[Lavinia's POV—The Void Between Light and Shadow]
For a moment, I couldn't breathe.
She stood there—real, solid, and impossibly bright in this sea of nothing. My fingers twitched at my sides, aching to reach out, but I didn't. I couldn't.
I was afraid that if I touched her, she'd vanish like the others.
"Mother…" I whispered again, the word catching in my throat.
Her smile was soft, the kind that once soothed monsters under beds and nightmares behind eyelids. "My sweet girl," she murmured, closing her distance until we were eye-to-eye. "You've grown so beautifully. You look ...exactly like him."
Him? She means Papa.
Then she said flatly with a glint in her eyes, "But...the smartness you got from me, not from that Idiot."
. . .
. . .
Did she call Papa Idiot?
. . .
. . .
She's too casual in this situation. I stared at her—those emerald eyes, the gentle tilt of her lips, and the faint shimmer of light around her. Every detail was perfect. Too perfect.
