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“I can’t build a map of every secret in this court and hope I eventually step on the right one.”
He rested his forearms on his knees. His hands stayed open between them. “Then I stop waiting for the perfect question. If I know something that affects your safety, your authority or a choice you’re making, I tell you.”
“Even if you think it will frighten me.”
“Fear is information. I don’t get to keep it from you because I dislike what you might do with it.”
That was closer. It still sounded neat in a room holding the remains of a very ugly truth.
“What are you frightened to tell me now?”
He didn’t look away. “I don’t know every command Adrian buried in the restraints. I know the ones he’s used. I don’t know what he prepared and never needed.”
Cold moved through me. “Could one make you attack me?”
“Yes.”
The word landed without comfort around it. He let me have the worst version first.
“Could my authority trigger them?”
“I don’t know. Your blood opened my prison and Harrowmere recognises you. The chains were made under the Crown’s authority. Until they’re gone, I won’t pretend those things can’t reach each other.”
I looked at the faint red marks under his skin. I’d touched them, fed him while they held him and slept with his body around mine. They had begun to look like scars because I wanted them to be scars. They were still weapons.
“How do I know if a command has taken you?”
“The marks usually brighten first. I go still because I’m fighting it, then I move whether I’ve won or not.” His voice remained level. “If that happens, don’t come closer. Use the house. Put stone between us and call Lenora.”
“You want me to lock you away.”
“For as long as it takes to stop me.”
The answer scraped against every promise I’d made about freeing him. “And if you can still speak?”
“Listen, but watch the marks. Adrian can force my body. He hasn’t been able to put words in my mouth.”
“So far.”
“So far,” he agreed.
No false certainty. No attempt to make the danger small enough for me to stay. The honesty frightened me more than reassurance would have, but fear with edges was something I could use.
“If I tell you to leave because you’re dangerous, you go,” I said. “If you decide you’re dangerous and try to disappear without telling me, I’ll have Harrowmere bring you back.”
Something changed in his face. Not amusement. Pain, perhaps, at being included in a plan that assumed he would survive it.
“Agreed.”
“You don’t get to turn guilt into another decision you make for both of us.”
“I know what that costs now.”
“You knew before.”
His jaw tightened. “Yes. I did it anyway.”
The admission mattered because it didn’t ask intention to carry the weight of consequence.
