Evelina's POV
High Priestess Mordaine's smile widens as the guards force me to my knees.
The marble floor is cold and hard. My chains rattle loudly in the silent throne room. Hundreds of eyes stare at me, but I can't look at any of them. Can't bear to see their disgust, their judgment, their fear.
"Lady Evelina Ashcroft," Mordaine's voice rings out like a bell. "You stand accused of practicing forbidden magic. Of consorting with the old gods. Of bringing darkness into this holy kingdom."
"I didn't—" I start, but a guard shoves my head down.
"You will speak when spoken to," he hisses.
Mordaine walks toward me slowly, her footsteps echoing. "The evidence against you is overwhelming. Books of dark spells. Altars to the betrayer gods. Witnesses who saw you acting strange." She pauses right in front of me. "Do you deny these charges?"
"Yes!" I lift my head, meeting her cold eyes. "All of it was planted! I never—"
"Lies!" A voice cuts through the room.
Isolde steps forward from the crowd, her face painted with false sadness. She's wearing white—the color of purity and innocence. Of course she is.
"I wish they were lies," Isolde says softly, her voice trembling. "I wish my sister was innocent. But I've seen the truth with my own eyes."
My heart stops. "Isolde, don't—"
"For months, I noticed changes in her," Isolde continues, and she's actually crying now. Fake tears sliding down her cheeks. "She became distant. Secretive. She would disappear for hours and come back smelling like smoke and strange herbs."
"That's not true!" I shout.
"I tried to help her," Isolde sobs. "I begged her to stop. But she threatened me. Said if I told anyone, she would use her dark magic to hurt me. To hurt everyone I loved."
The crowd gasps. Whispers spread like wildfire through the throne room.
"She's lying!" I scream, struggling against the guards holding me. "She's the one who betrayed me! She slept with Adrian! She planted all that evidence!"
But my words sound crazy. Desperate. Like exactly what a guilty person would say.
Isolde shakes her head sadly. "She's been jealous of my relationship with Prince Adrian for so long. When he told her he couldn't marry her—that he loved someone else—she snapped. That's when she turned to the dark gods. She wanted power to force him to love her."
"No! That's not—Adrian, tell them!" I turn toward where he stands near the throne. "Tell them the truth! Tell them we were engaged until you and Isolde—"
Adrian steps forward, and for a second, hope flares in my chest. He'll tell them. He'll finally do the right thing.
"Lady Evelina," he says formally, not meeting my eyes. "I ended our engagement three months ago. I told you privately that I had feelings for someone else. You seemed to accept it at the time."
My mouth falls open. Three months ago? That's a complete lie!
"You're lying!" I choke out. "We were supposed to get married tomorrow! Everyone knows that!"
"The wedding was canceled," Adrian says, his voice steady. "We kept it quiet to avoid scandal, but yes—our engagement ended months ago. I never wanted to hurt you, Evelina. But I couldn't marry someone I didn't love."
The floor tilts beneath me. He's rewriting history. Making me look obsessed and unstable.
"This morning," Adrian continues, "I planned to announce my engagement to Lady Isolde. A woman I truly love. A woman who has been my closest friend and confidant during this difficult time." He reaches out and takes Isolde's hand. "But we were waiting until after we could properly end things with you."
Isolde squeezes his hand, looking up at him with adoring eyes. "We never meant to fall in love. It just happened."
I want to vomit. Want to scream. Want to tear them both apart with my bare hands.
"Enough," Mordaine says sharply. "The facts are clear. Lady Evelina Ashcroft has practiced forbidden magic. She has communed with the betrayer gods who nearly destroyed our kingdom three centuries ago." Her voice drops, becoming dark and dangerous. "This is not just a crime against the crown. It is a crime against the Pantheon itself. Against all that is holy and good."
She raises her hands, and divine light glows around them. The crowd murmurs in awe.
