Chapter 107
Lila
The newspapers arrived before I’d
even dressed.
A servant had left them on the table in a neat stack, wrapped in a silk ribbon like they were something elegant–something meant to be savored with morning tea.
I stared at them from across the room, robe clutched loosely at my waist, feet bare on the cold stone. The light filtering through the windows was soft and golden, a lie painted across polished floors.
I’d been taught to face pain without flinching. So I pulled the ribbon loose and ready the first headline. ‘THE FALSE LUNA: Has the Crown Been Enchanted? The subheading below it read ‘From Packless to Palace‘
I flipped through the others quickly. They bled the same venom, just printed in different fonts. One included a side–by–side rendering–me beside a charcoal sketch of Natalie. Arrows pointed to our matching eyes. Our similar jawlines. The implication wasn’t subtle.
Another ran the title: ‘BEAUTY OR BETRAYER?‘ Beneath it, an editorial calling me everything from a social climber to a political liability.
I set the paper down with trembling fingers.
Funny how something so thin could cut so deep. Paper cuts hurt more when they came with your name carved into them.
The tray of letters was worse.
At first, I thought they were formal notes–diplomatic condolences, perhaps. But the moment I opened the first one and saw the smeared ink and jagged script, I knew better.
“You fooled him once. Let’s see how long it lasts.”
The next letter had no greeting, just a warning: “You’ll hang the moment his spell breaks.”
The one after that didn’t even use words–just a child’s sketch of a wolf being hunted, burned.
I opened another envelope out of habit, already numb, but the clipped article inside stopped my breath entirely.
A statement for all the Packs–official, stamped and signed. Not from the palace. From my Pack.
“The Nightfall Pack denounces any intentional deceit or misrepresentation of lineage in connection to the recent selection scandal. We stand by tradition and honor, and regret any implication otherwise.”
I reread it three times.
They hadn’t named me outright. But they didn’t need to.
I pressed the heel of my hand to my chest as if I could slow the ache swelling beneath my ribs. My lungs burned, not from breathlessness–but from the effort of trying to keep everything inside.
I folded the clipping back into its envelope and tucked it beneath the rest, as if hiding it might soften the truth. It didn’t.
Ruby stirred weakly–like a flicker of movement behind glass. She didn’t offer comfort or commentary. Just a low, unsettled growl.
I looked toward the door. Part of me still hoped Damon would walk through it. That he would come in, set the stack of papers on fire, take my face in his hands and promise none of it mattered.
I wasn’t sure if he was trying to protect me by staying away—or if he simply didn’t know what to say anymore.
17:09 Mon 9 Jun OD
Chapter 107
The chill in the room deepened. I pulled the robe lighter and moved toward the fireplace, trying to feel something other than the sharp edges of eac word still echoing in my head.
gin
Witch.
Impostor.
Enchantress.
I knelt and fed one of the letters into the low flame. It curled, blackened, and disappeared. I added a second. Then a third. My fingers hovered over the last one–the one with my Pack’s seal.
I couldn’t burn that one. I didn’t want to read it again, either. So I folded it. Neatly. Precisely. And I slid it into beneath a ledger he hadn’t touched in days.
the drawer of Damon’s desk, hiding it
If I was going to survive this, I couldn’t let it destroy every part of me. But for the first time since I entered the palace, I wasn’t sure what parts of me were still left.
So I went to the only place I felt good in this place and found quiet in the greenhouse.
It reminded me of Damon, but I didn’t care. It was warm and alive, and it didn’t ask me to pretend or perform.
I sat on a low bench tucked between two overgrown rosemary bushes, my back pressed to the cool glass.
The words from the newspapers still rang behind my ribs. The letters. The sketches. The clipped truth from my own Pack. Something inside me felt loose. Like if I moved too quickly, I might shatter.
I heard the creak of the old greenhouse door, slow and careful.
Emma didn’t announce herself. She didn’t ask to sit. She just did. And the silence between us stretched–not uncomfortable, just heavy.
Finally, she spoke.
“They published your height wrong.”
I blinked. “What?”
“One of the articles. Said you were five foot two. You’re taller than me.”
I huffed a dry sound–something almost like a laugh. “I suppose that’s the biggest lie they’ve told,” I said.
Emma leaned forward, plucking a leaf from a thyme bush beside her. “I’ve read every paper. Every letter they’ve let through. I don’t know how you’re still breathing.”
“I’m not sure I am.”
She looked at me then, and her face was open in a way she hadn’t been since before I told her my truth. “You shouldn’t have to do this alone.”
“I’m not sure anyone can do this with me.”
“Isn’t Damon supposed to do this with you?”
For a while, we sat in silence again. Bees buzzed/softly somewhere near the glass. The air smelled of earth and sun and green things fighting for space.
“I keep wondering,” I said, “if this is who I am now. Not to me—but to them. If there’s any version of myself I’ll ever get back.”
Emma didn’t answer right away. Then, quietly: “There might not be.”
That hollow part of me cracked a little more.
Chapter 107
“But,” she added, “that doesn’t mean they get to write the ending. They don’t get to define you unless you let them.”
“I’m tired of fighting just to exist.”
“I know.” Her hand brushed mine, I didn’t pull away.
“They’ll find someone else to hate,” she offered, her voice soft, tentative.
“But not before they finish burning me down.”
She closed her eyes. “No. Probably not.”
It was the honesty I needed more than any empty reassurance. I wanted to be angry at her for it. To lash out. But I couldn’t. Because she was right. And because anger took energy I no longer had.
All I could do was sit there and ache. It was low and constant–like the throb of a bruise you forgot to stop pressing.
I thought of my mother. I wondered if she’d seen the headlines. If she was reading letters, too–hers probably just as cruel. Maybe Henry was treating her
worse.
Was she lying in bed right now, trying not to dream of her daughter’s disgrace?
I clenched my jaw, swallowed the scream I didn’t want to make. I wouldn’t break. Not yet. But the cracks were getting harder to hide.
And no crown, no bond, no mark would hold me together if I shattered.
I rested my head back against the glass behind me again, eyes closed, lungs aching.
We sat like that for a long time–two women surrounded by wild rosemary and silence, the outside world held back by thin panes of glass and a few stolen moments of peace.
No promises.
No solutions.
Just the quiet ache of being seen and not having to perform.
AD
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