The night had the wrong kind of quiet.

Not peace

-a pause.

Like the air itself was holding its breath, waiting to see if the story would end in blood of mercy.

I didn’t need to look around to know she was there.

I could feel her. Mother Severine.

Her presence seeped through the corners of the room, the faint scent of salt and old ash curling into the air f could feel her even before she revealed herself like a pulse beneath the floorboards.

And then… the bond shuddered.

“Francesco?” I turn my gaze at him in shock.

He gasped, his back arching, a snarl ripping from his throat.

His eyes turned molten gold, his veins glowed faint blue, that same eerie color I’d seen in the visions- the color of her curse.

“Eine, stay back!” he growled, his voice broken with pain.

What….?

But I didn’t. I won’t follow.

“Don’t you dare tell me to step away!” I shouted, already moving toward him. “You’re not facing her alone again!”

The air cracked.

The floorboards trembled as his power surged

–

ancient, violent, untamed.

He dropped to one knee, panting, ws digging into the floor. I could see it – the curse twisting inside him, trying to wake. Trying ito /iconsume him from the inside out.

And then I heard her voice.

Whisper–soft, cruelly calm.

“You see? It begins again. Lycaon blood cannot love without destruction.”

Her words slithered through the room like smoke.

It’s a word of poison…

17:30 Wed, Oct 8 bN /b

“Stop!” I yelled into the emptiness. “You’re wrong!”

:

A coldugh answered. “Am I? You saw what he is. What they all are. He will choose himself, as his fathers did before him.”

Francesco groaned, clutching his chest, and I dropped to my knees in front of him.

“Look at me,” I whispered, grabbing his face with both hands. “Francesco, look at me.”

–

He tried gods, he tried

1-

gods, he tried but his eyes were wild, unfocused.

The beast within him fought for control.

“Don’t let her win,” I begged. “Don’t let her make you believe that’s who you are.”

He shuddered, shaking his head. “Eine, I can’t- it hurts-”

“Then let it hurt,” I said fiercely. “Let it hurt, but don’t let it take you.”

And I kissed him.

The bond red

–

violent and beautiful

—-

flooding my body with searing light.

Pain surged through me, not mine but his.

Ugh.. I could feel the curse trying to pull him away, to make him forget everything except hunger, power, survival.

But love isn’t soft.

Not the kind that saves.

So I fought.

Every heartbeat, I poured warmth into that darkness, forcing the bond to burn brighter.

Every wound in his soul, I filled with memory of the garden, ofughter, of the way his hand always found mine in the dark.

About our love…. His love….

“Eine…” His voice cracked like a child’s. “It’s… it’s burning…”

“Good,” I whispered against his lips. “Then maybe it remembers it’s alive.”

The light grew too bright to see.

My lungs screamed for air.

The curse roared

–

furious, ancient, hungry.

And then it stopped.

I gasped when the light dimmed to embers.

The roaring silence returned. fn8f4b ??? ????? ???????s ??? ?????s??? ?? find?novel/fn8f4b

Francesco copsed forward, gasping, his head buried against my shoulder. His heartbeat was ragged, his breath unsteady, but he was there. Alive.

The veins beneath his skin still glowed faintly, like fire hidden under ice. The curse was bstill /bthere- not gone, but lulled. Watching. Waiting.

Paused…

He clutched me tighter, his voice shaking. “Eine… what did you do?”

I smiled weakly with a shake head. “Nothing. I just reminded it that you’re not alone anymore.”

Heughed once a rough, broken sound – and pressed his forehead to mine. “You’re mad.”

“I’m yours,” I murmured. “That’s worse.”

For a while, we stayed like that – two creatures held together by love and defiance, surrounded by a silence that wasn’t empty, just… tired.

And then I felt it – that prickle on the back of my neck.

The air shifted.

She was still there.

In the far corner of the room, the light bent, and Mother Severine appeared – not solid, but enough.

A shimmer of gray, a faint outline of the woman she once was.

Her eyes

ancient and bitter – fixed on us.

She looked almost disappointed.

“You stopped it,” she said quietly. “But you didn’t destroy it.”

I met her gaze. “I wasn’t trying to destroy it.”

She tilted her head. “Then what were you trying to do?”

“To show it something it never saw,” I whispered. “That love doesn’t always end in ruin.”

Her lips curved, faintly, almost pitying. “You think love can pause what has been sealed in blood for

centuries?”

“I don’t think,” I said, “I feel it.”

17:30 bWed/bb, /bbOct /bb8 /bN

That made her falter.

For the first time, she looked uncertain.

Her gaze flicked to Francesco still shaking, his head bowed, his arms wrapped around me as if bI /bwere the only tether he had left to this world.

Something changed in her expression.

A flicker of… something softer.

Pity? Envy?

Regret?

“I once believed that too,” she murmured. “Before he made me forget who I was.”

Her words hung in the air like frost.

I wanted to speak to ask if she ever loved anything after him, if she ever forgave herself – but she turned, her form already fading.

“I will be watching,” she said, voice distant now. “The curse sleeps. But sleep is not mercy. It dreams.”

And then she was gone.

The silence she left behind was heavier than any sound.

Francesco’s fingers trembled as they found mine. “It’s not over,” he said quietly.

“No,” I agreed. “It’s only resting.”

He exhaled slowly, closing his eyes. “Then we rest too. Until it wakes again.”

I nodded, my heart aching but steady. “And when it does… we’ll be ready.”

He smiled faintly, pulling me against his chest.

“Together?”

“Always,” I whispered.

Outside, the wind shifted – soft, uneasy, carrying whispers from forests older than kings.

And somewhere unseen, in the space between dreams and memory, Mother Severine stood in silence, watching the Lycaon King cradle his Luna with reverence instead of dominance.

For the first time in centuries, her conviction trembled.

She had wanted to watch them break.

Instead, she had watched them love..

And though she would never admit it for the first time since the day she cursed his blood, she felt something colder than hatred.

Doubt.

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