Alina’s POV
The good part about this night is that the Vale security did a great job chasing all the gossip journalists away before I stepped out.
I walked out of the hall like a ghost, quiet, trembling, empty.
My legs didn’t feel like mine anymore. My body felt tight, drained, as if all the bones inside me were melting and collapsing. Each step echoed with the same words beating against my skull:
Get out.
Get out.
Get out.
Edric’s voice wasn’t soft or warm or teasing,
It was sharp.
Cold.
Screaming.
The kind of voice he had never used on me.
Not even once.
And now it was the only one I could hear.
The moment he pointed at the door, the moment his eyes, those same eyes that once softened whenever they looked at me, turned into blades… it shattered something in me I didn’t eve
