Genevieve woke late, the sheets heavy and tangled around her legs. The air was thick with perfume and sweat, and sunlight seeped through the drapes in lazy stripes across her bare skin. Her body ached in that soft, post-pleasure way that came after long nights meant to drown out thought.
For a few seconds she didn't move. She listened to the quiet hum of the house, the faint clink of glass somewhere beyond her door, and the steady rhythm of her own breath. It felt like life again — normal, solid, almost tender.
The nightmare was gone.
She smiled faintly at the thought. "Of course it was a dream," she whispered. "Snakes over butterflies — how ridiculous."
Turning her head, she saw the two women asleep beside her, their bodies half-covered by the sheet. She didn't remember calling them to her room, but she must have. That was her habit after bad nights — fill the silence, smother the fear, remind herself she could still feel something.
But the peace was thin. A tremor sat under it, small but insistent, like a sound she couldn't quite hear.
A knock came at the door.
"Come in," she said, her voice hoarse from sleep.
The door opened, and the rabbit-folk woman from the carriage stepped through, balancing a silver tray and a sealed letter. Her white-to-black ears twitched as she bowed.
"This arrived from Master Viktor," she said.
Genevieve sat up, drawing the sheet across her chest. "From Viktor?"
"Yes, madame." The servant crossed the room, her steps soundless against the rug. As she moved closer, Genevieve caught a smell that turned her stomach: not perfume or soap, but the damp, loamy scent of soil—heavy, raw, and ancient. It wasn't merely earth; it was the same scent that had filled the dark place of her dream, the one that clung to the creatures whispering her name.
Her throat tightened. "You smell like the ground," she said, voice thin. "Why?"
The rabbit woman stopped mid-stride. For a heartbeat she didn't answer, her ears twitching as if listening for permission from somewhere unseen. Then, carefully, Your father made me tend the garden before I came. He said he wanted to send you fresh vegetables he's been growing for your… voices. He said you'd had quite the nightmare."
Genevieve blinked. "My what?"
"Your voices, madame."
The words hung in the air, strange and heavy. The clock on the mantle ticked once, then fell silent.
"I don't have voices," she said, her laugh brittle. "He must be joking."
The rabbit woman didn't blink. Her head tilted slightly, one ear quivering. Her eyes stayed down, blank and glassy, as though she were waiting for something else to speak through her.
A chill brushed Genevieve's neck. "You can go," she said quickly.
Before the servant could move, something cold touched Genevieve's ear—a soft exhale that wasn't human.
We're still here, little butterfly.
The whisper slid through her like ice.
She blinked—once, twice—and the room seemed to ripple. The sunlight bent strangely, and for a single heartbeat she felt as though she'd fallen between moments. Then the world steadied.
The rabbit woman stood exactly where she had before, holding the tray, smiling pleasantly.
"This arrived from Master Viktor," she said again, voice identical, cheerful, unchanged.
Genevieve froze. The exact same tone. The exact same words. Even the way the light caught her earrings.
Déjà vu crawled up her spine.
She forced a shaky laugh. "Lord above… I really need to lay off the morphine."
Her hands trembled slightly as she reached for the letter. "All right then," she muttered, "let's see what the man's written this time."
She turned the letter over in her hands, tracing the seal with her thumb. She remembered this one—Viktor's careful handwriting, his neat restraint. The letter he had sent before all the noise began. Before the news.
Of course, he would come to his senses. He always did. He had a way of drifting off into impossible dreams, and she, ever patient, ever forgiving, was always there to collect what was left when those dreams burned out.
The memory of the nightmare clawed at her anyway—the sound of her own voice, rough and broken, shouting like some mad general on a battlefield. She had screamed that her father betrayed her, thrown words like spears at the walls. The image almost made her laugh now—it had been so theatrical, so unlike her. A lady of her standing, shouting herself hoarse? Absurd.
And yet, the echo of it lingered.
Her father. Her "betrayal." That dark world that had felt too real to dismiss.
She pushed the thought aside. It didn't suit her.
Better to focus on the present—on Viktor and his little woodland experiment. The memory of him with that woman, that woman, and the child he had chosen to keep, tugged at her pride. She told herself it was pity. The dragon had simply lost his taste for refinement.
She, at least, had learned her lesson: never insult Viktor's attachments again. They weren't companions or equals—they were amusements. Trinkets. Toys he dressed up as people.
And now, she decided, he would remember which of them was real.
By late afternoon Genevieve had decided to visit her father.
The servants dressed her in her new seasonal wear—a lilac gown cut close at the waist, silver thread running down the sleeves, gloves that fit like a second skin. Each layer steadied her; each clasp and ribbon reminded her that control was a costume she could still wear.
The carriage rattled through the avenue of cypress. The air smelled of iron and rain. When she stepped into Baton's sunroom, light poured through the tall windows, making everything too bright, too clean. Genevieve had given the letter a quick read,so she wouldn't surprise her father with no context at all before reading that. Last time she didn't read the letter before to scan for tricks. Her father had banned her from attending parties for a week because of bad hair day curse.
He sat there like the house itself—composed, patient, glass of brandy in hand. "You look well," he said, though his tone was more measurement than compliment.
