Read Chapter 17: The Torn Page

The ledger lay open on the writing desk, its pages smooth beneath Anya’s trembling fingers. She had come to Kael’s quarters to demand answers, to force the truth from him before the bells tolled midnight. But what she found instead was the missing page.

It sat curled in the spine crease, half-torn as if ripped away in haste and then forgotten. The handwriting was Kael’s—she knew it now, she had spent too many hours watching him write to mistake it. But the words were not the careful chronicle of a guard documenting a princess’s day.

*Before the curse. Before the forgetting. She walked the garden with her mother’s locket and asked the groundskeeper why the roses bled red in winter. Too curious for her crown.*

Anya read the line again. Then a third time. The words did not change.

“I didn’t mean for you to find that.”

She turned. Kael stood in the doorway, his face pale, his hands loose at his sides. He had closed the door behind him.

“You knew me,” she said. Her voice came out flat, strange to her own ears. “Before the curse. You were there.”

Kael took a step forward, then stopped. “Yes.”

“The groundskeeper.” Anya’s mind raced backward, trying to find a memory that would not come. “The winter garden. I only remember fragments—my mother’s voice, the smell of frost. Nothing else.”

“The frost killed the roses that year. You offered him your gloves.” Kael’s gaze dropped to her hands. “He cried. You didn’t understand why.”

The ledger pages blurred. Anya steadied herself against the desk. “Who taught you to write?”

“My father.”

“And who was he?”

Silence stretched between them, taut as a bowstring. Kael’s jaw worked. When he spoke, the words came slow, dragged from somewhere deep. “Lord Edmund Vale. Chancellor to your grandfather. Accused of treason when I was twelve.”

The name struck her like a physical blow. “The Vale family. I know that name. They were—” She stopped. Disgraced. Erased from the court records. Her father had ordered it.

“They were executed,” Kael said quietly. “My father was—he was executed. My mother died in the aftermath. My siblings were scattered to various wards. I was given a choice. Swear my sword to the crown, repay my family’s debt through service.”

“You’ve been a guard all this time?”

“I’ve been whatever the King needed me to be.” Kael’s eyes met hers, and for the first time, she saw the weight of years in them. “Chronicler was my assignment after your curse began. They thought a man with no past, no loyalty, would be safe to write your story.”

The torn page trembled in Anya’s grip. “But you had a past. You had—you had me.”

“I had a childhood memory of a girl who asked too many questions.” Kael’s voice cracked. “And then I was given an assignment to watch her die every single night. To watch her forget what I remembered. And to write it all down.”

Anya’s throat closed. She thought of every morning she had woken in a strange bed, her mind empty, trusting the pages in this man’s hands to tell her who she was. She had never once asked him what he saw when he looked at her. She had never imagined it was someone who grieved.

“The entry,” she managed. “It was written before I was cursed.”

“Yes.”

“You could have told me.”

“And what would you have done with that?” Kael’s tone sharpened. “Stood before your father and demanded to know why the son of a traitor was allowed near you? You would have been my death warrant, Anya. And yours.”

She flinched at the use of her name. He had never called her that. Not once.

“Is that the only secret?” she asked. “Or is there more?”

Kael’s eyes flickered toward the door. The candles had burned low. Somewhere beyond the window, the bells of the night watch had already rung twice.

“There is more,” he admitted. “But I need you to hear it before midnight, and I need you to hear it standing.”

Anya did not move. She stood there, clutching the page, as Kael crossed the room to the window. He stood with his back to her for a long moment before he spoke.

“The morning your mother died, I was in the eastern corridor. I had been assigned to the kitchens for a punishment detail—I was always getting punishments back then. I heard the queen’s scream. And I went toward it.”

Anya’s heart pounded. The healer’s words returned to her: *He was there the night she died.*

“I saw the Queen fall,” Kael said. “From the tower balcony. And I saw someone standing above her, at the railing. Watching her fall.”

“Who?”

Kael turned. His face was unreadable, but his hands trembled.

“Prince Marius. He stood at the railing for a long moment. And then he walked away.”

Anya’s blood ran cold. She shook her head slowly, unwilling to believe it. “Marius was a child. He couldn’t have—he wouldn’t have.”

