"You knew." Her voice came out hoarse, raw from crying in that cosmic space even though no time had passed here. She pulled away from Alexander's grip, scooting backward on the couch until her back hit the armrest. "You all knew something was going to happen. That's why you brought me here tonight. Why you kept me drinking, kept me distracted." The pieces were falling into place now, cutting her with their sharp edges. She looked at Sam, at Marc, at all of them. "This wasn't a celebration. This was a setup."
"No." Alexander's response was immediate, firm. He shifted to face her fully but didn't reach for her again, seeming to sense she needed the space. "Not a setup. We knew your awakening was close, that your nineteenth birthday would trigger something. But we didn't know when or how. We brought you here to keep you safe when it happened, to make sure you weren't alone."
"Safe?" Sophia laughed, the sound bitter and broken. "I just watched myself kill people by being born. I just learned my mother gave everything to bring me into this world and my father spent thirty years searching for me. I found out I'm some kind of prophesied empress who's supposed to unite magical realms and save a dead world. How the fuck is any of that safe?"
The room went very quiet. She saw the looks they exchanged—quick, weighted glances that spoke of shared knowledge and carefully laid plans. Marc was the first to move, pushing off from the door to crouch in front of her, putting himself at eye level. His blue eyes were soft but serious.
"We didn't know the specifics," he said gently. "We knew you were special, that you came from another realm. We've been watching over you, making sure you stayed hidden, stayed protected. But the details of your birth, your parents, the prophecy—we didn't have access to all of that. Only the goddess could show you the full truth."
"Watching over me?" Sophia stared at him, feeling something cold settle in her stomach. "How long? How long have you all been lying to me?"
"About a year," Jack said from his position by the bookshelf, his voice carrying the weight of centuries. "Since you started at Hartwell Enterprises. When your power first started to leak through. Small things at first—electronics malfunctioning around you, people feeling inexplicably drawn to you or repelled by you, minor reality distortions that most humans dismissed as coincidence."
"We're part of a network," Amanda added, her voice softer than usual but still carrying that edge of steel. "Supernatural beings who've been watching Earth, waiting for signs that the prophecy might be coming true. When we felt your power beginning to wake, we knew we had to find you. Protect you. Because if we could sense you, others would too. And not all of them would have your best interests at heart."
Sophia's mind was reeling. A year. They'd been watching her, following her, manipulating her life from the shadows for a year and she'd never known. Every coffee she'd shared with Sam, every shift she'd worked with Marc, every conversation with the others—had any of it been real? Or had they all just been playing their parts, keeping her contained, keeping her ignorant?
"The café," she said slowly, her voice shaking. "You all work at the café right next to Hartwell. That's not a coincidence either, is it?"
Sam had the grace to look uncomfortable, pushing his glasses up his nose. "We needed to be close. To keep an eye on you without being obvious about it. The café was perfect—close enough to respond if something happened, casual enough that our presence wouldn't seem suspicious."
"And the job at Hartwell Enterprises," Sophia said, her gaze snapping to Alexander. Her voice was rising now, anger cutting through the grief and confusion. "That wasn't a coincidence, was it? You hired me specifically because you knew what I was."
Alexander had the grace to look uncomfortable, but he didn't deny it. "I hired you because you were qualified and because having you close meant I could protect you better. There are forces out there—the Council from your home realm, rogue supernatural factions, even some human organizations—who've been searching for you. Your father isn't the only one looking. There are those who want to finish what they started nineteen years ago, who believe you're too dangerous to live."
"And you thought lying to me, keeping me in the dark, was the best way to keep me safe?" Sophia's voice was rising now, anger cutting through the grief and confusion. "You let me think I was crazy! All those times I felt like I didn't fit, like there was something wrong with me—you could have told me the truth! You could have explained instead of just... just stalking me like some creepy supernatural bodyguard service!"
"Would you have believed us?" Marc spoke up, his voice quiet but firm. "If we'd approached you a year ago, five years ago, and told you that you were the daughter of a werewolf alpha and a cultivation genius, that you had enough power to level cities, that you were destined to become an empress of magical realms—would you have believed a single word? Or would you have run screaming in the opposite direction and gotten yourself killed by something that actually wanted to hurt you?"