Seraphine's POV
I didn’t wake up— I simply returned to consciousness.
That return wasn’t the sudden rush of light and noise, but a slow, deep, almost physical sensation, as if I were rising toward the surface from a very warm, heavy body of water.
The first thing I felt was weight. Darius’s weight on me. Not choking, just pressing down like a warm stone. His arm was wrapped around my waist, his chest pressed to my back, and he was still buried deep inside me. That was the first realization: he hadn’t moved. The bond had held through the night, unbroken.
The second thing was pain. But not the old kind—not trauma or injury. This was a deep, tired, but satisfied soreness. My hips, the insides of my thighs, my neck—everywhere I could feel the marks of last night’s ritual. The mark on my sh
