Chapter 6 Morning After

The room spun again. Thessaly pressed her palms flat against the table, trying to anchor herself to something solid. "No. That's not... if that were true, everyone would know. Someone would have—"

"Who would tell? The king himself, who can barely live with what happened? The court, who's terrified of looking weak to their enemies?" Ondine shook her head. "The truth gets buried when it's inconvenient. You of all people should understand that."

She did. Gods help her, she did. Hadn't her own family buried her, tucked away the broken princess like a shameful secret?

"I should go." Ondine moved toward the door again. "Eat something. Sleep. Tomorrow's going to be difficult enough without you collapsing from exhaustion."

"Wait—" Thessaly stood. "The king. At breakfast. What does he want from me?"

Ondine's expression was unreadable. "Answers, probably. Understanding. Maybe just... someone who doesn't die when he forgets himself and reaches out." She paused with her hand on the door. "For what it's worth, I don't think he wants to hurt you. I think he's more terrified of you than you are of him."

Then she was gone, leaving Thessaly alone with too many thoughts and not enough certainty.

She ate mechanically, barely tasting the food. It was good—better than anything she'd had in years—but it could have been ashes for all the attention she paid it. Her mind was spinning with impossible information, trying to fit together pieces that didn't want to match.

Possessed. Cursed. Sun-Bonded.

None of it felt real.

Thessaly changed into the nightgown someone had left folded on the bed—soft fabric that probably cost more than her entire wardrobe back home—and crawled under blankets that felt like sleeping on clouds. The bed was too soft, too comfortable, and she lay there staring at the ceiling while her mind refused to quiet.

Tomorrow she'd face Davorin again. Tomorrow she'd have to look into the eyes of her enemy and somehow reconcile him with the man Ondine had described—cursed, isolated, suffering alone because he couldn't risk hurting anyone else.

Tomorrow she'd have to decide if any of this was real, or if she'd just traded her brother's chains for a prettier set of her own.

Sleep came eventually, but it was shallow and restless, full of dreams that scattered like smoke when she tried to hold onto them. At some point deep in the night, she woke to find moonlight streaming through the windows—proper moonlight, not the eternal twilight she'd seen earlier—and for a moment she could pretend she was back home in her tower.

Then she remembered.

Home was gone. Her brother was there but she was here. And somewhere in this palace of obsidian and secrets, a cursed king was probably lying awake too, wondering what it meant that after ten years of killing everything he touched, a powerless princess had survived.

Thessaly pressed her hand to her chest, where that warmth still pulsed steady and strange.

Whatever happened tomorrow, whatever truth or lies she uncovered, one thing was becoming impossible to deny: something fundamental had changed the moment Davorin's skin met hers. Something that felt less like an ending and more like a beginning, even though she had no idea what she was beginning toward.

She finally fell back asleep as dawn started painting the sky in shades of gray.

When someone knocked on her door three hours later, announcing breakfast with the king, Thessaly was already awake. Had been awake for an hour, pacing the rose suite like a caged animal, trying to figure out what she was going to say to the man who held her life in his cursed hands.

"The king is waiting, Princess."

Right. The king. Her enemy. Her destroyer.

Possibly—impossibly—her fated mate.

Thessaly opened the door, chin up and spine straight, and tried very hard not to look as terrified as she felt. "Lead the way."

The guard—the same scarred woman from last night—studied her for a moment. Something flickered across her face that might have been approval. "This way."

They walked through corridors that seemed different in daylight. Less ominous, maybe, though still imposing. Servants moved through the halls with quiet efficiency, and several of them stopped to stare as Thessaly passed. She kept her eyes forward and her hands still, even though they wanted to shake.

The breakfast room was smaller than she expected—intimate, almost, with a table set for two and windows overlooking gardens that were actually beautiful in the morning light. Roses and night-blooming flowers she didn't recognize, all arranged in careful chaos that looked wild but probably wasn't.

Davorin stood at the windows with his back to the door.

He was dressed less formally than last night—simple dark clothes without any of the royal regalia—and his hair was tied back. He looked younger like this. More human. Less like the monster her nightmares had built him into.

"Thank you, Varian," he said without turning around. "That will be all."

The guard—Varian—bowed and left, closing the door behind her with a soft click.

Thessaly was alone with the Shadow King.

The silence stretched long enough to be uncomfortable. Finally, Davorin turned around, and Thessaly was struck again by how tired he looked. Like he hadn't slept in days. Maybe years.

"Princess Thessaly." His voice was carefully neutral. "I hope your accommodations were adequate."

"They were generous." She matched his formal tone, even though her heart was trying to pound its way out of her chest. "Thank you."

"Please, sit."

She did, mostly because her legs were threatening to give out. Davorin sat across from her, and she noticed he was wearing gloves now. Black leather that covered his hands completely. Because he couldn't risk touching anything. Couldn't risk touching her again, even though yesterday's contact hadn't killed her.

The food was already laid out—more than two people could possibly eat. Davorin didn't touch any of it.

"I imagine you have questions," he said.

Thessaly almost laughed. "A few."

"Then ask them. I'll answer what I can."

She picked the most important one. "Why did you want to speak with my family?"

Davorin was quiet for a moment, his eyes distant. "Intelligence suggested your brother might be involved with insurgents planning an attack. I wanted to question him, determine the truth." He paused. "I never intended for you to take his place."

"Would you have let him go if I hadn't?"

"No."

At least he was honest. Thessaly picked up her fork, more to have something to do with her hands than because she was hungry. "What happens now?"

"That depends."

"On what?"

"On whether you believe what I'm about to tell you." Davorin leaned forward slightly, and his gray eyes were intense. "I need you to understand something, Princess. Ten years ago, I led an army against Lumenvale. I gave the orders that burned your city. My hands killed your father. Those are facts, and I won't insult you by denying them."

Thessaly's hand tightened around the fork until her knuckles went white. "Then why should I listen to anything else you have to say?"

"Because I remember every second of it, and none of it was my choice." His voice was raw now, stripped of formality. "Something took control of me that night. Something ancient and hungry that wore my body like a puppet and made me watch while it destroyed everything. I couldn't stop it. Couldn't even slow it down. Just... screamed inside my own head while my hands did things that still wake me up at night."

He wasn't lying.