[Divine Library—Lavinia's POV]
The diary quivered in my hands as though it resented being touched. My pulse hammered, every part of me screaming not to open it—yet my fingers moved on their own.
The handwriting. It wasn't Papa's.
My heart lurched. Those strokes—sharp but careful, steady even when the ink bled—I knew them. I would know them anywhere.
"Ravick…" I breathed.
After Papa, there had always been Ravick. He had been my shadow, my shield, my second father. He had taught me to hold a quill when my fingers were still too small and had knelt beside me as I traced my first letters. Those hands had steadied mine. Those letters had always been full of warmth.
And now… that same handwriting stared back at me from a book that should not exist. I felt myself tremble. The air grew heavy, the silence pressing against my skull as I began to read.
