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But why would she have kept them this long in the first place? He couldn't come up with a reason.
Castor snapped the music box shut, cutting off the music mid-swell. Just days after he gave her this music box, he had professed his love to her and asked him to marry her.
By the next night, she had been gone.
Regardless of these discoveries, Castor couldn't dwell on what might have been. He had to focus on the now. Ianora was his prisoner until they were married, and it was very possible that she would remain so even after they'd consummated their marriage until she decided to be more cooperative with him.
Perhaps through a little prodding, he would be able to discover the truth of her feelings soon enough. If there was any sentiment left on her end toward him, perhaps he could find it in himself to lessen the punishments he had planned for her.
Perhaps he could unlock the love he'd once felt for her again.
But until then, the only priority was seeing to it that the wedding went off without a hitch. With her locked away in her suite, she couldn't cause him any trouble unless he welcomed it. Considering how much damage he knew she could cause if he gave her free reign, it seemed best to keep her in isolation until the time was right.
The only trouble would be the ceremony itself. No one he had invited was under the illusion that Ianora was willingly wedding herself to him, yet he did want the proceedings to go as smoothly as possible. His usual go-to for something so important would be to threaten his opponent's family, but because of the curse that caused him pain whenever he so much as thought of harming Ianora or her family, that wouldn't work in this case.
It was a challenge, to be sure. However, Castor was a master at getting what he wanted. Given some more time, he was sure he could come up with a way to keep her obedient.
Chapter 5 - Ianora
The ceiling was carved to look like a night sky, with stars that glistened and twinkled as if they were truly made of silver. The smoky colors of the night painted a soft harmony that was almost too beautiful to look at, carved with intricate filigree that was the work of a master. Ianora stared at it anyway, hoping the patterns of light would take her away. They didn't.
Nothing could distract her from the cold, hard truth: she had tried everything possible to escape this golden prison, and she was still trapped.
After the first day, where she had spent much of that entire twenty-four hours clawing at every corner of the room in search of a way out, Ianora promptly laid down in bed and did not move. She saw no point in doing anything but retreating to her thoughts, using her mind's sharpest corners to come up with a solution.
But by the time the second day had passed, no solution had come.
Nor had she been able to stop Castor's kiss from haunting her.
His lips against hers had been brutal and possessive—a far cry from the man who'd once kissed her so sweetly in this same castle. Rather than the gentle flourishes with his tongue to show how careful he would be with her, this kiss had been hard and controlling, meant to show her just how little freedom and say she truly had anymore.
And she'd liked it.
What was wrong with her, to enjoy, even just a little bit, that moment of suspension where she knew there was nothing she could do to pull away? His kiss had been bruising, demanding, and so rife withneed,unlike anything Ianora had experienced in her entire lifetime.
She might still be a virgin, as unfortunate as that was, but she had more than enough kisses to judge and compare with past experiences.
This kiss left her with shivers days later, the kind that she couldn't tell if they were good or bad. Because despite the passion in the kiss, Castor was nothing like the man he'd been all those years ago. There are still glimpses of his sense of humor in his twisted designs, in the thoughtfulness that had been turned against her. And, of course, the handsome features that had been twisted by the curse, the powerful jaw that had been one of many factors luring her to him in the first place.
But those memories only served to trick her from the truth: Castor had become a horrible, cruel man, driven to seek vengeance over a series of events he didn't fully understand. He only knew the small fraction that he had borne witness to ... and the hurt he felt in the aftermath.
Lying here now, Ianora couldn't help but feel, deep in her wretched soul, that he was right about one thing:shewas responsible for all of this, for turning Castor into the dark man who'd pursued her these many years. The man who'd planned to kill her entire family just to take her for himself.
Had she been more communicative of him back then, had she confided in him in the events that had torn her away from his side...none of this would have happened.
She should have known better, shouldn't she? Even back then, Castor had been single-minded and driven, if in a more productive capacity. He had wanted to achieve great things, to be somebody important—more than a king who had rotted upon a throne for centuries.
And in the end, that's exactly what he became ... even if it wasn't in the way either of them had anticipated.
It was all her fault. Ianora had been so wrapped up in her own world that she hadn't considered how far Castor might go. She knew that leaving would hurt him. Deep down, she knew it would drive him to drastic measures that she would have to stave off for years. And she had.
But this ... this cruel man who would have murdered all her loved ones?
Threaten to exile her, strip her immortality, and ensure she would never see her family again if she didn't marry him?
This was not the man she had fallen for all those years ago. Being with him now, despite her body and mind's mixed feelings about him, had solidified one thing for her: she could not love him.
She would not.
