CHAPTER 214: LIKE I MATTER

"I’m always listening," Rowan replied smoothly. Then, his attention shifted to Liora. "But you’re shaking."

She stiffened, realizing too late that her hands trembled against her skirts. She curled them into fists. "I’m fine."

Rowan’s brow arched faintly. He didn’t press, but his look lingered long enough to make Lucien step forward, subtly angling himself between them.

"Report later," Lucien said, his tone cold and decisive. "For now, we leave."

Rowan inclined his head, though his lips tightened as if holding back words. "As you command."

He melted back into the corridor’s shadows, leaving only the two of them again.

Liora swallowed hard, her voice breaking the silence. "Lucien... if Darius was lying, say it. Now. Look at me and deny it."

Lucien’s eyes darkened, but he didn’t speak.

And the silence cut deeper than any answer.

The corridors gave way to the wing reserved for Lucien, quieter, darker, and patrolled by only a few loyal guards who bowed low at his passing. The door shut behind them with a weight that left Liora’s ears ringing in the sudden hush.

For the first time since the trial, they were alone.

Lucien moved across the room, stripping away the ceremonial cloak from his shoulders, his movements taut with suppressed rage. The firelight caught in his eyes as he turned, and for a moment Liora felt the chill of standing before a man whose silence was sharper than any blade.

She stood near the door, unwilling to move farther in. "You owe me the truth, Lucien. No more delays. No more half-answers. Did my parents die because of your family?"

His chest rose and fell once, steady but weighted. "Yes."

The word struck like steel. No evasion. No attempt to soften it.

Her breath caught. She gripped the edge of the nearest table, the polished wood biting into her palm. "How?"

Lucien crossed the space between them, though he stopped short of reaching her. His voice was rough, stripped bare. "Your father stood against the Crown. Against my brother, against the council. He rallied men who believed the king’s war in the east was madness. He was right." His jaw clenched. "But when the council demanded blood, it was not Alden’s hands that carried out the order; it was mine. I was commanded to lead the strike."

The room swayed. She searched his face, waiting for denial, for some sign that he was twisting the truth, but his eyes held nothing but raw, brutal honesty.

Her throat closed. "You... you killed them?"

His gaze faltered for the first time. "I gave the order. But I did not light the fire that took your mother. I did not strike the blow that ended your father. Yet the blood is mine all the same. Because I obeyed."

Her vision blurred as her chest heaved. Memories, her father’s voice, and her mother’s laugh it crashed into her like waves. And now this man before her, the one she had begun to trust and cling to, was the same one who had torn it all away.

She staggered back, shaking her head. "You should have told me. From the beginning."

"I know." His voice cracked. He took a step forward, but she flinched, and it froze him where he stood. "Every day since you came into my life, I’ve carried this. Wanting to tell you. Fearing it would break you. Fearing it would drive you from me before I could prove I am not that man anymore."

Tears slipped down her cheeks, but her anger burned hot through them. "And yet here we are."

Lucien’s eyes blazed with something between despair and defiance. "Hate me if you must. But know this, I was a weapon in their hand. The same hand that now seeks to use you. That is why Lilian pits us against each other, why Darius taunts us with fragments of truth. Because if you turn from me, they win."

The silence that followed was thick and charged, their breathing uneven in the firelit room.

Liora pressed a trembling hand to her chest, torn between fury and the ache that twisted her heart when she looked at him.

And for the first time, she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to strike him... or cling to him.

Liora’s chest tightened as if the air itself had turned to iron. Her hand trembled against the table, and she forced it flat to hide the shaking. The truth sat heavy, immovable, refusing to let her breathe.

She lifted her chin, though her vision was blurred with tears. "I trusted you," she whispered, the words scraping out of her throat like glass. "Even when every voice warned me not to. Even when my aunt sold me like a pawn. I thought... at least with you, I was safe."

Lucien flinched, his composure cracking. "You are safe. I would tear down the world before letting it touch you now."

