The Virelya estate had always been a monument to calculated elegance, all white marble, blue silks, and precisely manicured frost-gardens.
But in the days following the imperial wedding, the elegance had soured into something stagnant and rotting. The air inside the manor felt thin, vibrating with a frantic, silent tension that mirrored the state of its inhabitants.
In the west wing, Bianca Virelya had retreated into a self-imposed exile that bordered on a haunting. She had locked herself in her private chambers, refusing all but the most essential of servants, and even they were beginning to flee.
Bianca was losing her mind. The rejection , coupled with the news of Soren's public devotion to Eris during the ritual, had snapped the final thread of her composure. She paced the length of her balcony, her silk nightgown tattered at the hem, muttering a rhythmic, low-pitched chant of grievances.
