Chapter 359: Chapter 359: Don’t you dare, Luca
"Oh no," Isabella whispered, eyes still locked on Kian’s face like she refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing her panic. "Tsk, you’re the worse." She pushed her lower lip out in a full, dramatic pout, the kind that usually got her exactly what she wanted. Not today, apparently.
"Hmph." That small offended sound came from Glimora first—sharp and tiny—before the little beast turned away too, copying her mama’s attitude like a mirror with fur. Ears tipped back. Tail flick. Disapproval in miniature.
Isabella dragged in a breath to argue more, then slowly twisted her head toward the door. And froze. Ophelia and Luca stood there like two carved statues that had accidentally learned how to gape. Ophelia’s mouth was open. Luca’s eyebrows were somewhere near the ceiling. The light from the hall framed them both, throwing their shock into clear relief. It wasn’t a quiet entrance. It was an ambush by silence.
When the two who had apparently been missing for who-knew-how-long finally stepped into the room, they had prepared themselves for anything. Everything. A spilled pot, a broken spear, Zyran hanging upside down from the rafters for some reason. What they did not prepare for was their King and Isabella caught in a pose that said close in every language: Isabella sunk into Kian’s lap like she lived there, Kian’s arm around her waist like a band of warm iron, Glimora planted on Isabella’s thighs like a crown jewel. It was intimate in that calm way that told you this wasn’t a mistake. It was a choice.
Ophelia had left Glimora only to fetch something from her room, and in that small window, the world decided to shift. Now the beast she’d been babysitting was curled on Isabella’s lap, looking like a queen who had discovered taxes. Ophelia’s eyes went rounder. Her full lips parted. She didn’t speak, but her face said, You too, Glimora? You too? Traitor?
She should not have been this shocked. This was a world where people woke up and discovered their neighbors had been mated to three, five, ten partners overnight and were now arguing over whose turn it was to fetch water. Surprise was supposed to be a daily breakfast. But this? This was not just any man. This was Kian.
Kian, who the whole village assumed would never find a mate—not because he was cursed or ugly (as if) but because he had decided not to want anyone. Kian, whose blue eyes made people step carefully and whose silence could break the brave. Kian, who women respected and feared at the same time, and therefore never dared to chase, to tease, to try. He had made himself a wall. People had learned to walk around it.
So yes, Ophelia’s shock made sense. She looked from Isabella to Kian and back again, running a fast checklist: Did Isabella look scared? No. Forced? Not in a million lives. Embarrassed? A little, but in the good way—the caught with your crush way. Happy? Oh yes. Bright around the edges happy. Relief loosened Ophelia’s shoulders by a finger-width. Then worry tried to climb back in, because it was Ophelia and she was built from worry and sugar both.
Luca wasn’t built for standing still under pressure. The man could face a charging boar without blinking, but this? This required commentary. "Sooo," he began, drawing the word out like a rope, ready to lasso the awkwardness. He was the first to break the silence, which was either heroic or very foolish. Probably both.
He had a lot to say. He also had Kian’s gaze on him—cool, level, no heat, just warning. Luca swallowed the rest of his sentence like a man swallowing a bone. His eyes flicked to Isabella for help. She was already looking at him. She had already read his face like a bad poem.
"Don’t you dare, Luca," Isabella said, trying to keep her tone firm, which was difficult because Kian’s palm against her waist kept reminding every nerve that she was held. Her voice still managed to have bite. It usually did.
"I haven’t even said anything yet," Luca blurted, defensive, scrambling, even though he had absolutely said everything with his sooo. He clasped his hands behind his back like a schoolboy trying to look innocent in front of the headmistress.
Isabella cut her eyes to Ophelia, and the air shifted again. Right—there was still a small cloud between them. A bruise of hurt that hadn’t faded. The charged air around Kian and Isabella turned into something else when it touched Ophelia: shy, unsure, a little prickly. "What do you want, Ophelia?" Isabella asked, voice even but edged, as if to say, You chose to leave. Why are you back?
