Chapter Thirteen – Karmia

I wake tangled in sheets that smell like sweat, sex, and his cologne. Sunlight slices through the curtains, cruel and unflinching, spilling across my bare skin. Every muscle aches, but not from bruises or fear.

No, it’s the echo of the night before, the memory of his hands marking me, the way I burned for him even as I fought.

For a moment, I squeeze my eyes shut, willing the memory away. I try to rewrite it in my mind: I was forced, I had no choice, I was manipulated. I repeat it like a prayer, as if enough insistence will overwrite the truth etched into my skin. He wanted control, he took what he wanted. I am a victim, nothing more.

Except my body betrays me. The ache in my thighs, the bruises on my hips, the ghost of his mouth on my neck—they pulse with heat, with something that isn’t pain. I press my palm to my chest, feeling my heart hammering far too fast, a shameful flush creeping up my throat.

I want to blame him for all of it, for every trembling second where I stopped saying no, for every gasp that sounded more like want than hate.

The problem is, I remember it all too well. The way his hands gripped me, holding me together even as he threatened to break me. The roughness, the hunger, the way I gave in—not out of terror, but out of need. How easily I let go, how fiercely I answered him, matching every demand with a desperate plea of my own.

I roll to my side, pulling the sheets tight around my body, hating the way I still crave the heat he left behind. Fury and shame wage war inside me, twisting into something I can’t untangle. I want to scream, to tear the bed apart, to scrub every trace of him from my skin and my memory—but I can’t. The more I try to separate the violation from the desire, the more they feel bound together, a knot that only tightens when I pull.

I am furious at him for doing this to me. For making me feel powerless, for making me want him. I’m angrier still at myself for yielding, for craving, for shattering in his hands and still wanting more. The contradiction is acid in my veins, burning through every excuse I try to build. It unsettles me more than anything Rostya Sharov has ever done, more than any threat, any violence, any cage.

I lie still, watching sunlight crawl across the ceiling, and wonder how I’ll ever forgive myself for last night. Or if I even want to.

I can’t bear to see him—not after the way my body still aches for him, not with the shame gnawing beneath my skin. So I drift through the mansion’s endless halls, a ghost in silk pajamas, shying from every footstep that might mean he’s near. The corridors are suffocating in their beauty: velvet drapes, oil paintings in gilded frames, floors polished to a mirror-shine that throws my hollow-eyed reflection back at me with every step. Chandeliers overhead spill light so bright it feels like accusation, every glint a bar in a gilded cage.

I walk aimlessly, hands knotted in my sleeves, trying to make sense of what’s become of me. Each step rings with guilt, the soles of my feet tapping out the memory of his touch. I replay last night in my mind, desperate to rewrite it, to edit myself into a victim, untouched by the fever that claimed us both. If I could just keep hating him, if I could only cling to outrage, maybe it would be easier to breathe.

But every flash of memory betrays me. The way I arched into his hands. The way I clung to him, hungry, not resisting but urging him on. My skin remembers even when my mind screams denial. I can’t erase the truth: I wanted it. I wanted him.

The realization curdles inside me. I stop before a grand mirror, the kind meant for preening royalty, and stare at the girl reflected back. My face looks drawn, hollowed by a night without real sleep. My lips are still swollen from his kiss, the faintest shadow of bruises dotting my collarbone like a brand.

Disgust wells up in my throat. I lean closer, searching for the cracks in my armor, for any sign of the old Karmia—the one who would have fought, who would have spit in his face, who wouldn’t have moaned for him even as she cursed his name.

The reflection doesn’t change. My eyes are glassy, my cheeks flushed, and there’s a softness around my mouth that makes me want to shatter the glass.

“You’re pathetic,” I whisper, my voice shaking. The words hit the glass, bounce back. The mirror shows me nothing but the evidence of my own undoing, painted in color and shadow across my skin.

No matter how many times I say it, the girl in the glass doesn’t become a victim, or a survivor. She is only herself—ruined, wanting, and utterly lost.

At breakfast, I try to slip in quietly, hoping maybe I can cross the room like a shadow, take my coffee and disappear.

