Recent content by Nikolai

His body sagged the instant Cinna’s bindings unravelled, shadows loosening around him like smoke. For a moment, he simply breathed, harsh, ragged, each inhale scraping his ribs raw. Then came the unmistakable cadence of heels striking stone, light and deliberate, a rhythm he knew too well...

He waited. Waited for them to reload, to fire again, to close in and finish what they’d started. But no more bolts came. No one stepped forward. Instead, one by one, the hunters lowered their weapons and turned to leave, boots crunching through the frost as they disappeared into the snow-washed...

Time blurred until it meant nothing. The moon waxed and waned, snow fell and melted, and Nikolai left a trail of corpses that would stain the Winter Court’s soil for seasons to come. Eluin had broken after three days. The sound of his begging had been… satisfying, though Nikolai had silenced...

Nikolai had been running for hours, but the pull of the bond felt like a knife twisting in his ribs, dragging him backward with every stride. It burned. Not just the bond, but everything. His chest, his throat, his stomach. The hunger was back, worse than it had ever been. Sadie’s taste...

The silence was deafening. Worse than any anger. Nikolai stood frozen in the centre of the room, shadows crawling restlessly at his feet, like they too didn’t know where to go without her. Guilt gnawed at his insides, cold and sharp and more biting than the iron chains that once held him. He...

Nikolai was.. tense. All the muscle of his back, his shoulders, arms, all coiled like a bowstring ready to snap. He leaned against the table, crossing his ankles, his knuckles pale as he gripped the wood beneath him. His head was bowed, his eyes dark as they fixed on the floor, to the broken...

Nikolai’s jaw twitched as Cinna’s voice gentled, as if her quiet sorrow had more teeth than her fury ever did. He didn’t want her pity. He didn’t want anyone’s pity. Not when his soul already felt like it was being carved hollow from the inside out. He watched with silent fury as Cinna...

Nikolai’s grip on Sadie tightened, not enough to hurt, but enough that she would feel the tension rising in his arms, the restraint it took not to lash out as Cinna continued. His shadows crackled at the edges of the room like a storm barely held at bay, flickering in sharp pulses as Cinna...

Nikolai held his ground while Cinna raged, but the shrill pitch still knifed straight through the shadow that pooled in his ears. Every spite‑laced word drove his temper a degree hotter. The living darkness at his shoulders thickened, pooling at his feet like ink about to boil. He drew a slow...

Nikolai’s head snapped back as Cinna’s tirade knifed through the room, every syllable striking his over‑sensitised ears like a hammer blow. Gods, the woman could make thunder seem polite. A low growl rumbled from his chest and shadows sluiced over his skin in a restless tide, knitting themselves...

Nikolai’s smile curved slow and crooked, something wicked and unbearably smug flashing in his violet eyes when Sadie whispered her confession. No male ever has. Until you. He stepped closer, not just with his body but with that predatory air he wore like a second skin. “Oh. I know,” he...

Nikolai watched her rise from the bed with the heavy, possessive stillness of a predator watching prey slip just out of reach. Only she wasn’t prey. She never had been. She was the storm after the silence. The fire under his skin. And she was walking away from him wrapped in his godsdamned...

Nikolai’s hands twitched against her skin, as if torn between dragging her closer and throwing her off. His jaw clenched hard enough to ache as she kissed him, hard, with the weight of doom wrapped in longing, and every inch of him screamed resist. But he didn’t. He couldn’t. Gods, why couldn’t...

Nikolai’s breath caught in his throat. Mates. The word echoed through him like a curse, a prayer, a death knell wrapped in silk. He hadn't thought it possible. Because a mate required a soul to bind with, and he had never believed himself capable of being bound to anything but shadows. Until...

Nikolai stilled as she climbed atop him, his breath catching the moment one hand settled on his chest and the other locked his gaze in place. He hadn’t expected her boldness. Nor had he expected her softness. He had expected to see disgust, fear, regret, but instead found steel wrapped in silk...