The Queen of Solmire did not speak for days.
She did not summon her handmaidens. She did not attend council. She did not demand breakfast or raise complaint when her silks were replaced by simpler garments. She did not scream. She did not strike.
She simply… existed.
A presence in the western wing. A shadow behind a door. A question no one dared ask.
Her room remained dim throughout the day. Curtains drawn. Lanterns unlit. Meals untouched.
Her staff whispered.
"She's slipping again."
"She hasn't eaten."
"She hasn't spoken."
But none of them went to her. No one dared.
Not after what had happened in the garden. Not after that laughter.
Solmire had learned long ago: Eris Igniva's silence was more dangerous than her rage.
On the third night, the moon was high, casting pale silver across the marbled halls of the palace. The air was cool, the hour late. The guards were few, their eyes low.
And then, without announcement, the Queen stirred.
Her door creaked open.
She stepped into the corridor, barefoot, hair loose, trailing behind her feet, her night-robe of dark red sweeping across the polished floor like spilled ink. She looked like something drawn from an old tale, not quite a queen, not quite a ghost.
She didn't speak.
She simply walked.
ERIS
The halls were quieter than I remembered.
I'd slept too much. Not from exhaustion. From… boredom.
I had done everything expected of me once. Married the hero. Played the crown. Burned the rest.
And now, here I was. A widow of my own ambition.
I moved slowly, not out of caution but indulgence. I liked the sound of my steps at night. The echo. The way the palace curved around me, silent and obedient.
I passed a mirror. Didn't look.
I didn't need to.
I knew what I looked like.
And then—
Footsteps.
Soft. Hesitant. Feminine.
Too graceful for a servant.
I stopped.
So did the other steps.
She appeared at the bend of the corridor like a staged entrance, hair brushed, robe embroidered in floral detail far too fine for someone who wasn't royalty.
Ophelia.
Of course.
I didn't move. Just watched.
She hesitated, then offered a curtsy. Shallow. Controlled.
"My Queen."
The words tasted rotten coming from her mouth.
I tilted my head, voice like glass. "And what," I said, "are you doing here, Ophelia?"
She didn't answer me.
She just stared.
Eyes wide, mouth slightly parted, the look of a girl caught between reverence and dread. Her gaze flicked over me like I was something half-divine, half-monstrous. And maybe I was.
I didn't repeat myself.
Not yet.
I wanted to see how long it would take her to choke on the tension between us.
Her name was Ophelia Calista.
Daughter of a disgraced house. The only child of Lord Calista — executed under my father's order for treason.
Or that's what the records say.
What they don't say is that he called me a witch at a banquet. Loud enough for two courtiers to hear. Bold enough to smile after.
He was dead within the week.
I was thirteen.
I still remember the poison I used — not something he drank or ate, but something I fed my dear father in pieces. A look. A word. A silence. I twisted his mind slow, sweet, careful… until he thought the execution was his idea. He signed the order with steady hands, never knowing I was the one who lit the fire behind his eyes. That man didn't die from a blade or a noose. He died because I decided he would.
Ophelia never knew.
She didn't need to.
The universe gave her everything back, didn't it?
My husband. My son's affection. The court's sympathy.
The people called her "graceful." "Gentle." "A breath of spring."
I called her unbearable.
And yet, as I stood there in the hallway, hair untied, robe soft against my skin, fire sleeping beneath it all, I felt… nothing.
Not the rage I usually felt in her presence. Not the searing hatred and jealousy that clung to my throat whenever I saw her dressed in cream and smiling like a saint.
Just… quiet.
But the irritation returned soon enough.
My tone dipped colder. "I asked you what you're doing here, Ophelia."
Her lips parted. Her voice was soft, like she'd practiced it in gardens. "I was… worried. About you."
I blinked once.
Worried.
Of course she was.
Of course she would be.
Because that's the kind of person she'd always been written to be, sweet even when standing in front of the woman who wanted her dead.
I studied her face, still delicate, still blooming with that infuriating softness. No sharpness. No bite. No hate, even now.
It had always sickened me. Her unrelenting kindness. Her endless supply of pity, like she was born to offer it.
And now I knew why.
Because she was.
That was her role. Her assigned color. The "gentle one."
And I wondered…
What would she become if she ever realized that?
If someone whispered in her ear, the way Orrian's words sounded in my ears... You were never real. You were made this way. You never had a choice.
Would she break?
Would she weep?
Or would she bare her teeth and finally stop pretending she didn't hate me?
I looked at her for a long time, letting the silence swell, letting her nerves dance behind her eyes.
"You always do worry, don't you?" I said, voice low.
She nodded.
Still sweet.
Still pathetic.
Still flawless.
It was almost… impressive.
But that didn't mean I forgave her for existing.
I stepped forward slowly, and her spine stiffened despite herself.
Good.
"You're very far from your chambers, Ophelia," I said. "Tell me… is this the part where you pretend you care? Or were you hoping to find your lover wandering the same halls?"
Her breath hitched. I smiled, slow. Sharp. Even without the old hatred clawing at my ribs, cruelty came easy. It always had.
But She surprised me.
She didn't flinch away, didn't bow and scramble off with the excuse I expected. No. She stood there, spine stiff with that polite, useless grace, and tried to hold my gaze.
"I heard you collapsed," she said gently. "Three days ago."