Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5: ELARA

Damien was gone. Just the empty space where he’d been, and the words he left behind.

I pulled my knees to my chest. The grass was damp from last night’s rain. I didn’t care.

Do not disappoint me again.

My father’s last line. Just a warning. A reminder that I was already a disappointment, and this was damage control.

He didn’t trust me. He never had. Not after the funeral. Not after I stopped speaking in court. Not after I asked to leave Virell.

So he sent a shadow.

Damien Cole.

I said his name out loud, just to see how it felt. “Damien.”

It felt like ice. Like the way he looked at me. Not cruel. Just… done. Tired.

And — God help me — he was handsome. Not in the polished, royal-court way I grew up around. This was sharper. Black hair that fell over his forehead when he leaned forward. Ice-blue eyes that didn’t miss anything. The kind of face that made it hard to look away, even when you should.

I hated that I noticed. I hated that some small, traitorous part of my brain clocked it before I could stop it. Like my body hadn’t gotten the memo that he was my father’s leash, not a person.

I’m not your warden. I’m just the guy who has to pull you out of the fire if you jump in it.

A student. That was the part my brain kept snagging on. He wasn’t some forty-year-old in a black suit with an earpiece. He was twenty. Twenty-one, maybe. He had classes. He probably had midterms.

How do you shadow someone when you’re supposed to be in Halliwell 214 taking notes on comparative politics?

Did he sit behind me? Did he walk the same halls? Was he in my Economics lecture this morning, watching me take notes on supply curves while Professor Blackwell yelled about tariffs?

The thought made my skin crawl. Not because I was scared of him. But because I wasn’t. He’d told me the truth — or part of it — and walked away. No threats. No conditions. Just don’t get yourself killed so I don’t have to do paperwork.

It was the most honest conversation I’d had since I got to Altiora.

And that was the saddest part.

My father sent a stranger to tell me I was a liability. And the stranger was kinder about it than my father.

My phone buzzed.

Roxanne: Where are you? The bagels are getting cold and Eve is eating all the blueberry ones.

Eve: It’s not my fault they’re the best flavor. Also Roxanne is pacing. She does that when she’s worried and pretending she isn’t.

Roxanne: I am not pacing. I am executing strategic movement around the room.

Eve: She’s pacing.

Elara: Commons Green. Under the big tree.

Roxanne: Stay there. We’re coming.

I locked my phone. Stared at the screen until it went black.

Tell them.

Don’t tell them.

If I told Roxanne, she’d go to war. She’d pull Cole family tax records by dinner. She’d file a complaint with the Dean, with the Board, with the UN if she had to. She’d make it her mission to get Damien expelled and my father arrested for “retaining private security on school grounds without disclosure.”

Because that’s what Roxanne does. She fixes things. With strategy. With rules. With facts.

And Eve… Eve would be quiet first. She’d listen. Then she’d ask me what I wanted. And then she’d stand between me and the world if I asked her to. Not with spreadsheets. With herself.

They’d protect me. Fiercely. Immediately.

But Damien said the danger wasn’t him. It was everyone else. Press. Foreign agents. People who wanted a Virell.

If Roxanne started digging, if Eve started asking questions, would that paint a bigger target on me? Would it make Damien’s job harder? Would it make me less safe?

You’re not safe here, Elara. Not with that last name.

He wasn’t lying about that.

And if I didn’t tell them, I’d be lying. To the two people who’d brought me bagels at seven AM and sat on my dorm floor without asking why.

My chest hurt.

I heard footsteps on the grass.

Roxanne got there first. No running. She never ran. But she was fast. Eve was right behind her, still holding the bag of bagels.

Roxanne stopped two feet away. She didn’t sit. She scanned me first. Head to toe. Like she was checking for damage.

“You’re pale,” she said. Not an accusation. An observation. “Did something happen?”

Eve sat down next to me, uninvited but welcome. She held out a blueberry bagel. “We saved you one. Roxanne threatened me with bodily harm if I ate it.”

“I said I would file a grievance with the Student Union,” Roxanne corrected. Then, softer “Elara. Talk to us.”

I looked at the bagel. At Eve’s hand. At Roxanne’s eyes, gray and steady and waiting.

You’re not alone. Because I said so.

Damien said that. But they’d said it first. With actions. With bagels. With pacing.

My father sent me a shadow because he didn’t trust me.

But I had to decide if I trusted them.

“I met him,” I said. My voice was barely a whisper.

Roxanne went still. “Who?”

“The person my father sent.” I didn’t say his name. Not yet. “The security.”

Eve’s hand found mine. She didn’t squeeze. Just held.

“And?” Roxanne asked. Her voice was carefully neutral. The way it got when she was bracing for impact.

“He said he’s not here to control me,” I said. “He said he’s here to keep me alive. That I’m… a liability. Not a prisoner.”

Roxanne’s jaw worked. “Did he give you a name?”

I hesitated.

If I said Damien Cole, Roxanne would know. She knew the Coles. New money, new power, donated the sculpture garden. She’d connect it in three seconds and have a plan in five.

And then what? Would she confront him? Would she go to the Dean? Would Damien get pulled off the job and my father send someone worse? Someone who didn’t talk to me first?

I’m not your warden.

I believed him. God help me, I believed him.

And I hated that part of me didn’t want her to confront him. Because when he’d leaned against the tree, when his eyes had burned instead of frozen, when he’d said you’re not alone— I’d felt it. That pull. That stupid, human reaction to someone who looked like that and talked like that and chose honesty over orders.

“He did,” I said finally. “But I’m not ready to say it yet. I need to think.”

Roxanne stared at me. For a long second, I thought she’d push. Demand the name. Cite the Student Handbook on transparency and safety.

She didn’t.

“Okay,” she said. Just that. Okay.

Eve bumped her shoulder against mine. “You don’t have to tell us anything you don’t want to, Elara. But you also don’t have to carry it alone. Whatever he said, whatever your dad did… we’re on your side. Always.”

Roxanne nodded. Once. Sharp. “Eve’s right. And for the record, if this ‘security’ thinks he can just show up and monologue at you, he’s wrong. You have people. You have us.”

She sat down then. On the grass. In her expensive slacks. Like it was nothing.

“Now eat the bagel,” Roxanne said. “Because you’re pale, and I’m not doing Westphalia with you if you faint. And because I said so.”

Eve grinned. “She really likes that line.”

“I do not,” Roxanne muttered. But she handed me a napkin.

I took the bagel. It was still warm.

I didn’t tell them his name. Not yet.

But I didn’t lie, either.

For now, that had to be enough.

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