Married To Darkness - Chapter 500
Chapter 500: Her breakdown
As they rode on, the night thinning into something wide and restless, Salviana’s voice cut through the wind.
“Let’s stop here.”
Alaric reined the horse in at once.
They were on a bridge—old stone, worn smooth by time and passing feet, its arches breathing cold air up from the water below.
The river rushed beneath them, dark and unseen, carrying the night with it. The wind tugged at cloaks and hair, sharp and insistent.
He nodded, though unease had already begun to coil in his chest.
The horse stilled. The world did not.
“I want to go down,” she said next, her tone flat, almost distant.
Alaric’s brows knit together.
Down… where?
Every instinct in him screamed against it. The bridge was high. The river loud. The night too open. Too exposed.
But she had been silent for so long.
If this would make her feel better—if this was the price of her breathing again—he would pay it.
“All right,” he said quietly.
He dismounted first, boots striking stone, then turned and lifted her down with careful hands, as though she were made of something fragile and easily shattered.
The moment her feet touched the bridge, she stepped away.
Not fast. Not slow.
Just… away.
She walked toward the edge.
Alaric’s heart began to pound, each beat louder than the last, drowning out the river, the wind, his own thoughts.
Salviana…
He followed a few steps behind her, afraid to startle her, afraid to rush her—but with every step she took closer to the edge, his fear sharpened.
He swallowed hard.
“Salviana?” he whispered.
She didn’t answer.
She didn’t turn.
She kept going.
Oh no.
The thought landed with brutal clarity.
She wouldn’t… would she?
His breath hitched.
He could not allow that.
He would not allow that.
He closed the distance between them quickly now, boots scraping against stone, his hands half-raised as though preparing to catch her—even from this far away.
She reached the edge of the bridge.
And then—
She sat.
Folded her legs beneath her.
And looked up.
Alaric froze.
The sky stretched above them—vast, endless, scattered with stars like distant witnesses. She gazed at it for a long moment, her face tilted upward, hair tugged loose by the wind.
Then she looked down.
At the river.
At the dark.
Her shoulders rose.
She sniffed.
Once.
Then again.
And then—
She screamed.
The sound tore out of her, raw and unrestrained, ripping through the night like a wound. It echoed across the water, bounced off stone and sky and silence.
She screamed again.
And again.
At the top of her lungs.
Not words.
Not pleas.
Just pain.
Then her voice broke, shattered into sobs that bent her forward, her body curling inward as though trying to protect something already hurt too badly.
Alaric’s chest caved in.
He crossed the remaining distance in two strides and dropped beside her, knees hitting stone, his heart breaking with every sob that shook her small frame.
He didn’t touch her yet.
Didn’t speak.
He stayed.
Because this—this was not a woman trying to disappear.
This was a woman trying not to drown.
And he would stay with her through every scream, every tear, every breath she had to relearn how to take.
Alaric finally reached for her.
Slowly. Carefully. As if she might break beneath his hands.
He wrapped his arms around Salviana from behind first, hesitant, then firmer when she didn’t pull away. When she leaned back into his chest—just slightly—it undid him.
He gathered her fully then, pulling her against him, one hand cradling the back of her head, the other locked around her waist as though anchoring her to the earth itself.
She cried into the night for a while longer.
Deep, wracking sobs that left her trembling.
Alaric had fought monsters at dawn, bled for realms, stared death down without flinching—but this? This helplessness, this inability to take her pain away, hollowed him out.
“I don’t know how to make it stop,” he whispered hoarsely into her hair. “But I’m here. I won’t leave you alone in it.”
Her breathing slowly evened, though her body still shook. She stayed pressed against him, fingers clenched in the fabric of his coat like it was the only solid thing left in the world.
Then, softly—so softly he almost missed it—she spoke.
“The royal seductress…” Her voice cracked. “She said you were a beast in bed.”
Alaric stiffened.
The words hit him like a physical blow.
He pulled back just enough to look at her face, disbelief flooding his expression. “What?”
She turned slightly, not fully meeting his eyes. “She said it so… confidently. Like it was something she knew.”
His breath caught.
“How,” he said slowly, carefully, “would she know that?”
Her lips trembled. “I asked myself the same thing.”
“I have never been with her,” Alaric said at once. The shock in his voice was real, raw. “Not once.”
She swallowed. “Then… who have you been with?”
“No one,” he said without hesitation. “I swear it. On everything that matters to me.”
Her brows knit together, confusion and hurt tangling painfully. “But Eva—”
“Who in all hells is that?” Alaric snapped, then immediately softened, realizing his tone. He exhaled hard. “Salviana, she is a known courtesan. I hate to say it that way—but how could you let someone like that plant such poison in your heart?”
Tears welled in her eyes again, slower this time. “Because it hurt,” she whispered. “You wouldn’t even… make me a woman.” The words came out broken. “Yet she spoke as though you’d shown your beast to another.”
Alaric’s chest tightened painfully.
He turned her fully then, hands framing her face, thumbs brushing away tears she hadn’t realized were falling.
“That is not true,” he said fiercely. “Not in any world.”
She looked up at him, vulnerable, scared. “Then why?”
“Because I was afraid,” he admitted quietly. “Afraid of hurting you. Afraid of crossing a line you weren’t ready for. Afraid you’d think I only wanted one thing from you.”
His forehead rested against hers.
“You are my wife,” he continued, voice thick with emotion. “But more than that—you are you. And I never wanted our intimacy to be something taken or rushed or proven to anyone else.”
Her breath hitched.
“You are my only woman,” he said softly. “You always have been.”
Her hands curled into his coat again, this time pulling him closer. “And… forever?”
A small, pained smile touched his lips. “And forever.”
He kissed her temple, then her hair, lingering there—not to claim, not to demand—only to reassure.
The river rushed beneath them.
The night watched.
And for the first time since the tea party, Salviana felt the knot in her chest loosen—just enough to breathe.