The fire crackled low in the Silver Lotus Sect's great hall, throwing flickering shadows along the walls. The others had goo sleep, leaving only Lay and Meyu seated on the floor, a bottle of warmed rice wiween them. Outside, the winter wind howled through the trees, but ihe sileretched thick between them.

  Meyu swirled her drink zily, side-eyeing Lay. "Alright. Out with it. And before you lie, let me tell you something first."

  She leaned forward, voice dropping.

  "You don't sleep well. Every night, yasping, panting like you just ran for miles. You sweat so much, I have to wipe you down so you don't freeze. And when you wake up, you pretend like nothing happened." Her eyes sharpened.

  "So don't tell me it's nothing. Just tell me the truth."

  Lay didn't respond immediately. Instead, she watched the fmes darying to find the words. How could she expin the nightmare without unravelling herself pletely?

  After a long pause, she spoke. "Something attacked me in my sleep."

  Meyu sat up straighter, sharp eyes log onto her. "Attacked you? Physically?"

  Lay hesitated. "ly. It—dragged me somewhere else. A pce that wasn't real, but felt real. It—" she exhaled sharply. "It showed me things. Told me things I didn't want to hear."

  Meyu's expression didn't ge, but her fiightened slightly around her cup.

  "What did it say?"

  Lay's throat felt dry.

  That I should. That I stole a life that wasn't mihat if I disappeared, no one would mourn me.

  She couldn't say those words. Not yet.

  Instead, she settled for "That I was weak. That I wasn't enough. It showed me a world where Shen Mu killed me that night. My father never came. The sect was sughtered. I saw another where we lost, where I survived, but the looks on their fay father's face—were worse thah. It felt real, Meyu. Too real."

  Meyu studied her carefully. Then, to Lay's surprise, she leaned back against the pilr, head tilting toward the ceiling. "You're not the only one who's heard that before."

  Silehen, softly "You knoas a sve before Ats found me."

  Lay turned her head sharply. She knew Meyu had been through hell, but the details had always been vague, hiddeh yers of sarcasm and defle.

  Meyu exhaled, eyes distant, as if seeing a different time. "I don't even remember my parents' faces. All I know is that I was sold young. By the time I was ten, I had been traded three times, ending up in a noble's estate in the Westerories." She traced a finger along the rim of her cup.

  "They weren't the worst owners. At least, not pared to what came after."

  Lay said nothing, letting the words e at their own pace.

  "I got too old for them" Meyu tinued.

  "Or maybe I got too sharp. Either way, they sold me off to a traveling mert, and I ended up in a pce where I saw what happens to people who aren't useful. The brokehe ones who 't smile when their master demands it."

  Her voice dropped to a whisper. "They disappeared. Or worse."

  Meyu swallowed hard. "Sometimes, they were made examples of. A girl who tried to run had her legs shattered, left to crawl until they decided she was too slow to be worth keeping. Others were given to the guards for sport. If you fought back, they'd take you to the courtyard a you until you fot why you ever resisted in the first pce. Some didn't even make it that far."

  She let out a slow breath, f a smirk that didn't reach her eyes. "I learned fast. Smile wheell you to. Lower your eyes. Move like a ghost. Don't get noticed. Because if they saw you, you'd end up like the others."

  Meyu's fingers curled slightly around the fabric of her sleeve. "But sometimes, it didn't matter if you did everything right. I retty, and that made me valuable in ways I never wao be. They sold me to those who wanted eai. Not just in the usual way but also in the 'service' way." Her voice wavered, but she kept going.

  "They had healers—ones who could stitch up flesh and mend bohey experimented, seeing how much pain a person could take before they broke. How many times you could cut someone open and put them back together before they stopped screaming." She swallowed.

  "Turns out, people st a long time."

  Lay felt something inside her tighten, a boiling mix e and horror burning her chest. Without thinking, she reached forward and pulled Meyu into a tight embrace.

  Meyu te first, then slowly rexed, her breath unsteady against Lay's shoulder.

  Lay's grip tightened as memories of her past life surfaced—of ws she had written, of battles she had fought to proteen from this very fate. But those victories meant nothing here. Nothing to Meyu, who had endured what she had only ever seen from a throne.

  She whispered, voice raw "You're not there anymore. They 't hurt you now."

  Meyu let out a shaky exhale, pressing her forehead against Lay's shoulder.

  "I know. But sometimes, it still feels like they ."

  Lay's hand ched. "And Ats?"

  Meyu let out a short, humourless ugh. "Ats was an idiot. He saw me in an au and spent every he had to buy me. He had nothing after that. No food, no shelter. He couldn't even afford the papers to keep us safe from bounty hunters."

  She looked down at her hands. "We suffered together. Starved together. Ran together. From Europe to Jin, scraping by, building his business piece by piece. The world tried to break him. But he never let it."

  She exhaled, voice quieter. "He should have left me behind. I would've uood. But he didn't. He kept moving forward, kept talking like everything was just aname to win, even when we were on the verge of colpsing. I didn't get it at first—I thought he was just too stupid to feel fear."