He’s already there. Rostya sits at the head of the impossibly long table, black shirt open at the throat, a paper in hand, the sunlight gleaming off the silver at his wrist. He doesn’t look at me when I enter, doesn’t so much as nod, only flicks his eyes my way for a heartbeat before returning to whatever report has his attention.

The tension in the room is suffocating. Servants glide around us in silence, setting dishes I can’t taste and pouring coffee I can’t bring myself to sip. The only sound is the clink of cutlery and the rustle of pages.

His indifference is so complete it’s as if I’m invisible, as if last night never happened, as if he didn’t pin me to the wall and burn me to ash with nothing but his hands and his mouth.

I can’t meet his eyes. My face burns with a shame I can’t swallow, anger simmering under my skin like fever. I thought I was prepared for more dominance, for him to gloat or threaten, for the echo of the night to poison the morning with its heat.

This cold dismissal—this way he acts as though I am nothing, as though I am air—hurts in a way I didn’t see coming.

I poke at my breakfast, pushing scrambled eggs across the plate, unable to eat. He flips a page, sips his coffee, and I want to throw the mug at his head just to see him react, just to prove I still exist in his world.

He’s untouchable. Every second his silence stretches, it makes the memory of last night feel less real, less like a wound and more like a dream that meant nothing to him.

What twists the knife is the ache blooming in my own chest—the sick pulse of disappointment. Why should it matter to me if he regrets it? Why should I crave acknowledgment or even anger? It doesn’t matter why; I just do. I want him to look at me, to see me, to admit with a word or a glance that I was not just another thing to be used and discarded.

The realization is a slap, raw and cold. I want his attention. I want him to see me, even if it’s only to hate me. I grip the fork so tight my knuckles ache, unable to understand when this shift happened—when my fear of him became tangled with something so much uglier.

Confusion and bitterness crawl through me. I force myself to swallow a mouthful of coffee, the taste sour and pointless, and stare at the white tablecloth, pretending I am anywhere else.

I can feel his presence like gravity, pulling every thought back to last night, back to everything I cannot escape.

My nerves fray with every heartbeat, every moment of thick, silent tension. I can’t taste my food, can’t seem to breathe right. My skin crawls with the memory of his hands, his mouth, his silence. Every time Rostya flips a page or sips his coffee without looking at me, my shame and anger knot tighter. The ache for acknowledgment curdles into something sharp and ugly.

A maid steps behind me, soft and careful, and pours too much coffee into my cup. It spills over the edge, dark liquid splashing across the gleaming white tablecloth, spreading toward my plate.

The heat of all my bitterness finds its target. I snap. “Are you blind? Can’t you see what you’re doing?” My voice is too loud, brittle, slicing through the hush like a whip. The entire room freezes. I see the servant flinch, her face going pale, hands jerking back so quickly she nearly drops the carafe. She murmurs something apologetic, but the damage is already done.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” she murmurs, cheeks flushed pink.

The look on her face guts me. It’s not just fear—it’s humiliation, a flash of old pain in her eyes that makes me want to be sick. I open my mouth, desperate to undo what I’ve done. “I’m sorry. That wasn’t… please. It’s fine. I didn’t mean to snap.” My hands shake, coffee still dripping from the cup as the maid backs away with her eyes downcast.

The rest of the staff move more quietly than ever, heads ducked, hands trembling. Even Rostya glances over, expression unreadable, before returning to his paper.

Guilt claws at me, sudden and suffocating. I want to disappear. For the first time, I really see myself: a stranger wearing my skin, someone sharp and cruel, quick to wound the powerless just because I’m powerless too. My heart pounds, and I’m horrified by what I’ve become, what this house is doing to me. I’m not just a captive. I’m being reshaped, every harsh edge of this place grinding me down into something colder, harder, meaner.

I stare at my reflection in the silver teapot: drawn, pale, eyes rimmed with red. I don’t recognize myself. The realization shakes me. I think of how easily Rostya can cut a room to silence with a single word, how he rules with icy indifference, how he has always used cruelty to keep the world in line.

Now, here I am, using the same weapon. Not against him, but against someone who never deserved it.

The terror isn’t just that he holds me captive, it’s that I am becoming like him. My anger, my hardness, my need to lash out just to feel anything but shame. It’s not just his ring or his orders binding me. It’s this darkness, creeping into me, molding me into a reflection of the man I thought I could hate from a safe distance.

