[center][h1][color=D0B4EC]Charlotte[/color] & [color=lightsteelblue]Cassius[/color][/h1]

[h3]Part 3 [/h3][/center]

[color=lightsteelblue]Time:[/color]Evening 
[color=D0B4EC]Location:[/color] Hallway, Castle


[hr][color=lightgray]
A sound split the air.

Metal against leather. The sound of a buckle being fastened. 

It shouldn’t have meant anything. But it did.

She suddenly felt the ghost of pressure on her thighs, her ankles, her wrists…

It echoed unnaturally, and Charlotte’s eyes snapped open. She held her breath as the world seemed to stop. 

The warmth Cassius had lit within her extinguished in a single, soundless instant. 

She couldn’t breathe, and it felt as if she could no longer move her limbs.

Her vision tunneled on Cassius’s face, still close, lips barely parted, but she wasn’t seeing him anymore. Her limbs stayed where they were, but her soul was already spiraling backward, yanked into the dark by a memory she didn’t even know she still carried.

She blinked, but when she opened her eyes again, it was not Cassius she saw.

It was him.

Another older man stood before her. He was tall and neatly dressed in muted tones. His posture was straight, and his dark eyes were detached. His hair was combed with precision. There was nothing monstrous in his features, and that made it worse. 

No fangs. No claws. 

[color=7bcdc8]“Relax...”[/color] a voice left his lips. [color=7bcdc8] “Count backward from ten.”[/color]

Charlotte exhaled sharply and shoved her palms flat against Cassius’s chest. She pushed at him [i]hard[/i], her entire body trembling with sudden revulsion.

She stumbled backward like a cornered creature ripping itself free from the predator’s maws. [color=D0B4EC]“Don’t touch me!”[/color] she blurted sharply. Her voice trembled, but there was no mistaking the terror in it. That sudden, violent fear was aimed directly at him.

Her hands hovered in front of her like she didn’t know what they were for anymore. 

Charlotte’s voice had trembled…Her body had melted into his, and now she recoiled as though he’d struck her.

Cassius froze. Arms still half-wrapped around nothing, lips parted. Her words sliced through the haze and sobered him up from the wine and the desire all at once. Her voice repeated the words once more in his head.

[i][color=D0B4EC]“Don’t touch me!”[/color][/i]

It wasn’t confusion that hit him first. It was something else…shame, maybe. Or disbelief. His hands slowly lowered as she backed away with eyes wide and wild with fear…and somehow, even though his heart didn’t want to accept what he was seeing, it was him she was looking at like that.

He took a step forward before he could stop himself, then he paused and held perfectly still.

Her voice had sounded like a stranger’s.

She was trembling, her gaze so harsh and revulsed towards him. Her hands… they hovered like she was afraid of him. As though he would ever hurt her.  

[i]Gods, it felt so personal.[/i]

Cassius blinked hard, as though trying to knock loose whatever the hell had just shifted between them. He took another step… slower this time. Quieter.

His voice came soft and low in a more earnest tone that he rarely used.
 [color=lightsteelblue]“Lottie…”[/color]

He reached for her gently, both hands raised. Not to hold her or to grab. Just to touch her face, to ground her…to let her know she was okay. That she could be safe with him.

His fingers were just inches away from her cheek.

[color=lightsteelblue]“It’s me…”[/color] he murmured. [color=lightsteelblue]“You’re okay. I swear, you’re okay. We can just talk…I’m sorry if I was moving too fast.”[/color]

Charlotte stared at the figure before her, but the face kept shifting before her eyes. The hallway darkened around them as if the shadows wanted to drown her. The lights overhead sputtered erratically, emitting a dull buzz that crawled inside her head. 

She felt leather digging into her wrists, tightening relentlessly.  She jerked, but her limbs stayed frozen. Panic rose in her throat.

A voice then echoed down the corridor, distant at first, then unbearably close:

[color=7bcdc8]“Charlotte.”[/color]

The same face came into focus again: older and expressionless. [color=7bcdc8]“Charlotte,”[/color] he repeated. The calm command in his voice made every muscle in her body seize up. [color=7bcdc8]“You know how this goes.”[/color]

Her lips parted, trembling, but no sound came. She wanted to scream,  but no words left her throat. Charlotte's vision blurred with tears as he pressed the cold prongs firmly against her temples. A low mechanical hum vibrated through the air, growing steadily louder. She felt impending dread.

[color=7bcdc8]“You’re delusional, Charlotte.”[/color] he whispered, almost affectionately,[color=7bcdc8]“ You’re very sick. Don’t resist.”[/color] He tilted his head slightly, curiosity sparking coldly in those lifeless eyes. He turned a dial slowly, a faint humming sound rising.

[color=7bcdc8]“How badly does it hurt?”[/color] His voice was gentle, almost kind.[color=7bcdc8] “One to ten.”[/color]

Agony sliced through her, ripping mercilessly into her skull, searing through her bones like heated blades. Her vision went white and fractured violently; she heard a ragged, primal scream echoing somewhere, only dimly realizing it was her own.