  She paused. "But then I saw it. He was afraid. Just like me. But the mome it show, the world would have eaten him alive. So he smiled. He ughed. He pyed the fool and I followed him, because it was easier that way. Easier than being vulnerable."

  She ran a hand through her hair. "I knew—I knew—he had been through something just as bad. Maybe worse. But he old me. And I never asked. Because if we didn't talk about it, then it wasn't real."

  Lay stared at the fmes, heart heavy. "So why do you follow him?"

  Meyu turned, and for the first time that night, her usual smirk was gone. "Because he gave me a choice."

  Her mind drifted back to that day—the day her s were broken. She remembered the st of damp wood and sweat, the suffog heat of the au house, the way the men leered as they shouted their bids. Then, a voice rang out above the others, sharp and fident.

  "I'll take her."

  The gavel smmed. Sold.

  She expected the worst—another master, another prison. But instead ing her away like the others, her new 'owner' k before her and, without hesitation, cut the bindings from her wrists.

  Ats grinned, his hand like they were about to strike a business deal. "You're free. Do what you want."

  Meyu had stared, too stuo move. "What?"

  He stood up, hands in his pockets, like buying a person was no more signifit than purchasing a sack of rice. "I don't own you. I just hated the way they looked at you. You leave, stay, stab me—it's up to you."

  She didn't leave. Not that day, not the . She demanded answers, demao know why he did it. But all he ever gave her was that same irritating smirk, same answer and the same shrug.

  "Did what felt right. No deeper meaning, sorry."

  But she saw the exhaustion in his eyes, the way he fli loud voices, the nights he didn't sleep. He had beeoo. He had suffered too.

  And like her, he had chosen to wear a mask instead of scars.

  For a long moment, her of them spoke. Then, Meyu reached for the bottle and poured Lay another drink. Meyu scoffed, but there was no bite to it.

  "You think you're the only one who's suffered? You think you get to wallow in this alone?"

  Her voice wavered, frustration bubblih the surface. "You keep everything in, act like you're fine, like none of this is g at you. Do you know how exhausting it is to wateone you care about pretend they're not drowning? I see you, Meilin. I see you breaking. And it pisses me off that you won't let anyone help."

  Lay fli the rawness in Meyu's words, but before she could respond, Meyu shoved at her shoulder, not enough to hurt, but enough to shake her.

  "I fought Ats too, you know? When I was too weak to walk, too angry to listen. I screamed at him, hit him, told him to leave me to rot because I thought that was all I was good for. You know what that bastard did? He stood there and took it. And when I was too tired to fight anymore, he just... sat o me and waited."

  Her breathing was uneven now, hands ched into fists. "So you don't get to shut me out, Meilin. You don't get to pretend you're fine when you're not. Because I will fight you too, and I will win."

  Sileretched between them, heavy with unsaid things. And then, without a word, Lay reached forward and pulled Meyu into a fierce embrace.

  Meyu feeling Lay's arms arouhe warmth of the embrach her. She exhaled slowly. "Now do you get it?" she whispered.

  "Why I follow him? Why I'll always follow him?"

  Lay tightened her grip. And for the first time, she did.

  Meyu shifted slightly, voice quieter now. "Meilin... don't be so hard on Ats. You don't see it, but I do. He's just masking his pain. His humor, his bullshittery—it's all just a way to cope. You yell at him, call him a scammer, but that man—" she exhaled, shaking her head.

  "That man has never raised his voice at me. Never asked for anything iurn. reated me like I owed him a damn thing."

  Lay remained silent, abs the words.

  Meyu's grip on her cup tightened. "I've seen emperors, masters, leaders—men who had everything but still took more. Ats? He had nothing. A, he gave me my life back. That's why I follow him. That's why I always will."

  Meyu exhaled softly, resting her on Lay's shoulder. "You don't have to fight alone, you know. I don't care how strong you think you o be. You always fide in me."

  Lay stiffened slightly, but something in those words struck deep.

  fide.

  When was the st time she had dohat? In her past life, there had been no one. Her siblings treated her like an afterthought, if not ht mockery. She had grown up surrounded by people yet utterly alone.

  A here was Meyu—a stranger, onoresehat felt just as steady, just as warm, as Yuxe Wuye, her mother.

  A lump formed ihroat. "You really see me as someone worth proteg?"

  Meyu scoffed. "Obviously. You're like the little sister I never asked for but got stuck with anyway."

  Lay huffed a quiet ugh, shaking her head. "Older sister, you mean."

  Meyu smirked. "You wish."

  Unbeknownst to them, Lin Wuye stood outside the doorway, listening. His hands trembled at his sides, his usually posed face glistening with silent tears.

  Later that night, he sat beside Yuxe Wuye and told the versatioween their daughter and Meyu, his voice hushed but heavy. "She and Meyu… they've found something in each other, something that we weren't able to, and I—"

  His voice broke for a moment. "I failed her, Yuxe. I let our daughter suffer alone and she talked to Meyu instead of us."

  Yuxe Wuye pced her hand over his, her eyes full of uanding. "Thehem have it, Lihem be what we couldn't be and strive to be better for her, enough that she too will tell her problems as well."

  Lin Wuye nodded, staring at the moonlit courtyard. "I only hope it's not too te."