Chapter 12: Valen - Bound to Ruin

I am a coward, a failing I can only admit silently to myself while hiding in the east wing billiards room. Being in my father’s office was slowly driving me mad. I sent messages to not only him, but all the weavers he was meeting with and our closest allies to ensure the body within Astoria’s shop is, in fact, a trick. Staring blankly waiting for a response wasn’t helping, so I came here.

Lucas is fast asleep in my bed, resembling a corpse once again as my potions do their magic.

He’s damn lucky that he found himself in my capable hands. Healing spells and potions are a careful balancing act between agony and speed. The faster the healing, the more painful the process and more difficult it is to numb. The brews he swallowed with much complaint are as vicious as they are effective on a broken body. Not many healers can compound the right ingredients for a heavy sedative that would not slow the healing effects. If I had used a standard sedative, Lucas would be awake and screaming.

At least, I hope my new potion keeps him sedated. This is the first time I’m testing my theory on combining mandrake root with silken weed. If I’m right, he’ll sleep all night and awaken to a usable leg. Then he’ll need to take my next round of potions that are currently simmering to help with his tokens.

I twirl my crystal glass between my hands, staring at the amber liquid glinting within. I left the ice cube out, and the glass is warmed by my hold. It’s easier to watch the light sparkle in the heavy glass and scotch. Otherwise, I’d have to stare at the mahogany-paneled walls and dark leather furniture and remember when this house used to be filled with weavers nightly.

Visiting relatives, family friends, and business partners would rotate through this very room. My father loved cards, and there would always be a game to join. Cigar smoke and magic would be thick in the air, and my mother would stroll through the crowd like a glittering jewel, catching everyone’s eye. Her gloved hands would slide over each person, drawing them in like moths to her light. She’d collect their secrets while winning at cards or weave her agendas through conversation until people would believe they were their own ideas.

I squeeze my eyes closed with a soft groan. No, I cannot think of my family tonight. My already bruised heart from Astoria refusing to be with me is now sliced open from her imprisonment. Reliving memories of my mother and how she begged me to run with her is too much to bear.

Before she fled this house, she had been scared. I understand that. But I assumed my sister would leave me a trail to follow my family members in case I ever needed their help. That was my miscalculation: clinging too tightly to the hopes that our family would one day heal.

I take a burning gulp of the scotch to choke down the nostalgia. I don’t have the strength to revisit memories, not with Astoria in Alasdair’s clutches and Lucas recovering from the brink of death.

I should take a sedative too and go to bed, but I need to stay vigilant. The wards around the estate crackle, the power surge from the brewing nighttime storm overhead drawing my attention. The large windows provide me with the perfect view of the erratic weather that is making its way down the mountain to pool in the humans’ flat land.

A flash of light that could easily be confused with lightning, if not for its rainbow iridescence, nearly blinds me. I sit straighter, my glass clicking on the side table. For a moment, the dome of magic that generations of Bauers have worked to thicken to impenetrable strength is visible. But…

Is that a crack I see forming?

Awareness tingles up my arms, lifting the hairs there on end. The blue light of my eyes casts shadows as I scan the room.

I glide silently to standing, my senses stretching to brush against the heart of the estate. My father has the true connection to it, but the ring on my left hand allows me to do the same with a little effort. The wards seem in place, but I can’t shake this tingling awareness that something isn’t quite… right.

My magic dances between my fingertips in a soft swirl of energy. My footfalls are silent as I make my way through my family home, scanning every corner, inspecting every shadow until a cry echoes through the halls. My heart stops.

Lucas.

I sprint through the estate, magic flooding my system. I slam into my bedroom door and the force nearly rips it off the hinges. The overly sweet scent of dark magic hits me full force and I gag, covering my mouth instinctively. Stilling, my eyes widen as I behold my bedroom. A coating of dark slime oozes down the walls, its oily sheen reflecting my eyes’ light. The shadows are writhing like they’re alive, and my heart stops, my lip curling in a snarl. A black mist surrounds Lucas’ sleeping, sedated form. Each of his screams makes the mist pulse, loosely condensing to form the vague outline of a man.

My mind goes blank, and ice cracks along the walls, icicles dripping from the doorway. I practically fly across the room. The blankets are tangled around Lucas’ waist, his chest bare and pumping. The bandage I covered it with has slid off from the flooding of crimson fluid beneath. The scar burns the bright red of a deadly infection.