"I can sense the corruption in her," Mordaine declares. "The taint of dark magic clinging to her soul. She is an abomination. A blight upon this kingdom."
"I'm innocent!" My voice breaks. "Please, someone believe me!"
But no one does. No one even looks sympathetic.
"The punishment for such crimes is clear," Mordaine says. "Death by execution at dawn."
The words echo through the throne room. Death. Execution. Dawn.
Tomorrow morning, they're going to kill me.
"However," Mordaine continues, and something in her tone makes my blood run cold. "There is another option. An alternative for those who cannot bear the thought of facing justice for their crimes."
She gestures toward the windows, toward the dark forest visible in the distance.
"Exile to the Forbidden Ruins of Ashenfell."
The crowd gasps again. People start whispering frantically.
"The ruins?" someone breathes. "That's worse than execution!"
"No one survives the ruins," another voice adds.
Mordaine nods slowly. "The ruins are cursed. Haunted by the Betrayer God who was sealed there three hundred years ago. His rage still lingers, killing anyone who enters. But..." She looks down at me with cold satisfaction. "If Lady Evelina wishes to avoid a public execution, she may choose exile instead. Enter the ruins and face whatever judgment the old gods have waiting for her."
It's not really a choice. Both options end in death. But one is immediate, in front of everyone I know. The other is alone, in darkness, where no one will see me break.
"What do you choose?" Mordaine asks. "Face justice here, before your people? Or run into the cursed ruins like the coward you are?"
I lift my head, looking at all the faces staring at me. My father, stone-faced and cold. My mother, who won't even look at me. Isolde, smiling behind her fake tears. Adrian, holding her hand like they're already married.
They took everything from me. My name, my future, my family. They made me into a monster in everyone's eyes.
Fine.
If I'm going to die, I'll die on my own terms. Not as their entertainment. Not as a lesson for others. I'll die alone, away from their judging eyes and lying mouths.
"I choose the ruins," I say clearly.
Mordaine's smile is victorious. "So be it. Remove her from the palace immediately. Let her face the darkness she invited into her heart."
The guards haul me to my feet. They drag me toward the doors, my chains clanging with every step.
"Wait!" Isolde's voice rings out.
I look back, hating myself for hoping she'll confess. Tell the truth. Stop this nightmare.
Instead, she walks up to me with tears streaming down her face. She reaches out and touches my cheek gently, like she's being kind.
"I forgive you, sister," she whispers, just loud enough for others to hear. "I hope you find peace in the ruins."
Then she leans closer, her lips right next to my ear, and whispers so quietly only I can hear:
"Die slowly. Die painfully. And know that I won."
She pulls back, and her public face returns—sad, forgiving, perfect.
The guards drag me away.
Through the palace. Past servants who scramble out of my path like I'm diseased. Out the front gates where the morning sun is bright and mocking. Down the road toward the dark forest in the distance.
They don't even let me walk. They throw me in a cart like garbage and ride toward the ruins.
No food. No water. No chance.
Just death waiting in the darkness.
The cart stops at the edge of the forest. The guards pull me out roughly, and one of them unlocks my chains.
"Why are you freeing me?" I ask, rubbing my sore wrists.
"The ruins won't let us enter with you," he says. "Besides, you won't make it far enough to escape." He points toward a barely visible path through the dead trees. "That way. Keep walking until you reach the seal. If the curse doesn't kill you first."
He shoves me forward hard. I stumble, catching myself on a tree trunk.
Behind me, I hear the cart leaving. The sound of hoofbeats fading away.
Then silence.
I'm alone in the cursed forest, with nothing but the clothes on my back and a broken heart.
The trees ahead look dead and twisted. The air smells like rot and old death. Every instinct screams at me to run the other way.
But there's nowhere else to go.
So I start walking toward the ruins, toward certain death, toward whatever horror awaits me in the darkness.
And with every step, one thought echoes in my mind:
If I'm going to die anyway, I want it to hurt them too.