No matter what, she now understood everything about Marcellus—including the pain behind his silence, the struggle buried beneath his choices.
Alia's heart was a tangled mess, knotted so tightly she could barely breathe.
She wasn't Livia. She couldn't forgive Marcellus on Livia's behalf.
But she—as Alia—could she forgive this man?
She leaned against the wall of the hospital room, her fingers pale from clenching too hard. In her mind, she kept replaying every word he had just said.
His remorse wasn't an act. Neither was his collapse.
He stood before her like a man drowning—raw, gasping, broken—struggling to climb out of a well of memories.
And the more genuine he seemed, the heavier her heart became.
She looked down at her hands—once nimble and clever, shaped by years of thievery. Now, they were pale and slender: Livia's hands.
Again, she felt that strange, alien weight settle into her chest.
This body was borrowed. This identity, a lie.
A second life, as absurd as it was cruel.
She couldn't lie to him any longer.
Her breath came fast, her voice low:
"I forgive you, Marcellus… I can forgive you."
He looked up. His eyes flickered between disbelief and release, like a man glimpsing salvation through smoke.
"But not as Livia," she said, her voice a blade slicing through the silence. "I… I'm Alia."
The room fell into an almost unnatural stillness.
Even the rustling of the trees outside the window seemed to fade into the distance.
She had finally spoken the truth—this long-buried truth that had pressed down on her chest like stone.
Her voice trembled, but her gaze was steady.
"I'm not Livia. In my past life… I was a thief. A nobody. I infiltrated your estate to steal something—anything. But then I saw you. You were standing there, with a gun, pointed at her. I thought you'd gone mad.
And then… you saw me. You shot her.
Then you shot me."
Her tone was calm, but every word landed like a nail driven deep into Marcellus's nerves.
"I died. But when I woke up… I was in her body. I didn't understand what had happened. My head hurt, I couldn't breathe.
And then her memories came—her emotions, her pain. I felt everything, like I was her.
But I wasn't. I knew I wasn't."
She looked straight at him, her voice rough with truth:
"This is who I am. Alia. Alia, brought back in Livia's body."
Marcellus had gone ashen. His fingers clenched into the bedsheets, white-knuckled.
He shook his head, again and again.
"No… no, that's impossible," he whispered, voice shredded with disbelief. "Livia didn't die. I didn't kill her. I couldn't have.
And you're not Alia. You are her. You're just… confused. You're traumatized. You've constructed a fantasy to avoid the pain."
"Do you really believe that?" Alia's voice broke. She could barely hold back her tears. "The person standing in front of you… isn't her."
"Stop." He pressed his hand to his forehead. His eyes were wild, torn between denial and desperation.
"I feel her," he muttered. "Livia's soul… it's in your body. I can see her. I know it's her."
Alia didn't respond. Her eyes shimmered.
She had thought that speaking the truth would bring her peace—relief.
Instead, it had only dragged them deeper into an impossible nightmare.
He didn't believe her.
He couldn't.
And in some ways, she didn't blame him.
If their roles were reversed, she would have thought the same: that it was all some cruel, elaborate delusion.
The air thickened between them, heavy as glass.
They stood like statues, on either side of a line drawn by fate—past and present, truth and memory.
Neither of them could cross it.
At last, it was Alia who lowered her gaze first. Her voice was soft, almost a whisper:
"Maybe… we both need time."
She didn't argue further. Didn't push.
Instead, she turned slowly and walked to the window.
The breeze lifted strands of her hair, and in the sunlight, they shimmered like threads of gold.
This wasn't running away.
It was simply the only thing left to do.
To pause.
To breathe.
To survive the weight of being—Alia, in Livia's borrowed skin.