[color=D0B4EC]“TEN! … TEN!”[/color] Her voice cracked, shrill and desperate, as her body contorted violently against the unseen restraints. Her spine arched sharply, limbs jerking with wild, uncontrollable convulsions.

[color=7bcdc8]“Good.”[/color] His voice was satisfied. [color=7bcdc8]“That’s good, Charlotte.”[/color]

The lights above her shattered into strobe bursts in time with her agony. The electricity surged again, blinding her. Her body spasmed uncontrollably, every muscle locked tight, her limbs thrashing helplessly against restraints that wouldn’t give.

[color=red][i]“STOP! PLEASE, STOP!”[/i][/color]

In a final surge of terror and desperation, she fought violently against the restraints, clawing, thrashing wildly to escape the unrelenting torment.

Then the vision shattered, reality crashing back into place as her fingernails suddenly found soft skin. She felt resistance and heard a startled sound that didn’t match her nightmare. 

Cassius staggered back from her, his hand flying up to his face, fingertips coming away red, streaked with blood from where her nails had carved deep, panicked scratches across his cheek.

She was no longer restrained, but staring wide-eyed into Cassius’s shocked, wounded face.

Her stomach churned violently, nausea rising as a strangled sound of disbelief escaped her lips.

[color=D0B4EC]“I–... Cassius—”[/color]

Her eyes filled with tears. Her hands hovered, trembling, and streaked with red. She had hurt him… and the realization was almost too heavy. Panic clawed at her throat again, but now for an entirely different reason.

She fumbled desperately with the small purse slung over her shoulder, her fingers shaking uncontrollably. [color=D0B4EC]“Please, wait…I know I have something…"[/color] Her voice was small as she fumbled with the clasp,  unable to steady her frantic, useless hands. 

Her limbs felt distant. Her mind felt untethered. She didn’t know who he was—[i]that man[/i]—or where she had gone just now, but it hadn’t been a dream. It had [i]felt[/i] real. Too real. And now all that remained was the crushing weight of fatigue.

Cassius staggered back, breath caught sharp in his throat. The sting of her nails was nothing...he’d taken worse blows ten times over...but the look in her eyes?

That broke him.

She wasn’t here, not really…not with him. At least not like she had been moments ago. 

And yet his blood now ran down her fingertips like she’d been clawing to defend her life from him.

His jaw clenched as his hand hovered just shy of the wound. He could feel it... warm, wet, the sting spreading like a second heartbeat beneath his skin. The pain was real…too real. And so was the echo of her words.

[i][color=D0B4EC]“Don’t touch me!”[/color][/i]

Her voice replayed again in his mind’s eye.

He stared at her, raw with disbelief. She fumbled for her bag, trembling and panicked, her emotions crumbling before him in real time.

Cassius stood still, blood warm on his cheek, and for a moment, he didn’t breathe or move or understand how they had gotten here. 

He watched her scramble with shaking hands, her voice cracking as she tried to explain, to fix it, to backpedal through panic and tears... but it was already too late. The look in her eyes was burned into him now.

That fear. That recoil…The sound in her throat as she spoke. It made him feel every bit the monster she had treated him to be; the one his own secrets made him fear he could not overcome. 

He lowered his hand slowly, eyes falling to the red streaks across his palm. The cuts stung, but not nearly as much as the cold that seeped into his chest out of instinct… brick by brick… wall by wall… all the places he had let her in now closing up fast.

He took a step back, just one, like distance might dull the sting.

Then he laughed, quiet, bitter. Not because it was funny, but because it was the only thing keeping the rest of him from unraveling.

His voice came rough. Detached. The armor was already slipping back on.

[color=lightsteelblue]“No… no, it’s fine. Really.”[/color] He nodded to himself, not to her. [color=lightsteelblue]“I don’t know what I was expecting.”[/color]

His gaze met hers, but there was something unreadable in it now. Something retreating.

[color=lightsteelblue]“You know, Lottie…my father told me everything I needed to know about you.”[/color] The words tasted like venom, but his tone stayed smooth. [color=lightsteelblue]“Guess I was just the fool who thought maybe... maybe you were different. Maybe you could actually…”[/color]

He didn’t finish his words. Instead, he looked away, jaw tight, and exhaled once through his nose.

[color=lightsteelblue]“That’s on me.”[/color]

And then, without another word, Cassius turned and walked away.

Every bone in his body fought to turn back, but the pride he wore so well like armor forced his steps ever forward. Away from the girl who had just wounded him so. His steps were not just carrying him away from the hurt she caused, but also the damage he knew his own words would inflict upon her in return. 

Charlotte’s gaze snapped upward at the bitter sound of his laughter, and the look upon his face was enough to fracture her heart long before his words ever touched her ears. Her pulse quickened with panic, her mind frantically searching for the right words, but before she could form them, his voice cut through her hope:

[i][color=lightsteelblue]“You know, Lottie…my father told me everything I needed to know about you.”[/color][/i]

A sob choked its way into her throat, and her trembling hand reached toward him as if to grasp the rapidly unraveling threads. But he was already turning away, leaving her outstretched fingers to touch only empty air.

