Layers of Blooms, No Sign of Her Face

They called me the luckiest woman in the city.
An orphan, I had found a broken man in the gutters, and with a little begging here, a little borrowing there, I had somehow nursed Julian Devereux, the heir to the Devereux fortune, back to life.
In return, he had lifted me from obscurity and was about to make me his wife.
Everyone said he spoiled me, let me run wild with his affection. When I idly mentioned I liked pearls, a collection once belonging to British royalty appeared at my door. When I gazed at a single rose, the next morning, the entire estate was carpeted in the rare Louis XIV varietal.
He was the untouchable Lord Devereux, master of his familys empire. And then, at the zenith of my fairy tale, the day he was to make me his, I met Vivienne Pembroke.
And she had my face.

Vivienne tilted my chin up with a manicured finger, her eyes a canvas of undisguised contempt. "You do have a pretty face, I'll give you that."
Whispers erupted around us.
"That's Vivienne Pembroke... she looks exactly like her..."
"Be quiet. Do you know who she is? The Pembroke heiress. She could snap her fingers and half the Capital would tremble. As for her origins..."
No matter how Julian tried to hide it, the fact that I was an orphan could never be erased. They just didn't dare say it aloud. Not after what happened to the last person who did. At a gala, when Julian first brought me into his world, a society matron had sneered about my parentage. Julian had merely glanced at her, his expression placid. The next day, that woman was found on the citys busiest street, broken and begging, her mind gone.
No one had breathed a word against me since.
In the next instant, the glowing cherry of Viviennes cigarette was pressed against my cheek. The smell of burning flesh filled the air. I cried out in pain and shoved her away.
She stumbled backward, falling gracefully into Julian Devereuxs arms.
The burn on my face was agony, but a sharper pain lanced through my heart at the look in Julians eyes as he held hera tempest of emotions I had never seen before.
"Julian, my face," Vivienne whimpered. "It hurts so much..."
But Julians gaze was fixed on the cigarette still in her hand. He gently took it from her fingers. "Your lungs are delicate, Vivi. You must be more careful."
He had completely ignored me.
Vivienne looked over his shoulder at me. "Aren't you going to introduce me to this... young lady?"
Only then did Julian seem to notice the weeping burn on my face. He looked away, his voice low. "This is Celine. She's... my sister."
The ancient jade signet ring on my finger slipped from my grasp, hitting the marble floor and splitting in two.
He had placed it there only last night when hed asked me to be his wife.
I looked around the grand ballroom. The crimson banners celebrating our union, the loving portrait of us at the entrance, even the interwoven gold embroidery on our formal attireeverything screamed engagement. So how had I, the fiance, suddenly become the sister?
The jade had broken cleanly, but my heart was tearing apart, a ragged, shredding agony.
"Julian..." I stepped forward, wanting to demand an explanation, but he was already turning, shielding Vivienne as he led her away.
The whispers swelled into a roar.
"I thought this was their engagement party."
"The next lady of the Devereux estate? I wouldn't be so sure now."
I looked to Julian, the man who couldn't bear to hear a single bad word spoken about me. He didn't even glance my way. His entire world was focused on Vivienne.
I was invisible.
In a haze of pain and medication, I felt a cool sensation on my cheek.
I opened my eyes to see Julian carefully applying a salve to the burn.
I threw my arms around his waist, clinging to him. "Why did you call me your sister tonight?"
He didn't answer, his voice a low rumble. "I have to go to the Capital City."
The Pembrokes... they were from the Capital.
The events of the nightthe canceled engagement, his sudden departure, the strange new obsession in his eyes when he looked at Viviennecrashed over me in a suffocating wave. My heart hammered against my ribs, a painful, frantic rhythm.
I couldn't breathe. "Is it because of her? Because of Vivienne?"
Julian's gaze snapped to mine, cold and hard. "Celine. Be careful what you say."
It was the first time he had ever looked at me with anything but warmth. My voice trembled. "Then tell me why! Why are you going to the Capital? Why did you call me your sister? Why did you cancel our engagement? Why!"
He looked away, unable to meet my eyes. "Take Miss Celine to the family chapel," he commanded the guards at the door. "She will kneel there until she has calmed down."
I stared at him. The man before me was a stranger. Not the Julian who had promised to grant my every wish, to answer my every question.
I knelt in the cold chapel, before the stone tombs of his ancestors. Staring at the eternal flame, I whispered a desperate prayer.
"Spirits of this house, I will accept a lifetime of hardship and poverty in my next ten lives, if you will only grant me this one with Julian. Let us be together, always."
A soft, mocking laugh echoed from the doorway.
Vivienne stood there, wreathed in shadow. "The Devereux ancestors," she purred, "do you really think they'll ever accept you?"
"A woman like you, Miss Pembroke," I retorted, my voice shaking, "has no shame, interfering in our relationship?"
She laughed again, a low, throaty sound. "Interfering?" She blew a plume of smoke in my direction. "You, who appeared with my face while I was away at university and attached yourself to my childhood sweetheart. You call me the intruder?"
With a flick of her wrist, she touched the lit end of her cigarette to an ancient tapestry. It smoldered for a second before catching fire. I tried to scramble away, but she grabbed my arm, her grip like steel.
"You think I'm the one who came between you?" she hissed, her face illuminated by the growing flames. The fire spread with terrifying speed, smoke billowing around us. She didn't seem to feel the heat at all. "Then let's see who he chooses."
The fire alarms blared. Servants rushed to the chapel doors, but Vivienne pressed the sharp point of a hairpin to her own throat.
"Tell Julian Devereux he has to choose between me and Celine, right now! Or we both burn!"
