Sitting inside the café, Nyx remained still, her gaze fixed on her beloved husband.
The faint clatter of cups and low murmurs of strangers drifted through the air, yet none of it reached her.
Even though he still wore the skull mask, the image of his real face flickered again and again within her mind... as if her thoughts refused to let it fade.
It felt as though something had wrapped around her senses, tightening gently yet persistently, pulling her deeper into him without resistance.
'It didn't happen when we came together, though?' she wondered, her brows knitting ever so slightly.
When they had been together before, Aether had looked completely normal to her.
But after leaving him alone with Her Majesty, after that moment where he had taken her, something had shifted.
She couldn't grasp it. His face, his posture, even the way he sat across from her, remained the same, yet something beneath it all had transformed into something that stirred her instincts.
