Chapter 8 #2
What if it meant he was starting to see me differently?
That thought was like a match, striking a tiny flame in the ashes of my heart. I tried to blow it out, told myself not to be delusional—but that flame was too stubborn. It flickered in my chest for three whole days, refusing to die.
On the fourth morning, I touched my still-flat belly and made a decision.
I'd gamble one last time.
The morning I decided to tell Zane about the pregnancy, Leah came.
She didn't knock.
She just pushed the door open, wearing a dark green gown, hair pinned in an elegant bun, that smile on her face that made my stomach turn. Her gaze swept over my rounded belly—I was thin, and even several months pregnant, it barely showed.
Her smile deepened.
"Looks like the news I got was right," she said, voice sweet as honey laced with arsenic. "You're pregnant."
I instinctively stepped back, hands protecting my belly.
"Don't be nervous," she walked in and shut the door behind her. "I'm not here to hurt you."
She was lying.
I saw it in her eyes—that jealous, crazed, murderous light.
"You know what this means, right?" She sat in the chair across from me, crossing her legs, posture elegant as if she were having afternoon tea. "Once you give birth to this child, especially if it's a boy—you'll be the heir's mother. And me—" she pointed at herself, "I'll be completely kicked out."
I stared at her, silent.
"So I came up with a solution," she pulled a small bottle from her sleeve, filled with murky liquid. "Drink this. It'll all be over. You won't suffer long, I promise."
I jumped up, knocking over the flowerpot behind me.
What is that? I didn't even need confirmation to guess its purpose!
—To hurt me, or hurt my child!
I shook my head, backing up step by step until my back hit the windowsill. My fingers fumbled along the window frame, mind racing—the door was behind her, the window was sealed, nothing in the room I could use to defend myself.
"Don't make me use force, Mia." She stood, advancing on me. "You're a mute. Even if you scream, no one can hear you. And—" she smiled, "who do you think they'll believe? You or me?"
She was right.
No one would believe me.
But I wouldn't let her hurt my child.
When she lunged at me, I dodged sideways. The bottle grazed past my ear, a few drops spilling onto the floor and turning to white foam—that stuff was poison, I was sure of it now.
I grabbed her wrist, trying to get the bottle. She was taller than me, stronger too, but we wrestled, knocking over the vase on the table, kicking over a chair. Shards scattered across the floor. I stepped on a piece of porcelain, the pain breaking my focus.
In that instant, she seized her chance, pinning me against the table edge, raising the bottle to force it down my throat.
I shoved her with everything I had.
Her elbow hit the table corner.
She screamed, let go, and fell backward. The bottle hit the floor and shattered, brown liquid pooling everywhere.
Then the door flew open.
Zane stood in the doorway.
His gaze swept the room—overturned chairs, porcelain shards everywhere, brown liquid all over the floor, Leah curled up on the ground clutching her arm, and me backed into the corner, gasping.
"What's going on?" His voice was ice-cold.
"Your Majesty—" Leah lifted her head, tears pouring like an opened faucet. "She—she tried to hurt me... She's insane... She had that bottle, tried to poison me..."
My eyes went wide.
"What are you saying?"
I rushed forward, signing frantically. "Not me! It was her! She tried to drug my child!"
But Zane wasn't looking at me.
He walked over, crouched down, and helped Leah up. Her arm had a bruise—from hitting the table corner. She leaned into Zane's embrace, crying pitifully, looking fragile as glass about to shatter.
"Your Majesty, I was so scared..." She buried her face in his chest. "She looked so terrifying... She was going to kill me..."
Zane looked up at me.
Those gray-blue eyes held no questions, no hesitation. Only cold, certain disgust.
"Hold her down," he said.
Two guards rushed in, pinning my shoulders from both sides, forcing me to the floor. My knees hit the cold marble with a dull thud.
"Mia, how dare you do this?" Zane stood before me, looking down, his voice carrying a kind of exhaustion that broke my heart. "I thought you'd at least show some restraint. I thought if I gave you some space, let you tend your flowers, you'd settle down."
I shook my head, shaking it frantically, tears blurring my vision.
No. It wasn't like that.
"But you'll never settle down, will you?" He crouched, meeting my eyes at level, the coldness in those eyes making me tremble. "You always want more. You want my attention, my trust, the Luna position—and now you even want to kill Leah!"
My mouth opened, my throat making a hoarse wheeze like a dying animal.
"Lock her up." He stood, back to me. "She doesn't leave that room without my permission."
The guards dragged me up, pulling me toward the door. I struggled, looking back at him and Leah—she still leaned in his arms, looking at me with a victor's gaze, a barely perceptible curve to her lips.
That smile froze every drop of blood in my body.
She won.
Again.
I was dragged from the room, past the garden I'd planted with my own hands. Those daisies and lavender swayed in the sunlight, petals still holding morning dew. They didn't know what had happened. They just stayed there, quietly, innocently blooming.
Like a child who didn't know what they'd done wrong.
I closed my eyes, letting the guards drag me into the darkness.