The voice disappeared.
But its echo remained.
You should have left me forgotten.
Aliena stood frozen before the portrait.
The woman in the painting stared back at her.
Her face was hers.
Not similar.
Not resembling her.
Hers.
The same blonde hair.
The same red eyes.
The same expression that Aliena saw every morning when she looked into a mirror.
Except the woman in the portrait looked older.
Colder.
As though she had already lived through something Aliena had only begun to understand.
Sebastian stood beside her.
He hadn't moved.
His eyes remained fixed on the words beneath the painting.
I sealed the king beneath the throne.
I sealed myself with him.
And finally—
If I ever return, do not let me love him again.
Sebastian's jaw tightened.
"She wrote that."
Aliena nodded.
"Yes."
"About him."
She looked at the portrait of the first king.
The same man who had stood behind the prison door.
The same man who had looked at her as though he had known her forever.
