IRIS
Recovering was a slow, frustrating process. For three days, I was confined to our chambers, a willing prisoner in my own body. Kaelen was a constant, solicitous presence. He brought me meals, helped me to the bath, and sat with me in silence for hours, his hand resting on mine, a steady, grounding presence that fueled my slow recovery. The profound, soul-deep connection we now shared was a comfort, but it was also a source of a new, sharp-edged vulnerability. I could feel his every flicker of impatience, his constant, low-level hum of worry for Lysander, and the gnawing, restless energy of the beast that was chafing under the weight of inaction.
On the fourth day, I was declared well enough to leave our rooms. The first thing I did was seek out Elara. I needed answers about my magic, about the new, merged nature of my bond with Kaelen, and about the Sepulcher. I found her in her chambers, a small, cozy room tucked away in a less-traveled corridor of the stronghold. She was tending to a small, glowing plant that seemed to pulse with a soft, internal light.
She looked up as I entered, her ancient, knowing eyes taking in my appearance, the faint, new silvery mark on my hand where I had touched Kaelen's heart. A slow, sad smile touched her lips. "I see," she said, her voice a soft, rustling sound. "The prophecy was not of a shared throne or a shared grave, child. It was of a shared soul."
"I need to know what we are now," I said, my voice direct, skipping all pleasantries. "What happened in that atrium... it shouldn't have been possible."
"Love makes the impossible possible," Elara said simply, turning her attention back to her plant. "You didn't just heal him, Iris. You fused with him. Your life forces are now irrevocably intertwined. His strength is yours, and yours is his. But it comes with a cost. A distance between you now will be more than just painful; it will be a slow, withering death for you both."
The words were a cold weight in my gut. I had suspected as much, but hearing it confirmed was another thing. We were no longer just bound by a contract; we were bound by life itself.
Our conversation was long, filled with cryptic warnings and ancient lore about Moon Witches and their fated Lycan counterparts. It was Elara who finally pieced together the final part of the Sepulcher's puzzle. The plague wasn't just anchored by a living conduit; it required a specific artifact to focus its release. The Sanguine Chalice, an ancient vessel carved from the heart of a slain vampire elder, designed to hold and amplify blood magic.
"Marius will have it with him at the ritual site," Elara concluded, her expression grim. "He would never trust a spell of that magnitude to a conduit alone."
Armed with this new, critical piece of information, I left Elara's chambers, my mind racing. I had to find Kaelen, to tell him. The bond was a quiet, steady hum, but it was laced with a new, sharp-edged tension I couldn't quite place. A frustration, an impatience that felt… different. It wasn't just worry for Lysander. It was something else.
I found him not in the war room or on the training grounds, but in a formal receiving hall, speaking with a visiting dignitary from a neutral Fae house. Lady Anya was a vision of ethereal, silver-haired beauty, her voice a musical, melodic sound as she discussed a trade dispute. As I approached, I saw the source of Kaelen's tension. Anya was standing too close. Her hand, with its long, delicate fingers, was resting on his forearm, a gesture of intimate familiarity that was completely inappropriate. And Kaelen, while his expression was its usual mask of cool indifference, wasn't pulling away.
A hot, sharp spike of jealousy, ugly and immediate, shot through me. It was an irrational, gut-wrenching thing. I knew he loved me. I knew our souls were fused. But seeing another woman's hands on him, seeing him allow it, was a physical blow. The days of forced inactivity, of feeling weak and dependent, had frayed my newfound confidence, leaving it thin and raw.
I stopped a few feet away, my arms crossing over my chest, a defensive, aggressive posture. Kaelen's head turned, his silver eyes finding mine. Through the bond, I felt a jolt from him—not guilt, but a sharp, irritated frustration at my interruption. It was that small, careless flicker that did it. That made the hot, jealous anger in my gut turn into a cold, hard rage.
"Iris," he said, his voice a low, even rumble. He made no move to disentangle himself from Lady Anya's touch. "We are just concluding our business."
"Are you?" I asked, my voice dangerously sweet, my eyes locked on the Fae woman's hand. "It looks a bit more personal than business."
Lady Anya’s lips curved into a slow, deliberate smirk. She didn't remove her hand. Instead, her fingers gave his forearm a gentle, possessive squeeze. "The King and I were just discussing the… finer points of interspecies relations," she purred, her musical laced with a deliberate, provocative undertone. "A topic that requires a certain… intimacy."