A millimeter of skin pops open along the old injury, blood bubbling out of it.

I have no plan. My heartbeat is roaring in my ears, my vision dulling in the corners. My magic pulses, encasing me, and instinct takes over. I have no idea how Alasdair is here or what he is doing, but I need to stop the damage he’s causing.

I pull my hand back, power swirling around it, and slam it forward to splay across the inflamed, open wound.

Power clashes, a flash of blue lightning and black energy dancing up my arm and along my bed. I stagger as a force slams into me, blinding me, dragging me forward until I collapse on top of Lucas.

I stumble into Lucas’ dream.

A massive scarlet office surrounds me, housing a monstrosity of a wooden desk that is so large it could be mistaken for a sacrificial altar. Above it is the bleached white skull of a monster, a startling contrast to the paint. Its long horns are twisted and its maw stretched in a terrifying roar.

Recognition hits me, and I spin on my heel. This is the Amur’s office. It’s been years since I’ve been here, and back then I was with my father, his silent shadow during a Guild trade dispute between the Preservation Domain and the city.

Voices from behind have me turning around. Lucas is seated on a large leather couch, a full glass of whisky trembling in his hands. He’s younger, his hair trimmed short and his face freshly shaved. His clothes are finely made and both crisp and clean, the shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbow. His black flame tattoo is missing. Instead, an image of a stalking tiger crawls up his arm. The artist must’ve been extremely skilled to so effectively create the illusion of the ink’s claws sinking into Lucas’ flesh and the creature’s eyes track the observer in a disquieting way.

Gritting my teeth, my eyes flick to the man sitting next to him. Dimitar is much the same with his manicured beard and yellow eyes. He stretches his brawny arm out along the back of the couch so it nearly drapes over Lucas’ shoulders.

He sighs and taps the bottom of Lucas’ tumbler and rumbles, “Drink up. It’ll make it easier.”

Lucas chugs the drink obediently and gasps for breath after it drains. Dimitar refills his cup. Lucas’ voice is so small, so broken, I almost miss it. “You’re sure she’s—” He cuts off with a wave of tears that fill his eyes.

Dimitar nods solemnly. “My men went to check the apartment this morning. She appears to have passed in her sleep while you were away. I know this is hard, son. Your grandmother was a strong woman.”

Lucas wipes his face. “Fuck. Just, fuck. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t. These walls contain all secrets. You can tell me. I’ve practically raised you.”

Lucas nods. He downs half of his refilled drink before whispering, “I don’t know what to do. She… she was watching over my mom. How am I going to help her now?”

A gleam in Dimitar’s eye has my shoulders setting.

Dimitar croons, “Come here.” He pulls Lucas into a hug, one that the younger man is rigid in before submitting to the promise of comfort. But Lucas cannot see the way Dimitar breathes in his smell or how the older man turns his head towards Lucas’ trembling shoulders like I can. His hands sliding up and down Lucas’ back is not a fatherly comfort.

My teeth click together, my hands curling into fists. Mind healing was not one of my interests, but I know a thing or two about dreams. My magic pulses and I arc my attack towards Dimitar. It passes through the man with a ripple. My heart pounds. I’m not in a dream. I’m in a memory that Alasdair is forcing Lucas to relive.

Dimitar’s voice is full of gentleness, but it has a warning prickling up my spine. “Oh, Lucas. So much feeling. Let me take care of this for you.” I nearly turn violent when his hands shift, his face turning. “Let me make it all better.”

His lips brush Lucas’, and Lucas rears back. “What the fuck are you doing?”

Something dark slithers in my chest, a pressure building as Dimitar responds with a dismissive laugh, “Don’t tell me you didn’t know?”

If only this were a dream, then I’d have some hope I could manipulate it, but I cannot rewrite a memory. Regardless, my magic pulses icy cold through my veins. Lucas mumbles something, but I cannot hear him over the pounding of my heart. All I can see is the way he attempts to pull back and how Dimitar grips him, keeping him close.

I stretch my neck, my teeth aching from how hard I grind them, and contemplate how to end this before Lucas is forced to relive something that I should not witness without his consent.

Dimitar sighs, like he has a heavy burden, “You’re already deeply indebted to the Guild because of your father.”

Lucas freezes, his eyes wide and staring at the wall.

