AuthorSME

  Camellia perched high within the thick jungle canopy, her crimson locks billowing with each gust of wind that filtered through the sweltering air.

  Below, the Wandering River slithered through the valley like a living artery, its deceptively still surface masking the treacherous currents below. Low hanging mist moved along its length, the soft tapping of rain pattering around her.

  Creatures hid any pce they could, upset by the colossal and abrupt changes in weather that the hag had generated. Although, the elements were starting to temper.

  Her gaze drifted over the geothermal vents that lined this part of the banks, leading up to the giant fortress beyond the tree foliage. Plumes of smoke billowed skyward, mixing with the humid jungle air. The heat and rain made her new human-like skin slick with sweat. It was an odd sensation—the slickness of sweat where before, her exoskeleton had been impervious to the elements.

  Ruby irises fell to her fleshy hand, she let the liquid pool and flow down her arm, watching it twist and curve around her tiny hair follicles. The atmosphere was alive around her, feeding back scent trails, pressure, and dozens upon dozens of other phenomena that collected into a dazzling reality.

  What will Mother and my sisters think when they see this form I’ve taken?

  A shiver ran down her spine, reflecting on everything she’d experienced since being resurrected.

  Our purpose was to evolve and conquer for our species… World after world, we spread, consume, adapt, and expand to the next generation. Yet, these emotions I obtained from the Empress are…confusing that purpose to an extent. No, expanding?

  She looked up at the gray sky before rising further to the canopy, breaking through to view the swaying, wave-like jungle as it moved to the gusts.

  This is an evolution. A new power crawling through my veins…but at the cost of children? Perhaps. Perhaps not. Who is to say we cannot further develop?

  A sharp inhale and exhale brought the familiar terrain into her nerve system—the northern center of the valley.

  Her youngest sister’s domain.

  She liked to draw in her prey, lounging around spinning her silk and admiring her craft… Lazy. But she did save me a few times when we went to help Mother…

  She brought her hand up to her breast, a sharp pain compressing her chest.

  What happened to my family?

  Sharp eyes picking apart areas she recalled roaming, Camellia continued her path along the canopy. Their mother’s territory was everywhere, so she’d find her webs scattered throughout the valley. Her forces had once used the river behind her as a natural boundary, a divide between sectioned off areas.

  Camellia flexed her fingers, memories of her past life tugging at the edges of her thoughts. Mother was indestructible. I never questioned that—until now. Had I wanted to prove myself to her, or had I doubted her ability to kill the White God? The answer gnaws at me like an old web unraveling…without a solution.

  She had spent too much time around humans, absorbing human philosophies that made her question things she once took as absolute. That wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. But the new perspectives felt…strange. Dangerous.

  Her crimson locks swayed as the wind carried the scent of sulfur and rain on her rise up the jungle cliffs and hills. The st remnants of the storm that the hag had conjured were dissipating, leaving behind a heavy humidity that clung to her human skin.

  She exhaled, adjusting her bance on the thick branch beneath her. In the distance, the northern shelf of the valley loomed, its volcanic pins breaking through the tree line like the exposed ribs of the quen’talrat it used to house.

  The Bck Fortress—Kel’mal’tha—y just beyond it, its towering silhouette waiting at the horizon, defiant against time and destruction.

  With a flex of her legs, she unched into motion. The humid air parted as she sailed over the jungle, her limbs coiling and releasing in rapid succession. Silk shot from her fingertips at the apex of her jumps, tching onto sturdy branches and propelling her forward like a shadow through the swaying night canopy.

  Below, the Wandering River stretched through the valley, half-obscured by the low-hanging clouds that curled along its banks. There was some sort of structure further along its currents, incredibly long and wide that hadn’t been there before. She barely gnced at it.

  She pushed those thoughts aside. Her focus remained on her trajectory—on reaching the shelf that would give her a clear vantage point.

  The higher she climbed, the thinner the canopy became, giving way to rocky outcrops and barren soil. The jungle's breath thinned here, yielding to the violence of the nd beyond.

  Camellia emerged at the crest of the hill, where the jungle met the sulfuric wastend beyond. Kel’mal’tha’s colossal bck walls loomed ahead, standing defiant against the ever-shifting ndscape.

  The nd was scarred by the elements. Volcanic vents hissed from deep fissures in the earth, their plumes of steam mingling with the lingering rain. Much of the ndscape had changed due to the recent heavy storms over the past months, yet still the vibrant pools of organisms somehow survived.

