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He observed me then, his expression a maelstrom of conflicting emotions.

“Something in that house yesterday… It didn’t just scare me. It…it recognized me. Or maybe I recognized it. And it called to something deep inside.”

“You think it woke something up?” he asked, his voice laced with a dread that mirrored my own.

I nodded once, a slight jerky movement. “Or still trying to.” My voice grew quieter still. “Remi…” And for the first time in what felt like an eternity, I let my fear show, raw and unfiltered. “What is happening to me?”

He reached out and took me into his arms. He didn’t answer. Didn’t offer platitudes. Just held on. His breath warmed the edge of my jaw, and one of his hands stroked the curve of my spine, a slow, rhythmic caress.

I let my head rest against his shoulder, listening to the steady rhythm of his pulse. He didn’t ask for anything more. And I didn’t explain. Not yet. There were no words.

We just breathed. Together.

At some point, Remiel and I must have fallen back asleep. I awoke to the disorienting sensation of being pressed against a living furnace in the shape of an angel. His presence, so familiar yet still so unwanted, felt like a chain coiled around my spirit, one I had forgotten I still bore. His arm rested across my waist, a grip that was secure, heavy, and undeniably possessive.

A slow, steady rhythm echoed from his chest to mine as his warm breath caressed the nape of my neck. I could feel my battered form, drained and curling involuntarily. For a single fragile moment, I let it all fall away: the looming house, the whispering auras, and the screaming walls.

But the faint scrape of metal at my wrists dissolved that moment. The silver cuffs were no longer pristine. They were tarnished, streaked with veins of black oxidation that hadn’t been there the night before. My darkness wasn’t just resisting them; it was eating them.

I threw myself out of bed, my limbs becoming tangled in the rumpled sheets, and staggered onto the hard wooden floor. My breaths came in sharp, jagged bursts, my pulse thundering in my ears.

Remiel awoke with a jolt, his eyes flying open and his hand searching the space where I had been only moments before. “Cassia?” His voice, rough and laden with sleep, trembled with a concern I didn’t want, didn’t trust. “What…what is it?”

I turned to face him and extended my wrists to display my shackles, letting the cold metal catch the morning light. “Take them off!”

He blinked, his mind clearly still struggling to bridge the gap between sleep and this confrontation. “What…?”

“The cuffs, Remiel. They’re still on me.” My voice was low, cutting through the quiet air. “I nearly died yesterday, and you left them on.”

“I didn’t think…”

“Exactly!” I snapped, stepping closer. “You never think! You chain me up like some feral beast—and never once consider freeing me.”

His jaw tightened, a pained protest. “It was the only thing that kept you contained yesterday. I was trying to protect you—”

“Take them off.” My voice rose. “I will not be bound by anything or to anyone!”

Remiel pushed himself upright, his shirt clinging to his chest. His form still bore the unmistakable power of one hailed as righteous, though now shadowed by strain. “I told you it was temporary. Just until—”

“Until what?” My tone was edged with bitter, incredulous disbelief. “Until you trusted me again? Until you decided I was safe enough, tame enough, to be granted my freedom?”

He could offer no response; his silence was a damning admission.

“You don’t get to decide that for me, Remiel,” I whispered, the finality of my words heavy. “Not anymore.”

Softly, with a resignation that was laced with a sorrow I refused to acknowledge, he said, “I was trying to keep you close because I knew you’d run the moment I turned away. Don’t lie, Cassia.”

“Maybe I would have.” My voice cracked with the weight of truths too painful to fully voice. “And after everything you did to us, you deserved that.”

The space between us stretched thin, laden.

His voice was then a plea. “Cassia—”

“No,” I snapped, shoving one foot into a boot. Then the other. My eyes darted for my coat, but it was nowhere I could reach without breaking stride. So, I left it. The cuffs clinked as I pushed past the chair, past him. “If you want a tether, Guardian, come with me. See what you’ve chained yourself to.”

I slammed the door, and my boots struck hard against the narrow stairwell. My fury filled the air, fierce enough to drag him in my wake.

He followed, silent but near. This time, he made no move to hold me back.