5: The Door She Didn't Open

The room was... beautiful. That was the first betrayal.

Velvet drapes hung from the ceiling to the floor, enveloping the walls in deep red. The light was gentle, but it revealed everything: gold trimmings, a bed too large for one person, a faint scent of jasmine that felt like someone else's memory. The floor was warm, but she couldn't feel it through her heels. The silence was so still it made her ears ring.

Anaya stood just inside the door, her coat still wrapped around her like armor, hands curled tightly into her sleeves. Her shoulders were stiff, as if she might be ordered to move again, to turn, to run. No one came.

This was her room.

For three months.

And she didn't know what to do with that.

The bag at her feet wasn't hers. Just something passed into her hands after the Auction. Plain, synthetic. The zipper stuck when she tried to open it. Inside, folded clothes. Soap. A hairbrush with cheap plastic bristles. The kind of essentials you give someone when you don't want them to feel like a prisoner, but also don't want them to feel human.

She set it down gently. Then stood again, on edge. Like if she made the wrong move, the room might remind her what this place really was.

Her eyes drifted to the mirror in the corner. Not wide, but tall. The reflection didn't surprise her. She looked as she felt—creased, tired, distant. Her skin was pale, her lips pressed into a line. There was a bruise near her shoulder she hadn't noticed earlier. Her eyes were rimmed with redness that didn't come from tears, but from holding them in.

She pulled the coat tighter. The collar scratched her neck.

Not yet, she told herself again. You can fall apart later.

This time, her body didn't listen. Something inside her was already folding inward.

A memory surfaced. One she hadn't invited.

She must've been sixteen. Maybe seventeen. Jenna had taken something, some heirloom brooch, small and gold, and slipped it into Anaya's purse before breakfast. While they gathered in the parlor, Jenna's mother had already summoned the house staff and demanded a search.

Anaya never had a chance.

The brooch clinked when it hit the floor, loud enough for everyone to hear. Jenna's mother called her a quiet thief with soft eyes, like that was worse than someone bold and cruel. No one listened when Anaya said she didn't take it. No one believed her. Not even when her hands shook with truth. Not even her father.

Her voice was too tender, her role too fixed.

Jenna had smiled from the corner, unbothered, twirling her hair with fingers that never touched consequence.

That was the day Anaya stopped defending herself. Stopped trying to make people see. She learned that saying nothing could be a shield. But it could just as easily be a grave.

There was a knock.

She startled—not from fear, but from habit. Her body braced as if expecting to be yanked again, commanded, humiliated. But the voice on the other side wasn't Ferreti's. It was a female.

"I'm coming in."

The door opened before she could say anything.

A woman entered, chiseled-featured, black-clad, with hair pulled so tightly back it looked sculpted. Her movements were precise, efficient, like she came from a place where emotions were a weakness. She didn't smile.

"I'm Mira. Housekeeper."

Anaya nodded slowly.

Mira handed her a tray. Chicken. Rice. A bottle of water. Plastic utensils.

"Eat. Shower. Sleep."

Anaya's brow furrowed. "That's it?"

Mira didn't answer. She set the tray down and turned.

"Rules," she said. "You stay for Ninety days. You don't ask questions. You don't lock the door. You don't go near the West Wing. You don't wander after ten."

"And if I do?"

Mira didn't move a muscle.

"Don't."

Then she left

Just like that.

Anaya stood alone again. The door clicked behind her like the end of a sentence.

She sat.

The tray waited untouched on the low table in front of her. The rice smelled good. The chicken was still warm. She lifted the fork but didn't eat. Her stomach twisted from everything else.

She set the fork down.

In the quiet, her breath felt too intrusive.

She got up, walked to the window. The curtains were dense, but parted enough to show the moon. It hovered close, dim and round, as if it had been waiting for her. Below, she could see the hazy outlines of the estate grounds: trees, gravel paths, far-off hedges trimmed to symmetry. It looked so orderly. So perfectly managed. Like grief disguised as elegance.

She remembered summers when she was twelve, sitting on her mother's porch steps with sunburnt legs, dreaming of castles and escape. Back then, freedom was something with a ribbon on it. Now it felt like a knife—but she still clutched it.

She backed away from the window.

There was a painting on the wall. Nothing big or special, just some blushed tones and brush marks that didn't quite make a face. It wasn't clear who or what it was. Maybe it was just meant to fill the space.

Still, Anaya looked at it for a while.

Something about it felt full and unfinished as if whoever painted it had a lot to say, but didn't know how.

I know the feeling, she thought.

She moved towards the thing that passed for comfort in Ferreti's world, placing a hand on the blanket. Velvet. Too soft. She didn't want soft. She wanted the world to feel as rough as she did.

Eventually, she peeled off her coat. Her hands trembled more than she expected. Underneath, her shirt wrinkled, stained near the cuff. She smelled like old perfume and chapel incense.

She found the bathroom. Washed her face

Stared into the mirror again.

You're still here, she told her reflection.

That's something.

By the time she eased into bed, it was nearly 2. am.

She didn't sleep. The walls creaked and shifted gently. They weren't threatening, just old sounds. But every sound jolted her.

She got up again. Opened the door. The hallway was dark, except for one small sconce that cast more shadow than light. She stepped into the cold woods barefoot. Her breath was shallow, but she kept walking.

The corridor stretched ahead like something from a dream.

She wasn't going anywhere in particular. Just... breathing.

The air felt different out here. Stiffer and stale.

She passed framed portraits. Men and women from some other time, their eyes dark, expression stern. They watched her. She knew it wasn't possible, but she felt it anyway.

Then she stopped when she saw the door at the far end.

Not large, not marked. But it looked odd.

The West Wing.

She took one step closer. Then another.

And paused.

The knob was brass. Worn.

Her fingers twitched.

But she turned around.

Not tonight.

She made her way back to her room. Shut the door behind you. Crawled under the blanket and pulled it over her head as if it could hide everything.

The tears came, slow at first. Then steady. She didn't sob, she didn't break, she leaked; a pipe that had been under pressure too long.

She whispered into the dark, "I hope whoever I become... doesn't hate me for this."

She then closed her eyes.

And waited for morning.