Updated Nov 6, 2025 • ~10 min read
Three days passed in a blur of performance and pretense.
Ember learned the rhythm of her captivity. Mornings alone in her chambers, where Lark brought breakfast and quiet company. Afternoons when Prince Blaze would summon her for “training”—teaching her to navigate the palace, to understand Fire Court politics, all while maintaining the facade that he was breaking her will.
And evenings. Gods, the evenings were the worst.
Court gatherings where she played the role of broken pet. Where she knelt at his feet and ate from his hand and endured the court’s laughter.
Where she hated him and understood him in equal measure.
On the fourth morning, Lark arrived with breakfast and a message.
“The prince wants to see you. In his study. Privately.”
Ember’s stomach dropped. “Why?”
“He didn’t say. But…” Lark hesitated. “He looks worried.”
That couldn’t be good.
Ember dressed quickly and followed the now-familiar path to Prince Blaze’s study. The guards let her pass without comment—apparently word had spread that she was “tamed” enough to move freely under supervision.
She knocked.
“Enter.”
He stood by the window, tension in every line of his body. He didn’t turn as she closed the door behind her.
“You wanted to see me, Your Highness?” The formal address tasted wrong. But she didn’t know what else to call him.
“Blaze.” His voice was quiet. “When we’re alone, call me Blaze.”
“That seems—”
“Please.” He finally turned to face her. “I spend all day being called titles and playing monster. I’d like to hear my name from someone who knows the truth.”
She saw the exhaustion in his eyes. The weight of the performance.
“Blaze,” she said softly.
Something in his expression eased. “Thank you.”
They stood in silence for a moment, and Ember became acutely aware of the bond humming between them. She’d felt it constantly over the past three days—a warm pulse in her chest that reached toward him whenever he was near.
“What did you want to talk about?” she asked.
“The bond.” His words were blunt. “We need to discuss it.”
Ember’s breath caught. “So it is—”
“A mate bond. Yes.” He moved to his desk, putting distance between them. “I felt it snap into place when I bought you at the market. I tried to deny it. Tried to convince myself I was wrong. But when we touched…”
“It activated fully.” Ember finished. She’d done enough reading over the past three days to understand the basics. “Fae mate bonds are rare. Bonds between fae and mortals are—”
“Forbidden by ancient law. Punishable by death for both parties.” His voice was flat. “Yes.”
“Oh.”
“If anyone discovers it—if anyone even suspects—we’re both dead. You quickly. Me slowly.” He met her eyes. “The court would make an example of us.”
Fear slid through Ember’s veins, cold and sharp. “Can we… can we hide it?”
“We have been. But it’s getting harder.” He gripped the edge of his desk. “The bond wants us to be near each other. It makes my fire harder to control when you’re close. It probably makes you feel—”
“Like I’m being pulled toward you,” Ember admitted. “Like there’s a thread connecting us.”
“Yes.”
“And at night—” She stopped, embarrassed.
“You dream of me.” His voice was rough. “I know. Because I dream of you too. That’s the bond, trying to forge a connection between our minds.”
Heat flushed Ember’s cheeks. She had been dreaming of him. Dreams where they weren’t playing roles. Where he smiled at her like she mattered. Where they—
“We can’t let it complete,” Blaze said firmly. “The bond is activated but not fully accepted. If we both consciously accept it—truly accept each other as mates—it will complete the transformation. You’ll become immortal. Tied to me forever.”
Forever. The word hung in the air between them.
“And if we reject it?” Ember asked.
“Active rejection kills both parties. Always.” He looked away. “The bond doesn’t let go easily. Trying to sever it tears both souls apart.”
“So our options are: accept and be bound forever, or reject and die.”
“Yes.”
“That’s not much of a choice.”
“No.” His expression was bleak. “But there’s a third option.”
Ember waited.
“We ignore it. Keep it activated but unaccepted. Maintain distance. Don’t consciously acknowledge it as real.” His voice dropped. “Activated bonds can exist indefinitely without completion if both parties refuse to accept them. It’s painful—the bond will pull at us, demand acknowledgment. But it won’t kill us as long as we don’t actively reject it.”
“How long can we maintain that?”
“Forever, theoretically. Though the pain and pull never truly stop. Just become… bearable.” He said it like he was condemning them both to slow torture.
“And you?”
“I’m immortal. I’ve endured worse.” He said it like it didn’t matter. Like his suffering was a foregone conclusion not worth discussing.
“That’s not fair to you.”
“Fair?” He laughed, but there was no humor in it. “Ember, I bought you at a slave market. I’ve spent three days humiliating you in public. Fair is not part of this equation.”
“You’re trying to save me.”
“I’m trying to survive while maintaining a lie that’s lasted fifty years. You’re just caught in the crossfire.” He moved toward the window again, presenting his back to her. “The point is—we can’t let this bond complete. No touching. No private moments like this unless absolutely necessary. And when you’re free, you leave and don’t look back.”
