Veil of Amethyst

Chapter Two

Trying to keep the tears at bay, I ran out. Air. I needed air. The walls of the showroom felt like they were folding in on me, closer with every breath. She had no right. No right to use Haron like that, like a weapon to soften me into obedience.

He might have been her son, but he was my brother. My friend. More than that, he had always been a shield for me, an anchor between me and the rest of them, the one who translated my silences into something my parents could understand, who stepped between us before their disappointment ever had the chance to land. When he laughed at something I said, it gave everyone else permission to laugh too. When he defended a choice I’d made, no one argued. I never had to explain myself, not really, not when he was there to do it for me.

Now there was no one standing in that space. Just me, and the distance he used to fill. It had always been us against the world, until the day he died two years ago. Some nights I still thought it should have been me instead. Or that death could have simply taken us both, so neither of us would have had to learn how to be alone in a house that had never quite known what to do with me.

My parents never said it aloud, but I felt it anyway, the quiet suspicion that somehow I was the one who should have gone. The odd one out. Red hair where theirs was dark. Pale skin against their sun-warmed tones. Eyes that matched no one else’s in the family, a shade I’d stopped trying to name. None of it was my fault, but it didn’t stop the feeling from settling into my bones. I kept running, blind to where my feet were taking me, chest burning, throat tight.

Then I collided with someone, hard enough that we nearly went down together. All I caught, in that single disoriented second, was a flash of golden flecks in his eyes. A hurried apology tumbled out of me before I kept moving, not stopping until the garden came into view.

Our spot.

He used to sit right there, on the low stone bench beneath the vines, always so steady. He never made me feel like the outsider. Just his sister. Just Zaya.

Why did you leave me?

I missed him so much it felt physical, a hollow ache behind my ribs. Lying back against the grass, I tried to look around the way we used to, but it wasn’t the same without him there to point out which flower meant what, which one symbolized loyalty, which one meant new beginnings. The garden felt like a language I no longer knew how to read alone.

Why did you leave me?

By the time I opened my eyes again, the moon had risen high overhead. I must have cried myself into exhaustion and slipped under without realizing it. Everything in me felt scraped hollow, wrung out, and still somehow empty.

Mum said winning didn’t matter, didn’t she? Fine. I would do what I always did best: blend in until the contestants were chosen, then slip quietly back to my life.

The days that followed moved quickly. Phyn and Mum didn’t bring up The Ascension again, so I let the subject rest where it lay. We threw ourselves into dresses and fittings instead, the fashion house turning into something close to a madhouse from sunup to well past dusk.

On the eve of The Proving, my father summoned me, Derek Dawton. He rarely asked for me directly, which meant whatever this was, it mattered.

The walk to his study was one I knew too well and never grew used to. Our house sat at the edge of the Amethyst quarters, tall and formal in a way that never quite felt like home, more like something built to be looked at than lived in. The main hall was lined with portraits of Dawtons going back generations, each one watching with the same composed, unreadable expression my father wore most days. Haron’s portrait hung among them now too, added the year after he died, and I still couldn’t walk past it without slowing my steps.

My father’s study sat at the far end of the house, past a set of tall doors that opened onto a private balcony overlooking his garden, kept in strict, orderly rows, nothing like the wild little corner Haron and I had claimed for ourselves. Even the flowers here seemed to stand at attention.

I made my way there, feet slowing the closer I got. Standing outside the door, I willed myself to knock and found I couldn’t quite manage it.

Come in, Zaya, he called, as though he’d sensed me standing there. Not Z, like Haron used to call me. Just Zaya.

Pushing the door open, I was surprised to find Phyn already inside. She and my father had never exactly seen eye to eye, which made her presence there stranger still. The study was as cold and composed as the rest of the house. Tall shelves of ledgers lined one wall, each spine labeled in my father’s exacting hand. A tea set sat untouched on the side table between us, poured for appearances rather than comfort, the steam long since given up. My eyes caught, just briefly, on a folded piece of parchment half tucked beneath a paperweight on his desk, sealed with a wax stamp I didn’t recognize. I wondered, for half a second, what business required a seal like that.

Then I let the thought go. Whatever it was, it wasn’t mine to ask about, not tonight.

Without any preamble, Derek said, Tomorrow is The Proving, and everyone will be there. Do not embarrass the family. The words landed squarely on me, though he hadn’t looked my way once. And Zaya. Try not to stand out.

Something in that stung more than it should have. It wasn’t as though I had any intention of doing otherwise, but shouldn’t a father be telling his daughter to win? It was our clan’s turn to rule, and he had no son left to carry that expectation instead.

Don’t go there, I told myself. Just focus on not standing out.

Can I go now? I asked, adding a reluctant Father, at the end.

You can.”

As I turned to leave, his voice dropped low behind me. Be careful, Zaya.

I nearly missed it. Why would he say that? It was only The Proving. Blending in was the plan, the whole plan, and yet the words followed me out of the room like a shadow that didn’t quite fit the light.

Phyn was still standing near the door when I turned to leave.

Let’s go, Phyn. We have to prepare.

We stepped out together, the corridor quiet around us, past the portraits, past Haron’s watchful painted face.

Blend in, I told myself again. That was the plan, but a tingling feeling had settled low in my stomach and refused to leave. I shook off the feeling. I do not want to be queen, and that is all that matters. Tomorrow couldn’t come fast enough, if only to get it over with.