The morning after the confrontation was quiet—too quiet.

Maya hadn’t slept, her mind churning with the echo of Zayed’s voice, his claim over her, the ice in his tone that masked fire beneath. She rose early, bathed in silence, and wore a soft beige abaya with golden embroidery—modest, regal, untouchable. Maybe that would please him. Maybe that would tell him she understood now.

But he was nowhere to be seen.

The palace felt colder in his absence. Not physically—no, the marble and gold still gleamed, servants still bowed, and her every comfort was met before she could speak—but he was missing.

Zayed’s absence was a punishment in itself.

By afternoon, Maya couldn’t bear the silence. She wandered through the private gardens, the one place she felt even slightly free. The roses were blooming—blood red and wild—and she found herself kneeling beside one, her hand reaching instinctively to touch a thorned stem.

A sharp sting snapped her out of thought.

She yanked her hand back, a bead of crimson welling on her fingertip. It wasn’t serious, but it startled her.

The rustle of footsteps behind her froze her in place.

“Maya.”

That voice again—low, sharp, unmistakably him.

She turned around, startled.

He stood a few feet away, dressed in all black, like a shadow carved from fire and stone. His eyes dropped immediately to her hand. And in the next moment, he was beside her.

“What did you do?” he demanded, voice cutting through the air.

“I—it’s nothing. Just a thorn. I wasn’t paying attention.”

His jaw clenched.

Zayed took her wrist in his hand, holding it firmly but carefully. His eyes scanned the small wound like it was something unforgivable.

“You touched it?” he growled. “With your bare hand?”

“It’s a rose,” she said softly. “I’ve seen worse than a thorn.”

“You don’t touch anything that can harm you,” he snapped, eyes still on her hand. “You don’t bleed. Not when you are mine.”

The words struck her again—that claim, that fierce, possessive mine that he kept repeating like a vow.

“I didn’t know I needed permission to feel the thorns,” she replied, her voice more defiant than she intended.

His eyes flicked up to hers, sharp and unreadable. Then slowly, he wrapped a silk handkerchief around her finger with deliberate care. His hands were firm, commanding—but the gentleness in that act made her breath catch.

“You don’t need permission,” he said after a long pause. “But you do need protection. And if you won’t think for yourself, I’ll do the thinking for you.”

“That’s not fair.”

“Fairness is for strangers. Not for wives.”

He stepped closer, their faces inches apart now.

“You wear my name. My ring. You live in my palace. You eat my food, sleep in my bed, breathe under my protection. And you think you can offer pieces of yourself—to smiles, to thorns, to the world—without consequence?”

“I wasn’t offering anything.”

“But you did,” he said, voice lower now. “And it cost blood.”

Maya’s throat went dry. Her hand, now wrapped in silk, still rested in his grasp.

His voice dipped further, into something darker. “I don’t share, Maya. Not your smile. Not your kindness. Not even your pain. If you bleed—it will be by my hand, not a thorn’s.”

The air between them shimmered with tension, thick with something unsaid.

“And if I don’t agree with that?” she whispered, unsure where the courage came from.

Zayed’s lips curved, a cruel sort of smile—not amusement, but possession.

“You will.”

He let go of her hand at last, his warmth gone too suddenly, like winter sweeping into summer.

Before leaving, he spoke once more, voice low and final.

“You will dine with me tonight. No excuses. No silence.”

Then he turned and walked away, his black robes sweeping behind him like the wind had bent to his will.

Maya stood frozen in the garden, heart pounding in a rhythm she didn’t understand.

He was a man of control, of iron, of boundaries she wasn’t allowed to test. But something inside her had changed.

She wasn’t just afraid of him now.

She was drawn to him. To his obsession. To the twisted safety in it. To the way her name sounded like a command in his mouth.

She had touched a thorn.

And now, she was beginning to wonder if he was the real danger.