The silence after the banquet clung to me like a second skin.
Whispers filled the corridors, spilling through servants' quarters, curling beneath the doors of noble chambers. Some whispered my name with reverence, others with fear. But all of them spoke it.
In my father's house, the air grew sharp.
My mother would not meet my eyes. When we passed in the gallery, her hand brushed the tapestry, fingers tracing the embroidered chain woven into its pattern. A warning. A plea. Her silence begged me to bend before it was too late.
My father's fury was different. Cold. Contained. He spoke little, but when he did, each word struck like stone.
"You have endangered us all."
"You mistake endurance for power."
"You will kneel, or you will be ash."
I answered with silence, measured and perfect. But inside, I felt the fracture widening between us.
Even within the hidden resistance, cracks spread. In the shadows of the lower halls, a Bride clutched my hand too tightly, her voice shaking as she whispered:
"You're forcing the Veil to notice us. You'll bring its wrath down on every one of us."
Another servant hissed back, "Better wrath than chains forever."
They looked to me—some with hope, others with dread. For the first time, I understood the weight of what I had become. Not just defiant, not just marked. A fulcrum. If I faltered, the silence would collapse into fear.
Alone in my chamber, I touched the crack running across the mirror. It had deepened, splintered into smaller veins that webbed across the glass. My reflection stared back at me, fractured into a dozen Selioras, each one colder than the last.
The Veil pressed closer now. I could feel it even in sleep, shadow tugging at the edges of my dreams.
The city was splintering. My family. The resistance. Even myself.
But perhaps splintering was not weakness. Perhaps it was the first step toward breaking entirely.
And if something breaks—then something new can be made.