Three days since the balcony. Three days since the gunshot.
No leads. No arrests. No answers.
Just a kingdom pretending nothing happened.
Seraphina sat alone in her dressing chamber, staring at her untouched breakfast. The silence wrapped around her tighter than any royal gown. She could hear them outside the staff pretending to be normal. The guards whispering.
They all knew.
Someone inside had tried to kill her.
And no one had been punished.
The knock was soft. Hesitant.
She didn't answer.
The door opened anyway.
Levi entered without apology, dressed in black, silver chain around his neck the only thing unprofessional about him.
"You should be resting," he said.
"You should be investigating," she snapped back.
"I am."
"Oh? Found the shooter yet? Or just tailing me in case I decide to trip and fall off a cliff?"
His eyes darkened. "You're angry. Good. Stay angry."
She stood, facing him. "I'm done playing the fragile princess. If no one's going to tell me the truth, I'll find it myself."
"You think it's that simple?" he asked, stepping closer.
"I think this castle is full of secrets. And you're keeping them."
Silence.
Then he said, quieter, "There's something you should see."
He led her through a servant corridor, deep beneath the east wing one she hadn't known existed. The air was damp. Cold. The kind of place no royal ever went.
At the end of the tunnel: a door marked Archives.
He unlocked it.
Inside: stacks of sealed reports, letters, photographs.
He handed her a folder marked Ophelia her mother's code name from when she was still just Princess Vivienne Laurent.
The file inside? It showed surveillance logs from fifteen years ago.
A girl who looked exactly like Seraphina.
Except it wasn't her.
It was Lila.
And according to the logs, Lila had been tracked. Monitored. Kept in a palace infirmary.
"You're lying," Seraphina whispered.
"No," Levi said. "Your sister didn't run away."
"She was locked away."