Chapter 15. Bound in Chains

The chains were silver, braided with moonroot and engraved with ancient runes, designed not just to bind a body but to calm a soul.

They coiled gently around Neriah’s wrists and ankles, then across her collarbones like jewelry that had forgotten how to be beautiful. The enchantments hissed faintly against her skin, suppressing the glow of the Ashen Flame just enough to make her feel distant from herself—like she was watching through a fog, not living in her own skin.

Caius stood at her side, expression carved from granite, his presence a stormcloud on the edge of her vision. The last time she’d stood in chains, he’d looked at her like she was nothing but a problem to solve.

This time, he looked at her like she was a question—one he might already know the answer to, but feared to ask aloud.

“You don’t have to do this,” Caius said under his breath, voice barely more than a vibration against her shoulder. She wondered, for a flicker, if he would have said those