Chapter 89

Chapter 89
Sera POV

The market was alive with colours, scents, and the low sound of chatter. Stalls lined the narrow streets, overflowing with fruits, herbs, and clothes dyed in brilliant hues.

I moved through the crowd, trying to focus on my list, trying to let the mundane task of buying provisions distract me from the storm that never seemed to leave my chest.

That’s when I saw a very striking man.

His presence cut through the crowd like a blade.

Even from a distance, I could feel the heat of his stare, the way the air seemed to shift around him. He moved with effortless grace, his black coat fluttering slightly in the wind, and when his eyes met mine, I felt a sudden inexplicable pull.

“You,” he said, voice low and smooth, a dangerous melody in the midst of the market noise. “I never thought I’d find you wandering so carelessly.”

I froze, clutching my basket a little tighter. “Who are you?” I said cautiously, keeping my voice steady, trying to appear as if I wasn’t trembling inside.

He closed the distance between us with slow, measured steps. There was a menace behind his charm, an unmistakable promise of chaos. “My name is Lucien, and I just want to tell you that you don’t belong here,” he said, voice dropping to a whisper. “You belong with power. You belong with me.”

I swallowed hard. “I belong with… my pack.”

He chuckled, low and dangerous. “Do you? Is that what you tell yourself to sleep at night? To convince yourself that living in fear of him is safety?” His eyes glimmered with the memory of past violence, of old wounds, and yet there was a temptation there, a whisper of promise.

“What do you want, Lucien?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady. My hands trembled despite the basket in my grip.

“I want you to remember,” he said, stepping closer, the crowd seeming to fall away around us. “Remember who you were. Who you are. You are not bound by anyone, not even that silver-eyed monster you call your Alpha. He will control you, consume you, and you will learn too late that love is not what saves you; it’s what chains you.”

I shook my head. “I… I don’t believe that. Jade… he’s not like you.”

He laughed, sharp and cruel. “Not like me?” His voice dropped to a whisper, meant only for me.

My chest tightened. I wanted to run, to hide, to throw myself into the nearest crowd and disappear. But there was a pull, a dangerous, forbidden pull that made me linger, that made me listen.

“I can give you freedom,” he whispered, voice soft, almost tender, but every word dripped with threat. “Freedom from him, from the pack, from everything that chains you. Power beyond what you’ve imagined. Revenge, sweet, burning revenge against the one who dares to claim your life as his own.”

I felt my stomach twist, my pulse racing. The promise of freedom was very intoxicating, but it was poison.

“I… I won’t,” I said finally, voice trembling but firm. “I belong with my pack. I belong with Jade.”

He tilted his head, a smirk tugging at his lips, like he had expected no other answer and yet found it amusing. “Ah… so the silver-eyed Alpha has already chained your heart. Very well, little one. But remember, chains can break, and freedom… freedom is a dangerous temptation.”

His hand brushed my wrist.

Just that bare, fleeting contact. No force, no insistence. But the moment his skin touched mine, something flared beneath the surface of my veins – sharp, scorching, a heat that did not belong to Jade.

I gasped, and my fingers trembled around the basket handle. It was as if my blood recognised him before my mind could catch up, as if some old echo, some buried memory, had stirred awake.

Lucien’s eyes watched every flicker of my reaction. He didn’t smile and didn’t taunt this time. He simply looked, and the weight of it pressed into me like a hand closing around my heart.

“You feel it,” he murmured, almost gently. “Don’t pretend you don’t.”

I pulled my hand back quickly, sharply, as if he were burnt.

“No,” I whispered.

The word tasted like fear and truth.

Lucien’s gaze darkened immediately; it was like something heavier… a kind of ancient sadness filled with hunger.

“No,” I repeated, stronger this time. “That part of me does not exist; I feel absolutely nothing for you.”

His voice dropped into silk over steel.

“Nothing that burns ever dies, Sera. It only waits.”

I shook my head, stepping back, but the marketplace noise felt distant now, blurred, like I was standing inside a memory instead of a street. My pulse thundered in my ears.

“I love him,” I said.

Lucien’s expression remained unchanged – calm and composed – but his eyes flickered with a quiet, knowing cruelty.

“You love the man who once wrapped his hands around your throat and watched your fire go out?” His voice was soft, lethal. “You love the beast who will do it again the moment fate turns?”

My breath hitched.

He took one step closer. Not touching this time. Just… close enough that I could feel him like heat through air.

“Remember how it felt,” he whispered. “The silver chains. The altar. The blade.”

My lungs stopped working. The world tilted.

For a heartbeat I saw it.

The fire and the blood.

The way my own scream had split the sky.

“No.” My voice cracked, barely audible. “Stop.”

Lucien exhaled the faintest sigh that sounded almost regretful.

“I will come for you again,” he said quietly.

It sounded like a promise already accepted by fate.

And then he stepped back, the crowd parting for him as if moved by invisible hands.

He disappeared as swiftly as he had appeared, leaving no trace except the heat that still coiled beneath my skin and the frantic, uneven pounding of my heart.

I stood there, frozen, my hands shaking so hard the basket nearly slipped.

“No,” I whispered again.