Ophelia flinched like the words had pinched her arm. Then she remembered the thing in her hands and straightened. She had been hiding it behind her back like a child with a gift, waiting for the right moment that never came. She stepped forward one careful pace, then another, as if she had to cross a moat of feelings to get there.
"This is for you," she said, and finally brought it out.
Resting on her palm was a bracelet made of flowers and thorns. Not just any thorns. Someone had bent each thorn perfectly so they curved in a smooth loop, harmless but still proud of their shape. The flowers were small, white with pale pink centers, braided in a pattern that matched nothing in the palace and everything in Ophelia’s heart. It was delicate but not weak, soft but not silly. It was pretty in that way that made you want to touch carefully and then wear it forever.
Isabella’s breath caught. Body first, mind second. She reached out a little, then paused, because the light caught on Ophelia’s skin and turned everything else into background noise. The backs of Ophelia’s hands showed thin healing lines—fresh, faint, dozens of them like pale scratches left by stubborn plants. Not accidents. Work. Effort. The kind of marks you get when you’ve refused to ask for help.
Isabella’s face shifted. The happiness at the bracelet slid under a frown so fast it made Ophelia’s heart knock. "Ophelia," Isabella said, voice low.
Ophelia’s eyes jumped up, hopeful, guilty, braced for whatever came next.
"What gave you all those scars?" Isabella asked. Her tone was gentle and sharp at the same time. She already knew the answer. Everyone in the room did, if they thought for even a second. Ophelia’s careful bends. Ophelia’s careful pride. Ophelia’s refusal to bring anyone else into it. But Isabella still asked it, because a small, stubborn part of her hoped she was wrong. Hoped the marks were from something harmless and not from love trying too hard.
Kian’s hand at Isabella’s waist tightened almost invisibly, a silent offer of support. He didn’t speak. He watched Ophelia with those river-blue eyes that measured danger by how close it was to Isabella’s heart. Glimora, very interested in the shiny thing, leaned forward on Isabella’s lap until her nose almost touched the bracelet. She sniffed. Decided it passed. Then sniffed Ophelia’s wrist, and her ears softened because the wrist smelled like flowers and worry, both of which she approved of.
Luca’s bulk stayed in the doorway, but his weight shifted—one foot forward, one back—as if he might bolt or salute depending on the next words. His eyes flicked once to Kian’s arm around Isabella, and he looked away quickly before Kian’s gaze could catch him again and pin him to the wall like a bug.
The room drew smaller. The sunlight stripe on the floor seemed to narrow. The warmth of Kian behind Isabella, the small weight of Glimora on her knees, the distance between Ophelia’s outstretched hand and Isabella’s fingers—everything got measured in breaths instead of steps. Isabella’s pulse ticked in her throat. Ophelia’s cheeks flushed, the pink moving up to the tips of her ears. Her hands trembled just a little, and the bracelet trembled with them, the bent thorns catching the light like tiny, curved moons.
"Ophelia," Isabella said again, softer this time, the anger folded so the worry could show. "What gave you all those scars?"
Ophelia swallowed. Her lips parted. Her eyes flicked down at the bracelet like it could answer for her. The room waited. Even the small breeze through the window seemed to quiet, as if it didn’t want to make noise at the wrong time.
Glimora made a tiny sound—half complaint, half comfort—and pressed her leg into Isabella’s thigh, leaning her weight. Isabella set her free hand on Glimora’s back, fingers sliding through the soft fur, grounding herself in the warm, living thing that had forced the door wide because a small opening was not enough.
Ophelia’s throat worked. She lifted the bracelet higher, almost as if to hide behind it, then lowered it again and gave the smallest, saddest smile. The kind of smile you use when you’re about to tell the truth and you hate it.
Isabella’s frown deepened, but her eyes gentled. She already knew the answer. She just wanted to hear it wrong one time.
"Ophelia," she repeated, "what gave you all those scars?" Even though she already knew the answer, she was just hoping she was wrong.