Liora's POV
The dungeon floor is freezing against my cheek.
I can't feel my arms anymore. The guards tied them behind my back so tight that my hands went numb ten minutes ago. Every breath hurts—they weren't gentle when they threw me down the stone steps. Something might be broken. A rib, maybe. Or two.
I don't care.
Let it hurt. Let everything hurt. At least pain means I'm still alive.
For now.
"Water," I croak, but no one's listening. The guards left an hour ago, laughing about how I'll "glow real pretty" when they burn me at sunrise. Six more hours until dawn. Six more hours until I die.
The cell is tiny and smells like old blood. There's no window. No light except the single torch burning in the hallway outside the iron bars. I can hear water dripping somewhere, each drop marking another second closer to my execution.
I should be terrified. I should be crying and begging for mercy.
Instead, I'm angry.
Furious, actually.
For thirteen years, I hid. I carved runes into my own skin every month, bleeding and crying in the dark. I kept my head down. I said "yes, sir" and "right away, ma'am" to people who would've killed me if they knew the truth. I survived by being invisible, by being nothing.
And the one time—the ONE time—I do something good, something right, something brave?
They sentence me to death for it.
A child was dying. What was I supposed to do? Let him choke? Watch him turn blue and stop breathing while his parents drank wine ten feet away?
"No," I whisper to the darkness. "I'd do it again. I'd save him again."
Mother would be proud of that choice. Even if it kills me.
"How touching."
I jerk my head up so fast that pain shoots through my neck. Someone's standing outside my cell, hidden in the shadows where the torchlight doesn't reach.
"Who's there?" My voice comes out stronger than I feel.
The figure steps forward, and my heart stops.
Celeste.
She's changed out of her ball gown into a simple traveling cloak, hood pulled up. But I'd know her anywhere. Same eyes as mine—silver-blue like our mother's. Same sharp chin. Same way of standing with her shoulders back like she owns the world.
"Hello, sister," she says softly.
The word hits me like a punch. "Don't call me that. You lost the right when you let Mother die."
Something flickers across her face—pain, maybe, or regret. But it's gone in a heartbeat, replaced by that cold mask she's so good at wearing.
"I came to explain," she says.
"Explain what? How you're going to watch me burn at sunrise? How you lied about me in front of everyone? How you're wearing Mother's crown like you didn't help murder her?" I'm shaking now, anger making my voice sharp as broken glass.
"I didn't know Father was going to kill her!" Celeste's mask cracks, and suddenly she looks younger. Scared. "I was seven years old, Liora. Seven! He told me we were just going to talk to her, make her give up her magic peacefully. I didn't know—"
"You stood there and did NOTHING!" I scream it, and my voice echoes off the stone walls. "You looked me in the eyes through that cupboard door, and you stayed silent while they killed her!"
"I was a child!" Celeste shouts back. "What was I supposed to do? Attack trained soldiers? They would've killed me too!"
"Then you should've DIED WITH US!"
The words hang in the air between us like poison.
Celeste's face goes white. Her hands are shaking. "Do you know what Father did to me after? Do you have any idea?" Her voice drops to a whisper. "He said I proved my loyalty. Said I was smart for choosing the winning side. Then he locked me in a room for two weeks with Mother's body until I stopped crying about it."
I feel sick. I didn't know that. I didn't know any of that.
"He made me what I am," Celeste continues, and now she's crying. Actual tears sliding down her cheeks. "He taught me that love makes you weak. That caring gets you killed. That the only way to survive is to be cold and hard and willing to sacrifice anyone—even family."
"So that's your excuse?" I ask quietly. "Father was cruel, so you became cruel too?"
"I became a survivor!" She slams her hand against the bars. "And you know what? It worked. I'm alive. I'm powerful. I'm about to be queen. While you—you and your stupid, soft heart—you're going to die tomorrow because you couldn't help yourself. You had to save that boy. You had to be good and noble and just like Mother."
She spits the last word like it's poison.
"And look where Mother's goodness got her," Celeste finishes coldly. "Dead. Just like you'll be."
