CHAPTER 152: CHAPTER 152: CASSIAN REFUSED TO STAY IN DEMON REALM

With this words he closed the distance between them in a blink of eye.

His hand gripped Cassian’s wrist tightly, not enough to hurt, but enough to remind him of the strength beneath his skin. His other hand slid behind Cassian’s neck, tilting his face up gently, but with unshakable control.

"You think this is new?" Dorian said quietly, eyes boring into him. "That this started the moment I brought you here?"

Cassian’s heart pounded. "It did. I never wanted this. I never—"

"You were mine," the Supreme Lord cut in, "long before I wore this crown. Before I had this title. Before you were dragged from that palace. You were always mine."

Cassian’s face flushed, hot with shame and fury. "I belonged to no one."

Dorian leaned in, brushing his nose against Cassian’s cheek, his breath warm and steady. "You did. You just didn’t know it then."

Cassian struggled, but the grip on his neck didn’t budge.

"Let me go."

The Lord chuckled softly. "I already told you. You can’t leave. Not anymore."

"I hate you," Cassian whispered, trembling now—whether from anger or something deeper, he didn’t want to name.

The Supreme Lord smiled, slow and cruel. "Good. Hate me from where you belong. At my side."

Cassian’s stomach twisted. "You turned me into one of them. Just one more number in your endless list of concubines."

Dorian’s hand slid down, brushing along the side of his throat, fingertips feather-light. Cassian shivered, even though he hated the feeling.

"I didn’t mark you like them," the Lord said. "You’re not like the others. You never were."

Cassian looked away, throat tight. "Then why do I feel like I’m in a cage?"

The Lord’s voice turned softer. Quieter. "Because you were born for mine."

Tears burned at the edges of Cassian’s eyes—hot and angry. He hated this. Hated the way Dorian made everything sound like fate. Like he’d never had a choice.

He clenched his jaw. "I don’t want to be here."

The Lord tilted his head, almost studying him. "And yet, you came with me."

"I was unconscious."

Cassian wanted to scream. He wanted to strike him. To run until he was nothing but a ghost in the wind.

But he didn’t move.

And Dorian saw that.

He stepped closer again, brushing Cassian’s hair from his face, his touch maddeningly soft. "You’re trembling, Cassian."

"It’s disgust," he spat.

The Supreme Lord tilted his head and looked at him with a slow smile that made Cassian shudder.

Cassian stood frozen as the Supreme Lord returned to his seat. The opulent throne-like couch. He leaned back leisurely, as though the heavy air between them was nothing. As if his cruel declarations were a simple, passing breeze.

"Go back, Cassian," the Demon Lord said at last, voice low and curling like smoke. "Earn your place back. And forget about going anywhere from here."

The finality in his tone settled like iron in Cassian’s chest.

Dismissed.

That was it.

Cassian’s lips parted, but no words came. He turned slowly, each step toward the gilded doors heavier than the last. His heart wasn’t just pounding—it was shattering. Splintering in silent echoes with every breath he took.

This couldn’t be real.

This couldn’t be his Prince Dorian.

The man who once was gentle with him and treated him as his equal never made him believe that he was just a possession. Or he was beneath there status to love a royalty.

But that man was gone.

This demon before him... he looked like someone out of Cassian’s nightmares—except for one cruel detail.

He sounded exactly like the man in his dreams.

He said things that tangled with Cassian’s memory and made his skin crawl with unwanted familiarity.

You were mine before any of this.

You just didn’t know it then.

Why did those words make something twist so painfully in his chest?

Back in his chambers, Cassian collapsed onto the edge of the bed—a bed far too grand for someone like him. Silk sheets. Moonstone embroidery. Everything in this room screamed belonging. But he didn’t feel it.

He wasn’t proud. He wasn’t flattered. He was angry and utterly furious.

And beneath that rage burned a deeper pain. A hollow ache that no position, no title, no soft bed could fill.

What did Supreme Lord mean by earning back a place?

What place? He had never had one to begin with.

He had only been a servant. A shadow in the palace walls. A quiet presence in the corner of a prince’s chambers. No name. No rights. Not even a goodbye the day he was dragged out like garbage.

And now?

Now he was a concubine. One of thousands.

Cassian’s hands clenched the silk sheets so tightly his knuckles turned white. Shame curled in his stomach like rot.

He didn’t want this.

He didn’t want any of this.

All he had ever wanted—was freedom.

Just when he had been close. So, so close.

He had nearly completed his six-year term serving the Morthagar Knights. That had been the deal. The unbreakable oath. Serve the northern kingdom, pledge body and loyalty, and when time was done—freedom would be his.

He would finally leave Morthagar and search for her.

His sister.

The only person left in the world that mattered to him.

He hadn’t forgotten. Not her face, not the sound of her laugh, not the day they were torn apart.

And now? Now all of it was slipping from his grasp. Again.

Why was he always someone’s captive?

Why did fate treat him like a coin to be passed between hands?

First, he was sold to the Aetherlyn Palace as a slave boy with no rights. Then, beaten and discarded by the Queen’s guards when Dorian had gone away. He should’ve died that night—but he hadn’t. A stranger had found him. A person of Morthagar. A man who promised shelter in exchange for one thing.

Loyalty.

Cassian had taken the oath. Not because he wanted to serve—but because he wanted to live. Because he wanted to see her again.

No one knew what he had endured for that dream.

No one knew how many nights he’d bled during training, how often he’d bitten back tears just to survive the rigid laws of Morthagar’s warrior code. How many bones he’d broken. How many sleepless nights he’d spent practicing with a blade twice his size.

He did it all. Without complaint. Without breaking.

Because he wanted to gain back his freedom.

Until he came back into his life like a storm, ready to blow apart his mind, his heart, and all the suffering he had endured for years.

Until Dorian—no, not Dorian. The Supreme Lord—appeared out of nowhere and dragged him to this cursed realm of obsidian skies and shadowed halls. As if Cassian were some jewel to be reclaimed.

As if his will didn’t matter at all.

Cassian pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes, breathing hard. He had to think. He had to find a way out.

The oath to Morthagar still bound him. He shouldn’t even be in another realm. The magic of that vow—etched in blood and bone—should have kept him there. Unless...

Unless Dorian had done something to bend the rules.

Of course he did.

Of course, the Supreme Lord of the demon realm would cheat fate, twist it, and rewrite every rule. Even as a human, he had known just how powerful the Supreme Lord was. But he had never thought that one day he would meet him and certainly not like this.

Cassian grit his teeth, throat burning with swallowed screams.

He refused to stay here.

He refused to be just another silk-draped shadow lounging in some perfumed harem. He had dignity. He had a purpose. He had someone to find.

He was not going to let the past or the lies of a man he once loved, trap him again only to be discarded at will.