Lahat ng Kabanata ng You Left, I Could Have Fixed Us: Kabanata 161 - Kabanata 170

Chapter One Hundred and Fifty-Nine Maya’s POV Morning didn’t break quietly. It didn’t slip into the room in soft gold or stretch slowly across the walls. It arrived. Sharp and bright and sudden like something had already been waiting for us to wake. I opened my eyes to find Ethan still beside me, though we hadn’t fallen asleep. We had just drifted — his arm solid around me, my head resting against his chest, the steady rise and fall of his breathing keeping mine from unravelling. I didn’t move. Not yet. His fingers traced the back of my shoulder once — slow, thoughtful — and I knew he was awake too. Not rested. But present. There was a quiet knock on the door. Not the gentle kind from last night. This one carried urgency. Ethan’s hand tightened on me for just a second before he let go. He sat up, and I followed, both of us waking fully without speaking. “Come in,” he said. The door opened, and Lucien stepped inside. His face showed nothing. Which meant everything was

Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-One Maya’s POV Morning didn’t feel like morning. It felt like we had never slept like the night had simply thinned into a lighter shade of quiet. Ethan and I walked the hall together, side by side, not speaking. We didn’t need to. The silence between us wasn’t tense anymore. It was purposeful. The guards at the end of the corridor straightened the moment they saw him. They didn’t look at me, but they didn’t avoid looking either. They just understood: I was supposed to be here. The doors to the strategy chamber were already open. Voices came from inside low, steady, but urgent. Lucien was there. So were generals. Advisors. People who held maps and ink-stained hands and expressions sharpened by too little sleep. When Ethan and I stepped in, the room shifted. Not just turned shifted. Chairs straightened. Backs straightened. Breathing paused. No one bowed. They didn’t have to. Respect didn’t require performance. Ethan didn’t sit. He walked strai

Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-Three Maya’s POV The castle didn’t sleep that night. Not a single corridor was quiet. Not a single room was dark. The sound of armour, boots, and whispered orders carried through the stone like a second heartbeat. I stayed near the balcony, watching torches move like small stars through the courtyard. Every soldier was awake. Every horse is saddled. Every banner was tied tight against the wind. Ethan was out there somewhere, speaking to the troops. I could see the ripple of movement when he passed — the way men straightened, how silence followed him like command itself. He wasn’t wearing the crown tonight. Just his black coat, the one he always wore before battle. It fit him too well — dark, quiet, impossible to ignore. When he turned his head slightly, I could see his face lit by the torchlight. Calm. Focused. The kind of calm that makes everyone else believe they can win. It wasn’t the same man who once looked at me and asked if I feared him. N

Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-Five Maya’s POV The courtyard didn’t stay empty for long. People moved through it with purpose lanterns carried, crates shifted, armour tightened, bows restrung. But it all felt far away from me. Like I was standing inside a quiet part of myself that no one else could see. The gates had closed again. The sound of them shutting had echoed up the walls and down my bones. Ethan had gone into the dark. And I could not follow. I stayed where he told me to. Right beneath the stone archway, where the torchlight was warm against my back and the night wind was cold against my face. I listened for him. Even though I knew I wouldn’t hear anything this far from the ridge. The battle would be silent from here. Silent until it wasn’t. A soldier approached with a cloak. “Your Highness,” he said quietly, bowing as he held it toward me. I didn’t realise I was cold until the weight settled onto my shoulders. “Thank you,” I said. He nodded once and stepp

Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-Seven Maya’s POV The hall seemed to shrink around us. Not physically but in the way moments close in when they matter. When something is about to shift. When the ground under you is about to become something else entirely. The messenger’s expression did not change. He wasn’t trying to frighten me. He wasn’t trying to impress me. He was simply telling the truth as he understood it. “Start from the beginning,” I said. My voice came out low, steady. More steady than I felt. He nodded once. “There is a man,” he began. “A strategist who hides in plain sight. Known by no name on record. No crest. No banners. But his influence runs through both courts like a thread through cloth.” Liora’s breath caught beside me. I didn’t look at her. “His design is not peace or conquest,” the messenger continued. “It is a collapse. A war that burns both kingdoms to ash. One that leaves nothing left to rebuild.” “Why?” I asked. He exhaled slowly. Not hesitant