CHAPTER 175: CALLING THEM TO WAR.

"I never asked you to protect me," she whispered.

"No," he said, his voice low. "But I’m doing it anyway."

A silence settled between them, thick and full of unsaid things.

Then, Lucien turned and lit another lantern near the desk. "You’ll sleep here. There’s a cot behind the curtain. I’ll have Rowan bring some of your clothes. You’re not to leave this room unless I say so. Understood?"

Liora hesitated, then nodded. "Understood."

He paused before leaving. "And Liora..."

She looked up.

"Keep the journal close. No one else is to touch it. Not even Rowan."

The door clicked shut behind him.

Left alone, she approached the heavy desk, her fingers brushing across its rough wood. It was littered with maps—old ones—showing not just the palace but the secret tunnels underneath, the forgotten routes once used by soldiers and spies. Her eyes widened as she realized what Lucien had been building all this time: a war beneath a throne.

Her war, now.

But even as her heart pounded with this new knowledge, her fingers went still.

Because beneath one of the maps... was a torn slip of parchment. One she hadn’t seen him leave.

A single phrase was written on it.

"Your mother knew the truth."

Liora’s blood ran cold.

Her mother had died when she was five. They said it was illness.

But now, standing here in the center of her estranged husband’s secrets, clutching the whisper of a memory too dangerous to speak aloud... She wasn’t so sure.

Liora didn’t sleep that night.

The cot was comfortable enough, the fire crackled warmly, and yet her eyes never closed. That single phrase looped in her mind like a curse scratched into bone.

"Your mother knew the truth."

Truth about what? The Red Veil? The journal? Or... something darker?

She had no memory of her mother beyond the scent of jasmine and warm arms lifting her from the floor during a thunderstorm. After her death, no one spoke of her again. It was as though she’d been erased, not mourned.

And now, this.

By dawn, her fingers were ink-stained, and her lap was covered in torn parchment and scribbled guesses. She had gone through every name, every title in the journal, comparing them to the maps Lucien kept hidden in his study. Symbols repeated, particularly one shaped like a crescent with three stars, a crest she remembered faintly from a brooch her mother used to wear.

Her pulse quickened.

Why would that symbol be embedded in the pages of a war ledger?

She heard footsteps outside. They stopped by the door. Not Lucien’s...too light.

Then: a knock.

Liora rose swiftly and cracked the door open.

Rowan.

He offered a bundle of clothes and bread wrapped in cloth. "Lord Blackthorne asked me to bring this."

She opened the door fully to let him in, her tone sharper than usual. "Rowan... Who left this?"

She showed him the torn parchment with the message.

He frowned, genuinely surprised. "Not me. And I don’t think Lucien left that either. He doesn’t pass notes...he speaks with steel, not riddles."

"Someone came in?"

"No one should’ve," Rowan said. "I’ve been stationed outside your room all night."

She stepped back. "Then someone is inside this house. Someone who knows about my mother."

Rowan’s jaw tightened. "Then you shouldn’t be alone."

Before Liora could respond, Lucien entered, his coat dusted with dew and his boots stained in mud. He looked more like a fugitive than a nobleman. "We have a problem."

He tossed a folded message on the table. The wax seal was broken.

"Red Veil?" Liora asked.

"No." He walked to the hearth, eyes dark. "The Queen Dowager sent word. You’re summoned."

Liora’s heart dropped. "To the palace?"

He didn’t look at her. "To her private chambers. Tonight."

Rowan’s breath hissed in. "That’s not a summon. That’s a death sentence in silk."

Lucien turned, gaze locked on Liora. "She knows the journal was in your possession. She’ll smile while she wraps a noose around your throat."

Liora straightened. "Then let her. If she wants a war in words, I’ll wear my mother’s voice."

Lucien stepped forward, closer than before, his expression unreadable. "You are not ready for her."

"I’ve already been traded, discarded, and hunted," she said quietly. "What else can she take from me?"

Lucien didn’t answer. His silence said too much.

Because the answer was you. She can take you.

But neither said it aloud.

The carriage rolled through the narrow gates of the palace’s west wing, creaking under the weight of its silence. Liora sat motionless inside, wrapped in a shawl Rowan had insisted she wear. "Velvet dulls fear," he’d said. "And you’ll need it."

Lucien hadn’t accompanied her.

"They wouldn’t dare kill you,"

he had said before she left. "Not yet. Not while they think they can use you."

And if they couldn’t?

He hadn’t answered.

The palace was unfamiliar now. Gilded corridors once meant for elegance now seemed like the ribs of a beast, trapping her inside. Every servant she passed lowered their eyes too quickly. Some bowed. Others simply vanished into side passages before she could see their faces.

