Page 31 of Moonlit Desires

Without warning, reality fractures. Lyra's vision splinters, the moonlit courtyard dissolving into somewhere else, somewhen else—

*A boy kneels in a chamber of obsidian, walls so dark they swallow light rather than reflect it. His hair is silver even in youth, his face contorted in silent agony as shadows flow up his outstretched arms, burning patterns into his flesh. The scars form in silver lines, runes and sigils etching themselves permanently into his skin. His mouth opens in a scream no one hears as darkness binds itself to his blood, becoming part of him in a ritual too terrible for witnesses.*

Lyra gasps, breaking the kiss, but Riven follows her retreat, one hand sliding to the small of her back to press her closer. His eyes are closed, unaware of what she's seeing, lost in the flow ofpower between them. Their bodies align from chest to thigh, her curves fitting against the hard planes of his body as if designed for this precise contact.

"Don't stop," he murmurs against her mouth, voice rough with need. "The connection must be maintained."

She surrenders to the kiss again, and reality splinters once more—

*An older Riven, face lean with new adulthood but eyes already ancient with suffering, kneels before a throne of twisted black wood. Upon it sits a figure whose features constantly shift between beauty and horror, wearing a crown of living thorns that pierce the skin of their brow. Blood like liquid darkness trickles down their face as they extend a hand toward Riven.*

*"Your shadows please me," the figure says, voice neither male nor female but something between and beyond both. "You will bind yourself to the royal blood. You will serve as guardian to the line of Moonshadow until death releases you or I command otherwise."*

*Riven's face reveals nothing, but his hands—pressed flat against the cold stone floor—tremble with suppressed emotion. "And in return?"*

*The crowned figure smiles, revealing teeth too sharp for comfort. "In return, your shadows will never devour you whole."*

The vision dissolves as Riven's hands grip her hips hard enough to bruise, fingers digging into soft flesh through the thin fabric of her night shift. The pain anchors Lyra to the present momentarily, bringing her awareness back to the courtyard, to the ritual, to the man whose mouth now travels along the column of her throat with desperate intensity.

Lyra's fingers tangle in his silver hair, holding him to her as her head tips back in surrender. The pendant at her throat pulses in time with the mark on her back, both growingwarmer with each passing second. Riven's teeth scrape against her collarbone, the slight pain drawing a gasp from her lips that transforms into a moan when his tongue soothes the spot immediately after.

The power exchange builds, electrical and wild, making the very air around them crackle with potential. The shadows wrapping her limbs tighten possessively as Riven's hands slide lower, gripping the backs of her thighs to lift her slightly, aligning their bodies more perfectly. Her fingers clench in his hair, tugging sharply enough to draw his mouth back to hers.

The moment their lips reconnect, a third vision overwhelms her—

*Riven alone in a chamber like a negative image of the Midnight Court, walls of black stone illuminated only by a single shaft of moonlight. He kneels at the center of a circle of runes carved into the floor, each filled with something dark that glistens wetly in the dim light. Blood—his own, drawn from deep cuts along those scarred forearms.*

*"Bind to me," he commands, voice hoarse as if he's been repeating the words for hours. "Bind to my blood, serve my will, become my weapon." The shadows around him writhe like living things, reluctant or hungry or both. "I offer pain as payment. I offer memory as tithe. I offer control as a promise."*

*The shadows contract suddenly, flowing toward him in a rush that knocks him backward. They enter through his eyes, his mouth, the open wounds on his arms—darkness pouring into him like he's an empty vessel they intend to fill. His back arches in agony, a silent scream stretching his features as the shadows make him theirs as much as they become his.*

Lyra tears her mouth away with a cry, but the vision persists at the edges of her consciousness—Riven's suffering, his sacrifice, the price he paid for the power he wields. Her hands cradle hisface now, thumbs brushing his cheekbones as if to erase the echoes of pain she's witnessed.

The exchange of power between them has become overwhelming, a storm of sensation and magic that threatens to consume them both. Lyra's mark blazes like a captured star between her shoulder blades, its heat no longer confined to her back but spreading across her entire body until her skin glows with silver luminescence. The light shines through her thin shift, transforming the simple garment into something ethereal.

Riven's eyes open, mercury irises nearly swallowed by dilated pupils. He stares at her with wonder and hunger as his shadows dance across her illuminated skin, darkness caressing light in a contrast that makes them both more vivid.

"Your power," he whispers, voice barely audible above the hum of magic filling the courtyard. "It's waking."

Silver light pools in Lyra's palms, gathering like water in cupped hands—not summoned consciously but responding to the overflow of magic the ritual has unleashed. It spills between her fingers, neither liquid nor fire but something with properties of both, dripping onto the courtyard floor where it forms patterns that mirror the sigils Riven traced earlier.

His hands slide up her body to frame her face, mirroring their position when the ritual began, though now it's Lyra who glows with power while Riven's shadows pulse and contract around them both. Their foreheads pressed together, breath mingling in the narrow space between their lips as the magic builds toward some inevitable crescendo.

"Let it come," he urges, his usual sardonic tone replaced by something almost reverent. "Don't fight it."

The silver light spreads from her palms up her arms, across her shoulders, meeting the radiance from her mark until her entire body shimmers with barely contained power. The shadows respond, twining more tightly around her limbs, notrestraining but channeling, directing the flow of magic through pathways Riven has created with his touch, his kiss, his will.

The courtyard itself responds to the ritual's power—ancient runes along the walls begin to glow with faint silver light, dormant magic awakening after centuries of slumber. The moon overhead seems to lower itself toward them, its light concentrated into a single beam that bathes them in radiance so intense it borders on solid.

In this moment, suspended between shadow and light, Lyra sees Riven truly—not as the sardonic guardian with his cutting remarks and careful distance, but as he is beneath the masks: broken, powerful, bound by oaths and pain and terrible loneliness. And she knows with sudden certainty that he sees her too—not as Ella's daughter or the Moon Court's heir, but as Lyra, caught between worlds, stronger for her divisions.

The recognition passes between them like a current, intimate beyond physical touch, devastating in its honesty. And in its wake, the power crests, silver light and shadow meeting in perfect equilibrium as the ritual reaches its climax.

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The equilibrium shatters. Riven tears himself away with such violence that shadows splash outward like disturbed water, his body recoiling as if burned. The silver light between them snaps like a severed cord, sending a shower of luminescent droplets across the courtyard stones. Lyra staggers backward, her body still humming with power, skin sensitive as if newly made. She reaches instinctively for the wall to steady herself, and where her fingers touch stone, silver light blooms outward in swirling patterns.

Riven stands several paces away, chest heaving with ragged breaths that seem to pain him. His composure—that carefully maintained facade of sardonic detachment—lies in ruins. His silver hair is wild where her fingers tangled in it, his mouthswollen from their kisses, his eyes wide and vulnerable in a way she never imagined possible. The shadows that normally obey his every command whirl around him in chaotic patterns, responding to emotions he can no longer conceal.

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