  Mud pits bubbled and churned, exhaling noxious fumes that made the air thick and acrid. Jagged obsidian shards jutted out from the terrain like broken teeth, remnants of long-cooled va flows that had once shaped this violent nd, terraformed by the quen’talrat.

  She crouched low, letting her senses expand as she studied the battlefield before her. The scene brought back memories of her past… Of her mistake.

  Once, this expanse had been filled with war camps, siege engines, and tens of thousands of bodies, preparing for the final assault on the Bck Fortress. Now, it was eerily silent, stripped of movement save for the distant gurgle of boiling mud and the occasional hiss of steam escaping the vents. Nothing of that siege remained—war machine or structure. Well, excluding the fortress itself that survived that colossal, united assault between eight different races.

  Her gaze flicked to the leftmost walls of Kel’mal’tha—the section that had once been breached by the goriex and the nelvians. The tree women, with their twisted, root-like bodies, had torn down sections of the fortress’s exterior, their pnt-based abilities burrowing through the stone like a creeping decay.

  Though none of the buildings or machines remained, the pnt women’s unique wooden pathways remained leading inside the fractured exterior wall. The fortress had two yers before reaching the inner sanctum, and the goriex were one of the few races who had managed to penetrate the quen’talrat protected structures, which was somewhat impressive, really.

  However, something strange drew Camellia’s notice now that her focus was on the giant city. That…wasn’t there when Mother prepared her subterranean assault.

  A new material coated sections of the broken wall—a bck, seamless reinforcement that didn’t belong to the quen’talrat’s architecture. It was unnatural, as if the fortress itself had begun to repair its wounds with something beyond stone. It reminded her of the strange substance her mother had unearthed near the fortress’ foundation.

  The Empress said there were some sort of automatic energy weapons the Yaltha’ma activated to attack anyone who comes too close… They are active on the walls, she noted, identifying the big contraptions mounted on the battlements. However, this reconstruction was not there several days ago.

  Her hair bristled, a shiver of unease running down her spine as she shifted her gaze to the west side of the valley, the sensation of being watched gripping her. Is that…the hag?

  “Don’t mind me, dearie, but you are quite the specimen. I’m merely intrigued by your observations. Carry on. I’ll leave you be. Such treacherous wonders to explore in this world.”

  The woman’s succulent voice faded with a gentle chuckle.

  Vision narrowing, Camellia lingered at the edge of the volcanic pin as the presence left, her crimson eyes scanning the fortress with a hunter’s gaze. Mother would have loved to make a snack of that hag… Maybe she will when she awakens.

  Memories cwed their way into her mind—memories of her mother, of her sisters, of a battle that had rewritten her entire world.

  She reached up, fingertips brushing against her pointed ears, a reminder of how much had changed. This form, this human-like body—it wasn’t just a shift in biology. It was a shift in perspective. She had thought herself complete before. Now, she wasn’t so sure.

  She had spent time among a few humans now, learning their ways, absorbing their philosophies, and now—standing here, seeing the aftermath of a war she had once seen as nothing more than a buffet—she felt…something unsettling.

  She had always understood the battlefield as a predator—as a space defined by prey and conquest. Yet now, she recognized something else.

  Loss.

  A loss of family.

  She clenched her fists.

  Our race often sees sisters killing one another for the right of our mother’s territory… Mother was different from our aunts, though. She had more of these human emotions adapted over them… She didn’t like it when we fought with each other. Hmm. Now I can see why… But why didn’t she pass those genes along to us?

  Her gaze shifted to the natural mounds at the fortress’s outskirts. Geothermal vents riddled the terrain, their heat carving hollowed tunnels through the stone.

  Did she view that as a weakness?

  Her mother had used these tunnels. So had her youngest sister, spinning webs into the byrinth below the fortress. If anyone was the quen’talrat’s bane, it was her youngest sister. Lurking far below, sending her invisible webs up from the belly of the earth to ensnare the apes and drag them into her domain.

  The White God had been different, though.

  No web—not even her youngest sister’s or their mother’s—could hold that beast.

  Camellia moved swiftly, scaling down into one of the hidden burrows. The heat intensified, the air thick with old decay and the remnants of battle. The walls pulsed with residual energy—her mother’s influence still clung to this pce, like a ghost refusing to be forgotten.

  What would happen if I could find Ke’Thra’Ma’s corpse? Would he be an asset to the Empress?

