The Stand-In Queen Chapter 02
But that wasn’t what I blamed him for.
It was the night of the attack. When Kael returned, I didn’t tend to my injuries first. I forced myself to the master chamber.
I wanted to see that he was safe.
But he didn’t look at me.
He carried the pot of silver-edged lilies straight into the inner chamber. It was the only thing Elara had left behind. He summoned every Healer to study how to revive its dead roots.
I curled on the couch in the side chamber, waiting for someone to treat my cramping stomach.
The lilies sat on the windowsill of the master chamber, only a few steps away.
Later, I learned that the roots of the silver-edged lily release a silver-tainted scent harmful to pregnant women.
I had lain too close that night. The bleeding became unstoppable.
In that moment, it felt as though someone had reached into my chest and ripped out my heart.
All those years of sacrifice became a cruel joke.
So much for love growing over time. It had been nothing but a delusion of my own making.
The air in the room grew suffocating. He stood. “I need air.”
But outside the door, a maid was already waiting. “Miss Elara has asked to see you, My King. She wishes to… catch up.”
Their voices weren’t loud, but the courtyard was too quiet. I heard every word.
The door wasn’t fully closed. I could see Kael pause, saying nothing.
His back was to me. I couldn’t see his face, but I knew he would go.
A man is forever trapped by what he could never have in his youth.
Besides, he had loved her so deeply.
As expected, he turned back toward the room, wanting to say something.
But I cut him off first. “My King, you owe me no explanation.”
I had heard too many lies in my life. Today, I was too tired to listen to whatever absurd reason he had fabricated for Elara.
The distance in my words hung naked in the air.
Kael stiffened, his brows snapping together. “Ayla, do you hate me so much? The moment your sister returns, you can’t wait to push me away?”
His chest heaved, a storm raging in his eyes. He grabbed his robe and slammed the door as he left.
How ridiculous.
He was the one who crossed the line first. Yet now I was the heartless one.
Tears spilled over before I could stop them. I wiped them away fiercely.
Then Mother slipped in and took my hand. “Ayla… I have no eloquence. I couldn’t talk sense into your sister, so I asked the King to comfort her.”
“Can you bear with her a little longer? She is stubborn, but kind-hearted. She will understand eventually…”
I lowered my eyes, a bitter smile tugging at my lips.
Kind-hearted?
When she fled six years ago, did she ever consider that a Bonding Ceremony is the Pack’s highest rite? One misstep, and our entire bloodline would have been destroyed.
I gently pulled my hand free, my voice dropping like ice. “Mother, after all these years, you still indulge her every whim without question.”
“In your heart, was there ever a place for me?”
Elara and I shared the same mother, but because I was frail since childhood, I was sent to live in the countryside. I was only brought back the year I came of age.
But Elara, who had monopolized our parents’ love, despised me. She framed me, tormented me, never stopped.
I cried. I defended myself. But every time, Father and Mother punished me without asking right from wrong. No matter how clumsy her excuses, they believed her unconditionally.
They even locked me in the cold cellar for days.
It wasn’t until Elara ran away that they remembered me, barely breathing, in that cellar.
In truth, we had only lived together for half a year.
“Ayla, in your heart, is there truly no affection for me at all?”
Pain filled Mother’s eyes.
I was stunned.
So the cold distance we both understood without words—in their eyes, it was something that needed to be questioned?
Did six years without Elara make everyone forget that I had only ever been a replacement? A spare part brought in to fill the gap?