I mumble another apology, but the words sound hollow. I sit, fists clenched, promising myself I will not let this house, this life, strip away the last of who I am. Even as I wonder if it’s already too late.

Holding in a sob, I stand from the table and slip into the cool hallway.

The walls close in, every corridor stretching too long, every polished surface reflecting my own frantic eyes back at me. Even when the house is full of silence, I feel watched by the guards at every doorway, by the weight of the chandeliers above, by the ghost of Rostya’s presence in every gilded shadow. Every door I try is locked, every window too high, every breath caught in my chest like a bird desperate to escape.

I pace through the halls, hands clenched, jaw tight. I hate this place. I hate the endless rooms with no exit, the endless reminders that I am not free. But what curdles deepest isn’t just hatred for my cage or for Rostya, it’s the way my body aches for him even as my mind screams rebellion.

I press a hand to my ribs, cursing the heat that won’t fade.

“I hate you,” I whisper into the empty corridor, but the echo is weak.

The truth is worse than hatred. Laced through the anger is something sharp and aching. I want his attention, his eyes burning into me. I want him to see me again, to want me the way he did last night, even if it’s only with that brutal, punishing hunger.

I hate myself for it. For craving his fire, for missing the way his hands made me forget everything except him. The ache in my chest won’t leave, no matter how tightly I grip my own arms.

I imagine screaming at him, letting the anger boil over. In my mind I storm into his office, slam my fists into his chest.

“You don’t own me!” I shout at the memory, my voice bouncing back off the marble. I picture myself demanding, “Let me go! Give me back my life!”

The fantasy is sweet for a second—until I see his face, see the twist of his mouth, the way he’d catch my wrists, yank me flush against him.

And then I imagine what would come next. His grip bruising, his mouth crashing onto mine, the taste of violence and surrender blurring together until I’m lost again. Both fantasies—freedom and surrender—choke me. I want to hate him, want to break free, but the memory of his touch is a chain I can’t shake loose.

I slide down against the wall, knees hugged to my chest. My breath shakes. “I hate you,” I say again, louder this time, wishing he could hear it. Wishing he would come, furious or hungry, just to prove I still exist to him.

The ache doesn’t leave. Neither does the craving. I press my forehead to my knees, torn between the urge to run and the urge to be caught. All I can do is sit in the silence, the fire and the fury burning a hole straight through me, not sure which would hurt more—to win or to lose.

***

Night drags slow, each minute stretching into hours that refuse to end. I lie awake in the darkness, staring at the ceiling, the bed beneath me too large, the sheets too soft, the emptiness too sharp. I turn over, again and again, but I can’t get comfortable. I can’t get warm.

Last night, his body was fire, a storm that devoured every thought. Now there’s nothing but the echo of that heat and the cold left behind.

The silence in the room throbs with memory. I remember his mouth on mine, the bruising grip of his hands at my waist. I remember the rough scrape of his voice when he said my name, the way his fucked me into the wall until I forgot my own name.

It replays, over and over, each time twisting tighter, growing heavier with every recall. The moment in the warehouse creeps in too—when he shielded me from bullets with his own body, when his arms made the world feel terrifyingly small and safe all at once.

I press my hands over my eyes, willing the memories away. “I hate him,” I whisper, my voice soft as a bruise.

“I’ll never forgive him.” I say it again, and again, like a prayer, a lifeline meant to pull me back from the edge. If I say it enough times, maybe I’ll believe it. Maybe it will be true.

Under the words, my heart betrays me. Desire hums in my blood, low and insistent. My body aches for his hands, his mouth, his heat.

The need is a traitor, humming through my veins, refusing to yield to anger or sense. No matter how I curse him, no matter how I remind myself of what he’s done, I can’t kill the wanting. I know sleep won’t come. Not tonight. Maybe not ever.

I curl tighter into the sheets, tucking my knees to my chest, wrapping my arms around myself like I can build a shield out of cotton and skin. Alone in the dark, I tremble, not sure if it’s from fear or shame or the ache of longing that refuses to die. My war with Rostya is no longer just with him.

It’s a war I’m losing with myself.