Chapter 223
“…….”
A suffocating silence.
Kazhan stood frozen, his thoughts stalled in the face of Ysaris’s regained memories. Only after forcing himself to breathe did he finally move his lips.
“Ysaa, I—”
“Don’t call me that.”
The sharp interruption made him flinch. He shook his head. This wasn’t just about a name. There was no returning to what they’d been.
“Calm down, Ysaa. Just listen—”
“I said don’t call me that!”
Her voice cracked like a whip. Fists clenched, head bowed, she shouted with such raw fury that Kazhan’s breath caught.
While he fixated on the name, Ysaris fixated on his refusal to yield—yet another proof that the man before her wasn’t the Cain she knew.
He was Kazhan Tennilath. The tyrant. The enemy.
“How could you?” Her voice trembled. “How could you—how could you do this to me?”
Something hot and jagged kept rising in her chest. She didn’t want to cry, but the pressure was unbearable.
The memory surfaced, vivid as yesterday: Cain Jenut, the man she’d secretly loved, murmuring that name with such tenderness it made her heart stutter.
And then—the rage. The murderous fury when Kazhan Tennilath, on the verge of death by her hand, had the gall to use that name. As if he took pleasure in tormenting her, even unconsciously.
The same actions. The same man. She knew that now. But the wound he’d carved into her heart had long since hardened into a scar—unremovable, unhealing.
That was what Kazhan was to her.
“I begged you not to.”
She’d begged him to kill her instead. To spare her people. To not take her by force. To see her innocence. She’d pleaded—
A drop fell onto the sheets. Then another. Like ink spreading through cloth, her sorrow seeped into everything.
“How could you…”
The words looped, a broken record with no resolution.
‘How could you. How could you do this to me?’
Unbeknownst to her, they mirrored the refrain Kazhan had chanted in his heart all those years, when he’d believed her the betrayer. Not that it would have mattered. Everyone sees their own pain first.
‘If you loved me, you should’ve trusted me. At least talked to me. If you realized your mistake, you should’ve asked for forgiveness, not lied.’
Her fists shook.
‘How dare he blame the curse? He was the one who’d shattered their covenant.’
‘Or maybe he was right. Maybe everything between them had been cursed from the start.’
‘Not love. Never love.’
“…Ysaris.”
Kazhan’s voice dragged her from the depths. Those somber crimson eyes were suddenly right before her.
“I’m sorry. This is my fault—so don’t cry.”
“……”
She knew that look. Knew he wanted to wipe her tears but didn’t dare touch her.
She hated it. Wished she could go back to the early days of their marriage, when Kazhan Tennilath had been a stranger.
Better yet—wished Cain Jenut had truly died that day, and Kazhan had been someone else entirely.
“Ha.”
The thought horrified her.
Wishing Cain had died?
After all her tears? All her regret? After loving and missing him so desperately?
How could she think such a thing?
“Ugh—”
“Ysaris! What’s wrong? I’ll call a physician—”
She tried to stop him as he lurched up, but the room spun. Her body crumpled sideways. Nausea churned in her empty stomach.
Everything was tangled—her body, her memories, her emotions.
Had she truly lived years of the past in just two days of dreams? It felt like she’d loved Cain, watched him die, and endured Kazhan’s forced marriage all in the span of a heartbeat. The emotional whiplash was a tidal wave.
And for a woman who’d just woken from captivity—it was too much.
* * *
Discussion
0 CommentsNo comments yet.