And nothing came out.
His face contorted. His throat worked, muscles straining against invisible bonds. He tried again, lips forming words that dissolved into silence before they could be heard.
Just like Georgia.
The same silencing spell. The same magical gag that had trapped Georgia for sixty years. His father had been fighting the same battle—trying to speak truth that refused to be spoken.
“You’re bound.” Hux’s voice was strangled. “Someone silenced you. You can’t talk about any of this.”
Isandro nodded, tears streaming down his face. The composed elder, the distant father, the man who had always seemed carved from duty and expectation—crying openly, his control shattered by the simple act of being seen.
“How long?” Hux demanded. “How long have you known?”
His father held up fingers. Three. Five.
“Thirty-five years.” The number was an abyss. “You’ve known for thirty-five years. Since I was—” His voice broke. “You watched me grow up thinking wrongness hung in the air with me. Watched me search for bonds I could never find. Watched me light that candle three months ago and see nothing. And you couldn’t say a single damn word.”
Isandro’s face crumpled further. He reached for Hux, and Hux stepped back—couldn’t bear to be touched right now, couldn’t bear the comfort of a man who had let him suffer in silence.
“Is there a way to break it?” Lunaria’s voice cut through the tension. “The curse, the binding—can it be undone?”
Isandro’s mouth worked. The veins in his neck stood out with effort. He fought the silencing spell with everything he had, trying to force words through barriers that had held for decades.
“Ch—” A gasp of pain. “Choi?—”
“Don’t.” Hux stepped forward despite himself. “Father, stop. You’re hurting yourself.”
But Isandro shook his head violently. Kept pushing. His face had gone purple with exertion, sweat beading on his forehead.
“Choice.” The word tore out of him like it was barbed. “Love.” Another gasp, another wrenching effort. “Anyway.”
Then he collapsed.
Hux caught him before he hit the floor. His father was unconscious, breathing shallowly, his pulse thready beneath Hux’s fingers. The effort of speaking those three words had nearly killed him.
“I’ll call a healer.” Lunaria had her phone in her hand. “Stay with him.”
Hux stayed. Held his father’s limp form and tried to make sense of what had just happened. Three words, forced through magical restraints that had held for thirty-five years.
NINETEEN
HUX
The healer came and went. Isandro was resting, sedated, watched over by a nurse who’d been sworn to discretion. The official story was exhaustion—overwork, stress, the usual excuses that powerful men used to hide their vulnerabilities.
Hux stood on the front porch of the family estate, staring at nothing. The night air was cool against his face, but he couldn’t feel it. Couldn’t feel much of anything except the vast, echoing wrongness that had settled into his bones.
Lunaria appeared beside him. Her hand found his arm, warm and steady.
“Hux—”
“I need to be alone.”
“You don’t have to?—”
“Please.” He couldn’t look at her. Couldn’t bear the concern in her eyes, the understanding. “I just need... I need to think. I need to not be here.”
She was quiet for a long moment. Then she squeezed his arm and stepped back.
