Force had brought her this far.
But it would not keep her.
And if he crossed that line again—if he tried to make her stay, to make her choose, to make her submit—
It wouldn't just damage what existed between them.
It would destroy it completely.
Liora didn't turn.
But she heard him.
And this time, she didn't interrupt.
The silence that followed stretched long and heavy, filled with everything neither of them was willing to say, everything that existed just beneath the surface where words failed to reach.
He had marked her.
Bound her.
Claimed her in a way the world would recognize, in a way no one would question.
But none of that gave him what he didn't already know he couldn't take.
Her trust.
Her choice.
Her belonging.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
And that—
That was the one thing Thessian, for all his power, could never force into existence.
