Chapter 37: Of Shadows Claimed and Histories Rewritten
Lucian's hands clenched at his sides.
The movement was small—almost imperceptible—but the tension travelled up his forearms and lodged itself sharply beneath his collarbone.
A demon?
Unimportant?
The words echoed through him with a force he did not permit to touch his face.
Lyria was neither.
She had never been.
And the knowledge settled in his chest with a quiet, aching certainty.
He remembered her far too clearly and far too differently for Jacinta's contempt to erase her so easily.
The soft way she used to linger at the edge of rooms that were not meant for her. The careful distance she kept from everyone. The deliberate quiet, as though she feared even the sound of her own presence might offend people.
He was painfully aware of the cruel irony of it.
He had been one of the boys—the only one, actually—who had made that quiet necessary.
Lucian lowered his gaze for a fleeting moment.
