I stepped out onto the marble veranda, the cool evening air hitting my face like a splash of cold water. It felt like a relief after having an almost dead conversation. The scent of pine and damp earth washed away the smell of old parchment, along with the weight of Xander's presence.
You will get through this. I told myself, clutching the silk of my skirts until my knuckles turned white. The investments, Alexander's inheritance, and the meeting with Selene. Those three things stand between me and ruin.
The path toward the eastern gardens was lined with silver-leafed poplars that shimmered like starlight caught in the fading glow. My mind, however, was miles away, racing through the different topics.
One step at a time, Kayla. That was the only mantra keeping my brain from short-circuiting right now.
First on the list: my father, Edward Solyne.
To the rest of the world, he was still "the Viscount". A guy with power, money, and big dreams, but behind closed doors? He was basically a gambler who thought he was a genius. He mistook ego for talent and wild guesses for actual business sense.
Those mines and the so-called mana crystals in them. Everyone kept saying they were "guaranteed."
Guaranteed my ass.
I had known the signs before because I wrote it myself. Duh!
Also, I got into his study chamber, one time. The red ink all over the books, shipments that never showed up, and partners quietly jumping ship. My father chased deals the way desperate people always do, with louder promises and even bigger risks, but zero actual plan. If he kept this up, the Solyne name wouldn't just lose its prestige, but it would be buried.
And I also be buried right along with it.
"Not happening, atleast not for now," I whispered to the empty air, but the promise was not empty.
I didn't need him to be a mastermind. I just needed him to stop being an idiot. If I could get Xander to nudge him toward something stable, like real trade routes or textile contracts, we could successfully pull him back from the cliff before the vultures realized he was falling.
My father wasn't a villain. He was just dangerously careless.
Then my mind drifted to the person who stood to lose the most. Alexander.
My pace slowed thinking of my younger brother. Alexander was everything our father wasn't. He was quiet, he watched everything, and he actually listened instead of just waiting for his turn to talk. While my father was busy bragging about his "empire," Alex was asking the hard questions.
Too many questions, according to Dad.
He thought Alex was "too soft" or "too slow" to lead. I had to roll my eyes at that. If being careful meant you were weak, then the whole world would have burned down years ago.
Alex didn't need someone to hand him power on a silver platter. He just needed the permission to lead. He needed someone to get him into the right rooms and stop him from being cast aside just because he didn't shout as loud as Edward. If he got the right guidance, he wouldn't just keep the Solyne name alive. He would actually make it worth something again.
My chest tightened, but not from the usual anxiety. It felt more like… determination, but more than the money, more than the title... There was Selene.
In the original story, Selene was the personification of grace. She was the "future Duchess," a woman of such purity and kindness that she stood as the perfect contrast to the "villainess" whose role I had been forced into.
The rumors said I hated her. They said I was jealous of her upcoming marriage to the Duke, a man whose power was second only to the Emperor. They said I had pushed her, or poisoned her, or cursed her. And they were true at some extent because of Josephine.
The details varied depending on which person you talked to, but the conclusion was always the same. I was the monster in her fairy tale.
But it was Irene who hated her not me, I thought, my gaze drifting to the horizon. I adored her. She was the only character who felt like an epitome in a world of cardboard cutouts.
As I rounded the corner of the hedge maze, the garden opened up into a sprawling expanse of floral brilliance. The guards were stationed at the perimeter. Those stoic men in polished breastplates stood straight but did not stop me.
I sighed in relief thinking that they had been given orders by Xander to let me pass within this specific sector.
I walked slowly, my heels clicking softly on the gravel path.
Was she still here? I thought while looking around. The sun was dipping low, casting long, amber fingers across the rosebushes. I still hoped that she would not have gone inside the mansion because it would be difficult to enter her wing with Duke's grace.
I was still in my thoughts when I felt a strange pull toward a secluded corner of the garden, away from the manicured rows of lilies and the expensive, magically-bred orchids. This area was overgrown, almost forgotten. It lacked the symmetry of the rest of the estate.
And then, I saw them.
Tucked between two weathered stone benches was a patch of flowers that looked entirely out of place. They weren't the vibrant, glowing flora of the high nobility.
They were small, delicate things with petals the color of a bruised twilight. Pale violets, wild daisies, and a strange, star-shaped blue flower I didn't recognize from the "botany" lessons I had been forced to endure. They were messy, and wild. They grew in tangles, fighting for space against the moss.
I stopped, mesmerized. In a world where everything was curated, polished, and faked, these flowers felt honest. They didn't need a gardener's shears to tell them how to grow. They just... existed. Like me.
"So beautiful," I whispered, the words escaping my lips before I could catch them. I reached out a finger, hovering just above a blue petal that seemed to shimmer with a faint, natural dew.
"Most people call them weeds."
The voice was like a chime of silver bells, clear, soft, and carrying a weight of melancholy that made my heart skip a beat.
I spun around, my breath catching in my throat. My skirts swished against the gravel, and for a second, the world seemed to tilt on its axis.
Beneath the arching branches of a weeping willow stood Selene.