The word landed sharper than the rest.

Hate.

It shouldn’t have struck so deep—not after everything, not after all the careful walls and illusions and distance she’d crafted like armor around a ghost. But it did. Not because it was accurate. Not because it was wrong.

But because it was so close.

Her expression didn’t change. Not visibly. Not in the way he’d be able to read—unless he was far, far more dangerous than she already suspected. The only giveaway was the stillness. That breath too long in her chest. That blink that didn’t come when it should have.

’Is it really that easy to see?’

’Does he already know?’

She looked at him, studied the lines of his face. Not the performative ones—the smirk, the tilt, the cultivated arrogance—but what sat beneath. The way his shoulders hung, too relaxed. The faint crease near his temple where calculation replaced instinct. The way his lips held a smile but his brow hadn’t joined the joke.

No.

He didn’t know.

Not yet.

Maybe he was circling it. Maybe he’d sensed something was off—too sharp, too reactive, too intent—but he didn’t know what he was circling. He hadn’t pierced the mask.

Not yet.

That was why… Elara’s head tilted slightly, lips parting just enough to let the words spill out with careful quiet.

“Why do you think it’s hate?” she asked.

Soft. Not mocking. But not passive either.

A question born of balance—measured and intentional, like a trap made of silk thread and misdirection.

Lucavion’s gaze flicked. Not away, not exactly—but inward. Recalibrating.

And that gave her the opening.

Her smile curved, just faintly, and she added, voice light but laced with blade-thin edge:

“Is it so unthinkable that someone might look at you like that for other reasons?”

That did something.

Not much. Not obvious. But enough. His mouth twitched again, only this time not in smug delight. It was hesitation. A falter. One that lasted just long enough for her to see it.

He studied her then—not just with amusement now, but suspicion laced with… intrigue. The kind that chased the edges of something he couldn’t explain, and couldn’t stop poking.

But he didn’t reply immediately.

Instead, Lucavion straightened—only slightly, only enough to reclaim the ease he’d let slip. His cat shifted on his shoulder, tail flicking once, twice, like it could feel the current change.

Lucavion’s gaze lingered on her a moment longer than necessary. Then—

“It comes from experience,” he said, voice quieter now, but still laced with that maddening lilt of amusement. “Your eyes… they remind me of someone, let’s say.”

And he smiled.

Smirked.

Elara didn’t move. Didn’t twitch. But inside, her thoughts turned sharp and jagged—cutting at the walls she’d just rebuilt.

He’s talking about me.

He didn’t know it. Not truly. But the words fell with too much precision to be accidental. The glint in his eye, the ease in his stance, the way he said “someone” like it was a secret only he was in on. Like he enjoyed the idea of touching an old wound he didn’t even recognize.

And all the while—he smiled.

That smile. That damn half-smirk, like the world was some clever trick he’d already solved. Like the memory of her—the real her—was a passing curiosity, not the inferno that had scorched them both.

Elara’s stomach turned.

Not visibly.

No.

She locked it down, shoved the heat behind her ribs, clenched her hands where he couldn’t see. She repeated the same phrase in her mind like a litany, a warding spell cast in sheer will:

Don’t show it. Don’t show it. Don’t show it.

“Coming from experience?” she echoed, and to her credit, her voice barely wavered. Just a trace of dry curiosity, as if the notion amused her. As if he hadn’t just scraped his fingers across a wound that hadn’t healed.

Lucavion hummed, as if considering it. His hand moved absently to stroke the cat on his shoulder, and it arched into his fingers with imperious approval. He looked entirely at ease. Too at ease.

Lucavion’s gaze drifted, slow and deliberate, away from her face. Upward again, toward the mist-choked sky or perhaps toward something else entirely. Something internal. Detached.

“Yeah,” he murmured, too casually. “Coming from experience.”

The smile had thinned. Not gone, not truly, but its weight had shifted—no longer teasing, but reflective. Like the edge of a blade pressed flat instead of sharp.

Elara didn’t let the moment pass.

“What kind of experience is it?” she asked, voice even, threading just enough curiosity to keep it from sounding like a challenge. “To recognize hate so easily.”

His jaw flexed once. Brief. Controlled. But he didn’t look at her.

And so she pressed—softer now, but with precision.

“You said my eyes looked like hate.” A pause. “Does that mean you did something to deserve it?”

That landed.

He didn’t flinch. Didn’t jerk his head or give her the kind of dramatic reaction she might’ve expected from any other boy his age. But Lucavion wasn’t other boys. He was too practiced, too schooled. His silence was a performance, and still—this silence felt… unscripted.

He turned.

Slowly. The dark pools of his eyes found hers again—not sharp, not mocking. Just still.

“…”

He said nothing.

Not at first.

And then, before she could brace for it, his hand lifted.

A flick of motion.

His fingers reached out and tapped her on the forehead—lightly, just once. Casual. Familiar.

Too familiar.

She froze.

And then the realization struck.

Her arm moved without thought.

Crack.

She slapped his hand aside, the sound clean and bright in the garden’s hush.

“What are you doing?” she demanded, her voice cutting low, tight with disbelief. Not quite loud—but dangerous in its restraint.

Lucavion blinked.

Not in shock. Not in apology.

He blinked as if mildly puzzled by her question, as though he were trying to understand what part of the interaction had invited outrage.

“Why is that a problem?” he asked, his voice maddeningly calm.

“You touched me,” she said, sharp.

“So?” he shrugged.

“You’re a stranger. Do you touch strangers?”

A beat.

He looked at her. That cool black gaze again. No pretense this time. No grin. Just Lucavion as he was: unreadable. Calm. Calculating.

And then—his mouth curved.

Not quite a smirk. Not quite a smile.

“You ask a lot of questions for a stranger,” he said, soft, deliberate. “Are you not?”

Because he didn’t say ’aren’t you?’ like a normal person. He said it like he already knew—or wanted her to believe he did. That mocking tone, light on the surface, wrapped tightly around something darker.

A threat?

No. Lucavion didn’t threaten.

He invited chaos, and let others step into it themselves.

Elara stepped back half a pace—not retreat, just room to think. To breathe.

Her hand was still tingling from the slap. Her forehead still burned where his touch had landed.

She wasn’t sure which was worse.

But she didn’t lower her gaze. Didn’t look away.

“I was just curious.”

Lucavion’s smirk returned like it had never left. Easy. Unbothered. A practiced thing he wore like silk gloves—measured, tailored, and just insolent enough to provoke without being punishable.

“And I was just being friendly,” he said, voice lilting with faux innocence.

Elara didn’t respond.

She could have. There were half a dozen barbed replies perched on her tongue, sharp and ready. But she didn’t trust her voice just then. Not with the memory of his fingers ghosting across her forehead still lingering, not with the burn of that single word—hate—still throbbing in her bones like a forgotten bruise.

So she stood still.

Silent.

That was answer enough.

Lucavion chuckled softly, shaking his head like she’d amused him far more than she had any right to.

“Well,” he said, spreading his arms in a grand, sweeping gesture that was far too theatrical for the garden’s hush. “Now that it’s come to this, let me introduce myself. Though you must already know me.”