Every word felt like a door slamming shut.
Ember looked at his rigid shoulders, the tension in his spine. “What do you want?”
“What?”
“Not what’s practical or safe. What do you actually want?”
Silence stretched. When he spoke again, his voice was barely above a whisper.
“I want to stop pretending. I want to drop this mask and be seen for who I actually am. I want to touch you without catastrophe following. I want—” He cut himself off. “It doesn’t matter what I want. It never has.”
Something in Ember’s chest ached.
She’d spent three days hating the performance. Hating the humiliation. But she’d forgotten that he was performing too. That every cruel word cost him. That he was just as trapped as she was.
More trapped, actually. Because she had an escape in a few weeks.
He had three hundred years of this stretching ahead of him.
“I’m sorry,” she said quietly.
He turned, surprise flickering across his face. “For what?”
“For making this harder. If you’d bought someone else—someone who wasn’t your mate—this would be easier.”
“If I’d bought someone else, I wouldn’t care about their suffering. This is harder because I care. But that’s not your fault.” He crossed to her, stopping just out of reach. “Ember, you’ve done nothing wrong. The bond chose us. Neither of us had a say.”
“I know. But still.” She met his eyes. “For what it’s worth, if circumstances were different… the bond could’ve done worse.”
His breath caught. “Ember—”
“I’m not saying I accept it,” she clarified quickly. “I’m just saying you’re not the monster everyone thinks you are. And whoever ends up being your mate someday—your actual, chosen mate—will be lucky.”
Something painful crossed his face. “Fae only get one mate, Ember. The bond only snaps once. There won’t be anyone else.”
Oh.
Oh.
“I didn’t know,” she whispered.
“Most mortals don’t.” He stepped back, rebuilding the distance between them. “Which is why we need to be careful. The bond can’t complete. You deserve a life free of this court, free of me. And I need to focus on freeing the mortals who come after you.”
Right. The mission. The bigger picture.
Ember could be selfless too.
“Okay,” she agreed. “We maintain distance. Ignore the bond. I leave in a few weeks and don’t look back.”
“Thank you.”
“But Blaze?” She waited until he looked at her. “For the record, I don’t think staying bonded to you would be a prison. I think it might’ve been something else entirely.”
Before he could respond, she turned and left.
Behind her, she felt the bond flare with heat and longing and something that felt heartbreakingly like hope.
But hope was dangerous.
Almost as dangerous as the truth.
That night, the dreams came stronger.
Ember walked through corridors of fire that didn’t burn. Searched for something—someone—she couldn’t name.
And found him in a garden that shouldn’t exist. A garden of flame-flowers and obsidian trees, beautiful and impossible.
Dream-Blaze turned to her, and his expression was open in a way real-Blaze’s never was.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he said.
“Neither should you.”
“It’s my dream.”
“It’s our dream.” Ember moved closer. “The bond is connecting us. You said so yourself.”
He didn’t deny it. “We should stop this. Force ourselves awake.”
“Probably.”
Neither of them moved.
In dreams, there was no performance. No audience. No danger.
In dreams, they could be honest.
“I meant what I said,” Ember told him. “You’re not a monster.”
“I feel like one. When I make you kneel. When I see the hurt in your eyes.”
“I know it’s not real.”
“But it still hurts you.” He reached out, then stopped himself. “Even in dreams, I can’t touch you. If we get used to it here, we might slip when awake.”
Ember’s chest ached. “This is cruel.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Stop apologizing. You didn’t choose this either.”
“No. But I’m responsible for it.” He looked at her with those fire-bright eyes, and in the dream they glowed with actual warmth. “You deserve better than this. Better than me.”
“What if I don’t want better? What if I just want the truth?”
“The truth is dangerous.”
“So is lying.”
They stood in the impossible garden, separated by inches and miles all at once.
“What happens when I leave?” Ember asked. “When I’m free and the bond starts to fade—what happens to you?”
“I’ll survive. I always do.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
He was quiet for a long moment. “It will hurt,” he admitted finally. “Letting you go will probably be the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But it’s necessary.”
“Why?”
“Because you deserve a life. A real life. Not an eternity playing pretend in a court of monsters.”
“What if I choose differently?”
“Ember—”
“I’m not saying I will,” she clarified. “I’m just asking—what if?”
“Then you’d be making a terrible mistake.” But his voice was soft. Yearning.
“Or maybe I’d be making the bravest choice of my life.”
The dream began to fade, reality pulling them apart.
Blaze’s last words followed her into waking: “Don’t choose me. Please. I can’t bear to cage you too.”
Ember woke with tears on her cheeks and the bond burning in her chest.
And she realized that somewhere between the humiliation and the truth, between the performance and the private moments, she was starting to fall for the monster who wasn’t a monster at all.
Which was absolutely the worst possible thing that could happen.
But maybe also the most inevitable.
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