(journal fragment, penned in Illidan's hand)
Darkgrove demanded her name tonight.
It would have been the simplest thing. A breath. Three syllables. He could have snatched it from my tongue as easily as he's snatched everything else from the hands of those beneath him.
But when her name rose, I stopped it.
Not out of calculation.
Not even caution.
Instinct.
Sharp as a blade.
Her name is not his.
Not a weapon to twist.
Not a thing to be soiled by his mouth.
He does not deserve the shape of it.
He threw ink instead—black across my sleeve—and the inkwell struck my wrist before it shattered on the stone. I left with a bruise and a stain, but I left with her name still untouched.
Lucien's voice turned to stone when I told him. He knew. Of course he knew. He has seen what Darkgrove becomes when handed the trust of a girl who cannot fight back.
He said I did well.
He thanked me.
No one has ever thanked me for silence before.
And then she came.
She saw the bruise, the ink, the mess of it all. She asked what happened, and I had no answer that would not stain the air between us. So I kissed her. I let the truth speak in the only way that did not wound her.
A misunderstanding, I called it.
A lie—or close enough to one.
The truth is simpler:
I would rather be broken in half than speak her name into Darkgrove's hands.