Chapter 25- Legacy on Fire

It started with the shoes.

Black velvet heels, stolen from the back of her closet.

Then the dress—silk, slate blue, slit up one thigh, sleeveless but sharp. It had belonged to her mother once. Sonia had never worn it before.

She stared in the mirror longer than she meant to.

Not at the reflection.

At the war playing out behind her own eyes.

The truth was already moving through Daxton’s veins like poison. The media leak hit three hours ago. A carefully packaged dossier, complete with screenshots, signatures, and a voice memo someone definitely shouldn’t have had access to. A storm disguised as a whistle.

But the real performance?

That was scheduled for 7:00 PM. Gala Induction Night. Center stage.

Her name was still printed on the program.

Sonia Vale — Legacy, Loss, and Leadership

It almost made her laugh.

If they only knew.

If they only listened.

---

The campus lawns had been transformed. String lights blinked above white tents. Champagne flowed. Everyone wore their best secrets.

Inside, the hall glowed gold and silver, Daxton’s colors. Staff bustled. Cameras were being set up. The Chancellor floated like royalty. Mavina was already posing by the donor wall like she owned the place.

Sonia arrived precisely sixteen minutes before showtime.

Alone.

But not unseen.

Her presence cracked through the crowd like a match flicked into gasoline. Conversations paused. Someone took a photo. A senior from the media team visibly gulped.

And still sonia walked like her name weighed nothing.

Eric caught up to her near the back row of seats, dressed in tailored black, a tie he probably didn’t own, and a smirk that looked way too calm.

“You’re late,” he whispered.

“I’m perfectly timed.”

He eyed her. “You sure you’re ready to burn a legacy down in front of half the East Coast?”

She turned, leaned closer than necessary.

“I was born in the ashes, Eric. All I’m doing is lighting a match.”

The student before her was finishing their speech. Something about tradition. Belonging. The future.

Sonia tuned it out.

Her hand found the jump drive in her clutch again. She didn’t need it anymore—Cleo had already made sure the leak hit the alumni servers and social forums simultaneously.

But it grounded her.

One last tether to the version of herself that had existed before this war began.

The announcer cleared his throat.

“And now, closing our induction ceremony—Sonia Vale, representing the graduating class, and the Vale legacy.”

Applause. Staged. Polite. Familiar.

Sonia stepped into the light.

The spotlight was warmer than expected.

She approached the podium with slow precision, heels silent against the polished floor.

For a moment, she didn’t speak.

She just looked.

Out at the sea of old money and tailored lies. At students who’d watched her fall, rise, and bleed without ever knowing why. At faculty who pretended not to notice when systems cracked.

At Gregory Ashcroft—seated in the third row beside a bored-looking investor with a pocket square made of actual gold thread.

She smiled at him.

Then began.

“I had a speech prepared.”

Pause.

Smile.

“I burned it.”

Scattered laughter.

“Because tonight isn’t about tradition. It’s not about legacy, either. Not really. It’s about illusion.”

Eyes widened. Mavina turned in her seat. Gregory stiffened.

“Daxton sells the idea that legacy is earned,” Sonia said. “But we’ve learned it’s bought. Hidden behind scholarships. Buried beneath falsified files. Twisted into a system where power replaces merit.”

Silence.

“You want a real legacy?” Her voice dropped slightly. “One where sons and daughters walk in truth, not shadows?”

She looked directly at Gregory now.

“Then stop protecting those who pay to rewrite history.”

A flash of light—camera. Several more followed.

Too late to stop it.

Sonia leaned closer to the mic.

“I know who I am. And I know who I’m not. I’m not Silas Vale.”

Gasps. Audible ones.

She pressed on.

“I’m Sonia Vale. I took my brother’s name to survive a system that never planned to make space for me. I wore his blazer, his grief, and his legend. But not his lies.”

The whole room was still now. Even the air held its breath.

“I’m not asking for your approval. I’m not interested in your applause.”

She reached into her clutch, pulled out a folded photo—one of the leaked ones, with the falsified signature and admission report.

“I’m just here to give the next girl like me a chance to walk through the front door without pretending to be someone she’s not.”

She let the paper fall.

Then turned and walked off the stage without a bow.

The silence behind her wasn’t empty.

It was stunned. Furious. Changing.

7:20 PM — East Wing Stairwell

Sonia burst through the side doors, the cold air slicing into her lungs. She kept walking, needing space, needing—

“Wait!”

She turned too fast.

Eric caught up, coat flaring, face unreadable.

“You forgot this,” he said.

In his hand?

The drive.

Her fingers closed around it.

“Thanks,” she said, softer than before.

He looked at her, really looked at her.

Then, like something in him cracked, he blurted, “You were amazing.”

Sonia blinked.

“I mean it,” he said. “You could’ve disappeared. Let someone else take the shot. But you—God, Sonia, you lit the damn match.”

He looked a little unhinged, a little proud.

A little in love.

She stepped closer.

“I didn’t do it alone.”

“No,” he said, voice low. “But you did it loudest.”

She didn’t think.

She just kissed him.

Under the ancient stone archway, surrounded by the echoes of a crumbling system, she grabbed his lapel and pulled him in like he was air and fire all at once.

When they broke apart, breathless and smiling, he said, “So… does this mean I get to date the infamous Sonia Vale now?”

She raised an eyebrow.

“You’re already doing it, idiot.”

He grinned like he’d won the lottery.

Sonia pocketed the drive.

And for the first time in years, she walked forward not as a shadow.

But as herself.