POV: Olivia
The days blurred.
I didn’t count them. I couldn’t. Time meant nothing once I fled the Red Moon borders. There was only distance—step after bleeding step until the packhouse was nothing but a shadow I couldn’t hear or smell anymore.
I made it as far as the city gates with nothing but torn shoes and desperation.
Work was the only thing anyone would trade me for a roof.
The innkeeper’s wife set me to the lowest tasks—scrubbing pots until my hands split, sweeping floors until my back ached, folding linens until my fingers cramped. When there weren’t enough chores, she sent me to polish boots in the yard until my knees bruised.
The pay was meagre, but it bought bread, a cot in the servants’ quarters, and—maybe most valuable of all—the illusion of belonging.
I kept my head dow