I had inhaled too much smoke. My lungs burned, my vision swam. I collapsed to the floor. Through the distorted haze of heat and smoke, I saw Julian burst into the chapel.
He swept Vivienne into his arms and ran. He was in such a hurry that he didn't see me on the floor. His foot came down hard on my outstretched hand, crushing it as he fled.
The searing pain jolted me back from the brink of unconsciousness. As the darkness closed in, his promise from the day he brought me to his home echoed in my ears.
"Celine, you saved my life. I can only repay it with my own."
"I will give you a lifetime of honor, of wealth, of safety."
But here I was, broken and burning, my life hanging by a thread, abandoned by my savior.
When I woke up, I was in a hospital. I waited. Day turned to night, and back to day. I sat as still as a statue, a forgotten idol waiting for a worshipper who would never come.
Julian never came.
Perhaps the fire had burned away his love, I thought. My heart felt like a hollow chamber of ash, no longer capable of pain.
Then, he was there.
He gently tried to give me a sip of water. It tasted strange, bitter. I turned my head away, but he gripped my jaw, forcing my mouth open and pouring the liquid down my throat.
A fire erupted in my larynx, a pain so intense I thrashed wildly. Julians grip only tightened. I tried to cough, to scream, but no sound came out.
I was silent. My throat felt as though it had been scoured with acid.
A single tear escaped and traced a path through the soot on my cheek.
I looked up at Julian. His own eyes were red, rimmed with tears. He gathered me in his arms, his voice a broken whisper.
"Celine, it's okay. From now on, I'll be your voice. I'll speak for you..."
I bit down on his arm, hard. Blood welled up, but he didn't flinch, letting me inflict the pain. His tears were hot on my skin, a stark contrast to the chemical fire in my throat. The twin agonies made my head swim. Through the haze, I heard him whisper again.
"I'm so sorry..."
"Someone has to take the blame for the chapel, Celine... Vivienne can't... she's too fragile. And you... you're too stubborn. You would never have confessed for her."
"This was the only way... I'm so sorry..."
When I next awoke, the room was empty. It was all a nightmare.
The door opened, and the Devereux matriarch swept in.
She placed a document on my bedside table. "When Julian favored you, I allowed your foolishness. But Vivienne is back now. They were meant to be. Everything is finally back on its proper course. It is time for you to leave."
With a trembling hand, I wrote on a notepad: Is this what Julian wants?
"Julian's wishes are no longer relevant."
A thousand protests rose within meto fight, to scream, to beg. But I touched my throat, the silent, ruined flesh, and signed my name.
I wrote one last thing. I have only one condition.
I never want to see Julian Devereux again.
The matriarch said a car would take me to the airport in the morning.
But just as dawn broke, Julians men came for me instead.
Before the charred ruins of the family chapel, Julian stood with Vivienne shielded behind him. The family elders were gathered, their faces grim.
"The ancestral tablets of eighteen generations, the family registry, all of it, gone!" one of them roared. "And you still protect this woman?"
Julian's shoulders relaxed when he saw me. He pulled me before the elders.
"Vivienne didn't do it," he announced, his voice ringing with false conviction. "Celine burned the chapel."
I wanted to scream, No! But only a strangled gasp escaped my throat. I gestured frantically, trying to explain, but no one looked at me.
After a long, tense silence, the eldest patriarch sighed. "Then let the family law be served. Forty-nine lashes. Not one less."
The Devereux "family law" was a brutal tradition. One lash could break a man.
I grabbed Julian's hand, my eyes pleading with him to speak, to stop this. He pulled his hand away, refusing to look at me. "Administer the punishment," he said softly.
As the first whip fell, my mind flashed back to the day I met him.
He was fleeing his enemies, bleeding and near death in the ruins of an old church. I found him.
He told me he'd give me a million dollars to save him.
I told him he was a liar, but I saved him anyway.
Later, when he was safe in his magnificent home, he had laughed. "A million dollars is for common people, Celine."
He had offered me the entire Devereux empire. His heart. His whole world. That was to be my reward.
At the tenth lash, I thought I heard his voice from the night he proposed.
"From this day forward, you are the lady of this house."
"If anyone ever tries to hurt you, they will have to go through my dead body first."
A mouthful of blood escaped my lips, spattering the mended jade ring on his hand. The brilliant green was stained with crimson. A broken gem, even one set in gold, is still just a broken thing.
When the forty-ninth lash fell, I was barely breathing, a bloody ruin on the stone floor.
In his study, Julians heart gave a violent lurch.
A terrible, suffocating unease washed over him. He couldnt name the feeling, but then a frantic shout erupted from outside.
"Miss Celine has no heartbeat!"
Julian shot to his feet. The world tilted, the room spinning around him. The only words that cut through the chaos were: "No heartbeat!"
What did that mean?
A hot rush filled his throat, and he doubled over, vomiting blood. The sharp pain cleared his head for a moment. He had to get to her. He threw open the door and came face to face with his grandmother.
The matriarchs smile was glacial. "And where do you think you're going?"
"I have to see Celine..." he mumbled.
"See her? Who is she to you?" Her hand cracked across his face. "Remember this! The daughter-in-law of this family, the wife of Lord Devereux, your intended, is Vivienne Pembroke! Not some gutter orphan you picked up off the street!"
Julian froze as if struck by lightning. He turned. Behind him, Vivienne stood, her expression unreadable. "Are you going to abandon me for her, too?" she asked quietly.
A wave of crushing despair washed over him. He collapsed into a chair, a bitter laugh escaping his lips.
It had all been a lie from the start.

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