ECLIPSE
"The four options, or something far more interesting?"
Malric's question did not linger.
It struck.
Not like a blade—those she understood.
The tense silence between them was quieter. More insidious. It slipped beneath her skin and settled somewhere deeper, somewhere that forced her mind to split in two—
—one part holding his words, the other dissecting them with ruthless precision.
He made his observations seem like a question, but it was not.
He was merely confirming what he already knew in a manner that made her blood curl..
Eclipse held his gaze, unmoving, even as the weight of that realization pressed against her chest with suffocating clarity.
Fifty opportunities.
To him, the bride selection contest was not a tradition. Not a courtship. But a hunt.
And she—she had never been outside of it. Not once. Every step she had taken since stepping into the North had been within the boundaries he had already drawn.
Measured.
Anticipated.
Allowed.
