Returning home

Lydia returned home just after dawn, the sky still painted in soft greys and streaks of

lavender. The air smelled different

here—cleaner, quieter, like the world exhaled differently in the province of her childhood.

As the car pulled up the winding driveway lined with tall, rustling trees and jasmine

bushes in bloom, her chest tightened with a strange mix of relief and nostalgia.

Home wasn’t just a place. It was a rhythm—slow and familiar, like a song only she could hum.

Her mother met her at the front steps, barefoot and radiant in a silk robe, with arms wide open and eyes glistening. “You’re taller,” she

whispered as she wrapped Lydia in a long

embrace. “And thinner. They need to feed you more in that school.”

Lydia laughed softly into her shoulder.

“You always say that.”

“It’s always true.”

Inside, the house was warm with scents of cardamom and old wood polish, the floor gleaming beneath her boots. Nothing had changed. The portraits still hung in their gold-trimmed frames, her father’s library still locked unless summoned, the white orchids still blooming by the window near the staircase. It was as though the house had paused while she was away, waiting for her to return to breathe it back to life.

The first day was slow and lovely. She shed her uniform, traded formal silence for soft

pajamas and familiar slippers. Her mother

insisted on feeding her every few hours—cheese, Beef, pepper sauce, spiced teas,

buttery bread that reminded her of late evenings and whispered stories. They sat on the balcony most afternoons, her mother brushing her hair or massaging scented oils into her shoulders, asking about school, about the girls there, about the whispers and rivalries Lydia never cared much to entertain.

Then one evening, as dusk melted into a coral sky, Lydia mentioned Cassidy.

Her mother lit up.

“Cassidy,” she repeated, like the name itself brought good omens.

“I’ve heard that name—Callum’s sister, yes? Or half-sister. The other wives have been

whispering, as they do. Tell me more.”

Lydia smiled shyly. “She’s… kind. In a real way. It’s strange, Mother. I didn’t expect to like

anyone there. But she’s different. She listens. She doesn’t try to prove anything. And she’s been there for me.”

Her mother folded her hands and nodded slowly, pleased. “That makes me happy. I told my friends at the tea house that my daughter had finally made a friend. I might have bragged a little.”

Lydia gave her a mock frown. “You didn’t.”

“I did,” her mother said, smirking. “You know how long I’ve waited for you to have someone. Even if it’s a girl from one of those families.”

Then her voice softened, her eyes meeting

Lydia’s with a quiet gravity. “But Lydia… you must be careful. Don’t go looking for trouble. I know how you are. Fire in your mouth and lightning in your hands. It’s beautiful, but

dangerous.”

“I don’t go looking for trouble, Mother.”

“No,” she said knowingly. “But trouble has a habit of finding you.”

Her father didn’t return that week. His work had taken him to a summit across the

seas—somewhere cold and full of stiff

diplomats in wool coats. But he sent letters across Every night. His writing always came through tired, velvet-rich but frayed at the edges. He asked about her health, her studies, whether she was drawing again. And though his voice was distant, there was always warmth

beneath his writhing, like a coal banked under ash.

“I hear you’re becoming quite the young lady,” he said one night in his letter to her the first day she arrived.

“I’m trying,” Lydia replied to his Letter a hint of affection, she smiled warmly as she sent it off to him. She didn’t write much, she didn’t have to her father had always understood her

perfectly without too many words.

Two days later a New message arrived from Her father again.

“Try a little less,” he said. “You’ve always been enough.”

She smiled softly, It was the kind of thing he said without hesitation, but that Lydia tucked away like a secret gem.

By the sixth day, another Letter the arrived.

A thick envelope embossed with gold, bearing the insignia of the Kingdom. The National Razzito Ball. A name that carried weight and tradition. An event where legacy paraded itself in glittering gowns and tailored suits under marble ceilings.

Lydia held the letter between two fingers like it offended her.

“I don’t want to go,” she told her mother.

“You have to,” came the calm reply.

“Your father has to be there. And his family must be seen beside him. It’s not about the ball—it’s about presence.”

“I hate that.”

“I know,” her mother said gently. “But we don’t always get to choose when we are seen.”

So Lydia began to prepare. Gowns were pulled from velvet hangers, shoes polished, jewelry carefully matched. Her mother oversaw

everything, and Lydia tried not to sulk. It wasn’t the dressing up that bothered her—it was the gaze. The inevitable eyes that followed her at events like this, searching for cracks, for imperfections, for a whisper of scandal.

But she would go. For her father. For the family name. For the image that needed maintaining.

Still, that night, long after the house went quiet, Lydia sat at her window, sketchbook open on her lap. And she drew. Not gowns, not chandeliers or marble halls. But faces. One familiar—Cassidy’s wide, kind smile. Another more difficult—Callum’s. His eyes, the line of his jaw, the way he looked at her like she wasn’t entirely real.

She closed the book when she was done, and for the first time in days, she exhaled.

The ball was coming.

But Lydia would meet it on her own terms.

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***