MARKED FOR PRETEND - Chapter 17: Chapter 17

Chelsea's pov
She hadn’t expected to stay long, just a glance, a breath, proof that the palace wasn’t swallowing her whole.
But Kaden didn’t send her away. He didn’t speak again either, not immediately. He just turned back to the training dummy and resumed, blade flashing in the low torchlight like a whisper.
Chelsea lingered at the edge of the courtyard, watching.
“You’re not going to ask me why I’m here?” she called out eventually, arms crossed.
He didn’t pause. “If you’re here, you have your reasons.”
“That’s it?”
“I don’t force people to speak.”
A beat. “Unlike some in this place.” He didn’t need to name names. She already knew.
The council,the advisors, the silent stares from those who still didn’t know what to do with her.
She stepped closer, eyes drifting over the weapons scattered on the table nearby;daggers ,blunt swords,even a thin silver staff.
“You fight often?” she asked.
“I lead a pack.” He responded.
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
“Then maybe I don’t want to.” Chelsea raised a brow. “Are you always this charming?”
A flicker of something curved his lips. It might’ve been a smirk or surprise.
“Only when I’m not trying to terrify someone.”
“You think you terrify me?”
He turned then, fully this time and stepped forward, slow,calculated.
The air shifted, like it always did around him.
“You haven’t left your room in almost two months,” he said softly. “You barely eat. You flinch when people say your name. But somehow, you always find the nerve to talk back to me.”
Chelsea straightened her spine.
“Maybe you’re the only one worth talking back to.” That earned her something, not quite a smile but the tension in his jaw eased.
He picked up a small dagger and walked toward her.
You ever used one of these? Once. When I was cutting wildberries and nearly sliced off my thumb.”
He stepped closer and flipped the dagger, offering it hilt-first.
“Try not to bleed on my floor".
“You don’t own the courtyard.”
“Everything here answers to me,” he said. “Even you.”
Her fingers brushed his when she took the dagger. The spark between them was brief—but sharp.
“Hold it here,” he said, moving behind her.
“Now shift your weight.” “Like this?” “No. You are bracing like you expect to be hit. You’ll never strike first that way.”
His hand brushed her waist to correct her stance. She froze.
“Relax.”
“Hard to do when a man who doesn’t blink is touching my waist.”
“Would you prefer I blinked more, or touched less?”
She turned her head to glare at him, but his eyes were unreadable. Focused. On her grip. On her stance. Not on her.
At least… that’s what she told herself.
They trained like that; slow, controlled. She was clumsy,stubborn, but she listened.
And he—he didn’t lose patience.
He did not laugh when she tripped, did not flinch when she snapped.
And somehow… that felt worse.
Like the absence of mockery was more intimate than a thousand words.
After a while, she lowered the dagger. “You’re not what I expected,” she said. Kaden tilted his head.
“And what exactly did you expect?”
“A monster,” she said plainly. “Someone cruel,silent, distant
“And what do you see now?” Chelsea didn’t answer.
Not with words.
She just looked at him, and for the first time, let herself look.
At the man who claimed her without touching her, at the Alpha who’d done nothing but give her space—and yet filled every corner of her thoughts.
“I don’t know what I see,” she admitted softly.
“Good,” he said. “That means you’re looking properly.”
She didn’t follow him when he left the courtyard, but her steps back to the East Wing were lighter.
And when she reached her door, she noticed something tucked against it.
A single black feather, and a note with no name.
“You’re not alone, even when you think you are.”