Heian sat at the foot of the bed, naked, spine curled like a question mark around a cigarette that had long burned itself out.
He hadn't slept.
He rarely did after touching her.
The night had cooled, but the room still throbbed with the ghosts of their bodies—paint and sweat smeared on the sheets like ritual stains.
He watched her sleep.
No—writhe.
Limbs twitching. Mouth open. A low noise escaping from her throat, more animal than woman.
She's dreaming again.
He leaned closer, studying the tremor in her lip, the quiver in her thighs. Her breath stuttered like a dying engine.
Her skin glistened with a fevered sheen. She clutched the pillow as if it were a blade.
He could see it—all of her. Not just the body, but the fracture beneath it. The place no one else dared touch.
And something inside him… stirred.
Do it, the voice inside him whispered.
Mark her while she's vulnerable. Bind her again. Turn this sleep into submission.
He reached for the velvet rope.
Paused.
Her face twisted suddenly, contorted in pain. A tear slid down her cheek, carving through ash from earlier rituals.
"You're just his next canvas…"
She whispered that. In sleep.
He froze.
The rope dropped from his fingers.
For a moment—just a second—he saw her not as his muse, not as his worshipper, not as his perfect ruin.
But as a girl.
Lost in a war she never chose.
Is this love, Heian?
Or just a gallery of your madness, dressed in flesh?
He stood up. Walked to his drawer. Took out the black ink.
He dipped his finger in it. Walked back to her.
And slowly—delicately—wrote one word on her thigh.
Mine.
He didn't tie her.
He didn't wake her.
He just watched.
Because sometimes, the most violent thing you can do…
Is let someone dream.
——