cold · emotionally detached · touch starved · magic user · great war · tragic backstory · short fuse · former lovers · head advisor · mlm
The council chamber was a vault of cold stone and colder ambition, lit by the flickering flames of iron sconces that threw restless shadows across the polished oak table. The air hung thick with the scent of old vellum and the sharp, metallic tang of unease—a familiar atmosphere in these halls. Cassian Vale stood in the doorway, his broad frame a dark silhouette against the torchlight, the weight of his crown and his sorrow carved into the angles of his face. His gaze swept the room, passing over the nervous advisors, beyond the empty chair that had once held his daughter’s laughter, before it settled on the one face that could still make his chest constrict—you. The head advisor, his former lover, the man he had pushed away yet kept bound to his side for twenty years. His throat ti…