Dimitar strokes the back of his hand down Lucas’ throat. “I helped you before. I hid his body. Cleaned his blood off you. Bribed the Magistrate to keep you out of prison. Got your mother and grandmother nice apartments in the city. Made sure those rings were passed to you.”

He takes Lucas’ limp hand and presses a kiss to his palm. “All things I was happy to trade you for. Now I ask that you consider me more than your mentor. Be with me, and I’ll ensure your mother gets the best help in the city. I’ll keep her safe.”

Lucas doesn’t move, and I can see the vacancy in his eyes. Rage trembles through me as Dimitar trails kisses up his arm to chuckle against the tattoo, “I’ve already marked you as part of my inner circle. What is one more mark? It’s an easy choice.”

Lucas flinches when Dimitar kisses his neck, panic flooding his face before he squeezes his eyes closed. He speaks softly—a fear response, as if he’s unsure of the outcome if he doesn’t appease Dimitar. “I need time to consider it. Please, let me have a few weeks so I can lay her to rest and grieve. She was everything to me, and I don’t want to disappoint you.”

He jerks his arm back, but Dimitar doesn’t let go of him. The shadows shift, and I cannot tear my gaze away as a dark smoke swirls from Dimitar’s form.

Lucas is changing, his brows furrowing as his hair lengthens and stubble grows until he appears exactly how I left him earlier. An echo reverberates around the room when he mumbles, “That’s not right… He let me go…”

Lucas throws his body back, but he’s not fast enough. Dimitar’s hand closes around his throat and he hurls him down on the couch with a slam. Dimitar laughs.

The memory has finally ended, and I move before I realize what I’m doing. Dimitar rips open Lucas’ shirt with long, curled claws, as he hisses, “She’d be alive if you’d been a good whore.”

Lucas chokes, his hands trembling as he claws Dimitar’s arm. The black flame tattoo drips away to reveal the tiger crawling up his arm and the Amur Guild’s crest etched onto his shoulder. Tears pour down his face, the room flashing. Another apartment flickers. A woman cold on the ground, and Lucas sobbing.

Smoke wafts from Dimitar’s lips. “It’s all your fault.”

My hand wraps around Dimitar’s wrist and I rip his hand back. The room freezes like it’s coated in ice as my power pulses. Lucas can’t move, his face twisted in soul-deep agony, tears staining his face.

A familiar laugh echoes through the room, building to rattle against the ice that freezes the dream. Dimitar is a shadow form of himself that I grip with my power, unable to let go without risking dropping my spell.

The shadows along the walls twist and pool together until a man steps forth, darkness dripping from him like black oil to reveal an unstained cream suit. I stare into the glowing green eyes sitting within pits of blackness. I keep my voice calm, like I’m not about to tear this creature apart piece by piece for hurting the people I love. “Alasdair.”

He is as I remember, but more. More handsome. Healthier. Stronger. His teeth are pure white as he beams at me. “I’ve been wondering when you’d show up, Valentin.”

My hand on his shadow creature aches as a pressure builds under it, but I refuse to let it break free. My magic floods my veins, my tendons straining.

Alasdair clicks his tongue as he circles the couch leisurely. “I will admit, I’m a touch disappointed. You expertly crafted this feast, and now you are denying me a bite. What a cruel, selfish man you turned out to be.”

I don’t respond, focusing on holding this dreamscape in my control by pouring all the power I inherited from my father into keeping it unchanging.

Alasdair strokes the face of his shadow Dimitar. “He sparked with so much delicious agony earlier because of you. Like a beacon in the night, it allowed me to discover these little secrets he kept so well hidden. If you decide to team up with me, I could be fed so well for so long.”

I laugh to cover the trembling that begins in my arm from the effort of holding shadow Dimitar back. “And why in the darkest recesses of the Weave would I ever help you?”

Alasdair’s green eyes land on me. “Oh, Valentin. Don’t tell me they kept it from you?”

I don’t react. I cannot give him the satisfaction.

Alasdair tuts. “My dear sister hasn’t changed at all, but even I didn’t believe she’d be so heartless as to keep your father’s death from you.”

My heart seizes, and shadow Dimitar’s arm slips towards Lucas before I regain my control. “Your tricks will not work on me.”

Alasdair’s smile twists. The room darkens, the red walls shifting to the dark rust of blood. “She was able to identify the body I left her as a gift.”

