Chp 11
1204 Words
Zyra POV
By the time my last class ends, my nerves feel like frayed wires sparking beneath my skin. I pack my books with mechanical rhythm, the kind that belongs to people who’ve spent the entire day pretending they’re fine.
The halls are mostly empty when I step outside. The sky bleeds orange behind the rooftop towers, beautiful, but ominous, like something is waiting in the shadows.
I clutch my bag strap and walk faster. Just a few more minutes and I’ll be home. Or so I think.
A figure steps into my path.
Roth.
His smirk is crooked, like he chews on amusement the way others chew gum. “Where are you rushing to, little trash?”
My stomach drops. I glance around. The courtyard is quiet… too quiet. Then two more of Dael’s friends appear behind me, closing the path like jaws.
“Move,” I whisper. It comes out thinner than I want.
Roth tilts his head. “She talks. How cute.”
A hand bumps my shoulder deliberately hard. I stumble, and the boys chuckle.
“Shouldn’t she say please?” one of them asks.
“She should say a lot of things,” Roth says, stepping closer, “like why she keeps looking at Dael like he’s either her doom or her savior.”
Heat rushes into my face. “I don’t…”
But the words freeze because a shadow stretches across the ground. Heavy steps. Controlled. Familiar.
Dael.
He stands a short distance away, tall enough that the streetlight cuts around the edges of his shoulders like a crown of molten gold. His expression is unreadable, but his presence? It swallows everything else. Even Roth’s smugness shrinks beneath it.
Relief floods my chest, instinctive, stupid, desperate. Maybe he would save me!.
But when Dael’s eyes meet mine, the relief shatters instantly.
He’s not here for me.
He’s not here because of me.
He’s here to watch.
His arms cross over his chest, and he leans back against the lamppost with a lazy interest, like this is entertainment. Like I am.
Roth notices and laughs under his breath. “Look at that. We’ve got an audience.”
My pulse slams against my throat. “Dael…” I say, barely audible.
He doesn’t blink.
Doesn’t move.
Doesn’t help.
Something twists painfully inside me.
Roth steps closer, forcing me back until my spine hits cold iron, a bike rack. “You know, he could tell us to stop. One word and we’d leave you alone.”
He flicks a glance toward Dael.
Dael remains silent. It might as well be permission. The humiliation burns behind my eyes, but I refuse to let tears fall, not in front of him, not when he’s choosing to be a spectator instead of a shield.
Roth taps my chin with two fingers, mocking gently. “Poor thing. I almost feel bad for you.”
He doesn’t, of course.
And Dael…Dael watches with the exact same expression he’d wear watching fire swallow a building: cold fascination with no intention of putting out the flames.
My throat tightens.
I force myself to stand straighter, even though my knees tremble. “What do you want?” Roth grins, but there’s something darker in it now. “A reaction. And you’re giving it.”
The others laugh.
But Dael’s eyes…God his eyes sharpen as if the fear rolling off me is something he can taste from where he stands.
Like it does something to him. Like he came here not to protect me…but to see what I do when I have no one left to call for help.
My breath shakes.
And for the first time, I realize something terrifying: Dael isn’t the storm. He’s the person who decides whether to call the lightning down… or let it strike me where I stand.
Roth’s grin stretches wider as he steps into my space, so close his shadow swallows mine.
“You shake so easily,” he murmurs. “Makes you look…”
His hand lifts.
Toward my face.
Toward me.
Time slows, thickens, turns sharp.
Before his fingers reach my skin, a blur cuts through the corner of my vision.
A hand not mine, not Roth’s, slams around Roth’s wrist with a crack that echoes through the empty courtyard.
Roth freezes.
I freeze.
Even the air seems to stop breathing. Dael stands between us, though I hadn’t seen him move. One second he was leaning against the lamppost like this was a show, and the next..He’s here.
Too close.
Too fast.
His grip on Roth’s wrist is brutal enough that Roth’s knuckles go white.
“What the hell…” Roth starts. Dael’s voice cuts him off like a blade to the throat. “Don’t touch her.”
No shout.
No anger.
Just cold, lethal authority.
Roth tries to yank back, but Dael tightens his hold, expression carved in stone.
“I was just messing around,” Roth mutters.
Dael tilts his head slightly, the movement slow, controlled… dangerous. “Mess with me, then.”
Something shifts in the air. A ripple of fear, but it doesn’t come from me.
Roth swallows. “Dael, come on—”
“You think you can put your hands on someone I’m not done with?” Dael asks, voice lower now, quieter… which somehow makes it worse.
My heart stutters. Not done with?. His eyes flick to me for a fraction of a second.
Just a flicker. But it hits like a shockwave.
Possessive.
Uninvited.
Undeniable.
Roth laughs shakily. “You? Done with her? I didn’t know she was..”
Dael shoves him back with one harsh motion. Roth stumbles, nearly falling.
The courtyard goes silent. Dael doesn’t look at Roth again. His gaze cuts to the other boys, one look and they step back without hesitation. Then he turns his attention to me.
And everything inside me pulls tight.
He steps closer, invading my space the way Roth tried to but this feels entirely different. His presence is overwhelming, almost suffocating, but not in a way that makes me want to run.
In a way that terrifies me because part of me wants to stay.
His eyes narrow slightly as they sweep over me, checking for something. Bruises. Marks. Any sign I’d been hurt worse.
Not because he’s gentle but because he’s territorial. His jaw ticks. “If someone touches you,” he murmurs, “it’s because I let them.”
My breath catches.
“And I don’t,” he adds, voice like steel wrapped in velvet. I should step back, I should say something.
But my legs won’t listen, and my tongue feels too heavy to move. Dael leans in, his voice low enough that only I can hear it. “Don’t mistake my silence for indifference, Zyra.”
He glances over his shoulder where Roth still stands frozen, rubbing his wrist.
Dael’s expression darkens.
“I don’t share.”
The words strike something in me, fear, anger, confusion, all tangled so tightly I can’t breathe through them.
Before I can speak, before I can demand what any of this means, Dael turns slightly and murmurs to the boys:
“Touch her again, and I’ll break more than your wrist.”
- Writer
