Valentina looked down at the obsidian desk, her vision blurring as hot, stinging tears gathered at the corners of her eyes. This wasn't just shame; it was the agony of exhaustion.
For thirty years, she had carried this secret like a shard of glass embedded in her heart; every time she spoke of duty, every time she upheld the law of Aethelgard, that glass twisted deeper.
She had been the perfect headmaster, the perfect diplomat, and the perfect liar, all to shield a ghost from the very institutions she commanded.
Finally, the dam broke. The words began to spill out, raw and unvarnished, her voice trembling with the weight of three decades of unspoken grief.
"She wasn't always like this," Valentina whispered, the confession sounding hollow in the cavernous office. "She was gentle once."