“Leave, Alasdair. Get out of my estate.”

Alasdair laughs, black mist swirling around him. “Nice try, but you cannot wish me away. You don’t have the power as long as you haven’t claimed your inheritance. Besides, don’t you want to know the truth? I’ll tell it to you.”

The mist seeps from him, tendrils of it twisting around the couch and brushing my ankles. “I believe nothing you say.”

“Oh, but you should. I cannot lie. I am a curse at heart.”

“But you’ll twist it to infect me. Be gone.” My power pulses, ice thickening on the walls to still some of the dripping ooze. It costs me another centimeter on my hold on shadow Dimitar. My muscles strain and teeth grit.

Alasdair mists away, but the relief quickly evaporates when his lips brush my ear. “I left Vincentius’ ring on him, and Astoria saw.”

“You lie,” I snarl, arm shaking visibly now.

“I watched as she stayed silent, Valentin. She convinced Lucas not to tell you. You’ve suspected that she doesn’t truly love you, and now here’s the evidence of those dark thoughts. You know she doesn’t have the capacity to love after all the damage done to her. You feel it in your heart that you were of no more use to her after she got her shop back and magician safe. She didn’t tell you your father was dead. She didn’t come here when she had the opportunity. She didn’t care enough to ensure you were alive.”

My throat tightens, my muscles straining. The ice cracks along the walls, the ooze slipping free when Alasdair laughs. “I tortured your father so slowly to regenerate my withered body. His agony was deliciously filling. And if it wasn’t for Astoria, I would’ve chosen someone else. Someone she cared about more, but then you would never see how little she thinks about you, just like when she left you to die under her curse all those years ago.”

My arm is giving out, and Dimitar slips closer and closer to Lucas. Panic lances through me and I gasp when I surge with magic again. A pulse rips from my form, blasting the mist away from me and regaining the precious centimeters I lost during my distractions. It doesn’t last long. Mist slithers back up my legs, my flesh crawling with the prickling unease of such dark magic so close.

Alasdair rests his chin on my shoulder, and I hiss, but cannot do anything more. There are too many fronts to battle, and it splinters my focus. Alasdair murmurs against me, “You could banish me if you let my creature go, and yet, you still hold him back from the magician. Why?”

My chest pumps, the mist swirling over my middle, and Alasdair wraps his arms around me. I flinch, but it gives Dimitar a moment of weakness to surge towards Lucas. I choke on air, knees buckling when I grip him in my control again. He’s nearly touching Lucas’ frozen form.

Shivers crawl up my spine when Alasdair laughs. “Oh, Valentin. Has the ice in your heart thawed for another?”

My hand spasms and it’s too late. The shadow Dimitar breaks from my hold, and I lunge forward, but it’s a mistake. The creature doesn’t go for Lucas. It surges for me.

Claws sink into my chest and rip it apart. Blood sprays, my sternum snapping open to splay my ribcage. The darkness pours into me, burning my exposed, pumping heart, searing my soul hidden within. Alasdair laughs louder and louder until the room shatters.

I crash into the ground. My pounding heartbeat is in my ears as I claw at myself, my heels scraping along the floor, until I rip open my shirt. The skin there is intact, but I know there is something inside me. Something Alasdair placed there. Something that will force its way into the chambers of my heart.

Blue light flashes as my magic surges and fails over and over, and I grind my teeth to remain silent while I try to force Alasdair’s magic from me. My skin ripples with my power, ice dripping from the ceiling like deadly knives. I shiver, my breath misting, my eyes stinging from the cold as my lungs choke. But it’s no use. Alasdair was too fast, and his magic has already sunk too deep within me, leaving no trace. A bone-deep chill rattles me when a voice warps in my mind.

She doesn’t have the capacity to love…

“Shit,” I hiss and grip my head until it feels like my skull is going to crack. “Get out.”

I left Vincentius’ ring on him, and Astoria saw…

No. She was recovering from a corruption surge. She wasn’t in her right mind. The Magistrate’s officers arrived. She didn’t have time to comprehend it.

But they told her they were looking for my father. Lucas’ panic, his trembling, as he relived what it was like to be told that his own loved ones were dead. He told me even though it broke a part of him to be the one to bear it. Did Astoria know what happened to his grandmother and mother? Did she know it would hurt him to be forced to relive that nightmare?

