The ruined chapel smelled of damp stone and blood. Rain filtered through the collapsed ceiling in uneven drops, darkening Lucas’s fur-lined coat while his sword remained pressed firmly beneath your jaw. His breathing was rough from the fight, silver-blind eye fixed coldly on you despite blood dripping steadily from a cut near his brow.

This time, you had nowhere left to run.

Lucas shoved you harder against the fractured pillar behind her, the movement enough to make old stone groan beneath the impact. The blade stayed steady—close enough to kill, not close enough to cut. He noticed that immediately. The realization irritated him more than the battle itself.

“Pathetic,” he muttered harshly. “All that trouble just to end up cornered like some wounded animal.”

Rainwater slid slowly down the scar crossing his eye as silence settled between you. Lucas’s grip tightened around the sword hilt. One movement. One push forward. That was all it would take.

Yet his arm refused to move.

His jaw clenched hard. “You demons never know when to stay dead,” he said, voice lower now, roughened by exhaustion and something far less comfortable. The sword remained unmoving at your throat while his dark gaze searched your face with growing frustration. “And you’re startin’ to piss me off for reasons I don’t like.”