As the sun began to set, casting long, orange shadows across the room, she knew the truce was ending. The Tyrant would return, and with him, the fire that both sustained and consumed her.
She wasn't just sick from the magic. She was sick with the realization that she had become the very thing she hated: a woman who couldn't exist without the man who owned her.
And as the heavy doors of the Royal Suite eventually groaned open, announcing Kassian's return, Vera wiped a single, cold tear from her eye and put the mask back on.
"Welcome back, Your Majesty," she whispered into the shadows.
***
The air in the Royal Suite was no longer a sanctuary; it had become a vacuum.
