Chapter 231: The bird is free.
"No," the duchess said evenly. "You didn’t do anything. That’s precisely the problem."
The fire cracked softly behind her words, as if even the room understood it was a closing argument. Nothing cruel in her tone. No spike of anger, no satisfaction. Just a fact, delivered in that smooth, inexorable cadence Serathine used when decisions had already been made.
Ophelia stared at the shadows playing along the edge of the saucer beside the untouched tea. Her palms were damp now. She didn’t move them.
"You had one chance to make it right," Serathine said, her tone . "And you failed it. I would recommend you be wiser from now on."
Ophelia said nothing; there was no way Serathine could know.
She had been careful. The burner phone never touched the manor’s network, never stayed powered more than a few seconds at a time. She’d only used it once. A single message. Then she’d snapped the battery out and thrown the whole thing into the bin behind the arts building at school, between the empty paint tubes and leftover paper scrapings.
There were no fingerprints. No camera footage. No data trace. She’d checked. Twice.
Even now, as she reached for the envelope Serathine had placed on the armrest, her hands were steady.
She could still leave on her own terms.
Still vanish into the cracks of the capital, like Misty had taught her. Disappear through the routes no one watched because they were too old to matter, too familiar to be suspicious.
Serathine was wrong. She was finally free.
Ophelia stood. She bowed her head again and walked toward the door with the envelope tucked neatly against her chest, like an obedient child carrying a sealed grade report.