The next morning, Oriana tried to shake off the weight of the previous day, burying herself in chores around the hut. She swept the floors, fetched water, and helped Grandma Gina prepare fish for the market. But no matter how hard she worked, the humiliation clung to her like a shadow she could not escape.
Grandma Gina watched her quietly, her wise eyes seeing more than Oriana wished to reveal. "Child," she said gently, "you are carrying too much in your heart. Let it out before it crushes you."
Oriana forced a smile, but the tremble in her lips betrayed her. "I'm fine, grandmother. I just… I need time."
But time offered her no mercy.
That afternoon, while Oriana was gathering shells by the shore, two teenage girls from the richer part of town approached her girls she had once helped with directions, girls who used to greet her with polite smiles. Today, however, their faces were twisted with mockery.
"Look," one sneered, "it's Tavian's little project."
The other giggled. "Do you think she really believes he'll stay with her? Oh, poor thing she truly doesn't know her place."
Their laughter sliced through Oriana like a blade. She felt her knees weaken, but she refused to let them see her fall. She turned away, swallowing her pain.
But one of the girls wasn't done.
"Oh, and by the way," she said, pulling out a small folded paper, "Vionna asked us to give you this. She said it's important."
Oriana hesitated, dread creeping up her spine. She took the note with trembling fingers. The girls didn't wait for her to open it; they ran off laughing, their cruel giggles echoing along the shore.
When Oriana finally unfolded the paper, her vision blurred.
"You are embarrassing yourself.
Stay away from Tavian before things get worse."
But beneath those words written faintly in a rushed, different handwriting she noticed something else scratched at the bottom:
"They don't want you here."
Oriana pressed the note to her chest, her breath catching painfully. This wasn't just Vionna. This was the town. The community. Her world turned against her.
She felt the humiliation crash over her again stronger this time, drowning her.
That evening, when Tavian came by to see her, Oriana couldn't bring herself to face him. She stayed inside, pretending to be asleep, though tears streamed silently down her cheeks. She heard him call her name softly outside the hut, heard the worry in his voice, but she couldn't step out, not when she was breaking inside.
"Tavian," she whispered to herself, clutching the cruel note, "I love you but I don't know if I can survive this."
When she finally emerged after he left, the moon was high, casting its silver light over the waves. Oriana walked toward the water, letting the cool tide wash over her feet. She closed her eyes, breathing in the salty air, grounding herself the way she always had.
But something was different.
For the first time, the sea didn't soothe her.
It reflected her turmoil back at her restless, crashing, unforgiving.
She sank to her knees, gripping the sand. "Why?" she cried softly. "What did I do to deserve this? Why do they hate me so much?"
Her voice broke, carried off by the wind.
She stayed there until the tide crept up around her, as if the ocean itself was trying to pull her in and hide her from the world.
Finally, she stood, wiping her tears. And it was in that moment standing in the moon's pale glow, soaked with saltwater and sorrow that something shifted inside her.
It wasn't anger.
Not yet.
But it was the beginning.
The beginning of a new Oriana one who would no longer shrink under cruelty, no longer let others decide her worth.
She looked at the waves and whispered, her voice steadier than before:
"They think I am weak. They think they can break me.
But they have no idea who I will become."
The ocean roared as if in agreement.
And though Oriana returned home with a heavy heart, a new fire flickered deep inside her small, but alive.
A fire that would one day burn brighter than every insult, every humiliation, and every shadow Vionna tried to cast upon her.