Seraphina's POV
The mop bucket smelled like bleach and old water.
I had been on my knees for three hours.
Today was my seventeenth birthday, and I was scrubbing the marble floor of a house that used to belong to my father—the house that should have belonged to me.
"You missed a spot," Vivienne said.
She didn't even look up from her phone. She was sitting on the couch with her legs crossed, sipping her morning coffee while I worked on my hands and knees like a dog. Her voice was always like that—bored. Like hurting me was too easy to even be interesting anymore.
I looked at the spot she pointed to. There was nothing there. Not a single mark.
I scrubbed it anyway.
That was what four years of living with Vivienne Ashford had taught me. Don't argue. Don't cry. Survive.
Outside, a car horn blasted twice.
"Morgana!" Vivienne jumped up like she'd been shocked, her whole face changing into something that actually looked like a mother. "Come down, baby! Your gift is here!"
Heavy footsteps thundered down the stairs. Morgana—my stepsister, seventeen months older, ten times louder—burst through the front door shrieking with excitement. Through the window, I watched her throw her arms around the brand new white car sitting in the driveway with a red bow on the hood.
For Morgana's birthday last year, Vivienne had bought her a trip to Paris.
For my birthday today, I got a mop and a bucket of dirty water.
I sat back on my heels and stared at the floor. I didn't cry. I stopped crying a long time ago. Crying was for people who still had hope, and hope was something I'd stopped wasting on Vivienne.
Then I heard it.
A knock at the door—slow, deliberate, like whoever was knocking knew they'd be heard.
"Seraphina!" Vivienne snapped. "Get the door. I'm busy."
She was watching Morgana laugh in the driveway. Busy.
I stood, dried my hands on my worn jeans, and opened the door.
Nobody was there.
But on the doorstep sat an envelope.
It was the most unusual thing I had ever seen. Deep, blood-red—darker than roses, almost brown at the edges, like something old and powerful had sealed it shut. The wax stamp on the back was pure gold, shaped like a crescent moon swallowing a star. My name was written on the front in sharp, perfect handwriting:
Miss Seraphina Ashford.
Not "the help." Not "girl." Not the way Vivienne said my name, like it tasted bad in her mouth.
Miss. Like I was somebody worth addressing.
My fingers tingled when I touched it. Just slightly. Just enough to notice.
"Who was it?" Vivienne called.
I turned around, envelope behind my back without thinking. Some survival instinct kicked in—something that whispered this is yours, don't let her take it.
"Wrong address," I said.
I don't know why I lied. I'd never lied to Vivienne before. Lying to Vivienne was dangerous. But something about this envelope made my heart do a strange, quiet thump, like a door in my chest had just swung open for the first time in years.
I hid it under my mattress and went back to scrubbing.
I read it after dark, with the light from my phone held low so it wouldn't show under the door.
You have been selected for admission to Moonveil Academy. Full scholarship. All expenses covered. Your presence is required. A car will arrive at midnight.
That was all.
No address. No phone number. No name of who had sent it.
I read it five times. My hands weren't fully steady.
A school. A full scholarship. A car.
It didn't make sense. Nobody had ever given me anything. Nobody had ever selected me for anything. Vivienne made sure of that—pulled me from my private school at thirteen, told everyone I'd been "struggling emotionally," kept me locked inside this house doing her cooking and cleaning while the world went on without me.
Why would a school want me? How did they even know I existed?
I was still staring at the letter when I heard Vivienne's voice.
She was on the phone. Late-night calls weren't unusual—she had a lot of people she owed money to. But tonight, something in her voice was different. Lower. Careful. Like she was afraid of who she was talking to.
I pressed my ear to the crack of my door.
"Yes," Vivienne said quietly. "I'm sending her. Tomorrow. The letter was delivered today like you said it would be."
Silence. She was listening.
"She'll get in the car. She won't fight it—she's too broken to fight anything." A short laugh. "Believe me. I made sure of that."
My stomach dropped through the floor.
"And the debts?" Another pause, longer this time. "All of them? Every single one?" Her voice went soft with relief. "Good. I don't care what happens to her after that. Do whatever you want."
The call ended.
I stood frozen against my door with my heart slamming so hard I could hear it in my ears.
I don't care what happens to her after that.
She knew. Vivienne knew about the letter. She'd known all along—known and said nothing, let me find it like it was a gift, like it was a miracle. But it wasn't a miracle.
She had arranged it.
She was selling me. Trading me—her stepdaughter, her dead husband's daughter—to whoever was on that phone, in exchange for her debts being erased.
My legs felt like water. I sat down on the floor because I didn't trust myself to stand.
I should run. Right now, tonight—slip out the window, disappear into the street, find someone who could help me.
But where? I had no money. No phone plan. No friends Vivienne hadn't already chased away. No family who would believe me over her.
And if I ran and she found me—
She would find me.
I looked down at the letter in my shaking hands. Moonveil Academy. A car at midnight.
Whoever had sent this wanted me. Badly enough to pay off Vivienne's debts. Badly enough to arrange a private car in the middle of the night.
That wasn't kindness.
That was something far worse.
But here was the thing I kept coming back to, the thing I couldn't shake no matter how terrified I was—
At least at this mystery school, I would be somewhere Vivienne wasn't.
And if someone was going to be afraid of what I became next, I decided right then, sitting on that cold floor—
It wasn't going to be me.
I folded the letter carefully and tucked it into my sock.
I'll go. I'll walk into whatever trap this is with my eyes open.
And then I'll find a way to survive it.
At 11:58 that night, I crept past Vivienne's door with one bag on my shoulder, moving silent as smoke, just the way she'd trained me—small, invisible, unnoticed.
I was almost to the stairs when her bedroom door swung open.
Vivienne stood in the dark hallway. She wasn't surprised. She wasn't angry.
She was smiling.
"Have a safe trip, Seraphina," she said softly.
And then she held up something that made the breath die completely in my throat.
A photograph. Old, slightly blurred—like it had been taken from far away without the subject knowing.
It was me. Standing in this hallway. Right now. Tonight.
Someone was already watching.