He sparked with so much delicious agony earlier because of you. Like a beacon in the night, it allowed me to discover these little secrets he kept so well hidden.

Sickness surges so violently that I gag, whipping to my side as my stomach convulses. I did this. I taunted Lucas with Dimitar because I couldn’t stand the heartbreak that Astoria turned me away. Alasdair is right. I am cruel, just like I was raised to be.

A low groan from the bed has me stilling. The voice in my head goes quiet, and I claw my way back up to the bed. Lucas is curled up in a shivering ball on his side, his breath visible in the cold. His ashen, pale skin is clammy under my palm when I lay a hand on his bare shoulder gently. There are no signs of further injury from Alasdair’s dark magic. My power retracts within me, the ice disappearing until the chill leaves the air. The shivering stops.

Lucas opens his eyes and blearily looks up at me. They’re glassy like he’s unwell with a fever. The sedative I gave him was incredibly strong and must’ve given Alasdair an opening to infect his dreams. An opening Alasdair was only able to exploit because he found a way to slip the wards. A weakness that could only be from an absence of a head of the family line.

My father is dead.

I choke on air and grind my teeth. Keep it together. Just keep it together. My unsteady hand strokes Lucas, and I whisper in a shockingly calm voice, “Go back to sleep. I’m here.”

Lucas licks his dry lips sluggishly. “Dream…”

He trails off, and I swallow, seizing control of my body with all my strength. “Yes, just a dream. Go to sleep.”

But Lucas doesn’t close his eyes. I watch with a sinking feeling as he slowly realizes what has happened. His eyes clear more and more with each blink, his body tightening until his gaze drops with a shudder. Something within me cracks. I withdraw my hand from him and curl it into a tight fist.

In the quiet of the room, I ask, “Are you alright?”

Lucas’ jaw tightens before he releases his held breath in a rush. “I’m fine. I’m… I’m just… It’s not something I…” His gaze drifts to the side table where a full glass of water sits. I snatch it up and hold it out to him. He blinks at it before shifting up to lean against the headboards stiffly. The sheen of sweat on him, either from the pain surfacing now that he’s awake or the horrors he relived, glistens in the moonlight. He accepts the water. “I’m sorry you had to witness that.”

I squeeze my eyes shut and grit my teeth to keep the harsh words within. May the Tapestry give me strength to not yell at this kind fool. I face him again. “Do not apologize. You’ve done nothing wrong.” I’m tapping the bedspread and flattening out my hand. “Yesterday, I taunted you with an insinuation about the nature of your business with Dimitar. It was cruel, and I should not have said it. Forgive me for my thoughtlessness.”

His throat works, and he looks away sharply. He downs half the water before replying. “It’s alright. You didn’t know. No one does.”

I blink. “No one?”

He shakes his head.

A memory from our time together in his apothecary friend’s apartment surfaces, one that I usually enjoy reliving but now fills me with sickening weight.

My lips trail along Lucas’ unshaven jaw, a wicked delight building within me as I slip my fingers roughly into his willing mouth in a sinful tease. “I’m very tempted to mount your face right now. Think you could suck cock while I fuck your mouth into the mattress?”

Lucas shivers in response. I withdraw my fingers to drag his lip down and demand, “Answer me.”

Lucas’ voice is rough, and I watch his mouth, transfixed, as he says, “I’d probably gag. I don’t usually let men be rough with me like that.”

“Would you let me?”

Lucas licks his lips, his breathing ragged. “Yeah. Fuck. Yes. I would.”

The question comes out before I can stop myself, my voice low in the darkness. “Is that why you don’t let men be rough with you?”

Lucas’ pause is like shadow Dimitar ripping open my chest again. I bow my head, my teeth grinding as my arms curl up over me. How did I miss all the signs? Dimitar’s fixation on Lucas, his eagerness to trade with only him when Dimitar had Astoria right where he wanted. It was all to get Lucas back under his sick control. It was there before me, and I never cared to look deeper.

Lucas sighs hard. “Stop that. I don’t need your pity.”

“It’s not pity,” I practically growl. I can’t seem to get my tone under control. Emotions storm within me: rage towards Dimitar, towards myself for being so foolish….

“V, sit up and look at me.”

