Chapter 2
I simply looked away, my eyes utterly lifeless.
After leaving the Golden Hall and returning to my manor, I collapsed with illness.
The fever refused to let go.
Cold sweat soaked through my inner clothes, clinging to my back in a sticky, miserable layer.
My father stood by my bedside, hands folded behind his back, his knuckles pale with strain.
Seeing me so weak and barely hanging on, he didn't utter a single word.
He just gave a forceful sweep of his sleeve and strode out.
As he stepped over the threshold, he let out a cold snort, heavy with disappointment in his disgraced daughter.
Rumors were swirling all over Veloren.
The Wainwright heiress's needle skills had once been unmatched in the capital.
Even the palace matrons couldn't help but admire her mastery of double-sided needlework.
The coffee spilled across the Tapestry of a Hundred Blossoms wasn't some careless mistake; it was intentional.
Everyone was whispering that I'd done it on purpose, rebelling against the throne.
They said I'd gambled the Wainwright family's hundred-year reputation on nothing but a fleeting impulse.
But nobody realized I was just severing the path to hell with my own hands.
The door creaked open.
A cold wind, carrying the dampness of the night, swept into the room.
My brother entered, carrying a bowl of thick, pitch-black potion.
He stood by the bed, his gaze carrying a quiet, helpless sorrow.
"Drink it," my brother said.
He scooped up a spoonful of the potion.
I turned my head, burying half my face in the cold, damp gauze drapes.
I held out, refusing to budge.
My brother sighed helplessly.
The spoon tapped against the edge of the bowl, making a crisp sound.
"Why make things so hard for yourself?"
"Are you really going to risk everything out of spite, just because Evander favors Cordelia?"
His voice was calm, full of reason and calculation.
"It's all just a game to him; men just want a bit of novelty," he said.
"In the end, the position of the Crown Prince's Concubine will always be yours," he added.
The Crown Prince's Concubine.
I tugged at my cracked lips, letting out a cold, bitter laugh from my throat.
My laughter rang out in the empty room.
My bother didn't get it.
The tower blaze on Emberfest had already burned through all those empty pretenses.
The burning tower collapsed with a thunderous crash.
As the broken beams came crashing down, I saw Evander, the Crown Prince, standing right there in front of me.
My husband, he abandoned his own feverish child, clinging to Cordelia, who just had a twisted ankle.
He shielded her and forced his way through the crowd.
He moved with ruthless determination, swift and cold.
He never looked back, not even once.
I used to believe that, for all the power and schemes in those hands of his, there'd always be a trace of warmth left to shield his wife.
I thought he understood the silent endurance it took for me to survive in Sunstone Palace.
It wasn't until I died in the ashes that I finally realized how blind I'd been.
The lies I told myself were laughable when faced with life and death.
Back when we were kids, he used to tuck blossoms behind my ear.
At the spring banquet, he vowed we'd grow old together, never to part.
He said, "Calista, I promise I'll watch over you for all my days."
I believed him.
I endured the icy prison of Sunstone Palace for him.
I cleaned up the messes Cordelia made, the ones that infuriated Queen Rowena.
I shielded him from countless venomous "arrows", whether they came from the officials or the palace women.
All I got in return were flames that consumed everything.
The acrid stench of burnt flesh made me sick to my stomach.
My three-year-old was burning with fever, his skin hot to the touch.
He was knocked down amid the panicked crowd, crushed and trampled to death.
His young, desperate cries were torn apart by the tongues of fire.
That faint plea for help echoed in my nightmares, day and night.
And Evander never even looked back.
My stomach suddenly churned, a wave of sourness rising up from deep inside.
I abruptly knocked aside the bowl that my brother was handing me.
The dark brown potion splattered across the brocade coverlet.
It left behind an ugly, glaring stain.
"Don't bring him up."
I pressed my nails deep into my palm, the pain biting into my skin.
"I just feel disgusted by Sunstone Palace."
The words were forced out through my clenched teeth.
I was disgusted by his fake kindness and the way he tossed out charity as if I should be thankful.
But what sickened me even more was the version of myself that used to grovel for his scraps of affection.
The warmth in my brother's eyes cooled, little by little, until nothing was left.
His expression settled into the calm, impassive look of a veteran bureaucrat.
I looked at him.
And in that moment, I saw through the merciless detachment hidden beneath his comforting words.
Without the worth of being Crown Prince's Concubine, I was nothing but a disposable shell to the Wainwright family.
The room fell into dead silence.
The only sound was my ragged, stifled breaths.
My brother slowly set the half-empty bowl down on the table.
The bottom of the bowl hit the table surgace with a dull, heavy thud.
He stood up, blocking the faint moonlight that filtered in through the window.
His shadow covered me completely.
"Calista, stop this."
His voice dropped, carrying a warning that left no room for protest.
His gaze slid past my shoulder, fixing on the half-opened window.
The night wind tugged at the sheer curtain.
For a split second, it exposed the edge of black clothes.
A biting scent threaded in with the breeze.
My brother leaned in, his voice all reason and no emotion.
"His Higness is right outside.
"If you want to win back, you'd better act fast."