Lillian Voss died that night.
Not in the flames of her burning estate. Not when the blade cut through her ribs. Not when Harrow stole her son and left her bleeding in the dirt.
She died here, in the shadows of a forgotten hut, with her hands shaking around a wooden staff, her knees bruised from the cold stone floor.
She had tried to rise a dozen times, and a dozen times, her body had betrayed her, sending her crashing back down. Moira watched in silence, arms crossed, her expression unreadable.
Lillian clenched her jaw. She would not fall again.
She gripped the staff, planted her foot, and pushed. Every muscle screamed, but she locked her jaw against the pain. The staff wobbled beneath her weight, but she forced herself upright.
A single step. Then another.
A breathless laugh escaped her lips. She was standing.
"Good," Moira muttered. "Now let go."
Lillian's grip tightened. "What?"
"Let go of the staff."
She hesitated. Then, slowly, she loosened her fingers and released her hold. For a single heartbeat, she was steady. Then her legs buckled.
She hit the ground hard, coughing from the impact.
Moira sighed. "You were raised in silk and lace. You do not know how to fight, how to endure, how to survive. That is why you lost."
Lillian pushed herself up onto her hands, her breath ragged. "I—"
Moira knelt beside her, eyes dark. "If you want to die as a noblewoman, go ahead. Walk into Harrow's halls as Lady Lillian Voss and let him kill you a second time."
Lillian's fingers curled into the dirt.
"I am not that woman anymore."
Moira's lips twitched. "Then prove it."
---
That night, Lillian made the first cut.
She sat before a cracked mirror, a dagger in her hand. Her reflection stared back at her—the golden curls, the delicate cheekbones, the soft blue eyes of a noblewoman. The face of someone weak.
She lifted the blade and hacked away the first lock of hair.
By the time she was finished, her once-perfect curls lay scattered across the floor, and the woman in the mirror was a stranger. Her hair was uneven, jagged, just long enough to brush her jaw.
She did not look like Lady Lillian Voss.
Good.
The dress was next. She stripped off the silken nightgown, the last remnant of her former life, and tossed it into the fire. The flames devoured it, turning the delicate fabric to ash.
Moira watched from her chair. "What will you call yourself now?"
Lillian met her gaze. "Lia."
A mercenary's name. A name that did not carry the weight of nobility.
A name that would be feared.
Moira nodded once. "Then sleep, Lia." She leaned back, closing her eyes. "Tomorrow, I break you."
Lillian lay down on the hard wooden floor, the scent of burning silk in her lungs.
Lady Lillian Voss was dead.
And in her place, something new had been born.
---