Page 43 of Sage Haven

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I let the words settle and watched the realization click into place.

“We’ll keep her safe,” I said, my voice dropping lower. “Relatively speaking.”

Castor exhaled sharply. “You’re playing a dangerous game, brother.”

I smirked, but it didn’t reach my eyes. “Good.”

I already knew what I was doing, and I didn’t care.

Because I had just found my way to her.

She was mine now.

Even if she didn’t know it yet.

11

SAGE

My routine had spiraledcompletely out of control since the festival.

Everything I’d built—the carefully ordered days, the rituals that once kept me grounded—was unraveling like frayed threads slipping through my fingers.

I’d tried. I really had.

I’d taken Sam’s advice. Told myself to slow down. Take it easy. Breathe.

But the longing inside me refused to loosen its grip. It only sank deeper, winding itself through every thought, filling up the hollow spaces I had fought so hard to keep empty.

And it wasn’t restlessness.

Not really.

It was sharper than that.

A gnawing ache for something more.

More than routine.

More than the hollow predictability I’d convinced myself was safety and now, I was starting to see it for what it was.

I hadn’t been protecting myself.

I’d been hiding.

Mistaking comfort for stability.

Mistaking numbness for peace.

I’d carved out this careful version of myself and locked myself inside it. Told myself I needed control. That surviving was enough.

But I was wrong and all I could feel was the burn of that realization.

The irony of it.

This life I thought I’d built to keep me safe had become a prison.

And I was the one holding the key.

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