They call me the angel of Crowcrest.
A title that sounds beautiful until you realize it's a cage.
An angel doesn't speak. An angel doesn't live. An angel is worshiped from afar, locked behind glass and gold, untouchable, unknowable.
For seven years, I played my role perfectly. The phantom princess. Always smiling when the cameras demanded it, always silent when the world whispered questions I had no strength to answer. Behind closed doors, I vanished. Locked in my rooms. A ghost in the palace halls.
Because what was I without him?
The day I left Kasim Marlowe, the girl I was ceased to exist.
I can still feel the way my chest ripped open, the day my world was dismantled with cold, regal precision. My father's thundering decree. My cousin's poisonous smile, a silent promise of ruin.
They offered me a choice, but it was a blade disguised as a path. One way led to his destruction. The other led to my own.
So I walked away. I let him see the ice in my eyes, the finality in my silence. I crafted my betrayal so he would never look back, so he would never question why. His hatred was the only armor I could give him.
Not because I believed them, but because I knew the cost of defiance. The only path forward was one that led him to hate me.
And in the shadows of my exile, I rebuilt myself. I found a mentor—a retired military commandant who forged me into something unrecognizable. I learned taekwondo until my body bled, learned to fire a gun until recoil was second nature, learned the bow and arrow until my hands were calloused and steady as stone. I finished my studies in silence, textbooks stained with sweat and tears.
I became strong.
But strength in secret is still invisible. To Crowcrest , I remained the phantom.
Until today.
The throne room smells of cedar and dust, the weight of centuries pressing against my lungs. My father sits at the head of the table, age carving deep lines into the once-imposing king. His cough has grown worse. The empire has grown weaker.
Around us, the council murmurs, voices slick with greed. And beside me sits my cousin—her—the one who destroyed everything. Her lips curve into a smile so sweet it rots, her eyes darting to me with a challenge. I don't look back. If I do, I'll see Kasim's face in her treachery, and rage will consume me.
"Eldora." My father's voice is frail, but it cuts through the chamber. "It is time."
The room silences.
Every gaze turns to me—the princess who never speaks, the angel who never acts. Their disbelief is a blade against my skin.
"By decree of the Crown and the council of Crowcrest, my daughter, Eldora Owden, shall succeed me as the acting head of the Owden Conglomerate," my father declares. His hand trembles as he raises the seal. "From this day, she will represent our empire in all alliances, negotiations, and treaties."
The council murmurs. My cousin's nails dig into the tablecloth.
I rise slowly, my hands steady though my heart hammers like a war drum. Cameras flash. The media will eat this alive—the angel stepping into power at last. They will call it grace. They will call it fate.
But inside, I am no angel. I am a phantom with a blade, a ghost with fire in her veins.
"My father's will is mine," I say softly, my voice carrying in the silence. The council leans in, startled—I have not spoken in public in years. "I accept this duty. And I will not fail the Owden name."
The room shifted. Murmurs rippled down the table, low and restless. I could feel the cameras closing in, their lenses hungry, waiting to capture the exact second history changed.
I uncapped the pen, my hand steady, deliberate, even as my heart thudded against my ribs. Slowly, I pressed it to the page and signed my name with a flourish:
Eldora Crowcrest.
The moment the ink touched paper, I felt the shift inside me. I wasn't just the heir anymore. I was the empire.
My father's advisor clears his throat, sliding a folder across the table toward me. I know even before I open it what it contains.
My first duty as heir.
I lift the cover.
And my breath freezes.
Marlowe Global.
The name blazes like fire across the page.
The councilman explains, but his words dissolve into static. "Strategic alliance … economic stability … his empire surpasses ours … the Crown cannot afford to—"
But I am no longer listening. Because the file stares up at me with a name I buried years ago.
Kasim Marlowe.
I taste blood where I've bitten the inside of my cheeks.
The boy I loved. The man I left. The ghost I could never outrun.A memory,unbidden and sharp: his laugh, low and warm, directly beside my ear. The scent of rain on his skin. The solid feel of his hand in mine, not as a CEO's grip, but as a boy's— certain and forever.
He is the empire itself now. Larger than the Owden name. Larger than the crown.
And I am to face him.
The chamber tilts. The phantom in me wants to run, to lock myself in the dark again. But the warrior I became in silence refuses.
Seven years. Seven years I've hidden, rebuilt, endured. And fate chooses now to drag him back into my orbit.
Perhaps this is punishment. Perhaps this is mercy.
Either way, the storm I've avoided is here.
I close the file with steady hands, though my pulse is chaos. "I will attend the negotiations," I say, my voice sharper than it has ever been.
My father exhales as though relieved. My cousin's smile falters.
And inside me, the phantom whispers the truth I cannot say aloud.
I am not ready.
I will never be ready.
But I will see him again.
And when I do …
I don't know if he will destroy me—
Or if I will destroy us both.
.
Behind Closed DoorsThe champagne flutes clinked faintly in the distance as the celebration raged on in the grand hall. Billionaires, politicians, sycophants — all toasting the same name over and over again.
Crowcrest. Crowcrest. Crowcrest.
But here, in the quiet of my private study, the noise felt like it belonged to another world.
I stood before the tall gilt mirror, still in the power suit they'd tailored to perfection, the diamond pin on my lapel catching the firelight. My reflection stared back at me, eyes rimmed with exhaustion beneath the gloss and polish.
I whispered it aloud, just once, to the empty room:
"Eldora Crowcrest."
The name felt like stone on my tongue. Heavy. Immovable.
From the shadows behind me came a voice I knew better than my own. Annabelle — my sister, the one soul who had never abandoned me, no matter how high the walls of this palace grew.
"You don't look like her right now," she said softly. "You look like… you."
My lips trembled, though I'd held them firm as marble for the cameras all day. I turned from the mirror and pressed my palms against the edge of the desk, my shoulders sagging.
"They saw me claim it," I whispered, "but they don't know. Owden was mine. It was… lighter. Now Crowcrest feels like chains dressed as diamonds."
Annabelle stepped forward and laid her hand gently over mine. Her touch was warm, steady — an anchor I hadn't realized I was still clinging to.
"Then let the world have Crowcrest," she murmured. "But let me keep Owden. The part of you that still laughs, still dreams, still breathes."
I lifted my eyes to hers. They burned, glassy with unshed tears, but steadier now with her there. And somehow, I managed the smallest smile.
"Owden in here," I said softly. "Crowcrest out there."
And for a fleeting moment, I felt like both could exist.