The contract

The nib of the fountain pen hovered just above the page. Elara’s pulse thundered in her ears, drowning out the steady tick of the grandfather clock in the corner. Each second was a blade slicing away the last of her hesitation.

Damian watched her like a hawk—motionless, unreadable, yet coiled with a tension that filled the room like smoke.

Finally, her hand descended.

Ink flowed across parchment, binding her name to clauses that felt more like shackles than promises. The scratch of the pen was deafening. When she finished, she set it down as though it burned her skin.

“It is done,” she whispered.

“No,” Damian said softly, retrieving the contract with careful precision. “It has only begun.”

He folded the papers into a leather folio and locked it inside the desk. The metallic click echoed like a closing cell door.

Elara’s knees weakened, and she gripped the back of a chair for balance. “You’ve caged me.”

His gaze sharpened, but for an instant, the darkness in his eyes flickered—not pride, not triumph, but something jagged, something that hurt. “Better a cage than a grave.”

The words chilled her. They sounded less like threat and more like confession.

She wanted to ask who put you in a cage first? but the question stuck in her throat.

The hours after blurred. A seamstress arrived with gowns—black, navy, blood-red—fabrics that whispered against her skin like whispers of doom. Tailors adjusted measurements while Damian gave curt instructions: “No pale colors. No frivolity.”

Elara stood stiff as they pinned hems, refusing to flinch when needles pricked her skin. If he wanted her draped in shadows, so be it.

By evening, she was summoned back to the study. Damian stood before the fire, the flames casting his profile into harsh relief. A decanter of wine sat untouched between two glasses.

“You’ve signed,” he said, not looking at her. “So now you must understand what it means.”

He gestured toward the glass, but when she reached for it, his hand intercepted hers. His fingers closed around her wrist—firm, not bruising, but unyielding.

“There are rules in this house,” he said. “Rules that keep you alive.”

Her breath caught at the weight of his stare. “Alive?”

“This estate has many locked doors. Do not open them. There are rooms you will not enter, questions you will not ask.”

A chill snaked through her veins. “And if I do?”

He leaned closer, so near she could see the faint scar crossing his temple, the shadow of stubble along his jaw. His voice dropped to a murmur, dangerous and intimate.

“Then you will see the monster everyone claims I am.”

The fire popped behind him, showering sparks. His grip loosened, though his eyes did not.

Elara pulled her hand back, rubbing her wrist. “You’re not asking me to be a wife. You’re asking me to be a prisoner.”

“You think too little of yourself,” Damian said with a sharpness that startled her. “Prisoners can be discarded. Wives… cannot.”

The distinction did not comfort her.

Later, when she retreated to her chamber, the storm had calmed. Yet unease churned in her stomach as violently as ever. The contract lay signed, the vows unspoken but carved into her fate.

From the hallway beyond her door came the echo of footsteps—slow, deliberate, patrolling. Guards or shadows, she couldn’t tell.

She turned away, pulling the curtains tight, trying to banish the vast darkness of the estate from her mind. But sleep came only in fragments, broken by dreams of locked doors and eyes watching from portraits, by whispers of promises written in blood.

Damian’s POV

He sat alone in the study long after the house fell silent. The contract rested in the drawer, a thin sheath of paper holding together the ruins of his control.

He poured himself wine but did not drink. His hand trembled once before he forced it still.

He had seen the flicker of fear in her eyes when she signed. He should have relished it—fear was leverage, fear kept people obedient. But instead, something old and unbidden had stirred inside him.

The look had reminded him of another time, another girl, another set of wide, frightened eyes staring up at him while he was still a boy locked in someone else’s cage.

He pressed his fingers to his temple, shoving the memory back into the vault he never dared open.

This was not about him. This was about control, survival, order.

And yet, as he stared into the fire, Damian could not shake the echo of her whisper: You’ve caged me.

He poured the wine down the drain and closed the study doors against the night.

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