The skin-to-skin contact broke, and the sudden, violent return of my own existence hit me like a physical blow.
For a handful of minutes, Ivy’s touch had done the impossible: it had killed the pull. For the first time in two centuries, the wretched, automatic attraction born into my genetic makeup had gone dead-silent. No forced adoration from the masses. No cheap, suffocating compliance from court sycophants. Just... nothing. Absolute, beautiful neutrality.
Walking half a step ahead of her down the long library aisle, I had to force my posture into a rigid, unnatural line to mask the tremor in my jaw. The aura was rushing back, a sickening, magnetic heat rising to the surface of my skin like bile. It was a psychological nightmare—tasting absolute freedom only to have the cage door slam
