Semua Bab Will Bear the Moon: Bab 381 - Bab 389

*Belinda*A flush of crimson surged up her throat like blood through water, blooming hot beneath her high-buttoned collar before the door had even finished groaning open. The heat crawled along her spine with fingers of flame, settling sharp as glass shards behind her cheekbones, painting her pale skin with the particular shade of fury that comes from fear turned inward.And, for once, she didn’t bother to smooth it down.Didn't reach for that practiced mask of serenity. Had the fury and something else, that terrible, tender thing she'd tried to kill—flicker wild across her face like shadows from a dying fire. The heavy moan of the shattered the hearth's constant crackle, that ceaseless whisper of wood surrendering to flame that had masked her approach. It was enough, barely, to drag his attention from whatever foolishness had possessed him this time.Alexander froze.Thin, parchment-colored fingers stiffened mid-motion. His knuckles jutted out like branches stripped bare. The feathe

*Hidi*Hidi took her time dressing.She moved with deliberate slowness, each gesture calculated to contain the fury threatening to detonate beneath her skin. It was a rather daunting task to be honest. For one her size and temperament, she who'd never met a door she couldn't barrel through, a problem she couldn't solve with sheer force. Or a good sharp sword through the chest, it was practically impossible. Or she’d thought so. But somehow, she seemed to muster some hidden reservoir of restraint from within just when the call demanded.Her large fingers, usually so decisive, slightly trembled as the corrected invisible flaws in her seams. The silk thread felt rough against her fingertips, catching on calluses earned from years of sword training her mother had insisted upon. The memory rose unbidden, sharp and blinding as a crisp winter morning in Almony's mountains.She'd been seven. Still growing into her height, all knees and elbows, already taller than most human children her age

*Julia*The doors shut behind her with a sound too soft for how loud it felt in her bones.Not a slam. Not even a click.Not a slam. Not even a proper click. Just that faint, traitorous snick. The sealing of a letter no one would ever open, of forty years of service ending with less ceremony than snuffing out a candle.The blue box pressed into the soft flesh of her thigh through layers of skirt, its edges biting like teeth, like memory, like all the sins she'd committed in love's name. Of all she’d done.And for a moment, just one terrible, endless moment, Julia could only stand there. The hall stretched ahead of her like a blade waiting to fall if she dared a single step further.Nervous flames flickered from their sconces across the corridor. Active and anxious, likely disturbed by her presence. Their waxy halos painted dancing shadows on the walls. Shadows that looked like reaching hands attached to names long forgotten. With like accusation, no longer spoken of. And like all the

*Johan*The hall should have felt the same. Johan had walked this corridor a thousand times before. During storms that rattled the windows like bones. During celebrations that gilded the walls with laughter. And on sleepless nights when duty was a weight and sunlit mornings when it was a privilege.But tonight was different.Everything was twisted. Altered like the weight of nightmare’s geometry. Its’ truth pressing between his ribs with each hollow step toward the south wing, Nicoli's wing, had transformed familiar into foreign. The safety of red runners beneath his feet felt like walking on sanguine. The same portraits that had watched him for decades now seemed to track his movement with eyes that knew too much.Every flicker of candlelight stretched longer than it should, , reaching for him with fingers of shadow. Every echo of his footfall was swallowed too quickly, as if the stones themselves wanted no memory of his passing. As if the palace was already revolting against him.T