Luna Forsaken (Arya and James) novel Chapter 173

173 Hope Is the Cruelest Trap 2

Arya’s POV

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The thought came from nowhere and everywhere at once, called up by Rebecca’s voice

and all the little cuts of the evening: rogue. stray. cast-out.

I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes.

Who were they?

Did I come from a pack with banners and territory and history?

Did I come from nothing?

Was I lost?

Was I hidden?

Was I thrown away?

The last thought hit hardest.

I hated that it still had power over me. Hated that even after everything, after surviving chains, betrayal, loss, public humiliation, near death, I could still be dragged raw by a

question I had no answer to.

Maybe someone, somewhere, had once looked for me.

Maybe no one had.

Maybe I had been a problem someone solved by abandoning.

The thought stung so sharply I pressed my palm to my chest like I could physically hold myself together.

Maxwell was kind. More than kind. Protective. Steady. He had given me a place, a name in his house, a shield I had never had before.

But kindness did not erase old wounds.

It did not erase the way people looked at me when they said rogue and meant less than.

It did not erase the truth that James had found it easier to throw me to politics because I

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had no bloodline powerful enough to make it costly.

It did not erase the mark on my throat.

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It did not bring back my child.

My eyes burned harder.

No.

Not here.

I pushed off the wall and forced myself to move.

A maid appeared at the far end of the hall carrying folded linens and paused when she

saw me. Her eyes widened slightly, likely recognising me from the ballroom, from

whispers, from the scene downstairs, from the fact that tonight my face had passed too

many mouths already.

I kept my voice steady. “Restroom?”

She nodded quickly and pointed farther down. “Past the next turn, my lady. Left-hand

side.”

“My lady.”

The title almost made me laugh again.

“Thank you.”

I turned in the direction she indicated and took only a few more steps before a hand

caught my wrist and another arm came around my waist, pulling me hard and fast

through a half-open door I had not noticed.

I gasped, instinct already surging up my spine, body twisting to fight before fear had

even fully formed.

The door shut behind me with a soft thud.

I spun, breath sharp,

Lev.

My back hit the inside wall. His hand was still around my wrist, not bruising, but firm

enough to stop me from bolting. The room smelled faintly of cedar and old paper, some

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private sitting room or office, dim and unoccupied, lit only by spill from the corridor and

one lamp burning low on a side table.

Shock gave way to fury so quickly my eyes stung all over again.

“What are you doing?” I hissed, trying to jerk free. “Let go.”

He looked at my face once and his jaw tightened.

Not anger.

Recognition.

He had seen enough tears from me to know when I was one breath away from more,

and he hated it. Not in the way men hate women crying because it inconveniences them.

In the way a predator hates evidence that something else got there first and hurt what it

has chosen.

The thought made me angrier.

I yanked harder. “Lev.”

His grip shifted but didn’t release. He pinned me with that dark, infuriatingly calm gaze

of his and said, low, “Don’t run.”

A laugh broke from me, sharp and almost ugly. “I wasn’t running. I was leaving before I

made a spectacle of myself.”

“You were leaving alone,” he corrected.

“Isn’t that what tonight made clear?” I snapped before I could stop myself.

The words landed between us.

His eyes narrowed slightly. “Arya, ”

I cut him off, because if I let him speak first I might hear something kind, and kindness

would split me open right now. “So you’re engaged.”

There it was.

Plain.

Bitter.

st Trap 2

Too raw.

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I hated how small the question made me feel even though I had phrased it like an accusation.

Lev’s expression did not soften. If anything, it got harder, more focused. He took one step closer, crowding my space without slamming me into it, making me choose whether to

retreat.

I held my ground.

“Not that I know of,” he said.

The answer was so immediate, so dry, that if I had not been hurting I might have laughed.

I stared at him. “Radimir just announced a date.”

“Yes.” His mouth flattened. “The old man wants to please his friend by marrying his friend’s daughter off to me.”

He said it without embarrassment. Without politeness. All the smooth diplomacy he had used in the ballroom was gone. This was Lev stripped down to blunt truth and

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