Chapter 1
By the time you realize something is wrong, it’s already too late to turn back.
Ariel realized that far too late.
Drip. Drop.
The sound of water collected on the ceiling falling to the stone floor made her eyelids flutter open.
As her fingers searched the ground, they brushed against a slick, slippery liquid.
The cold temperature slowly revived the senses that had gone completely numb as her fading consciousness returned.
From far away came the sound of cannon fire. The damp underground prison air reeked of gunpowder and metallic blood, making her stomach churn. The chill rising from the floor set her lips trembling.
In the kingdom’s infamous underground dungeon, Ariel lay sprawled like a crumpled rag.
Why am I lying in a dungeon?
The question flashed through her mind, and the past few days reeled past her eyes like a lantern slide.
It was an afternoon about a month ago. She had been reading when soldiers stormed in, yanked her up by the hair, and dragged her into the town square.
“Traitor who sold out the nation!”
“Filthy whore! Murderer! Because of you, hundreds starved to death—just to sustain your luxury!”
The unbelievable insults were followed by stones hurled at her. Before she could resist or call for help, the rocks split her skin and bloodied her scalp.
Then came the interrogation.
“Is it true you gave the order to burn down the village of Munte?”
Where even is Munte? While she hesitated to remember, sharp splinters were shoved beneath her fingernails. Torture to force the “truth” out of her.
“Answer. You told them to burn Munte, didn’t you? To kill all who spoke against the king?”
No. Ariel had indeed been close to the king, but she had never directly demanded he do anything for her.
But the interrogator refused to believe her.
He acted like a man reading from a prepared script, repeating the same questions, and when he didn’t get the answer he wanted, he tortured her again.
Where had things gone wrong? The answer came from the interrogator’s own mouth.
“The Duke of Blake has already testified. The more you cling to this, the more you’ll lose.”
So it started with Blake. He’s pinned everything on me.
The last of her mental defenses crumbled. Worn down by the violence, she muttered as she slipped into unconsciousness:
“Please… please, just let me rest… I’ll tell you everything later…”
Those words were twisted in court into a confession of guilt.
Ariel still didn’t understand how they could interpret them that way.
One thing was certain—she had become a criminal.
A fallen noblewoman who supposedly lured the king into greed and corruption, driving the people into poverty.
Every vile epithet imaginable now preceded her name: cruel, witch, cunning, wretched, damnable, garbage, devil incarnate.
Ariel was innocent.
She wasn’t calculating enough to measure every breath, nor cruel enough to treat human lives like flies.
If she had committed a sin, it was believing in her patron far too deeply.
“…Blake…”
The name escaped her lips like a sigh. He was the patron who had turned her into a prisoner.
And yet, there had been another—one who had helped her grow into the woman she became. Perhaps she should call her a “former” patron now.
Ariel thought back on her life.
As a child, she had lost her parents. And being from a disgraced noble house, her future should have been obvious.
Either a plaything for other nobles… or starving to death on the streets.
But she had been given a different chance.
She received higher education—unthinkable for a girl—and with her beauty and eloquence became a muse for young intellectuals.
All thanks to Countess Bronte, who had taken her in.
Though the Countess never gave her love, she shielded Ariel from the cruelty of society and educated her.
But upon reaching adulthood, when Ariel sought independence, she met a new patron—wounding Bronte deeply.
Countess Bronte had vehemently opposed the Duke of Blake becoming Ariel’s new benefactor.
Traditionally, patronage ended when the ward came of age. For a grown woman, the only path left was marriage.
But Ariel didn’t want to marry—there was no one she wanted to marry. So she needed a new patron. And then Blake appeared.
For Blake to keep supporting an adult Ariel was enough to fuel the public’s imagination.
“So much for acting pure. How much did Countess Bronte take for selling her off?”
Rumors spread like rot, but Ariel still took Blake’s hand.
And was ultimately discarded like trash.
Blake dumped all his crimes onto her and became a hero who had “saved” the suffering citizens.
Memories of what Blake had made her do surfaced one by one.
Blinded by love, she hadn’t even thought them wrong at the time—but in hindsight, they were great crimes.
She had persuaded the king to sell off national assets to foreign powers at a pittance, and driven away loyal ministers who dared speak the truth.
And her greatest mistake…
Ariel hung her head.
“Ariel Amelia is hereby sentenced to death. If anyone objects, raise your hand.”
On the day her sentence was declared, one man quietly raised his hand.
And she hadn’t trusted him.
He had long warned her not to trust Blake, telling her to reach out if she ever needed help.
But Ariel had been suspicious of his kindness—and thought him a fool for enduring Blake’s insults.
Looking back, he had been the only one who truly would have helped her.
And perhaps the only man who could have set the kingdom back on its proper path.
What became of him?
After seizing power from the king, Blake had slaughtered anyone with royal blood.
The man had royal blood too, but as a marquis distrusted by the royal family, perhaps he had survived?
The memories made her chest ache.
She had thought herself neither especially good nor especially bad, but wherever she had walked, she had left others wounded.
“I… I want to apologize properly…”
Tears slid down Ariel’s cheeks.
She wanted to thank Countess Bronte for raising her, and apologize for ignoring her sincerity.
She wanted to tell that man she had been a fool, and that she had never meant to put him in danger.
And she wanted to bow her head to those who had died or suffered because of her.
But she would never have the chance. Her execution was tomorrow.
“Hhh… hhh…”
Ariel’s body collapsed forward, her hunched back shuddering.
With fingers too broken to clench properly, she pounded the floor again and again.
Sorrow, guilt, and fear slowly boiled into rage.
Suddenly, a desire to live surged inside her. It was too unjust to die like this.
Somehow… somehow, I’ll survive and do something—anything.
Her ankle was broken—she couldn’t walk. She dragged herself across the floor, each movement sending pain through her bones and searing her insides.
But she forced herself onward, until she reached the cell door.
“Help me… p-please, help me. Just listen to my story…”
Her faint voice echoed down the silent underground corridor.
“Hhhnn… please open the door. Is there really no one out there?”
Her sobs grew louder, splitting her cracked lips open again.
Still, Ariel didn’t give up.
She lifted her ragged hands and pounded on the door. With what little strength she had left after days without proper food or rest, she kept hitting.
No one answered.
“I want to live… hhh… I want to live…”
I’ll live… so I can atone.
She struck her chest with her fist and wept.
Then—
Click… click…
Footsteps echoed. Ariel gasped, lifting her head.
Her eyes were swollen, her vision blurred. She strained to focus, and then—
Clack. The cell door opened.
“…You’re in quite a state.”
A gentle voice.
“…!”
Ariel knew that voice.
“Mmm… too dark,” the man murmured, and switched on a wall lamp she hadn’t even noticed.
His face came into sharp focus.
He looked exactly the same as the last time she’d seen him, months ago—hair like molten gold, a face carved with an artist’s precision, a chiseled nose, strong brows, and warm, kind eyes.
“Lord… Lord Schumiern?”
Schumiern Conte Cervantes.
The man who had been the only one to question her death sentence—had come to see her.
