Claimed By Fire And Crown

Chapter 8

I made it halfway down the street before I realized he was still there.

Not beside me. Not close enough to touch. But present in a way that didn’t need distance to matter. The awareness sat just behind me, steady and unbroken, like a shadow that didn’t quite match my movement.

I kept walking.

The road stretched out ahead, uneven and dimly lit, the few working lights casting more shadow than clarity. My steps stayed even, measured, even though my pulse hadn’t settled since the alley. Every sound felt sharper now—the scrape of my shoes against the ground, the faint hum of something in the distance, the quiet shift of air that followed me without closing the space.

I didn’t look back.

Not because I didn’t want to.

Because I already knew.

My fingers curled slightly at my sides as I slowed just enough to listen, my head turning a fraction as if I might catch something in the periphery. The sound of footsteps didn’t come. That didn’t mean he wasn’t moving.

It just meant he didn’t need to be heard.

I exhaled slowly, then stopped.

The movement felt abrupt after the steady rhythm of walking, my body going still as I turned this time, not slowly, not carefully—just enough to face him.

He stood a few steps behind me.

Not close.

Not far.

Far enough that he could have been anyone else on the road if I didn’t know better. But I did. The way he held himself gave him away—still, controlled, like nothing around him required his attention unless he decided it did.

“You’re following me,” I said.

It wasn’t a question.

His gaze didn’t shift as he looked at me. “I’m making sure you don’t get caught again.”

I frowned, my arms crossing loosely in front of me as I shifted my weight. “I didn’t ask you to.”

“No.”

He didn’t elaborate.

Didn’t need to, apparently.

Something in my chest tightened, irritation pushing through the lingering tension. “Then stop,” I said. “I can handle myself.”

His eyes moved over me then, not dismissive, not mocking—just assessing. It lasted a second longer than I liked before he spoke again.

“No,” he said simply.

The answer hit harder than it should have, something about the certainty in it scraping against my patience. “You don’t get to decide that,” I shot back, my voice tightening.

“I already did.”

The quiet in his tone didn’t soften it.

If anything, it made it worse.

I let out a short breath, shaking my head as I turned away from him again, resuming my pace without waiting for another response. “You don’t even know where I’m going,” I muttered, more to myself than to him.

“I know you don’t.”

I almost stopped again.

Almost.

Instead, I kept moving, my jaw tightening as I pushed forward. “Then this is pointless,” I said, glancing back over my shoulder this time. “You don’t know me. You don’t know what I need.”

“No,” he agreed.

A beat passed as I turned fully again, walking backward for a few steps so I could face him properly.

“Then why are you still here?” I asked.

His gaze held mine, steady and unreadable. “Because you’re still in danger.”

I huffed out a quiet breath, my head tipping back briefly as frustration edged in. “That doesn’t mean you get to—”

“It does.”

The interruption was quiet.

Final.

I stopped walking again, my arms dropping back to my sides as I faced him. The space between us hadn’t changed much, but it felt different now that I wasn’t moving.

“You don’t even know what he wants,” I said, searching his expression for something—anything—that would make sense of this.

“I do.”

The answer came without hesitation.

My stomach tightened. “Then explain it,” I said.

He didn’t.

Not right away.

His gaze shifted slightly, not away from me, but past me, scanning the road ahead like he was checking something I couldn’t see. When his attention returned, there was something sharper there, something more focused than before.

“He’s not the only one who knows about you,” he said.

The words landed slowly.

He didn’t rush them.

Didn’t soften them either.

A cold feeling slipped through me, settling low and heavy as I held his gaze. “I don’t know what that means.”

“I know.”

That again.

My fingers curled slightly as I took a step closer without thinking, closing some of the distance between us. “Then stop saying that and actually tell me something,” I said, my voice lower now, more controlled.

For a second, he didn’t respond.

His attention shifted again, dropping briefly to the space between us before lifting back to my face. Up close, it was easier to see the details I’d missed before—the stillness in him, the way nothing in his posture felt rushed or uncertain.

Like he’d already made every decision that mattered.

“You shouldn’t have survived this long,” he said.

The words hit harder than anything else he’d said so far.

I blinked, my breath catching slightly as my chest tightened. “That’s not an explanation.”

“It is,” he said.

“No, it’s not,” I snapped, my frustration breaking through. “It’s just another way of saying something’s wrong with me.”

Something shifted in his expression then.

Not much.

Just enough.

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” he said.

The certainty in it threw me off more than the words themselves.

“Then what is it?” I asked, quieter now.

He didn’t answer.

Instead, he looked past me again, his focus sharpening in a way that made the hairs on the back of my neck rise. My body reacted before my mind caught up, my shoulders tightening as I turned slightly, following his line of sight down the road.

The darkness ahead hadn’t changed.

But the feeling had.

That same cold awareness from earlier crept back in, faint but unmistakable, threading through the air like something circling just out of sight.

My pulse kicked up again.

“He’s not far,” Rhaegar said.

The words were quiet.

Controlled.

But they settled heavy.

I swallowed, my fingers curling slightly as I forced myself to stay still. “Then we keep moving,” I said, even though my voice didn’t carry as much confidence as I wanted it to.

Rhaegar didn’t move.

“Running won’t help,” he said.

“It’s helped so far,” I shot back.

“No,” he replied. “It hasn’t.”

I opened my mouth to argue—

Then closed it.

Because he wasn’t wrong.

My chest tightened as I glanced down the road again, then back at him. “Then what do you suggest?” I asked, the question coming out more reluctantly than I intended.

His gaze held mine for a second longer before he stepped forward, closing the remaining distance between us in a single, controlled movement.

“We stop,” he said.

The words settled between us, heavier than anything that had come before.

“And we deal with it.”