“He found her body,” Kael said, as if she had not spoken. “He was the one who reported it. Commander Voss confirmed that. But no one ever asked him what he was doing so far from the Queen’s wing at that hour.”

“You’re lying.” The words came out small, fragile. “You’re trying to turn me against him.”

“You came to me looking for pieces of your own story, Anya. I am giving them to you.” Kael stepped closer, his voice low and urgent. “I have spent every night for the last month deciding whether to tell you. Every morning I watched you wake up innocent, and I told myself that keeping this secret protected you from a truth you were not ready to carry.”

“And now?”

“Now, midnight is coming.” He looked toward the door. “And I am telling you because someone in this palace has been blackmailing me since the day I was assigned to you.”

Anya’s breath caught. “What?”

“Letters. Left in my chambers, under my door. Each one draws closer. They know who I am. They know what I saw. And they have been threatening to reveal it all if I refuse to report your movements.”

“Report to whom?”

“A name I have never seen. A symbol instead.” Kael reached into his coat and produced a folded piece of parchment, creased and worn. He held it out to her. “I have been their eyes in your chambers, Anya. And I am done being their pawn.”

Anya took the parchment with unsteady fingers. The seal had been broken, but the emblem remained. A crow in flight, its wings spread over a crescent moon.

She knew that symbol. She had seen it carved into the stones of the queen’s private chapel.

“This is the crest of the Silent Order,” she said slowly. “Mother’s personal advisors. They were disbanded after her death.”

“If they were disbanded, the letters stopped.” Kael’s eyes searched hers. “Instead, they became more urgent. The last one arrived tonight. Before I left for the crypt.”

Anya unfolded the paper. The writing was sharp, angular, a hand she did not recognize.

*The princess approaches the truth. Keep her from the King’s chamber at all costs. Our arrangement ends when she forgets forever.*

The words blurred. Anya stared at them, her mind racing to stitch together the pieces. Her mother’s diary. The second onyx ring buried with the queen. The healer’s claim that Marius had been involved. And now this—a note telling her own chronicler to stop her from reaching the King.

“Anya.” Kael’s voice was barely a whisper. “Look at me.”

She forced her gaze up. His face was open, raw.

“I know the weight of my family’s debt,” he said. “I know I chose this life. But I never chose to fail you.” He reached out, hesitant, and his hand covered hers where it still clutched the page. “I will write your story until there is no breath left in me. But I will not be the one who keeps it from you.”

From the corridor outside came the first toll of the midnight bell—hollow, resonant, spreading through the stone like a warning.

Anya’s heart seized.

“Kael.” The name came out urgent, pleading. “I don’t have time to forget this. If my curse takes me now, I will wake up not knowing any of this. Not knowing my mother’s ring. Not knowing what you saw. Not knowing Marius.”

Kael’s grip tightened. “Then let me show you before the bells finish.”

He released her, crossed the room in three strides, and pulled open a hidden panel beside the hearth. Inside lay a pouch of dark velvet. He lifted it, returned to her, and pressed it into her hands.

“The second ring,” he said. “I retrieved it from the crypt while you spoke to your brother. It is yours now.”

Anya’s hand closed around the velvet. The shape within was cold, solid. She did not need to open it to know what rested inside.

“You have until dawn,” Kael said. “When you wake, you will be lost again. But if the rings are brought together before the curse resets—” He paused, jaw tight. “I have read more than my own pages, Anya. The power of the seal does not break the curse by force. It *heals* it. But it must be done by the one who holds both halves, and it must be done with full knowledge of what is being restored.”

The second bell struck.

“Full knowledge,” Anya echoed. A wild hope rose in her chest. “If I remember what truly happened that night—if I *see* it—will the curse break?”

Kael’s face was unreadable. He did not answer.

The third bell rang.

Through the open window came the sound of footsteps in the corridor. Two pairs. Without a word, Kael blew out the candles.

“Hide the ring,” he whispered as darkness swallowed the room. “And whatever you do, do not let Marius find you before you reach the chapel.”

Anya pressed the velvet pouch into the folds of her gown. The footsteps drew closer. The handle of the door turned.

And the final bell tolled midnight.