  A bitter taste touched her tongue as she ran into a dying geyser, following the boiling water down into branching tunnels that brought her into the depths of the volcanic interior.

  Do I want to introduce him to the empire… I do not. Is that wrong? Logically, yes. Hmm. There!

  Flipping into a fissure in the earth, she discovered one of her sister’s old tunnels.

  Inside, destroyed drones.

  Twisted and broken, their metallic exoskeletons torn apart with brutal efficiency—the ancient scent of not Elite Hunters on them…but one of The Twelve, as her middle sister called them. The White God’s rulers—kings and queens.

  This scent?

  The second strongest.

  The Silver Queen.

  A chill crept through her as she breathed in the air, filtering the chemical trails that remained. Just feeling her presence, even if centuries old, left a jitter in her bones.

  Mother always told me I wasn’t to attack any of the rulers when I was at my full strength and with guardians… Just their scent speaks of the power they held. My other sisters could have put up a fight…

  Her lips drew together, realizing so many new things with her human form.

  Mother, why did you care for me so much when I was so much weaker than your other daughters? I am like your older sister, who gave up the territory to you and went to the southeast… What worth do I have to the brood as a weak queen candidate?

  Shaking away the thought, she attached her hair to her youngest sister’s very complex web network. Frustratingly, it took a few moments to even gain rudimentary access. She loved to mess with her and apply little challenges to see if she’d get frustrated and give up.

  However, her middle sister’s scent snapped her thoughts back into gear. It led deeper inside the tunnels. Camellia pushed deeper into the tunnels until she reached the chamber where her mother had fought Ke’Thra’Ma.

  Upon coming to a branch, she paused.

  My scent?

  Kneeling down, she ran her hand over the smooth stone, mixed with webbing. She’d already delved hundreds of meters below the surface and was close to hitting the unusual bedrock of the fortress—the same material that was repairing the city walls.

  After the Xaltan’s trick of using her own silk, she’d kept her senses open to it. Without a doubt, her corpse had been carried away down this tunnel several decades prior. Their unique chemicals were designed to be untraceable, excluding their own species, and to st for many generations. Much could be determined through various chemical releases.

  The yaltha’ma… The Hidden Ones who took several drones. Many more pursued them, preventing the group from returning for my other siblings, she determined, reading the trace pheromones left behind—the fear, the rage. Could my family still be there?

  Proceeding, she passed into a starkly familiar territory—a floor of pure bck gss, spackled with twinkling star-like patterns. Her bare feet flexed against the unusual substance.

  It’s the same as it was a century ago… The vibrating presence of energy, emanating from billions of presences, like microorganisms. A field surrounding each one that binds and shifts on a scale that is nearly impossible to track… The substance Ke’Thra’Ma used to attack us with…and now it is neutral.

  She held her elbow behind her back while proceeding, analyzing every step and shift in the cool, and shockingly fresh atmosphere. It’s cycling the air and releasing it, breaking down carbon dioxide. It also responds to my steps, but only to firm and reject…keeping me stable. Such a strange system.

  Entering the vast, cavernous space her mother had used to battle the White God, Camellia felt a new emotion. The only word that fit was…hollow.

  Not a sound was heard as she took in the empty space.

  No mother.

  No sisters.

  Reinforced by her mother’s suspended silk-webbing that clung stubbornly to the high walls, the zone was still stable, if barely. Most of it was gone, burned away by Ke’Thra’Ma’s unique, all-consuming white fire, leaving behind an empty shell of the battlefield that had cimed her family’s lives.

  Is there…anything left to resurrect?

  The thought pgued her like an itch within her ptes as she moved to the obsidian gss-like wall that took up an entire wall, from the bck floor to the ceiling—the pce her mother had so easily carved out a hole into the fortress.

  There was no cavity now.

  Eyes scanning back and forth, Camellia let her silk hair flow out, crawling across every part of the unnatural material. The fortress is repairing itself. Could it have started due to that horn that shook the valley? Is it because of the threat of the hag? No, but the horn was blown when the Avana appeared, she noted, recalling what Bck had told her in passing about possible threats. If…

  Her thoughts shattered as her family’s scent bloomed.

  Vision snapping to the corner, she unched that way and bent down, silk coiling along the area.

  My youngest sister’s scent… Nalveans? Her nose twisted, the pungent smell of the species that stole her unhatched youngest sister burning on her hair. They took her down the left tunnel.

  Her network expanded, flowing after the trail as she turned to another spot.