Her laugh was raw, broken. "Safe? You were the blade that cut my family down."

He closed the distance in two strides, stopping so close she could feel the heat radiating from him. His eyes searched hers, fevered, desperate. "And yet I am the same man who has shielded you since the moment you entered these walls. The same man who stood in chains today and let them spit their poison because it kept the noose from your neck." His voice dropped, rough and low. "Do not confuse the monster they forged with the man who stands before you."

Her throat ached, words clawing their way out. "And how am I to separate them? Tell me, Lucien. How am I to look at you without seeing the flames that took everything I loved?"

His hands twitched at his sides, straining not to reach for her. He looked as if he’d rather she struck him, screamed at him, anything but that trembling distance in her eyes. "Because I will not let them take you, too. I am not asking for forgiveness, Liora—I know I don’t deserve it. But I will not let them claim you as they claimed your parents. That oath, I swear on the blood already staining my hands."

Her heart lurched violently against her ribs. His voice, his eyes, the tortured conviction threading through his words, gods, it broke her.

Anger tangled with grief until it knotted into something she could neither name nor master. And before she could stop herself, her palm lashed out, striking his chest.

The sound cracked through the silence.

Lucien didn’t move, didn’t even lift a hand to block. He only stood there, taking it, his jaw set and his eyes locked on hers as if he’d drink down every ounce of her fury and still come back for more.

Another sob tore through her, and she shoved him again. "I hate you," she breathed, though her voice quivered like it didn’t believe its own words. "I hate you for what you did—"

Her push faltered halfway, and in the next breath, her fist curled in the fabric of his tunic instead of striking him away. She hated the way her body betrayed her, trembling not from rage but from the unbearable pull toward him.

His breath caught sharply as her forehead pressed against his chest. For a heartbeat, neither moved.

Then, slowly, with infinite care, Lucien lowered his hand and hovered it at her back, not daring to touch until she gave the smallest, shuddering lean forward. Only then did his palm rest against her, trembling as though the fragile moment could break at any second.

"You can hate me," he murmured into her hair, voice raw. "But don’t leave me."

Liora squeezed her eyes shut, torn between everything she had lost and everything she still couldn’t stop wanting.

Liora’s breath shuddered against his chest, her fingers clutching at his tunic like she couldn’t decide whether to push him away or hold on. The fire crackled behind them, throwing shadows across the stone walls, but the silence between them was louder than the flames.

Her mind screamed at her to move, to break free before his words wrapped chains around her heart. And yet her body refused, frozen in that fragile space between fury and longing.

At last, with a strangled sound, she pushed herself back from him. Her palms flattened against his chest and shoved, not hard, but enough to put a breath of distance between them.

"Don’t," she whispered, her voice unsteady. "Don’t touch me like I matter... not after this."

Lucien’s jaw tightened. The space she had created was small, barely an arm’s length, but he didn’t try to close it. His hand dropped back to his side, curling into a fist to keep from reaching for her again.

"You do matter," he said, the words low and heavy. "More than I ever meant you to."

Her throat burned. She shook her head quickly, as if the denial would make it true. "No. I can’t..." Her voice cracked, and she turned sharply, stepping toward the door before the tears could betray her.

"Liora." His voice followed her, frayed and urgent.

She stopped, her back to him, hand trembling over the iron latch.

"Whatever you believe of me," he said, his tone softer now, threaded with something dangerously close to pleading, "whatever hatred you carry, hold onto it if you must. But don’t let Darius be the voice you trust. If you want the truth, demand it of me. Not him."

Her breath caught, her fingers tightening on the latch until her knuckles ached. For a heartbeat, she almost turned. Almost.

But the memory of fire and Darius’s cruel smile pressed harder than Lucien’s words.

Without answering, she yanked the door open and stepped into the corridor.

The door slammed shut behind her, the sound reverberating through the chamber like a final verdict.

Inside, Lucien stood rooted to the spot, staring at the space where she had been. His chest heaved once, then stilled, and the silence that followed was heavier than before.