Chapter 27 Realisation

Chapter 27 Realisation
Callum Blackthrone.

My breath hitched, trapped in a throat that suddenly felt lined with glass. I leaned back against the door, the cold wood the only thing keeping me upright. My mind raced upward, past the ceiling, past the second floor, to that forbidden hallway on the third level where I had dared to venture in my first few hours of "freedom."

The room. The smell of turpentine and old copper. The walls covered in those haunting, grotesque canvases, paintings of wolves that were nothing but jagged torsos, headless and tailless, trapped in eternal, silent screams of oil and pigment. I remember the chilling sympathy I had felt for the artist, wondering what kind of broken soul could see the world in such fractured pieces.

I had sympathized with him. I had looked at his art and felt a kinship with his darkness.

"The third floor," I whispered, the words barely audible. "The paintings... the wolves with no heads. That was him. That was his room."

Azran’s expression shifted, a flicker of genuine surprise crossing his features before it was smoothed over by a grim, stony mask. He didn't ask how I knew. He knew I’d wandered where I wasn't supposed to.

"He hasn't lived in that room for five years," Azran said, his voice sounding like it was coming from the bottom of a well. "But his ghost never left it. He leaves those pieces behind to remind me that he’s still unfinished. That we are unfinished."

I stared at Azran, trying to reconcile the stoic, possessive man in front of me with the monster who lived in the woods, and the tortured artist who had left his pain on the third floor. What kind of history did these brothers have? What kind of blood ran through their veins that it produced such polar extremes of destruction?

"I'll obey," I said suddenly.

The words felt like ash in my mouth, but they were the only way to get him to move, the only way to get a moment of silence so I could stop my brain from splintering. I looked down at my feet, refusing to meet his eyes. "I'll get ready. Just... give me a moment."

Azran didn't move for a long second. I could feel his gaze burning into the top of my head, searching for the lie, for the spark of rebellion I’d shown just minutes ago. But the shock of Callum’s name had extinguished it, leaving behind a cold, hollow compliance.

Finally, he leaned down. His lips were soft as they pressed against my forehead.  

"Thank you, Elara," he murmured. "I’m doing this to keep the world from taking you. Remember that."

He straightened up and walked toward his walk-in closet, the charcoal towel still precariously low on his hips. He moved with the ease of a man who had won the battle, leaving me standing by the door, shaking.

As soon as the closet door clicked shut, I bolted for the bathroom.

I slammed the door and locked it, leaning my forehead against the cool marble of the vanity. I turned the tap on full blast, the roar of the water drowning out the sound of my own ragged breathing. I cupped my hands, catching the icy stream and splashing it onto my face again and again, trying to wash away the scent of sandalwood, the memory of his lips, and the haunting images of those headless wolves.

I looked into the mirror. My eyes were bloodshot, the skin beneath them bruised with exhaustion. My lips were slightly swollen from his kiss.

Callum.

The man who had attacked me in the woods, the man who had "marked" me, was the same man who had painted those agonized creatures upstairs. I had felt sorry for him. I had stood in his sanctuary and felt his pain. The irony was a bitter poison. He wasn't a victim of his own mind; he was a predator who used his pain as a weapon.

How did they become this? I wondered, my hands trembling as I gripped the edge of the sink. And why am I the bridge between them?

Azran said I was to birth both of their children.

I shuddered.

I stripped off the oversized hoodie and stepped into the shower. I turned the water as hot as I could stand it, scrubbing my skin until it was raw and red, trying to peel off the layer of ownership Azran had draped over me. But no matter how hard I rubbed, I could still feel that internal hum, that vibrating cord that tied my pulse to the rhythm of the house.

As the steam filled the room, I realized with a terrifying clarity that Azran’s apology hadn't been for my benefit. It was for his. He didn't regret what he did; he regretted that I had seen the monster behind the mask. He was terrified of losing his grip on me, not because he loved me, but because I was the only thing that gave him power over his brother.

I stepped out of the shower and dried off, my movements slow and heavy. I found a simple, high-necked sweater and leggings in the bag Loren must have brought up earlier. I dressed like I was preparing for a funeral.

I wasn't a girl anymore. I was a casualty.

I sat on the edge of the tub for a long time, staring at the closed door. I had promised to obey, and I would. Not because I trusted him, and not because I was safe, but because I needed to learn the rules of this new cage before I could ever hope to break the bars.

Callum was the hunger. Azran was the wall. And I was the meat in between.

I stood up, wiped the fog from the mirror one last time, and stared at the stranger looking back at me. "Survival," I whispered to the reflection. "Just survive."

I opened the bathroom door and stepped back into the bedroom, ready to follow the man I hated into a war I never asked for.