  And my middle sister! Yaltha’ma again? Wait…

  She followed the path that led right to the sealed bck wall—repaired, seamless, impenetrable. Her palm pressed against the pce where her sister had been taken through, pressure mounting. It hummed, a subtle pulse vibrating from the bck substance.

  It was the same as the foundation—the same as the glyphs on the ground where her mother’s scent vanished. More power gathering, symbols formed like starlight, the resistance growing stronger and stronger.

  An electrical pulse shot through her nerve system, which she easily redirected into the substance, only for it to be redirected back to her feet four times stronger. Once again redirecting it through her silk, she instead sent it upward into the stone, causing a sharp arc of lightning.

  Withdrawing, Camellia flexed her fingers, watching the symbol fade and the force field diminish. It adapts… The Empress will likely have a solution. I am sure my middle sister is inside, though. That leaves…Mother.

  Her gaze returned to the same tunnel the nalveans had taken her youngest sister. Only, her mother’s scent was far more subtle to track, taking her a moment to find. Something else had taken her—something that smelled of a unique form of metal.

  Her mother had been taken.

  Her youngest sister had been taken by the Nalveans.

  Her middle sister was still inside.

  Camellia’s breath steadied. The next step was clear.

  She left the chamber for the tunnel, following the path her mother and sister had been taken. The tunnels opened up into a vast chasm beneath the fortress. Not made by them.

  No. This was made by the quen’talrat.

  A straight, square-like tunnel that went from the wall, far into the distance, many hundreds of meters below the surface and running underneath the valley. In the center of this strange passage, a glyph had been carved into the starlit floor, its intricate design branching outward in a precise, complex pattern.

  It didn’t match quen’talrat writing she’d seen on their parchment. It was simir to the one that had formed when she’d tried to push the wall in. Something infused with power. Camellia crouched, pcing her hand against it.

  A low, droning hum pulsed through her limbs again, a resonance that sent an involuntary shudder down her spine. It was fundamentally different than the previous one, trying to repel her. This one appeared to analyze every atom in her body.

  Mother and that metallic scent disappeared here… It was after me and my middle sister were taken. Mother was likely too rge for the nalveans, so they settled on my youngest sister… Their trail leads further up to the surface through the caverns… They appeared to get lost for a day or two before reaching the end. Whatever the case… I have a lead.

  Camellia straightened, her expression unreadable.

  A path leading deeper into the fortress, a missing mother, and a sister stolen by those she had once considered beneath her notice.

  She traced her pointed ear once more, a tick she had developed since adapting to her new form. She had changed. She had gained new instincts. New weaknesses.

  And yet, as she turned toward the massive bckened structure that now housed at least one of her sisters, she knew this evolution was for the better.

  Empress, it appears we have another reason to enter the fortress… My sister is waiting for me.

  With a final gnce toward the impenetrable bck wall, she turned and vanished into the tunnels, moving with renewed urgency. She had the scent of those who had taken her youngest sister and knew where her middle sister likely still rested.

  Soon, there would be two of them searching for the rest of their family.

  * — * — *

  The scent of burnt herbs and bitter blood clung to the air as Tiffany traced a final rune in the damp earth. Amber fmes licked at her fingertips, their light casting jagged shadows across the ritual circle. The blood of the sin beast, thick and dark, curled in tendrils along the etched lines, bridging the divide between realms.

  Tiffany didn’t voice to Elinor what would be required for this ritual. On the opposite side of the gate, one of the Autumn family’s daughters—the family Evelyn utterly controlled for generations—had prepared a chain link.

  Blood from her elder brother, who knelt at the center of the ritual on the opposite side. The current heir. Well, not that the hag particurly cared since she would just have them breed more. He was bound and trembling before his younger sister, bewitched from birth.

  A sacrifice like the many the hag had used to steal their Tempest powers over hundreds of years. A necessary link between blood and soul… One that her Empress need not be aware of. His breath no doubt hitched with each whispered incantation. Not that Tiffany could see it.

  Still, the disguised creature showed a wicked gleam in her eyes while directing her in how to facilitate the pattern. Roman stood nearby, cold pragmatism on his face. She knew he didn’t enjoy the hag’s ways, yet it was the only way to sustain a complete and stable portal—lodging a soul between spaces like a door wedge.

  He wouldn’t die per se. May not even feel pain! Well, it was a gray area.

