Zoe:

As soon as I went into my mother’s room, I was shocked to see her awake.

Throughout the night, I went to her room, and each time I found her wide awake.

Honestly, it hurt me.

I really cared about my mother, and although we had made mistakes, it still hurt to see her suffering like this.

In fact, it was guilt that was killing her.

"Mom, please, just rest for a little while. You haven’t slept the whole night. In two hours, Kash will wake up and our shifting will begin," I said, gently touching my mother’s shoulder.

My mother had spent the entire night sitting on the chair, staring outside through the window.

The tears in her eyes had already dried.

That was when I realized she was no longer crying for herself.

She was crying for the injustice that had been done to Iris.

And maybe karma had finally hit her hard.

"How did I get so blinded by Lara’s words? Even when I knew she cheated, how did I believe she was better than Iris?" my mother murmured, moving away from the chair to look at me.

"You’re not the only one who felt that way. I used to think the same," I replied. "But remember the last time Iris left and Lara married my brother? She had already shown us her true face." I sighed.

"It was just that you were too blind to see it," I added quietly.

I gently held her hands and helped her stand so she could walk to the bed and sit down.

However, she refused.

"Fifty-six lashes," my mother uttered.

I turned and looked at her in confusion.

"They gave her fifty-six lashes, Zoe."

I noticed tears forming in my mother’s eyes, and it gave me goosebumps.

"An innocent woman had been given fifty-six lashes. I was blind to the truth. So were you. So was everyone. But how did Lara bring herself to commit a crime like that? To let an innocent woman be punished with fifty-six lashes?"

My mother continued, and a tear rolled down her cheek.

I realized she was deep in sorrow.

She sniffed and shook her head.

"That should not have happened. It is not a simple thing," she went on.

I noticed how her hands trembled as she held them together.

"We kicked her out that day, thinking she would go back to the woods she came from. Did we really think she would survive out there? Did she even think about it?"

My mother continued, going back to that day we had kicked her out.

My eyes filled with tears, because I was just as guilty as she was.

"Mother, you should take some rest, or you will make yourself sick," I mumbled, my tongue trembling.

But my mother shook her head even harder this time.

This had been our plan, to make her realize how wrong she had been.

But now I understand that when someone does something so wrong and an innocent person is punished, it is not enough to shed a few tears and feel apologetic.

It is more than that.

How the heck was Lara so cold?

It made me realize what a dangerous creature we had brought into our home, into our lives.

"I have to go and see Iris. I don’t care about anything else anymore," my mother insisted, shaking her head.

She said that someone had suffered the worst injustice, and that person still had not received justice.

"Brother will be very upset if he finds out we went to the prison," I warned.

My mother shook her head again.

"Well, I am his mother. And he cannot do this. I don’t care what he says. An innocent woman is imprisoned," she grunted.

I stared at her for a few seconds and then acted as if I were disappointed in her.

"You’re only doing this so you can defeat Lara," I said.

The moment those words left my mouth, hurt spread across my mother’s face.

Then she smiled faintly to herself.

"Of course you would think that. You have only ever seen your mother speak negatively about others."

Even I felt bad hearing that.

"But no," she continued. "I just want to help Iris. She doesn’t deserve what is happening to her." her voice trembled.

"And I know that even after everything is over, even if Kash falls at her feet and apologizes, Iris will never forgive him." A big tear rolled her eyes as she realized she had ruined her son’s perfect marriage.

"So no, I am not trying to bring her back so Lara can lose. Lara is no longer my priority or my concern. I just want to correct something I did without thinking."

My mother’s words made me take a deep breath.

Then I nodded to myself.

I guessed it was time for my mother to visit the prison and meet Iris again.

"Let’s go," I said to my mother.

She immediately got up and hurried toward the door with me.

I knew she wanted to go there, apologize to Iris, and help her before we left.

Throughout the car ride, my mother cried.

She kept saying she would take Iris with us and convince Kash to let the children stay with her.

She also kept insisting that I show the video and the audio to Kash so an innocent person could be freed from crimes she never committed.

"I don’t understand why you don’t want to help Iris," my mother complained.

As we stopped in front of the prison, her eyes grew watery as she stared at the dark building ahead of us.

"I think there is a time for everything," I said quietly as I stepped out of the car and opened the door for her.

She got out and gave me a disdainful look.

"I don’t think there is a time for this kind of truth. The right time is now because an innocent woman has been punished for no reason."

I noticed agitation in my mother’s body.

"So no, you are not supposed to wait for the right time. You have to do it now because she doesn’t deserve this," my mother insisted.

We stopped in front of the guard.

"My daughter-in-law is here," my mother said.

Her tone shocked me. There was a softness in it when she spoke about Iris.

The guard looked at me and then at my mother. He seemed to know what to say.

He took a deep breath and lowered his head.

"She was punished by the Alpha King. After that, she never recovered. She is in the hospital, and I am not sure if she will make it out alive."

The moment those words were spoken, my mother collapsed to her knees.

Even I became worried for her. I tried to hold her, but she started crying uncontrollably.

"No, this cannot be. No, no, no. We cannot do this to an innocent person," my mother cried.

For a moment, even I was afraid for her well-being.

She began to shake terribly.

"Oh, we have made a mistake. Zoe, why didn’t you show the truth to your brother? Why did you let that innocent woman take the blame?"

My mother screamed at me, slapping her hands against the ground again and again.

I grew impatient and worried for her.

She was hiccupping so badly that I wondered if she could even breathe.

Then I stepped aside because someone had arrived behind me.

"Why? You don’t wish for me to be dead anymore?"

The moment Iris’s voice came from behind me, my mother gasped and stopped crying.

She stayed on her knees for a moment before slowly lifting herself and turning around to look at Iris.

Iris looked perfectly fine. Beautiful, in fact, just as she always had.

She carried herself with the grace of a queen.

She folded her arms across her chest and looked at my mother with a raised eyebrow.

My mother turned to me, then back to Iris, then to the guard, clearly confused about what was happening.

"You’re okay," my mother said with a trembling smile.

"It must be really painful to see me being okay," Iris replied.

Those words made my mother wrap her arms around herself and begin crying loudly again.

"No, that is not true. I made a mistake in the past, but I have realized it. I am so sorry."

My mother immediately tried to fall at her feet.

But this was not Lara.

Iris quickly stepped back and gestured for her not to do that.

"No, please. I need to apologize. We have been wrong to you. We were so brutal toward you. But I have learned my lesson, and I also have proof of your innocence."

My mother kept trying to touch Iris’s feet while Iris tried to stop her.

At that point, I had to step forward and stop my mother.

"Don’t you understand, Mother?" I said, shaking my head.

It seemed she was in so much pain and grief that she could not notice the obvious.

Like how Iris was standing right outside the prison.

Then I began to explain everything to her.

Me and Iris.

I told her about the entire plan we had made together to reveal Lara’s true colors.