I stayed there for a long time.
Not moving. Not blinking. Just breathing in his scent and trying not to fall apart.
Nine didn't stir.
His chest rose and fell in shallow rhythm, the kind that barely qualified as sleep. His eyes were closed, lashes unmoving. His skin had a faint sheen of sweat, like he was still running from something even in unconsciousness.
Maybe he was.
The damage didn't need to be named. I could smell it. Not blood, not bruising—though those were there too, buried beneath the antiseptic and the clinical sterility of the room—but the scent of fear. Of misuse. Of something taken too far.
Kol had left quietly, his presence retreating without words. Maybe he knew I needed to be alone. Maybe he didn't want to watch me fall apart.
Nyx wasn't growling.
She wasn't pacing.
She was just… still.
And I knew what that stillness meant.
She didn't want revenge right now.
She wanted him.
Safe. Warm. Curled up against us like he used to be—seeking comfort with the same wide-eyed devotion he gave even when everything else was cruel.
But that wasn't what lay in front of us now.
What lay in front of us looked like a boy made of glass that someone had tried to shatter for sport.
A thought crept into my mind, quiet, ugly, and uninvited.
If he was really broken… they'd throw him out.
My stomach twisted.
If he was truly ruined—if they couldn't use him anymore—then maybe I could just… take him. Hide him. Steal him from under their noses and disappear.
I stared at him, fingers ghosting across his cheek.
Was it so wrong to want that?
To wish that he couldn't go back to being what they wanted?
If he stayed like this—unresponsive, unusable—they'd discard him eventually. Scrap the project. Mark it as a loss. And in that failure… he'd be mine.
And gods, wasn't that sick?
That a part of me—some small, grasping, desperate part—almost wanted him to stay like this?
Because it was the only version of freedom I could imagine for him.
Nyx made a soft, wounded sound in the back of my head. You don't mean that.
I didn't answer.
Because I wasn't sure if I did.
Or if I did just enough.
I brushed his hair back from his forehead. "You shouldn't have had to do any of it," I murmured. "None of this."
There was a monitor nearby, tracking vitals. They weren't bad. But they weren't good either. Just… flat. Like he was suspended between being here and being gone.
I leaned forward, resting my forehead gently against his.
His skin was cool.
His scent muted.
I could still feel the bond between us—but it was stretched thin. Quiet. Not silent, like it had been out in the forest, but not bright either. It pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat echoing through water.
He's still in there, Nyx whispered. But they pushed him too far.
I closed my eyes.
"They always push," I said aloud. "Because they think there's no end. No edge. Just more to take."
My voice caught in my throat.
I had seen it happen before.
But this time it was him.
And that made it different.
That made it personal.
That made it unforgivable.
I pulled back, carefully adjusting the blanket someone had draped around his shoulders. My hand lingered near his face.
"I'll get you out," I promised him.
Whether you wake or not.
Whether they still want you or not.
You're mine.
And they don't get to take what's mine anymore.