  Evelyn leaned against the withered altar she’d crafted, her silk dress pooling like spilled ink around her legs. “Oh, Tiffany, you’ve grown so comfortable with these rites,” she mused, her voice a purr wrapped in thorns. “The amount of scolding I have to give my apprentice witches, but you…are perfection. Such a delightful change from that pious little thing you used to be.”

  Tiffany didn’t gnce up, feeling the dagger twisting into her chest. I know you can hear my thoughts, hag, and read my soul. There’s no need to sink your cws deeper. Edmon cuts my undead heart enough… Perhaps I’ll need to dig it out and pce a charm on it.

  A chuckle slithered through the night air of the Hidden Ones’ cavern; the creatures were milling around, wide-eyed and whispering prayers.

  “Why, dear girl, I would love to offer you a hand in that. When you wake up, it is only darker the next night. Now, the blood of the linked soul, the transdimensional demon your lovely empress slew, and a little…something immortal.”

  Evelyn took out two vials from empty space, pouring the red and toxic bck blood into the proper circles before dragging a nail along her own forearm, slicing into the caramel skin. Silver ichor welled up, glowing as it dripped into the circle, sending a pulse of power through the ground.

  The symbols fred, making Tiffany’s breath catch at the ripple of power that quaked through her to the very core. The hag, however, carried on as if this were an average Tuesday.

  “But I do wonder…does dear Edmon really still mourn the woman you were? Does he pray for a way to bring her back?”

  Tiffany cleared her throat, stepping back and gncing at the maids beside the wall, stiff and uncomfortable in the enigmatic fiend’s presence. To be fair, even she was intimidated by the potent, eldritch-like entity.

  Must you speak aloud such things to the help? she sighed. I would say what nonsense are you suggesting… But a hag does not speak nonsense. She speaks ill-fortuned truths. In my eyes, he absolutely abhors me, she stated bitterly, entering the dual channeling circle with the brown-haired woman opposite her. He told me himself… I am but the demon that possessed his wife.

  Evelyn tilted her head as she touched the sage on the altar, turning it bck as mock curiosity gleaming in those slitted yellow eyes. “What a man says and what his heart cries are two different things, my lovely… What makes you think he does not see himself as a demon in human skin?” Her golden globes glowed with mischievous intent. “What will his pure wife think of the cold, dead Death Knight who stole her husband?”

  Tiffany stilled, a numb quiver running through her marrow. The runes beneath her fingers hissed as heat bled from her touch. Evelyn was testing her, poking at raw wounds with elegant precision… She really was a perfect specimen.

  “She will love him regardless,” she said finally, voice cold as the grave. “But…I know what it is like to be her. I don’t have the patience to wait for his grief to run dry.”

  Roman scoffed from the sidelines, arms crossed as he leaned against a stone obelisk. “The drama. He won’t let go of a ghost,” he muttered with a small smirk. “Not when he has the option of getting her back, which you…so cleverly offered. For the record, I’m free.”

  “Pass.”

  Evelyn cpped her hands with delight. “Oh, my, how tragic! What a splendid atmosphere for a blood ritual. And yet, Tiffany, I see no sorrow in your lovely eyes when I am done with you. Only amusement and victory.” She leaned in, whispering, “How much of you is still hers, I wonder?” The witch’s lips curled. “Just enough to enjoy the irony? Or…perhaps more than you think…”

  Leave… Tiffany ordered the maids.

  They swiftly hustled out, leaving them alone as Tiffany held the smirking creature’s gaze.

  The wind picked up, pulling at the edges of their cloaks. The sigils around the circle burned white-hot, reacting to the convergence of energies. Roman strode forward, summoning his cane to pce at the center of the altar.

  A rift opened. The cave quaked. The Yaltha’ma scattered in a panic, running every which way. A noble man on the opposite side let out a sharp cry as he came into view, his veins lighting up like molten gold. A tether formed, stretching between realms as the ced blood of red, bck, and silver twisting up to pull him through, carving a path where there was none.

  Roman’s weapon passed through him like a ghost, his soul drawn out and twisting in binding circles around the item before his body stretched, like drawn into an event horizon.

  Tiffany maintained the resonance, feeling the hag easily sustaining the potent waves as she acted as the echo to amplify the power. “You’ve avoided answering one of my questions, Evelyn,” she mumbled, feeling the pressure colpsing around her body.

  The hag raised a delicate brow, her teeth fshing. “Only one? Not how you can bypass the tedious repeated chanting? No? How disappointing.”

  Tiffany ignored the jest. “The storm you created… You pyed it up, but you don’t do anything for free or for so little. You owe the Empress more than you expected, don’t you?” she challenged.

