t a question.