Hades' Cursed Luna novel Chapter 170

Hades

I had to keep my expression carefully neutral as she relayed all that happened. I gritted my teeth so hard that I had to hope that I was the only one that heard my molars grind.

She told me the whole story, the message and the literal written letter that he had left her on his only fucking visit since her arrival here.

That fucking ass...

I craned my neck, relieving the tension with crack but barely had an effect on the growing whirlwind of wrath that tore through my restraints.

When she was done, silence and the sanguinous scent of blood cloaked us. "You didn’t tell me," I mumured, words that came out like a whisper in the tense silence. I did not let even a pint of accusation seep into my voice. I had just won her back with half lies and truths, I couldn’t I push her away by antagonizing her especially after all she had been through today.

Her gaze lowered,she sank her teeth into her lip. It still sounded like an accusation.

I pinched her chin gently, raising her face so she could meet my eyes, to see that there was no ire behind my question.

Her eyes were moist and I was afraid that they would never dry. How much more would she cry? How much more times would she be betrayed? How many more times would she be a victim of the machinations of others? This question clouded my mind, attacking me, ripping into me, the way that I would rip into her.

The Flux whispered in the back of my mind, a dark murmur that coiled around my thoughts like a serpent. It pulsed with a possessive hunger, a primal need to claim, protect, and consume. It reveled in the torment she endured, feeding off the cracks in her spirit like a vulture circling a dying beast.

The corruption had come closer to the forefront, closer than it had ever been before. The mate bond was pulling it closer, it seemed as though my simple acknowledgement of the truth had reduced the effectiveness of the inhibitors.

I fought against it, clenching my jaw so tightly that the muscles ached. I couldn’t afford to let it take control. Not now. Not when she was looking at me with those wide, weary eyes—eyes that carried too many ghosts and too fragile trust.

It wanted her.

"You want her," it almost taunted, countering me. _{fгeewebnovёl.com}

"You didn’t tell me," I repeated, my voice softer this time, almost coaxing. My thumb traced the curve of her chin, a silent plea disguised as tenderness.

She blinked rapidly, a tear slipping free before she could catch it. "I—" Her voice wavered, and I saw the way she struggled with the weight of everything, the burden of truths she wasn’t ready to share. "I didn’t know how."

Didn’t know how to tell me? Or didn’t want to?

My stomach twisted with something I refused to name. I had spent so long constructing this web of deception, pulling her strings with careful precision, and yet... here she was, unknowingly unraveling everything I had built with a few whispered words and a single hesitant look.

"Cain," I murmured, tasting the name like poison on my tongue. My hand slid down from her chin, curling into a fist at my side. The bastard had dared to reach out to her—to plant seeds of doubt in her mind.

I forced a breath through my nose, forcing control back into my voice. "He wants to turn you against me," I said, letting the bitterness seep through my words like venom. "You know that, don’t you?" It made sense she would not tell me during that time, we were not exactly tolerating each other back then.

She nodded slowly, but there was still hesitation in her gaze, a sliver of doubt that twisted deep inside me.

The Flux seethed, urging me to take action—to show her why she couldn’t trust anyone but me. My fingers itched to pull her closer, to whisper words that would bind her to me irrevocably, to rewrite every doubt in her mind with promises she couldn’t resist.

Instead, I stepped back, giving her space she didn’t ask for but needed. It was a dangerous gamble, but I had learned long ago that control wasn’t always about force; sometimes, it was about restraint.

"You think I would hurt you, Red?" My voice was low, laced with just enough pain to make her second-guess herself.

She hesitated, chewing on her lower lip, but I caught the slight shake of her head. "No," she whispered. "I don’t."

The relief that surged through me was almost shameful.

Almost.

I nodded, reaching out to tuck a stray strand of hair behind her ear. "Then don’t let Cain’s words poison you." My fingers lingered at the nape of her neck, a possessive touch disguised as comfort. "I’m the only one standing between you and them. You know that." I lied. I was no shield. I was her hunter.

Her eyes met mine, searching, weighing the truth wrapped in my lies. And then, after a long moment, she exhaled and nodded.