  Something flickered in Evelyn’s expression. The usual mirth dimmed, repced by something more calcuting, almost wary. “Oh, how very clever you are, my little morsel. So perceptive,” she murmured. “Indeed, I do. And my dealings with Nungal may have been…more costly than I had anticipated. Perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised, but the goddess is…far more formidable than even I anticipated.”

  Roman shifted, shifting his sungsses on his nose as the teen girl on the other side colpsed, nearly dead, even with all the potent artifacts Evelyn left to take the brunt of the ritual. “That’s an interesting way of admitting you miscalcuted… Nungal appears to have hoodwinked you, as she’s done our sweet Empress.”

  Evelyn’s smile turned dark as her slitted eyes darted to the Legend. “Careful, strategist… Trying to py on my pride will trigger my spite, and a hag’s spite is not a curse one desires.”

  “Apologies,” he chortled, giving a small bow. “I’ve heard so little about this goddess, yet she appears to have great significance to Empress Elinor, and who better to seek advice than from an ancient wisdom such as yourself?”

  “Charming… No, I never miscalcute, Roman. I merely—” Her fingers twitched. The ritual’s pulse shifted, darkening for the briefest moment as the man and altar between them exploded, only to draw into a spiral rift of blood, materials, and gore. “—adjust.”

  Tiffany watched her carefully, unsure exactly what she’d done to change the ritual in the middle of it—something that should be impossible. “And how will you adjust now that she has shifted the pying field?”

  Evelyn sighed, as if genuinely weary, rubbing between her eyes. The cane remained at the center of the rippling pool, growing rger and rger to stretch from floor to ceiling. “I suppose I’ll have to find a way to make it even. A debt owed is a debt paid, after all. The word of a hag is a precious thing… Our lifeblood, you could say,” she added with a wicked smile.

  And there she goes… Offering unsolicited information few will understand to even the pying field. It doesn’t count if I don’t tell the Empress, which you have the deal with, sweetheart.

  “Clever girl!”

  The portal fred, widening into a swirling abyss of blue-bck void, drawing in the ingredients within a singurity. A passage into the depths of Kaspir Kingdom’s hidden chambers. The energy crackled, the soul of the Autumn noble snuggly fitted into a pane of gss between realms.

  Tiffany exhaled, rolling her shoulders, feeling the weight in her bones when she really didn’t do anything. “Then it looks like we all have our next moves. You need to prepare my other half’s return for my beloved Death Knight. Roman has his own mission in Kaspir, no doubt. And I…need to check in on our branch kingdom… Ah,” she paused.

  Gncing at the amiable, wicked creature, Tiffany’s eyes narrowed, knowing Elinor would not like the truth of how this rift was maintained. Still, there was something she could do for the Autumn family in return for this small sacrifice.

  “You don’t happen to need your former identity, do you? Would it be possible to craft a simple doll of yourself that I could use for my own ends on the other side?”

  The hag’s sinister smile returned, brown eyes returning as she took on the elegant facade she’d carried for centuries. “But of course. It is a minor request since the family is…practically useless to me now. And the price of your pride is worth the loss… You adjusted. Beautiful.”

  Tiffany cleared her throat as the hag snapped her fingers, and a shimmering double materialized, blinking innocently and totally devoid of the hag’s nasty personality—a true, temporary heir to the Autumn family until the teen could take over her house’s name.

  “The family is yours, Witch Queen.”

  Without another word, she stepped toward the rift, leaving Roman to whatever deal he pnned to make. A bitter tear slid down her cheek upon reaching the other side, feeling as if she’d been breaking since the moment she’d been born… Unloved from inception.

  Is there a small piece of me that wishes for something…good?

  Evelyn’s smirk deepened on the other side as her voice faded away. “Do try not to get lost, dear. I would so hate to find you wandering where you don’t belong… The byrinth of self-worth is dangerous.”

  Tiffany cast a final gnce over her shoulder, brushing the tear away before it could be seen, her grin mirroring the hag’s own. “Oh, Evelyn,” she whispered, stepping forward to check on the brown-haired teen, “I always find a pce to belong.”

  And with that, she tended to her new little appearance’s wounds—when the young Ms. Autumn awoke, she would be freed from the hag’s control. Her fake mother was standing nearby for the transition.

  I don’t want to be like this forever… But for now, just let it go. Edmon… I know it hurts. I know…but you don’t know what it’s like to be me.

  AuthorSME