I stare at my sister—this stranger wearing our mother's face—and suddenly I understand. This whole time, I thought Celeste was purely evil. I thought she betrayed us because she wanted power more than love.
But the truth is worse.
She betrayed us because she learned that love kills you. That caring is weakness. That the world destroys anyone foolish enough to be kind.
Father broke her, and she never healed.
"I feel sorry for you," I tell her honestly.
Celeste laughs, but it sounds broken. "Save your pity. You'll need it tomorrow."
"Why did you come here?" I ask. "To gloat? To explain? What do you want from me, Celeste?"
She's quiet for a long moment. Then she reaches into her cloak and pulls out a small glass vial. Inside is a swirling silver liquid that glows faintly in the darkness.
"This is moonpetal extract," she says. "One drop, and you'll feel no pain when they burn you tomorrow. You'll just... go to sleep. Peacefully."
She slides the vial through the bars. It rolls across the stone floor and stops at my bound hands.
"Mother used to give it to dying patients," Celeste whispers. "She said everyone deserves a gentle death."
My throat closes up. This is mercy. Twisted and terrible, but mercy nonetheless.
"I can't save you," Celeste says, and her voice cracks. "If I try, Theron will know I'm lying about us being strangers. He'll investigate, and he'll find out you're my sister. Then he'll kill both of us. I've worked too hard to throw it all away now."
"So you'll let them burn me alive to protect your crown," I say flatly.
"Yes." She doesn't even try to deny it. "The crown is all I have left. Without it, I'm nothing. I'm just a girl who watched her mother die and did nothing. At least as queen, I'm someone."
She turns to leave, her cloak swirling behind her.
"Celeste, wait."
She pauses but doesn't turn around.
"Did you really plan this?" I ask. "Did you know I'd save that boy? Did you set it all up?"
A long silence. Then: "The boy's father owed me money. I told him to make sure his son sat near the servants' entrance. I told him to give his son something that would make him choke—nothing fatal, just scary enough. I told him you'd react."
My blood turns to ice. "You planned my exposure."
"I knew you were in the palace," she admits quietly. "I've always known. I pay the head servant to keep me informed about any servants with 'unusual qualities.' When she reported a girl who never got sick, who seemed to glow faintly in darkness, who healed her own cuts within hours... I knew it was you."
"Why didn't you just have me killed quietly?"
"Because people would ask questions. But if you exposed yourself in front of hundreds of witnesses? If you 'used dark magic' to hurt a child and I heroically stopped you?" She finally turns, and her smile is sharp and sad. "Then I'm the savior. And you're the monster. Clean. Simple. Perfect."
I can't breathe. Can't think. This whole night—the boy choking, my light exploding, the public accusation—it was all a trap.
And I walked right into it.
"I'm sorry," Celeste whispers. "I really am. But between your life and my crown? I choose the crown. I'll always choose the crown."
She walks away, her footsteps echoing down the dungeon hallway. I watch her shadow disappear around the corner, and something inside me breaks completely.
Not my spirit. Not my hope.
My fear.
I spent thirteen years being afraid. Afraid of exposure. Afraid of death. Afraid of my own power.
But you know what? I'm already sentenced to die. What's left to be afraid of?
The guards think I'm helpless. They think I'm just a weak servant girl with a little bit of magic.
They have no idea what I really am.
I close my eyes and reach deep inside myself—past the broken binding runes, past the pain, past the fear. I find my light, that burning star-core of power that's been trapped for so long.
And I stop holding it back.
The ropes around my wrists start to smoke. My skin begins to glow—brighter, brighter, white-hot and furious. The cell fills with light so intense it hurts to look at.
The iron bars start to melt.
Somewhere in the palace above, alarm bells begin to ring.
Good.
Let them come.
Let them all come.
I'm done hiding.
I'm done being afraid.
I'm done dying quietly to make things convenient for people who want me dead.
The cell door explodes outward in a shower of melted iron and white fire. I stand up, power crackling around me like lightning, and I smile.
"Sorry, Celeste," I whisper to the empty dungeon. "But I choose to live."
Then I run—straight toward the one place no one will dare to follow me.
The Shadow Wastes.