The air crackled. The Fae woman was deliberately, publicly baiting me. And Kaelen was letting her. The bond between us was a screaming, chaotic mess of my jealous rage and his cold, infuriating impatience.
"Lady Anya," Kaelen said, his voice a low, warning growl. It was a warning to her, but it felt like a dismissal of me. "Our discussion is over. I will send Ronan with the revised treaty."
"Of course, Your Majesty," she said, her smirk widening. She finally, slowly, withdrew her hand, but not before letting her fingers trail down his arm in a final, lingering caress. She gave me a look of pure, triumphant spite before gliding from the hall, a cloud of silver silk and poisoned perfume.
The silence she left behind was a thick, suffocating thing. I didn't move. I just stood there, my arms crossed, my heart a frantic, angry drum against my ribs. I was waiting for an explanation. An apology. Something.
He turned to me fully, his expression a mask of cold, kingly displeasure. "Was there a reason for that display?" he asked, his voice a low, dangerous rumble.
My jaw dropped. A hot, incredulous wave of fury washed over me. "My display? She was practically climbing you like a tree, and you're asking me about *my* display?"
"It was politics, Iris," he snapped, his control finally fracturing, a hot flash of his own anger blasting through the bond. "She is a powerful ally. Her house is pivotal in securing the northern trade routes. I was handling it."
"By letting her grope you in a public hallway?" I shot back, my voice rising with my hurt and anger. "That's not handling it, Kaelen, that's encouraging it! You let her touch you. You didn't even flinch!"
"Because I am a King!" he roared, the sound echoing off the stone walls, a pure, frustrated blast of sound. "And I cannot slap away the hand of a diplomatic envoy because my bond-mate is feeling insecure!"
The word—insecure—hit me like a physical slap. It was the same word Daniel had used to describe me all those years ago. It was the deepest, most painful cut he could have made. The cold rage in my gut crystallized into something hard and unyielding. I saw red.
I didn't say another word. I just turned and walked away, my back ramrod straight, my steps quick and furious. I could feel his shock, his dawning regret through the bond, but I didn't care. He had used my deepest fear, my most painful scar, as a weapon against me. He had turned our private connection into a public tool for his political gain, and then had shamed me for reacting to it.
I didn't go back to our chambers. That was his space. Our space. I went to the one place in this whole stronghold that was mine alone. The small, sparsely furnished room he had first assigned to me, the one that still held the faint, lingering scent of my own herbs and my own magic. I slammed the door behind me, the sound a sharp, satisfying crack in the tense silence.
I paced, the angry energy a living thing under my skin. How could he? After everything? After we had literally fused our souls, how could he still see me as the insecure little hedge witch he needed to manage? How could he let another woman touch him with such casual familiarity?
The bond was a frantic, discordant hum of his regret and my fury. It was an open, bleeding wound between us. I wanted to slam a mental wall on it, to shut him out, but I couldn't. We were too close now. His emotions were my own, a constant, maddening buzz under my skin.
Minutes later, the door to my room crashed open, slamming against the wall with enough force to splinter the wood. Kaelen stood in the doorway, his chest heaving, his silver eyes burning with a turbulent mix of fury, regret, and a desperate, possessive need. He looked like a storm, a terrifying, beautiful force of nature.
"Don't you ever walk away from me like that again," he growled, the words a low, guttural command as he strode into the room.
"Or what?" I shot back, my voice shaking with a rage that was so much more than just jealousy. It was the betrayal of it all. "You'll bind me? You've already done that! You've already made it clear that I'm just another piece on your board, to be moved and managed at your convenience!"
"That's not what I meant and you know it!" he roared, closing the distance between us in three long, furious strides. He grabbed my arms, his grip not gentle, but a hard, possessive brand. "I was handling a political snake, Iris! I was playing a game! It meant nothing!"
"It meant something to me!" I yelled, trying to pull away from his grip, but he was an unmovable wall of muscle and fury. "It meant you let her touch you! It meant you made me feel like a fool!"
"You're not a fool," he snarled, his face inches from mine, his breath a hot, angry gust against my lips. "You're my mate! My entire soul! And you drove me to distraction with your suspicion, with your…" He broke off, a raw, frustrated sound escaping his throat.
"With my what?" I demanded, my eyes burning with unshed tears of pure fury. "Say it!"
