Yen was the one to wash her thighs.
With a damp cloth and hands far too gentle for the fury that had just roared behind his eyes, he cleaned the blood from her skin. Each stroke was deliberate, reverent—yet it made her shiver, not from tenderness, but from the quiet calculation in him. His touch was never thoughtless. Even now, after the violence of his possessiveness had settled, he moved with control.
Lily didn't speak. She sat there—bare, exposed, bleeding—and let him care for her like a doll that had broken under his grip. Not out of love, not out of comfort. But because she didn't know what else to do. Her body felt borrowed. Her limbs moved without asking her.
When he finished, he helped her dress. Smoothed her skirts back down. Pulled her sleeves up properly. Then stood back, and simply watched.
Watched her retreat into herself.
She sat at the vanity, the soft lamplight gilding the edges of her still form. Her fingers shook only once—when she dabbed powder beneath her eyes, chasing the redness away. Her lips trembled briefly as she reapplied the soft rouge. But she didn't cry.
She swallowed it. All of it. The ache, the shame, the scream scratching the back of her throat.
Then she looked up.
And took his offered palm.
Their fingers met like a lock snapping closed.
They returned to the gathering just like that—his hand curled around hers like a cuff, their silhouettes regal and composed. Not a hair out of place. Not a word exchanged.
As if nothing had happened behind that sealed door.
As if the darkness hadn't nearly consumed her whole.
-----
The music hadn't changed. The scent of honeywine, crushed petals, and ancient spells still hung thick in the air like a veil too heavy to lift.
No one noticed the shift.
Or maybe they did—and chose to look away.
Yen reentered the room with Lily at his side, his posture impeccable, his aura polished to its usual sheen of quiet menace and magnetic charm. His fingers remained laced with hers, gripping her hand. Not too tight to bruise. But never loose enough to let her slip away.
He laughed now and then—low, warm, a sound smooth enough to fool even the sharpest ear. He spoke to dukes, heirs, foreign beasts cloaked in glamour, each of them eager to earn his regard. And all the while, his hand never left hers.
When he laughed, he would sometimes glance down at her as if to include her in the joke. She smiled, mechanically. Bowed her head where appropriate. Her body performed the part she'd perfected: the elegant empress, the silent muse, the woman so adored she needn't speak to hold the room.
But beneath the silk of her gown, her thighs still ached. A phantom throb lingered from where he'd touched her—where his madness had momentarily worn her skin like a mask.
She said nothing.
She didn't have to.
Yen's grip on her hand would tighten ever so slightly every time she hesitated to respond, or when her gaze drifted too long toward a corner of the hall that didn't contain him. A warning. A reminder.
He turned to a councilor from the southern reaches, something in their language clicking with soft vowels and sharper consonants. His tone was light. Commanding, but affable. Then he leaned to whisper something to Lily in their tongue, and she felt it—his lips grazing the shell of her ear.
"Smile, darling."
She did.
Her eyes flicked over the crowd—beasts in human skin, spirits draped in glamoured gold, highborns who sipped from glasses made of frozen breath. An empire of beautiful monsters. Every one of them more dangerous than the last.
Yet none as dangerous as the man beside her.
None who smiled quite like Yen did—head tilted just so, as though nothing in this world could ever touch him. As if every heartbeat she had was safely locked in his fist.
A noblewoman passed them and curtsied, murmuring compliments to Lily's poise.
"She has that glow of a woman treasured," she said sweetly.
Lily managed a nod, even as her fingers twitched inside Yen's hold. He didn't let go. Only brought her hand to his lips, brushing a kiss against her knuckles with exaggerated tenderness. The crowd cooed, sighed. Jealousy bloomed like smoke in the room.
They looked perfect.
Inseparable.
Untouchable.
But Lily… Lily could feel the crack inside her widening, hairline fractures spreading beneath her skin like a mirror begging to shatter. Her lips smiled. Her eyes shimmered under candlelight.
And her soul screamed so softly that no one heard it but the shadows coiled beneath Yen's skin.
The hall shifted like a living thing—walls draped in flowering vines that curled and bloomed with the music, roots crawling across the ceiling like veins under skin. The Dryad host had spared no magic. Every step left the floor dusted in pollen and stardust. Guests floated more than they walked, enchanted by charm and wine and centuries of protocol.
And then the host herself arrived.
She emerged from a curtain of leaves, her body tall and willowy, bark-and-blood beauty wrapped in robes that shimmered like dew at dawn. Her eyes were like the oldest trees—wide, slow-blinking, filled with the kind of knowing that made even the boldest stop and reevaluate their worth.
"Imperial Highness," the Dryad greeted, her voice a soft rustle of branches. She bowed to Yen, then turned her gaze to Lily. "And Empress. You honor my halls."
Lily lowered her head respectfully. "The honor is ours," she replied, her voice even. Controlled. Not a tremor. She was proud of that.
Yen bowed slightly at her side, the image of grace. "You've woven a masterpiece, Lady Theria," he said, smiling. "Only you could make diplomacy feel like seduction."
Theria chuckled, vines fluttering from her sleeves like breathing things. "That is the goal, isn't it?"
The Dryad's eyes flicked between the two of them.
Lingered just a second too long on Lily.
A question formed in that silence, unsaid, but present like a thorn beneath silk.
And Yen saw it.
His hand slipped from Lily's and instead wrapped around her waist again—not gently this time. His palm flat against her ribs, thumb brushing the underside of her breast as if to say mine in a language older than words.
Theria raised a brow. Not shocked. Just observant.
"I would love to speak more with Her Majesty, if she's willing," the Dryad said smoothly, and offered her hand.
Yen's smile didn't falter.
But it no longer reached his eyes.
"She's been quite tired lately," he replied, his tone gracious but final. "And still recovering from our last journey."
"I see." Theria's gaze sharpened. "Forgive me for asking. I only wished to discuss the gardens. Perhaps another time, then."
Yen inclined his head. "Of course."
Theria bowed once more, but Lily saw the flicker of understanding in her eyes. The kind that only ancient beings possess—the kind that recognized prisons even when they were gilded in gold and called love.
As the Dryad walked away, the vines around her retreated with her like a tide pulling back into seafoam.
Yen said nothing for a moment.
Then he leaned close again, his lips brushing the corner of Lily's ear. "Do not accept hands that are not mine," he murmured, voice low and velvet-dark. "Even if they come wrapped in petals."
Lily didn't respond. She couldn't. She only nodded once, subtly, the way a soldier might salute after surrender.
The crowd kept moving.
The music played.
Somewhere, a spirit laughed too loud. Someone else dropped a glass that shattered into butterflies. Life continued in the realm of the elite.
And Yen? Yen kept smiling. Kept laughing. Kept charming everyone he spoke to, always with his hand anchored to her waist—reminding her and everyone around them exactly where she belonged.
They called it love.
They called it beautiful.
But Lily's smile had begun to ache. Her teeth clenched behind the lipstick.
And deep inside, the part of her still untouched—still hers—was beginning to whisper again.
You have to leave one day.
Even if it kills you.