She was being avoided. That meant one thing: fear.

Two guards opened the carved doors to the Queen Dowager’s chamber. Liora’s throat tightened.

The room was warm. Lavender smoke coiled through the air. Gold panels reflected soft candlelight. At the center, a throne-like chair covered in red silk faced the wide windows. The figure seated in it was thin, dressed in mourning gray. Her silver hair was braided in loops and pinned like a crown.

Queen Dowager Lilian did not rise.

"So you’re the concubine."

Liora lowered into a bow. "Liora Miral, Your Grace."

"Hm." The Queen Dowager’s fingers toyed with a small, black ring. "You don’t look like your mother."

Liora’s breath stopped.

"My...?"

"Alenya," the queen said with a smile that didn’t touch her eyes. "She was a poor little sparrow. Always fluttering, always crying over nothing. I told her once...’you’ll drown in the secrets you chase.’" She tilted her head. "And she did."

Liora’s fists tightened in the folds of her dress. "You knew her."

"I raised her." The dowager rose slowly, her silks whispering as she approached. "I knew every breath she took. Every step. Every foolish letter she tried to send beyond these walls."

A pause.

"I also knew when to stop pretending she wasn’t a threat."

Liora looked up, and for the first time, she saw the monster behind the mask. Not just royalty...but a strategist, a viper coiled for decades in a bed of power.

"You killed her," Liora whispered.

Queen Dowager Lilian smiled. "No, dear. Your mother killed herself."

She stepped closer, fingers trailing the edge of Liora’s shawl. "Just like you might...if you forget your place."

Liora didn’t flinch. "I won’t."

"Good," the Dowager said, stepping back. "Because there’s someone I’d like you to meet."

She clapped once.

The doors opened.

And in stepped someone Liora never thought she’d see again.

Her aunt, Evelyne.

Wearing silks. Smiling like a woman reborn.

Evelyne Miral’s smile was as polished as the jade pin in her hair.

She walked forward with the grace of a noblewoman...measured, proud, a stranger dressed in borrowed dignity. The woman who once slapped Liora for speaking without permission now dipped in a curtsy, as if they were equals.

"Aunt Evelyne," Liora said, her voice low.

"My dear Liora," Evelyne replied, "what a strange place to meet again. You look... improved."

Improved.

Liora didn’t blink. "You look well-fed."

Queen Dowager Lilian let out a soft chuckle, sipping something dark from her goblet. "Evelyne has proven useful. Unlike most in your family."

"I suppose lies and betrayal are currency in court now," Liora murmured.

"Oh, child." Evelyne’s tone sweetened like rot. "We are survivors. You of all people should understand what it means to do what’s necessary."

Liora took a step closer, refusing to lower her gaze. "Necessary doesn’t excuse selling me like cattle."

"You were a disgrace!" Evelyne snapped before softening again. "We gave you a chance... Prince Lucien might’ve cast you aside, but here you are, clothed in velvet and silk, standing before the Queen Dowager. You should thank us."

Queen Dowager Lilian rose from her chair once more. "I think gratitude is beneath her, Evelyne. She wears her mother’s stubbornness like armor."

There was a pause. Then...

"You’ll dine with me tonight," the queen said. "Both of you. There will be others. High Lords, a few foreign eyes. Be pleasant, be silent, and remember...your performance reflects my generosity."

Liora lowered her eyes. "Yes, Your Grace."

As they were dismissed, Evelyne looped her arm around Liora’s as if they were kin again.

"Don’t try to be clever," Evelyne whispered, lips unmoving. "They’ll devour you."

"And you?" Liora murmured back. "What will they do with a pawn that thinks she’s a queen?"

Evelyne’s smile froze.

They parted at the end of the corridor. Liora turned a corner, her pulse hammering behind her ears only to freeze.

Rowan stood leaning against a pillar.

"Thought I’d lost you," he said softly.

"You followed me?"

"I watched the guards who were watching you." He stepped closer. "Your aunt...?"

"A traitor. Or maybe she always was."

"And the Dowager?"

Liora swallowed. "She knew my mother. Raised her. Killed her."

Rowan’s expression darkened. "Then we’re running out of time."

"No." Liora lifted her chin. "We’re running out of excuses."

She looked toward the far wing...where Lucien waited, unaware of how close the enemy truly stood.

"I’m done playing their games."

Rowan didn’t speak. He only nodded.

And somewhere beyond the heavy walls, the palace bell began to ring...once, twice.

Calling them to dinner.

or

Calling them to war.