"I received a letter from Viktor." She drew it from her pocket. "He writes about building things together again. About… reconciliation."
She read the words aloud. Viktor's promises sounded gentler spoken, and each line fed something soft inside her chest—a fragile belief that maybe the dream had been nothing more than withdrawal and fever.
That bastard of a dragon—of a man—had always feared crossing her. He could breathe fire and curse mountains, but as long as she kept his brother on her payroll, even the great Viktor Barinov bowed to her rules. His brother served her house as interpreter to their court, a leash in polite company, proof of her reach.
Viktor might rebel in small, elegant ways—late arrivals, defiant silences, that quiet mockery behind his eyes—but he always followed her path in the end. Always.
Genevieve smiled faintly as she folded the letter. The memory steadied her, a small reminder that whatever else the world tried to rewrite, her hold on Viktor had once been absolute.
She looked up. Baton was watching her from the opposite chair, brandy glass balanced perfectly between two fingers. His expression was unreadable—neither warmth nor malice, just a patient stillness that made her throat tighten.
"I never approved of that man," he said finally.
The words were quiet, but they struck like a blade.
Genevieve blinked, half amused. "You never approve of anyone, Papa. You practically built your reputation on disapproval." She gave a light, practiced laugh. "Besides, you used to say Viktor was exactly the kind of creature you'd choose for me."
A flicker crossed his face—something like humor, but sharper. "My kind of creature," he repeated. "Perhaps. But he's still a creature, Genevieve. A dragon may wear a man's face, but he's still a beast underneath."
"That's dramatic, even for you," she said. "It's not as if I'd have children by him."
He laughed, short and dry. "Fae and dragon grandchildren? Saints forbid. I'd sooner laugh myself to death than watch my bloodline crawl on four legs."
She stared at him, startled by the venom. He'd never spoken to her like that. Never so openly, so—
cruelly human.
He leaned forward, eyes glittering. "You forget what you've done to him."
Her heart stumbled. "What I've done?"
Baton's tone stayed almost casual. "You enslaved his brother. You fed him the eggs of his own kind. You humiliated him." Each word struck with a slow, deliberate cruelty. "And yet you expect him to love you still."
He rose, his movement smooth and deliberate, and began to circle her chair. The click of his shoes was steady, metronomic. Every pass threw his reflection across the window behind her—a shimmer of light bending at the wrong angle, lagging just behind his real motion.
Genevieve's throat tightened. The rhythm of his steps matched the pulse beating at her temples. It reminded her of something she didn't want to remember—the slow march of her nightmare, the sound of the dark world breathing beneath her feet.
He stopped behind her, close enough that she could smell the brandy on his breath. "You shouldn't go chasing after prey like that," he murmured. "I thought your mother taught you better."
The words hit harder than the tone deserved. Baton always knew how to strike cleanly, without effort. She felt the floor shiver beneath her shoes. The rug rippled as if stirred by something underneath. Maybe she was dizzy. Maybe the morphine still hadn't left her blood.
"You think this is about me?" he said. "That I went begging for the Shadowman's power? No, Genevieve. You called the dark first. You wanted it to notice you."
She twisted around in the chair. "That isn't true."
"Isn't it?" His reflection in the glass smiled a heartbeat later than he did. "You always need to be seen. You call it love, call it devotion, but it's just another way to feed that hollow place in you."
Her pulse thundered. "Papa—"
"Will you ever stop letting others decide who you are?" he said sharply. "The Shadowman, Viktor, even me. You let every one of us make your choices, then act surprised when they burn."
He moved closer, shadow spilling over her. "I've done nothing but clean up after your clever little mistakes. You've never wanted power, only the feeling of being wanted."
His words cracked something inside her. Her stomach turned; her breath came uneven. The light swelled around him, bright enough to sting.
"You talk about strength," he went on, voice lowering. "But you've never chosen anything for yourself. Even that night with the Shadowman—you thought it was power. All it was, Genevieve, was surrender."
"Stop it," she said.
"I spoiled you too much," he continued, almost gently. "Such a weak daughter."
The words folded over themselves, growing deeper, layered—his voice and something underneath it, something whispering the same lines through gritted teeth. The floor rippled again. The chair legs sank half an inch. Genevieve's vision blurred, the room tilting as the voices returned in a hiss of air.
He knows, little butterfly… he always knew…
She pressed her palms over her ears. "Stop! Please, stop!"
Baton's shape flickered; his reflection split like a mirror cracking down the center. The light bent sideways, stretching his shadow across the floor toward her.
He raised his hand and snapped his fingers.
The sound tore through the room like a whipcrack.
Everything stopped.
The floor was still. The light returned to its usual warmth. The voices vanished.
Genevieve blinked rapidly, chest heaving. Baton stood where he had been before, serene, one hand resting on his chair, a faint smile softening his features.
"There now," he said. "All better."
But her body knew otherwise. Her palms still burned from where she'd covered her ears; the scent of smoke clung to the air, and her reflection in the window trembled on a delay. She sat frozen, every breath sharp and shallow, and wondered—perhaps for the first time—if her father was even real at all.