"With your jealousy!" he finally roared, the word a raw, desperate sound. And then he was kissing me.
It wasn't a kiss of apology or comfort. It was a violent, desperate collision. A punishment and a plea all at once. His lips crushed mine, his tongue forcing its way into my mouth in a hard, possessive invasion. It was an angry, brutal claiming, a physical manifestation of the chaotic storm raging between us. He was angry at my lack of trust, and I was angry at his careless disregard for my heart. And all of that fury, all of that hurt, was pouring into the kiss.
I should have pushed him away. I should have fought. But I didn't. I met his fury with my own. I bit his lower lip, a sharp, punishing sting that made him growl and kiss me harder, his hands tightening on my arms, pulling me flush against the hard, unyielding wall of his chest. The kiss was a battle, a raw, desperate fight for dominance, for apology, for understanding.
He spun us, slamming my back against the wall, his body pinning mine, a hard, possessive weight that was both infuriating and unbearably arousing. The bond was a screaming, chaotic feedback loop of anger and desperate, clawing lust. This wasn't about love or connection. It was about erasing the sight of another woman's hands on him. It was about reasserting a claim that had felt, for a few horrifying moments, like it was slipping.
He tore at my tunic, the sound of ripping fabric a loud, violent tear in the tense room. His hands, rough and urgent, were on my skin, palming my breasts, his thumbs brushing over my nipples in a hard, possessive caress that made me gasp into his mouth. My own hands were not idle. I fumbled with the lacings of his trousers, my fingers clumsy with desperate need, with the primal urge to have him inside me, to erase everything and everyone else until there was only us.
He kicked my legs apart, his body a hard, demanding pressure between my thighs. He entered me in one, hard, punishing thrust that was a desperate, angry possession. There was no preamble, no gentle preparation. It was a raw, desperate taking. A physical apology that was as violent as the argument that had precipitated it. He began to move, a hard, deep, driving rhythm that was a desperate, angry mantra. *Mine. You are mine.*
I met him, thrust for brutal thrust, my nails digging into the hard muscles of his back through his shirt, my hips rising to take him deeper. It was a fight, a desperate, angry clash of bodies and souls. Each thrust was a question, an accusation, a plea. Each meeting of our hips was an answer, a vow, a surrender. The pleasure was a sharp, secondary thing, a blinding, white-hot edge to the raw, emotional storm. It wasn't about feeling good. It was about feeling *owned*. About reasserting a truth that had been shaken.
The orgasm, when it hit, was a violent, shattering thing. It ripped through me, a convulsive wave that was as much pain as it was pleasure, a cathartic release of all the fury and hurt. My inner muscles clamped down on him, a rhythmic, desperate pulse that pulled a ragged, guttural roar from his own throat as he found his own release, his hot seed a final, furious brand deep inside me.
We collapsed against the wall, a tangle of limbs and ragged breathing, our bodies slick with sweat. The anger was gone, burned away in the fire of our desperate joining. In its place was a raw, aching vulnerability. A profound, soul-shaking remorse.
I leaned my head against his chest, my forehead pressed against the cool, damp fabric of his shirt, listening to the frantic, slowing beat of his heart. His arms came around me, not in a possessive grip, but in a gentle, hesitant embrace. A silent apology.
"I'm sorry," he rasped, his voice a raw, shredded sound. "The word I used... insecure... It was the most cruel, stupid thing I could have said. I am a fool. A jealous, insecure fool who was terrified of losing you for even a second, and I lashed out like a child."
I closed my eyes, a single, hot tear finally escaping and tracing a path through the sweat on my cheek. "I'm sorry too," I whispered, my voice a thin, reedy thing. "I should have trusted you. But seeing her... it broke something."
He tightened his arms, a hard, desperate hug. "It broke something in me too," he murmured, his lips pressing a soft, reverent kiss to the crown of my head. "To see that doubt in your eyes... to know I was the cause of it... it was worse than any poison."
We stood there, in the wreckage of our anger, holding each other in the quiet, dim light of the room. It had been brutal. It had been ugly. But it had also been honest. We had faced the ugly, jealous parts of ourselves, and we had survived. We had fought, and we had forgiven. And in the raw, vulnerable aftermath, our bond, once a screaming, chaotic thing, was now a quiet, peaceful river. Deeper and stronger than it had been before. We were not just mates. We were partners. And we were a mess. But we were a mess together.