I do as he says, unable to bear causing him any more unhappiness. Lucas spins his water glass between his heavily bandaged fingers and says, “Nothing happened between Dimitar and me more than what you saw tonight. What it is…” He pauses before sighing again. “This might be hard for you to understand with your weaver lifespan, but this happened a long time ago. I’ve had five years to process what he tried to force our relationship into. The pain Alasdair sensed tonight wasn’t the sexual aspect of it. Well, not completely. I like men. I don’t have a problem with that. What hurts me… I mean, he was… He took…” His voice breaks, and he clears his throat before trying again. “He was like a father.”

I ease myself up more until I sit on my heels. Lucas stares at the dark shadows of the room, collecting his thoughts before continuing softly. “My dad was not a good man. He hurt us, and when I finally became bigger and stronger than him, I made it stop. Dimitar took me in. I was fifteen and desperate for that kind of attention. For nine years, that was our relationship. The pain? It’s the realization of how wrong I was. It took all these memories I used to… well. Cherish. And turned them into something revolting.”

The grief and pain that last word holds cracks me open. I stare at him, at the way the moonlight casts half his face in shadow. His eyes close, and his chest expands. “I don’t like remembering those times. It makes the loss of my grandma and mom all the worse. I spent years trying to find evidence that Dimitar killed them, but he hid it too well.”

He sets his half-empty glass back down, but the bandages on his hands make it difficult, and it wobbles. I snap my arm out to grab it, and our hands meet to right the cup together. I don’t linger. I respectfully dip my hand away, and he watches the movement silently.

His eyes meet mine in the darkness. “I don’t let men be rough with me because I’m very careful with the men I sleep with. I don’t mind the roughness. Hell, I like the roughness. I just haven’t trusted any in a long time.”

My heart pounds, realization weighing heavily on me. He let me. He would’ve let me do even more if I’d stayed. We didn’t know each other that well, and yet he found something within me that allowed him to feel a sense of security to explore that part of himself again. He trusted me. And I threw it in his face.

My lips part, my chest aching, and it turns my words into a rough whisper of regret. “I shouldn’t have said goodbye to you in a letter.”

Lucas snorts and some of his normal playfulness returns. “Are you lumping all your apologies together tonight to get them over with?”

But his lightness doesn’t ease my burden. “I apologize for that as well. It’s not something that comes naturally to me. I was not raised to apologize. It would question my infallibility and that is not an acceptable Bauer weakness.”

Lucas hums, his warm gaze holding mine until I fall deep into those honey eyes when he says, “I don’t know about that. You’re still pretty damn perfect.”

My heart pulses, and a pressure builds. “I’m sorry, Lucas.”

He huffs a laugh. “Well, look at that. I didn’t even have to make you with my little threads or anything.”

A surprised laugh bursts from me. I stroke my hair back and lean on my elbows. “A thief of many talents.”

“Aw, V. I’m going to blush.” He shifts and grimaces. “Listen, this whole heart-to-heart after my trauma is nice and all, but whatever you gave me is wearing off.”

I sit up. “Where is the pain?”

“Everywhere.” His head tilts back in a groan. He’s slipping sideways.

I stand, my hands hovering over him. “May I touch you?”

Lucas startles, but it sets off a chain of flinches, and he flops down with a, “Fucking hell, yes. I’m too tired to have dignity.”

Another laugh comes unbidden, and I help him back into bed. I’m just about done with pulling the covers back up when he sleepily mumbles, “You don’t have to ask, you know. About you touching me. It doesn’t bother me.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” I sit on the edge of the bed. “Do you want more sedatives?”

“No. I just need to go back to sleep.” He wets his lips. “Aren’t you coming to bed?”

“In a minute. I need to check the wards first.”

His face is tight. I tick through my list of potions, but there’s nothing I can give him that won’t prolong his healing. I’m sure once he is asleep, the sedative I gave him earlier will help him stay so.

A reflex I didn’t know I possessed lifts my hand. My fingers slide through his soft, long hair and a new pain slices through my heart when he leans into them. I flinch when Lucas lazily slips his fingers along mine. My throat is so tight I can’t breathe, and I turn my hand in his to hold.

It doesn’t take long for the soft, steady breath of sleep to sound from Lucas’ lips, yet I can’t bring myself to stop stroking his messy long hair or let go of his hand in mine.

Oh, Valentin. Has the ice in your heart thawed for another?

I exhale harshly, my thumb gliding along his face. “Damn it.”