HIS TO COMMAND

Chapter7

Paper Castles

Emerald used to believe the world was made of magic.

Back then, she thought her father could fix anything with a phone call, that her mother’s illness was just a long fever, and that love would eventually save everyone.

She was wrong about all three.

Their house had once been a haven. A white-painted villa tucked into a quiet part of town, surrounded by flowering rosebushes and laughter that spilled into the halls like sunlight. Her mother had been vibrant then—her laugh rich, her skin glowing, her arms always open. Emerald remembered the nights they'd curl up together on the couch with warm tea and old black-and-white films, watching stories where love conquered everything.

But illness had a way of making time bleed.

It started with dizzy spells. Then slurred speech. Then the forgetting. Her mother had been diagnosed with a degenerative neurological disease when Emerald was only thirteen. From that moment, her world stopped being about dance rehearsals and sleepovers—it became hospitals, hushed prayers, and watching her father’s hands tremble when he thought no one was looking.

She remembered walking in on him once, just past midnight, pressing his forehead towards the kitchen counter, silently crying. That image never left her.

That was the night everything changed.

From then on, Emerald wore silence-like armor. She became perfect. Perfect grades. Perfect smile. Perfect daughter. She never argued, never asked for new clothes, never stayed out too late. She knew how fragile everything had become.

But inside, she was burning.

Her one escape had been her drawings. On old napkins, school notebooks, even her textbooks. She'd draw dresses—gowns made of starlight and fire. She wanted to be a fashion designer once, before the world turned cold.

And then there was Alex.

Her first crush. Her first heartbreak.

Alex had been her neighbor’s son—two years older, with crooked teeth and eyes that smiled even when his lips didn’t. He used to call her “sunflower” because she always sat by the window where the sun hit her face just right.

One evening, during a blackout in their small English town, they sat together in the backyard, lit by lantern lights and the hum of distant traffic.

“If your mom gets better,” Alex had whispered, “I’ll take you to London." There’s a school for designers there. You’d love it.”

She remembered laughing. “And if she doesn’t?”

His smile faded. “Then I’ll take care of you. Like, forever.”

It had been innocent, stupid. The kind of promise kids make when they think the world will wait for them.

But the world never waits.

Alex moved away a year later. His father got transferred. He left her a sketchpad with her name on it and a drawing of a girl with fire in her hair and a storm in her eyes.

She never saw him again.

---

Now, sitting in the cold servant quarters of the Thorne Estate, Emerald stared at the same sketchpad—tattered, frayed, nearly torn down the spine. She hadn’t opened it in years. She wasn’t sure why she packed it. Maybe to remember who she was before all of this.

Before her father’s fall from grace.

Before her mother's condition became irreversible.

Before Roman Thorne took away her choices.

She flipped to the last page, a half-finished drawing of a dress shaped like wings.

She used to believe she'd design it for her mom—something beautiful and strong, to wear the day she walked again. But that dream had died a long time ago.

And now?

Now, her mother was in a facility she couldn’t afford, hanging on by the mercy of the very man who had sworn to make her daughter suffer.

Roman.

---

The door creaked suddenly.

Emerald jumped.

It wasn’t a maid or guard.

It was Damien.

“I knocked twice,” he said, holding out two mugs. “You were gone.”

“I was... somewhere else.”

He handed her one of the mugs. “Hot chocolate. Figured you might need warmth that wasn’t emotional trauma for once.”

She managed a small smile.

He sat across from her on the floor, eyes drifting to the sketchpad.

“Did you draw those?”

She nodded.

“They’re incredible.”

“They were dreams,” she said quietly.

“Still are.”

“No,” she said. “They were. Now they’re just reminders.”

Damien was quiet for a moment. Then he leaned forward, voice softer. “You know, when my mom died, I stopped playing the piano. I thought if I didn’t touch it, the grief would stay locked in those keys. But it didn’t.”

She looked at him, tears brimming.

“Sometimes,” he continued, “you have to do the things that remind you of who you were before life decided otherwise.”

Her breath hitched, and she bit her lip.

“Roman won’t let me dream,” she whispered.

“He doesn’t know how to let people be free,” Damien said. “He thinks control is the only way to keep from drowning.”

Emerald looked down. “And I’m just the rope he’s clinging to.”

Another silence.

Then Damien reached out and gently brushed a strand of hair from her face. “You’re more than that, Emerald. You’re fire.”

She pulled back slightly, overwhelmed. “You shouldn’t say things like that. Not here. Not when your brother could destroy everything.”

“I’m not Roman.”

She met his eyes—and something lingered there. Something she hadn’t seen in a long time.

Possibility.

---

Later that night, she lay in bed, the sketchpad beside her.

She touched the drawing gently, then reached for her pen. She hadn’t drawn in so long it felt like a foreign language—but it poured out of her now.

Lines. Curves. Detail.

A new design. A new vision.

Something was awakening.

Then her phone buzzed.

A single message.

“You’re needed in Roman’s room. Now.”

No explanation.

Just a summons.

She stared at it

.

And for the first time since she arrived at Thorne Estate, Emerald didn’t feel like a prisoner.

She felt like a storm on the verge of breaking.