Page 27 of A Touch of Darkness

You’re not crazy.

The voice is soothing, familiar, like a warm embrace.

I’m here. Help me, Sylv.

A sob escapes me, and I sink to my knees, clutching at my chest. My hands cup my ears, trying to drown her voice out, trying to mask my crazy.

“You’re not real,” I whisper. “You’re gone. You’re dead. They said…”

Tears continue to stream down my face as I shake my head back and forth, a high-pitched whine coming from my throat. I want to believe her, but the rational part of me is screamingthat it’s impossible. That she’s just saying whatever she can to manipulate me.

But the voice in my head… it feels too real to ignore.

I love you, Sylvie.

I don’t know what to believe anymore. I don’t know what’s real, what’s a lie, or what’s just the desperate ramblings of my grief-stricken mind.

But as I sit here, broken and lost, Isabel’s words hang in the air, and a part of me wonders if she’s right, or if I’m just grasping at the last threads of hope before they slip through my fingers.

But the moment my thoughts drift back to Solstice and Isabel, Lara’s words come again.

Don’t trust her.

The bedroom in my parents’ manor feels like a tomb, the air sizzling with an unspoken finality as Seraphina gently stirs beside me. Her body, warm and soft against mine, is both a balm and a blade, a comfort I no longer deserve. The early morning sun filters through the billowing brocade curtains, splintering into fractured beams that paint her skin in shades of gold. Her long, loose curls fan out on the pillow, her nightcap long gone after our time together in the middle of the night. She is a vision of serenity—an illusion I long to preserve. My eyes trace the faint constellation of freckles dotting her neck, and I cannot resist brushing my fingers over them, as if mapping the starts of a world I can never return to.

An odd stillness brews in the air as she stirs, a weight that lingers between us like the quiet before a storm. I should have known that nothing good would come from this, and yet, she is temptation incarnate—a force that has unraveled me, thread by delicate thread.

Her hand rests lightly on my chest, the quiet rise and fall of her breath soothing, but my thoughts churn with a restless violence.

“I’m carrying your child, Lucian.”The words from our night together come back to me. She told me directly after we came together.

A child. Our child. It feels surreal, like a dream I can’t wake from.

One that will surely cast us into an inevitable nightmare.

Everything has changed so quickly. All I’ve learned—what we’ve created—bears down on me with the crushing force of inevitability. This—this life, this love—will surely destroy us both.

Pregnant.

As much as I want to hold onto that fragile spark of life, something inside me tells me that this is the end.

It must be.

She’s everything I’ve desired, everything I’ve needed but denied myself. For years, I convinced myself she was beyond my reach—a forbidden fruit, too sweet, too perfect for a man like me. She was the light that pierced the shadow of my existence. And now I have destroyed her. I have ruined us. She’s the one who’s always been there, the one who healed my wounds—both the ones on my body and the ones in my soul. Over the years of her working for my family, we’ve grown closer, slowly but surely, each touch, each stolen glance building into something I can’t contain anymore.

But now, it’s clear: we’ve gone too far.

I was raised to understand duty—my duty to my family, to my name, to my future. The crown of this house, the title, the wealth, the power—it all comes with conditions. I have never been allowed to stray from those expectations, not once. Andthe moment I allow myself to indulge in something like this, it all falls apart.

Her family have been the healers of ours for longer than I can remember. My father has warned me, when seeing me stare a little too long, that I must never mix pleasantries with the “help.” I just couldn’t stay away from her. I know I have to end it. I know I have to deny her because if I don’t, she will be ruined by my father—and I will, too.

She will be better off without me.

I have no choice.

As if the universe itself has decided to test me, the door creaks open. My father. He stands in the doorway, imposing, his silhouette dark and angular, like a sword poised to strike. His eyes narrow as he takes in the sight of us—me, tangled in the sheets with Seraphina, my arm protectively around her. The disgust on his face is palpable, and I already know what’s coming.

“Lucian,” he growls, his voice like a knife cutting through the still air. “What in God’s name is this?”

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