ROYAL HIGHNESS

52. loud again

I had mastered the art of restraint, of keeping my distance while watching over her from the shadows, but now—now the fragile balance I’d built over these two years felt like glass cracking beneath my feet.

But never—not even in my most restless nights—had I imagined that moment would become the fragile bridge connecting us again.

She thought I hated her. She thought I had moved on, forgotten her, resented her even. Oh, how wrong she was. So terribly wrong.

I knew exactly what I felt for her. My feelings weren’t something as weak as uncertainty anymore — I was *clear*. Crystal clear. The only thing standing between us was my own decision. My own cowardice.

Because I couldn't allow myself to have her.

She was like a tempting forbidden fruit—so sweet, so dangerously inviting, and I was already too far gone to resist anymore. One single initiative from her, one crack in my defense, and I would lose all my control completely. And I knew myself well enough to understand: if I let her in, there would be no letting her go again. I would want her forever.

But the cost of forever terrified me.

Tonight, it all snapped.

The thin thread I’d held onto for years finally broke, the weight of everything I'd carried pressing into my chest like a thousand bricks. The guilt of leaving her that night, the burden of watching her from a distance, the torment of denying myself—all of it came crashing down on me.

And here she was.

In my apartment.

Her small arms around me, holding me close as if she had never left. As if we hadn't been separated by time, silence, and my own stupidity.

I didn’t even know when I allowed her to step into my space again. My head was buried against her shoulder, my breathing ragged, my hands gripping her waist like I was drowning and she was my last breath of air. The strength I had faked for so long finally gave way under the safety of her embrace. And I sobbed. Uncontrollably.

Me—Amyardh Phatak. The man who ruled people with fear. The man who carried an empire on his shoulders. Reduced to a broken, trembling mess in the arms of the very woman I thought I had to let go.

Her fingers gently ran through my hair, slow and comforting. She whispered nothing. She didn’t need to. Her silence was the only comfort I needed—the kind that doesn’t judge, doesn’t demand, doesn’t accuse. She simply held me, and it was enough to destroy every wall I had so carefully built.

I was angry—angry at myself, at this cursed fate that kept me from living the life I craved with her.

I was hurt—hurt because I couldn’t hold her hand in the daylight without shame or consequence. Hurt because I couldn't be the man she deserved, even when I desperately wanted to.

And above all — I was terrified. Terrified of losing her completely. Of waking up one day to find that she no longer belonged anywhere near me.

As my tears dampened her shoulder, I felt her arms tighten just a little more, pulling me impossibly closer—as if trying to stitch together every cracked part of my soul.

And in that moment, I realized — I was already bare before her. Completely and irrevocably.

---

I never thought the confirmation would come so soon.

The morning after she held my broken self in her arms, I woke up groggy, my head heavy but my chest oddly lighter. The burden hadn't lifted completely, but her warmth from the night before still lingered, like faint fingerprints on my skin. The first rays of dawn streamed in through the half-open blinds, casting soft patterns across the room. My phone buzzed on the nightstand, pulling me out of my scattered thoughts.