There was no crowd.
No fire.
No steel biting into her throat.
Only stillness. And breath.
Celeste didn't move at first. She lay perfectly still, her body cold and her heartbeat distant, as though she were suspended somewhere between now and never. The silence pressing around her felt unnatural, too clean, too calm. It wasn't the silence of peace , it was the silence that followed after screaming.
Her lashes fluttered open.
Soft light filtered in through pale lilac curtains. The ceiling above her was carved with delicate floral patterns, familiar in a way that twisted her stomach. Her skin prickled against silk sheets. She turned her head, slowly, and saw them—crystal perfume bottles lined on the vanity, sunlight spilling across the marble floor, a gold-framed mirror catching the shape of her body beneath a velvet quilt.
Her room.
Celeste sat up like someone waking from a nightmare, or perhaps diving into one. Her chest heaved with shallow, uneven breaths as her fingers curled into the bedding, searching for something solid. She looked down at her hands—smooth, young, unstained. No scars. No rope burns. Her nails were painted pale rose.
Her pulse quickened.
She tore off the quilt and stood, stumbling slightly. Her legs were steady but unfamiliar, like they'd never carried her through war or dungeons or betrayal. She rushed to the mirror. The girl who stared back at her was too young. Too untouched. Chestnut-brown waves framed a pale, heart-shaped face. Her eyes—still the same cool silver—were wide with disbelief.
Seventeen. She was seventeen again.
The day it all began.
A tremor ran through her. The air shifted around her, and suddenly, the scent caught her nose—lavender and soft garden roses. The same perfume her maid used to sprinkle on her pillows before she became a prisoner in silks. It was the scent of innocence. Of weakness.
No. Not again.
Not ever again.
A knock came at the door.
"My lady?" a chirpy voice called. "Forgive the intrusion, but His Highness has arrived early. He's waiting for you in the garden."
Celeste went still.
His Highness.
Thorian Valenhardt.
Her heart didn't skip the way it used to when his name was spoken. It dropped like lead into the pit of her stomach. Her mouth went dry. Her throat burned not with longing, but with memory.
She remembered the way he looked at her as the chains closed around her wrists. The way he turned away when she screamed his name at the gallows. The crown had meant more to him than her life.
He had chosen the empire over her. And watched her die with cold, unreadable eyes.
Celeste closed her eyes and breathed in slowly, forcing the air down into her lungs until her spine straightened. The girl she used to be—the one who smiled too easily and bowed too low was gone.
She dressed in silence. Not in the pale blue gown her maids had laid out. That version of Celeste would have worn blue, soft and demure, like the crown princess she was being groomed to be. Instead, she selected the crimson velvet gown hanging in the back of her wardrobe—one she remembered being told was "too bold" for a girl her age.
It clung to her figure like blood to skin. She let it.
The pearls on her vanity gleamed in the sunlight, but she ignored them. She wore no jewels. Let them wonder if she was mourning or preparing for war.
She stood in front of the mirror, studying her face. Young, but no longer blind.
"I remember everything," she whispered.
The lies whispered into her hair.
The false smiles.
The late-night meetings she thought were secret.
The cold cell.
The verdict.
The sound of the crowd howling for her death.
Thorian's hand, the one that once held hers, signing her execution with an imperial seal.
Celeste lifted her chin. Let them try again. Let them smile at her with poisoned tongues. This time, she would not kneel. This time, she would not beg.
She stepped out of the room and down the stairs with slow, deliberate grace, like a queen descending into her court. No one stopped her. No one dared.
The garden was still blooming.
White roses lined the path, sweet and innocent. They used to be her favorite. Now, they looked like tombstones.
She saw him at the fountain. Crown Prince Thorian, tall and golden-haired, dressed in his signature silver-lined uniform. He turned when he heard her footsteps.
The sunlight loved him. It always had. It made him look like salvation.
But Celeste had seen him in the dark, where the crown sat heavier than his smile.
His face lit up as he approached. "Celeste."
The sound of her name in his voice used to send butterflies through her stomach. Now, it made her fingers twitch.
He reached for her hand, just as he had on this same day three years ago.
This time, she kept it tucked behind her skirt.
"Your Highness," she said smoothly, offering a faint curtsy.
A flicker of confusion passed through his eyes.
"You look…" He paused. "Different. Have you been unwell?"
"I had a strange dream," she said. "One I haven't quite shaken."
He smiled like he always did. Like he thought he understood her. "You used to tell me your dreams. When we were children."
Celeste smiled back, but it was carved from stone.
"I don't think you'd want to hear this one."
There was a pause. A ripple of silence between them.
He reached for her again. "Celeste—"
"I hear you've come to speak with my father," she said, voice silk and steel. "A matter of importance, I presume."
"Yes. It concerns your future."
She raised an eyebrow. "Is that so?"
She watched him hesitate. Not visibly, not in any way others would notice but she saw it. Felt the quiet falter in him.
He had come to offer her a throne. Or, more accurately, to offer her as a pawn to secure his own.
But this time, she wasn't playing the same game.
"Give him my regards," she said coolly. "But I won't be joining you."
Thorian blinked. "You won't?"
"It's a discussion between men of rank. I would hate to interrupt something so important."
She turned to leave.
"Celeste."
She paused. Not because he called her name, but because she wanted him to see her smile when she turned.
It was the same smile she had worn on the scaffold—elegant, eerie, calm.
"Be careful around the roses," she said lightly. "They still have thorns."
And then she walked away, never once looking back.
Behind her, she imagined him frowning. Perhaps confused. Perhaps wounded.
It didn't matter.
He had been the last face she saw before she died.
This time, she would make sure he remembered her differently.
Not as the girl who begged. But as the woman who burned.