The chamber smelled of smoke and herbs.

Lethia Lirian lay on the bed, her skin pale as bone dust.
Her gown had been stripped of its embroidery, her pearls cut away, her wrists limp on the sheet.
A physician leaned back from her, sweat clinging to his brow.

“She’s stable,” he murmured. “But… the child-”
He didn’t finish. He didn’t need to.

The silence filled in the rest.

Anastia stood just inside the doorway.
Still. Watching.

Not one step closer. Not one word spoken.

She hadn’t moved since they'd carried the Countess in, half-conscious and bleeding through the silk.

Not when the screams had started. Not when the blood spilled.

At the far end, near the stone wall, the commander was already there- silent, rigid, watching.
He had arrived minutes before, wordless, as if sensing the unraveling.

The physician stepped back, blood soaked to the elbow, and bowed low toward the commander.

“She’ll live” he said, voice tight. “Barely.”

The commander didn’t flinch.
He stood near the wall, arms crossed, jaw set- not with rage, but with restraint.
His knuckles whitened, not from anger at her,
but from witnessing something no soldier's training could harden even him to.

There was a storm in his eyes, yes, but it was sorrow, not fury,
that swirled behind the unreadable lines of his face.

He looked at Anastia. Just once. Not in blame. Just in understanding.
And perhaps, silently, asking how much of her had been lost in the blood and silence she stood among.

And then the Duke stepped in.
Steel eyes. Gloved hands. Quiet fury.

He scanned the scene once- the physician’s grim mouth, the bloody clothes, the ghost of a child that would never be.. and then looked to Anastia.

“What happened?”

His voice was calm. Too calm.

She looked up. Not blinking. Not shaking. Just… present.

“I asked her a question.”

She said it like she was reporting the weather.

The commander flinched. The physician frowned.

“A question?”

Anastia nodded. “She started crying. Then she fell. I don’t know why.”

No remorse. No confusion. No fear.

She wasn’t hiding anything.
Because she didn’t understand what she had done.

The room fell cold.

The physician cleared his throat. “The... the loss was from emotional shock. Too much strain. The bleeding began quickly.”

“She didn’t touch her?” Cael asked, sharply now.

“No.” The physician looked almost ashamed to confirm it. “No bruises. No marks. No physical violence at all.”

The commander turned slowly to the Duke, lips pressing into a tight line. His eyes flicked to Anastia again.

Still. Blank.

She didn’t flinch beneath the silence thickening around her.

Didn’t question the way everyone stared.
Didn’t seem to notice that none of them looked at her like a person.

She didn’t care.
Or maybe- she didn’t know she was supposed to.

The Duke’s jaw twitched once. Just a flicker of muscle. Then he turned away.

To a nearby guard, he said flatly-
“Send word to the Count.”

A pause.
“Let’s see how good a man he is… when the blood’s on his doorstep.”

The words hit the air like a knife unsheathed.

Everyone heard them.
But no one responded.

And still, Anastia did not move.

The Duke walked out. The Commander followed. The physician packed his bag.

But every man left in that room looked at her like she was something unclean.
Something carved from frost and born in shadow.

Their gazes weren’t just suspicion- they were fear.

They didn’t understand how a girl could break a woman with only a question.
How death could bloom from a single sentence.

And still she stood, expression unreadable.

She did not feel pity.
She did not feel pride.
She simply existed in the wreckage.

And when the last man brushed past her, eyes cold, she thought-

These stares… again.

From where she came from, eyes didn’t just judge-
They bled..