The air in the room shifted. The silence was so heavy it felt alive. Isabella’s pulse pounded in her ears, loud and uneven, matching the frantic rise and fall of her chest. Her hands were trembling—partly from fear, partly from the anger boiling beneath it.
Her voice cracked through the quiet like a whip. "What did you do to ?"
Cyrus froze. He had never seen her like this—eyes wide, pupils trembling, every inch of her body bristling with confusion and fury. His brows furrowed, his tone soft, cautious. "What are you talking about?"
"Don’t—" She cut him off, her voice shaking. "Don’t play dumb with ."
She took a shaky step back, glaring at him like he was so wild animal she couldn’t decide whether to fight or flee from. "You bit ," she said, her words barely above a whisper at first, but they grew louder, sharper. "You bit on my neck. Did you—did you mark ?"
Her throat went dry. The question hung between them like a curse.
Cyrus blinked, confused, the weight of her words not sinking in right away. He looked lost—completely lost—and it made her even angrier. "Isabella..." he said slowly, trying to calm her, "I didn’t—"
"That’s a lie!" she snapped, tears burning in her eyes. "Don’t you dare lie to , Cyrus!"
Her voice cracked halfway through his na, and it nearly broke him. He took a step toward her, hands raised, but she flinched back instantly, her breath hitching.
She rembered everything—everything she’d been told since stepping foot in this cursed world. A bite ant a mark. A mark ant ownership. And unless she’d rejected him, it was permanent. She ransacked her mories, heart racing. She hadn’t said no. She hadn’t rejected him. Oh god—
Cyrus didn’t answer right away. His lips parted, but no sound ca out. His eyes, however, betrayed him—they fell. Downward.
Right to her chest.
Isabella followed his gaze. Her stomach dropped.
There it was.
A red mark, coiling faintly like an ember beneath her skin. Thin and winding, like a serpent with its fangs resting over her heart—a mark that shimred faintly under the torchlight. His mark.
Her breath hitched. Her mind went blank.
"No..." she whispered, shaking her head slowly, her hands flying up to cover it. "No, no, no..."
Her vision blurred as her eyes filled. She took a step back until her heel hit the wall. "You—" her voice broke, "you actually—"
She couldn’t even finish.
She looked at him again, really looked at him, and saw the way guilt had already begun to shadow his expression. He wasn’t even defending himself anymore. That silence was an answer she didn’t want.
Her throat tightened. Her chest felt too small for her heartbeat. And then, the mories—her mother’s voice, her bruised smile, her quiet warnings—they ca crashing back like thunder.
"Never let a man own you, Isabella."
"Never give him that kind of power."
"Once you do, you’re his—body and soul."
Her breath grew ragged. Her heart clawed against her ribs.
She wasn’t married to Cyrus. She didn’t even love him. And yet, now—this mark, this curse—made her his.
Owned. Claid. Bound.
She felt sick.
Her fingers curled against the wall. The fear twisted in her stomach, hardening into anger. Anger at him. Anger at herself. Anger at the world that seed built to trap won and call it love.
Her voice shook, low and sharp. "How could you?"
Cyrus’s lips parted—her na trembling on them—but she didn’t wait to hear it.
Because right now, she wasn’t just scared.
She was furious.
And most of all—she was broken.
Her tears finally fell, hot and fast, as she pushed off the wall and rose to her feet, trembling. The room felt smaller now, the air heavier, the space between them a battlefield.
And without another word, Isabella stood—eyes wild, heart hamring, fear blazing into fury—as she stared down the man who had just ruined everything she’d sworn she’d never beco.
She got up angrily.
Her words cut through the room like a blade made of ice.
"I hate you."
Cyrus froze where he stood.
Her voice trembled, but the anger in it was sharp, precise—like she’d spent years learning how to sound unbreakable even while she was falling apart. "I hate you so much," she whispered, her voice cracking on the last word, her hands shaking at her sides.
The air between them felt wrong now—thick and heavy, like even the torches didn’t want to burn anymore.
Cyrus’s lips parted, but no sound ca. He just stood there, chest rising and falling, his heart twisting painfully with every shaky breath she took. He didn’t understand. He couldn’t understand.
He thought... he thought she’d wanted him.
When he’d touched her—when she’d kissed him back, when she whispered his na like that—it hadn’t felt wrong. It had felt real. It had felt like everything he’d ever dread of but never dared to want.
And the mark... gods, the mark.
His mark had only appeared because she hadn’t rejected him. That was how their world worked—how it had always worked. If a woman didn’t want a bond, the magic itself would rebel. The mark would burn away, fade into nothing. But his hadn’t. It had stayed. And worse—it had appeared near her heart.
That ant sothing.
Every old tale, every ancient teaching said the sa thing—when a beast man’s mark burns itself over a woman’s heart, it ans she loves him back. It’s the soul’s confirmation, not the body’s.
So hearing her now... hearing her say she hated him—it didn’t make sense.
His fingers curled tightly at his sides. His throat ached, and when he finally found his voice, it ca out hoarse, fragile. "Isabella..."
She didn’t look at him.
He took one step forward, then stopped when she flinched, and that tiny movent hurt worse than any wound he’d ever taken. His chest tightened, the realization sinking in like a slow, suffocating wave—she was scared of him.
Scared of him.
He blinked hard, his lashes wet. "I didn’t an to..." he started, his voice trembling, but even that sounded useless, empty, too small to reach her.
She just stood there, hugging herself like she was trying to hold the pieces of her own heart together, tears streaking her face.
He wanted to say he was sorry. That he’d misunderstood. That he’d never, ever wanted to hurt her. But none of it seed enough. Words felt like dust in his mouth.
If he’d known—if he’d even suspected that this would hurt her, he would’ve kept his distance. He would’ve never touched her, never crossed that fragile line between want and ruin.
Because seeing her look at him like this... like he was the monster under her bed, the nightmare she couldn’t wake from—it shattered sothing inside him.
He’d always been gentle. Always careful. He never fought unless he had to. He never raised his voice. He’d always been the calm one—the soft one. The one who smiled, who taught, who fixed what others broke.
But now, he was the one who broke sothing precious.
And as Isabella’s tears kept falling, Cyrus stood there motionless, his vision blurring, a deep ache burning behind his eyes. He hadn’t cried in years—not since he was a boy—but now, for the first ti, he felt that sting again.
The sting of helplessness. The sting of guilt.
The sting of realizing that sotis, loving soone only hurts them more.
He blinked, and a single tear slipped down his cheek before he even noticed.
And for the first ti, the ever-kind, ever-smiling Cyrus looked utterly defeated.
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