The car that took me away from the hospital was black—sleek, soundless, and guarded on both sides like I was a prisoner… or treasure. I didn't know which.
The windows were tinted so dark I couldn't see anything outside. I sat stiffly, dressed in white cotton, my wrists sore from days of restraints. No one spoke. Not the driver. Not the two guards. Not me.
I felt the silence in my throat, like a scream I'd swallowed and couldn't cough back up.
Then the gate opened.
It wasn't a house. It was a world.
The estate stretched wide like a kingdom carved from gold and shadows. Roads paved in marbled black stone. Fountains weeping silver into obsidian pools. Glass towers glowing under the setting sun. Roses climbed the walls in terrifying beauty—blood-red, untouchable. Everything smelled expensive. Clean. Hollow.
A place outside the normal world.
It was also freedom.
No rats. No chains. No cold metal floors or whispered sobs in the dark.
I wasn't behind a cage anymore.
I stood on imported grass, barefoot, and for the first time in what felt like a lifetime, I felt air that wasn't damp with rot. I almost wept from the silence—not the silence of dread, but of order. Safety.
This mansion was also loaded with guards, they were everywhere.
Dressed in black, earpieces coiled like serpents, guns at their hips. Always watching. Always still.
Is this truly freedom…?
I wonder within myself
But still... I could breathe.
Breathe without worrying if I was going to eat, without wonder in silence and hopelessness
---
The wedding preparations began that same week.
They didn't ask for my size—they measured me in my sleep. I awoke each day to find new clothes in the walk-in closet. White lace. Pearl heels. Veils. Like I was already a ghost.
People buzzed around me like bees around an offering. Stylists. Planners. A woman named Colette who never smiled but called me "Madame Elira " like I'd earned it.
I hadn't seen Luthor since the hospital.
He didn't need to see me, I guess.
Ownership didn't require attention.
---
I wandered the estate during the day, enjoying the view of what seemed to be peace. A feeling I had long lost
That's when I found it.
The Red Garden.
A hidden path behind the east wing. No guards followed me there. Maybe they thought it was safe. Maybe they thought I was too broken to run.
The moment I entered, everything changed.
Roses bloomed as tall as my shoulders. Thorns thick and black. Vines twisted like serpents around marble statues of faceless women. A single bench stood in the center, surrounded by petals like scattered blood
But here, it was quiet.
Not hollow.
Not dead.
Alive.
The ants crawled through the soil, red as flame. I watched them work. Watched them live without knowing how cruel the world above them was.
I came every day.
And slowly, the screams in my mind faded.
Here, I found fragments of myself I thought had drowned.
Hope. Stillness. Breath.
---
But then came that night.
The one that changed everything.
The one that taught me no matter how much perfume you pour on rot, it still stinks underneath.
I had gone to the Red Garden again, barefoot, wrapped in silk. Clora, one of the maids assigned to me by Luthor, followed behind, humming a soft tune that didn't belong in this place.
We were just playing a game of hide-and-seek.
It sounds childish, I know. But it was our secret ritual. A fragile attempt to remember joy, to feel like we were more than products for Luthor ownership.
It was her turn to hide.
She dashed off between the towering rose bushes, her laughter floating for a moment before the garden swallowed it whole. I counted aloud, eyes closed, feeling for once like a girl and not someone's possession.
"…eight… nine… ten…"
Silence.
I wandered between the roses, their petals brushing my arms like whispers. I searched, half-heartedly at first—until I noticed something odd.
One of the tallest rose plants—massive, with curling black thorns and flowers the size of my head—seemed to breathe.
The leaves trembled, though there was no wind.
I crept closer, expecting to find Clora crouched behind it, holding her breath.
Instead, I found… a statue.
But not just any statue.
Among the faceless marble women that stood eternally weeping in the garden, there was one I hadn't seen before
She wasn't faceless.
She had my face.
No—she was me.
The same wide-set eyes. The same soft lips. The same braid resting over her shoulder.
And she was naked.The naked version of me.
Perfectly carved, too lifelike to be stone. Her expression was hollow, terrified, mouth slightly parted like she'd tried to scream but never got the chance.
"Who, who are you..?" I whispered, but my voice cracking like I expected an answer.
That's when the roots moved
From beneath the base of the statue, thick black tendrils twisted and twitched like they were hungry. I staggered back. My mind screamed run, but my feet stayed frozen.
Within a split second,
Then everything faded.
I wasn't in the garden anymore.
I was running through a forest—dark, wild, endless. Branches clawed at my arms, roots tangled around my ankles. I wasn't barefoot anymore. I was bleeding. Chased. Desperate. Behind me, something roared.
My lungs burned.
Then—
"Elira!"
Clora's voice.
My eyes snapped open. She stood over me, panicked, shaking my shoulders.
"You fainted," she said. "You—you stopped moving. You were just standing there, eyes wide, like something too
k you."
I blinked, my hands trembling as I gripped her arms. I looked behind her.
The statue was gone.
The garden was quiet again.
Too quiet.