[color=D0B4EC]“No…”[/color] she whispered, her voice quivering and faint, [color=D0B4EC]“You don’t mean that. Cassius—please… you [i]cannot[/i] mean that.”[/color]

But he was too far gone, the hallway swallowing her words as surely as it swallowed him. The agony tore through her chest, unbearable in its intensity, a suffocating wave of grief she knew she’d never outrun. He had seen her…[i]truly seen her[/i]…and yet he still believed what the rest of them did. What Calbert believed.

The truth settled upon her: she had lost him.

With a shuddering breath, Charlotte’s trembling hand lost its grip on her purse, scattering its contents across the floor. Fighting through blurred vision, she sank to her knees, hands shaking violently as she hastily began retrieving the scattered items until her gaze fell upon something that stopped her heart altogether.

Fingers trembling, Charlotte lifted the card into the dim light. It was a crimson business card with Lucian D’Arcy’s name on it. It was from the club he had taken her to. Her breath hitched sharply, and her eyes widened in disbelieving horror. 

A familiar insignia stared mockingly back at her: [i]The Black Rose[/i].

An icy fury surged within her painfully as she swiftly rose to her feet. [color=D0B4EC]“Perhaps,”[/color] she began, her voice trembling and edged with hurt, yet clear enough to reach him now, [color=D0B4EC]“perhaps [i]you[/i] are exactly what I thought you were!”[/color]

She advanced toward him, tears streaming down her flushed cheeks. Her voice cracked, though it grew louder and sharper, propelled by the pain he’d inflicted.

[color=D0B4EC]“You come here tonight, all sincerity and devotion, yet you wasted not a moment in that banquet to flirt shamelessly with Kalliope! Did you think me blind? Wasn’t it her bed you warmed mere nights ago?”[/color] Her heart thundered, her chest aching as she fought to speak past the sobs threatening to break her voice entirely. [color=D0B4EC]“Tell me, Cassius—which one of us was [i]the fool[/i]? Which one of us was your second choice?”[/color]

She halted abruptly, thrusting the card forward in accusation, trembling hands nearly dropping it again as her voice rose to a grief stricken crescendo:

[color=D0B4EC]“You [i]scoundrel[/i]! You liar!”[/color] she cried bitterly. [color=D0B4EC]“You took me to the [i]Black Rose[/i], all the while professing your heartfelt concern for my wellbeing? It was all fake, wasn’t it?  You were their spy all along, weren’t you?”[/color]

Charlotte’s voice softened suddenly, breaking under the weight of her devastation, thick with despair and humiliation. [color=D0B4EC]“Do not dare paint me as the villain in this tragedy, Cassius [i]Damien[/i],”[/color] she whispered hoarsely, her voice now barely audible through her tears. [color=D0B4EC]“When I was nothing more to you than a plaything!”[/color]

She stared at him for a lingering moment, the tears endlessly cascading silently down her flushed cheeks. But when she spoke again, the tremor was gone, replaced instead by clarity. [color=D0B4EC]“Of course you believe your father “[/color] She began softly. Her chin lifted, eyes blazing as she took another step toward him, defiant despite the tremble of pain still etched upon her features.

[i][color=D0B4EC]“Because you’re exactly like him.”[/color][/i]

Cassius didn’t stop walking, nor did he turn or flinch or give her the satisfaction of seeing the way her words landed.

Because if he turned around now, if he saw her face, if he let himself believe for even a second that the girl standing behind him was the same one who had kissed him like he was actually fucking worth something to her… he’d fall apart right there in the hallway. His pride, which now had taken full control, would never have allowed such a thing. 

So, he just kept going…each step growing louder than the last, drowning out the voices in his head that begged him to turn around and stop this madness. To change the narrative unfolding around them. 

[b]But she had already made her choice.[/b]

And if this was how she wanted to remember him, if this was the story Lottie would tell herself to make sense of it all, then fine. Let it be ugly. Let it all be his fault. [i]Let it hurt.[/i] He was used to being the villain of other people’s stories.  

His voice, when it came, was just loud enough to carry to her ears, but cold enough that even if he had turned to scream it would not have had the same impact.

[color=lightsteelblue]“Whatever you say, Princess.”[/color]

He didn’t look over his shoulder, didn’t pause to see if she reacted…He just kept walking, jaw tight, blood still dripping down his cheek.

[color=lightsteelblue]“Good to know what you really think of me, after everything.”[/color] He took a sharp and bitter breath. [color=lightsteelblue]“Glad I figured it out before I wasted any more of my time.”[/color]

And then he disappeared around the corner, leaving only the echo of his footsteps behind… and the wreckage of everything they could have been. The ruins of the version of himself he’d almost dared to become…[i]for her.[/i][/color]