Cinder Rae

RAE

The slap came so fast I barely saw Celeste's hand move. My cheek burned where her palm connected, and I tasted blood where my teeth cut into my lip.

"You brought the wrong wine," she hissed, her perfect blonde hair catching the light from the crystal chandelier. "I specifically asked for the 1987 Bordeaux, not this cheap garbage."

I kept my eyes down, staring at the polished marble floor. "I'm sorry, Luna Celeste. I thought you said—"

"Don't you dare contradict me." Her voice could have frozen water. "Go to the cellar and bring back what I actually ordered. My guest is waiting."

I nodded and turned to leave, but her voice stopped me cold.

"And Rae? If you embarrass me again tonight, you'll regret it."

I walked through the ballroom, my face still stinging. The Vale estate was in full swing tonight, filled with the most important shifters in the territory. Crystal glasses clinked. Expensive perfume hung heavy in the air. Everyone wore their finest clothes, their shiniest jewelry, their most practiced smiles.

And there I was in my plain black dress, carrying wine bottles like the servant I was.

The whispers started the moment I passed the first group of guests.

"That's her, right? The bastard daughter."

"The Vales are really good people, giving her a place to stay and a roof over her head."

Someone chuckled. "She's only a maid after all. A good maid."

I kept walking. I was used to it by now. Eighteen years of being Alpha Magnus Vale's dirty little secret, the product of an affair he thought he'd buried in the past. But like all things, women suffered for a man's mistakes.

The cellar was cool and dark. I found the bottle Celeste wanted, the one she'd actually asked for in the first place. My hands shook slightly as I picked it up. The label was dusty, and I could see why it cost more than most people made in three months.

I climbed the stone steps back to the main floor, careful not to trip. The last thing I needed was to break this bottle too. The ballroom was even more crowded now, and I had to weave between groups of laughing guests to reach Celeste.

I was almost there when someone bumped into me.

The collision wasn't hard, just a shoulder brushing against mine. But the moment we touched, the world exploded.

I saw a woman pressed against a wall, her face twisted in terror. The man's hands were on her, rough and demanding. She was crying, begging him to stop, but he wouldn't listen. The fear in her eyes was so real, so raw, that it felt like my own.

"Please," she whispered. "Please don't do this."

But he was already—

The vision shattered. I was back in the ballroom, gasping for air. The wine bottle slipped from my numb fingers and crashed to the floor. Red wine spread across the expensive white epoxy like blood, and glass shards scattered in every direction.

The silence that followed was deafening. Every conversation stopped. Every eye turned to stare at me.

"Watch it," the man who'd bumped into me said. He was older, with silver hair and cold eyes. He looked at me like I was something he'd scraped off his shoe. Like I did not just get hit with memories of him raping someone.

"You're dead," whispered Sarah, one of the other maids. She grabbed my arm. "Rae, you're so dead."

I knelt down, trying to pick up the pieces with shaking hands. Maybe if I cleaned it up fast enough, maybe if I apologized enough, maybe—

"What the hell is wrong with you?"

I looked up to find Celeste standing over me, her face twisted with rage. The entire ballroom was watching now, waiting to see what would happen to the bastard daughter who'd dared to make a mess at their perfect party.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. "It was an accident. I'll clean it up and—"

The second slap was harder than the first. My head snapped to the side, and I saw stars.

"You embarrassed me in front of everyone," she said, her voice deadly quiet. "You will starve for two days for this. And that's kindness on my part."

I knew what I had to do. I'd learned long ago that the only way to survive in this house was to stroke Celeste's ego until she felt powerful enough to show even more ‘mercy’.

I dropped to my knees on the wine-soaked floor, glass cutting into my skin through my dress. "Forgive me, Luna Celeste. I'm so sorry. It won't happen again."

She looked down at me with satisfaction. "Clear this mess with your hands."

I started picking up the glass pieces, ignoring the way they sliced into my palms. Blood mixed with wine on the white floor. Some of the guests had started talking again, but I could feel their eyes on me.

Celeste's heel came down hard on my hand. I gasped, feeling the small bones shift under the pressure. She pressed down harder, and I bit my lip to keep from crying out.

"Next time," she said, "maybe you'll remember to be more careful."

Her phone rang. She lifted her foot and answered it, walking away from me but only making it two steps before she stopped.

"I'm confused," she said into the phone. "What do you mean Your condolences… hat happened to my Saraphina?"

The words hit the ballroom like a physical blow. Conversations died mid-sentence. Someone dropped a glass. Celeste's face went white.

"That's impossible," she whispered. "She's at your school. She's fine. She's—"

Celeste fell.

It happened so fast I didn't have time to react. One moment she was standing there, holding the phone to her ear, and the next she was on the ground. Her head hit the epoxy with a sickening crack that echoed through the ballroom.

Blood spread from beneath her blonde hair, mixing with the wine and glass on the floor.

"Luna Celeste!" I scrambled toward her, my own injuries forgotten. "Luna Celeste, wake up!"

She didn't respond. Her eyes were closed, her face slack. The phone had skittered across the floor, and I could hear a tiny voice calling from the speaker.

"Hello? Hello? Is anyone there?"

I picked up the phone with bloody, shaking hands. "Hello?"

"Oh, thank goddess. Is this Luna Celeste Vale?"

"No, this is... this is Rae. Her daughter. Luna Celeste just... she collapsed. What did you tell her?"

There was a pause. "I'm calling from Nocturne Prep and I'm afraid I have terrible news. It pains us to say that Luna Saraphina did not survive the fall."

The words didn't make sense. They bounced around in my head without finding purchase. What fall? Survive? "Are you saying my sister is dead?"

"I'm very sorry for your loss. The investigation is ongoing, but it appears—"

The phone was yanked from my hand. I looked up to see my father, Alpha Magnus Vale, his face carved from stone. He'd appeared so suddenly I hadn't even sensed him coming.

"This is Alpha Magnus Vale," he said into the phone. "Tell me everything."

I stayed on the floor next to Celeste, my hands pressed to her head wound, trying to stop the bleeding. Around us, the ballroom had erupted into chaos. Guests were murmuring, crying if you could even believe it, demanding answers. Someone was calling for the pack doctor as well.

But all I could think about was Saraphina. My half-sister, the golden child, the one who got everything I'd ever wanted. She was supposed to be safe at her fancy boarding school, surrounded by other wealthy shifter children. She was supposed to have the perfect life that had been denied to me.

Now she was dead.

I looked up at my father. His face was granite, but I could see the pain in his eyes. He'd loved Saraphina in a way he'd never loved me. She was legitimate, wanted, planned. I was just the mistake he'd been stuck with.

"What happened, Father?" I whispered.

He didn't answer. He was too busy talking to whoever was on the phone, his voice sharp with authority and grief.

Celeste stirred beneath my hands. Her eyes fluttered open, unfocused and confused.

"Saraphina?" she whispered. "Where's my daughter?"

I didn't know what to say. How do you tell someone their child is dead? How do you find words for something that destroys everything?