The Devil's Duchess-Chapter 59: Luring the Flame

Marcella found them near the veranda—Rachel and Anthony, glasses in hand, standing at the edge of the balustrade. It was quieter here.

She approached them, the cloak still wrapped around her.

Rachel saw her first. "Marcie!" she called with that familiar spark in her eyes, "you have become the talk of the ballroom."

Marcella arched a brow, the corners of her lips lifting with effort. "Already?"

"Oh yes," Anthony added dryly. "Lady Virelle looked like she had swallowed a pit of fire when you and Berith returned together. A few more seconds and I think she’d have asked to be baptized in the soup."

Marcella chuckled, grateful for the levity.

Rachel nudged her gently. "But really..are you alright?"

Marcella smiled, airy and dismissive. "I was cold," she said, gesturing lightly to the cloak. "The ballroom is drafty and Berith offered to retrieve it. That’s all."

Rachel blinked. "That," she drawled, "is the most suspiciously polite lie you’ve ever told."

Anthony chuckled under his breath. "Don’t question it too hard, love. If the Duke’s suddenly offering cloaks and protection, I would say let the man have his moment."

Rachel leaned in conspiratorially. "Well, I thought it was romantic. You both looked like something out of a storybook. I swear, there are poets scribbling about you two in the corners already."

Marcella rolled her eyes but the warmth was undeniable.

Every time she is with them, they healed a part of her they hadn’t broken. They had grown up together, climbed trees, and stolen sweets from the kitchen. In her past life, Marcella had never let herself get too close to Rachel. Their bond had been... strained by resentment neither of them had voiced.

But here, now in this life, Marcella was trying to build what they hadn’t before, trying to keep the version of Rachel who laughed like this, who leaned against her shoulder.

"You’re quiet," Rachel said, her voice softening.

Marcella blinked. "Just tired. Long night."

Rachel smiled knowingly but let it go.

Marcella sipped from the wine Anthony offered her, then glanced between them. "I had sent a letter last week for Evelyne."

Anthony’s expression shifted. "We never got anything."

Marcella blinked. "Nothing?" How weird is this because she clearly remembers that she had sent the letter to Sister Evelyne, what went wrong?

"Not a word," he repeated, shaking his head. "If Sister Evelyne knew, she would have received."

Her brow furrowed. "But I sent it through proper channels."

Rachel touched her arm gently. "Maybe it got held up somewhere along the line. Goddess knows how many hands these letters pass through."

Marcella let out a soft breath. "She’s alright, though?"

"Doing well," Anthony assured. "She said she owes you a visit."

"I miss her," Marcella murmured, eyes dropping to the garden below.

Rachel bumped her gently and Anthony too looped his arm through hers. "You’ve got us until then." They chorused in union.

Marcella looked at them. Their smiles. Their concern. Their ridiculous commentary and subtle care.

Maybe this life wasn’t fixable. But this part of her life? These two? She would protect it, just to keep them looking at her the way they did now.

Slowly, the hush of the veranda, Rachel’s breathless giggle, Anthony’s dry quip, all of these started fading. A bell rang on her ears, a dull chime threading through her wine-slowed senses.

At first, Marcella mistook it for fatigue, a trick of her tired mind. But then it rang louder again, deep in the marrow of her bones.

Her fingers twitched. She blinked, trying to brush it away like a gnat near her ear. But the sound returned, louder this time, more insistent. It thrummed through her marrow, shaking something inside her.

The Flame was being lured.

"Marcie?" Rachel’s voice floated from somewhere too far away.

Marcella turned her head, meeting Rachel’s confused eyes. She tried to smile, to nod, to say something reassuring.

A rush of vertigo took her as the hum became a chord, dark and full of inevitability. The garden below blurred. Her pulse pounded in her ears like war drums.

And suddenly, Marcella wasn’t entirely here anymore. She could see the ballroom—people laughing, candles burning, the gold trim of her cloak shifting in the breeze, but it all felt distant as if she were watching through a pane of thick glass.

Before she could gasp, her feet launched forward.

Rachel’s voice followed her, "Marcie, wait..."

But Marcella walked without looking back. She walked past a couple whispering beneath the rose trellis, past the old marble statue of Seraphine the Seeress, and finally, to the ivy-covered wall where no path should have led.

Her steps did not falter, even as the floor sloped downward into the old roots of Ashenholt Duchy. No one had walked here in decades. Marcella barely noticed, she couldn’t hear her name being called above.

Marcella reached the end of the passage, where the stone gave way to a tall iron door etched with symbols that stung the corners of her mind when she looked too closely. She should have been afraid. But fear was a distant thing now, like remembering the taste of sugar while submerged in water.

As she opened the door, the night air swallowed her.

No one saw her step out of the hidden door, not the guards posted at the gates, nor the footmen lingering near the stables.

A carriage was waiting for her all along. It was black, dull and matte like funeral cloth with no crest, no driver and no horses snorting impatiently.

The hem of her gown brushed the frostbitten leaves. Her fingers, pale and trembling at her sides, never reached to lift her gown. Marcella didn’t blink as the carriage door creaked open and she stepped inside.

The door shut the moment she sank into the velvet seat, and the carriage lurched forward.

The bells inside her head grew louder.

Tolling, tolling, tolling.

Not church bells. Not wedding bells. These were deeper, older. Bells rung to open doors best left shut.

Inside her, the Flame pulsed. With every toll of the bell, it brightened. It was no longer dormant—it was listening.

Marcella sat like a marionette with its strings cut—slumped yet upright, her spine rigid. Her hands rested on her lap, her eyes, wide and unblinking, stared into the darkness ahead, glassy and hollow like a doll left too long in the attic. The cloak had slipped off her shoulders, yet she didn’t feel the stinking cold that bit her.

The bells ruled her now.

The part of her that remembered Anthony’s laugh or Rachel’s shoulder against hers was buried deep inside her. The Flame had peeled her open from the inside, and now something else looked through her eyes.

Through the window glass, the world passed in muted fragments—branches that looked like clawed fingers, ravens sitting backwards and the stars above vanished one by one. Time unfurled oddly here, as the road bent and twisted unnaturally.

The carriage knows where to go. No one had dared enter there in decades, but the road had reopened for her.

*****

In the ballroom.

Berith had spent the last hour gliding through the ballroom making small talk, exchanging pleasantries, feigning interest in the ramblings of lesser lords and fortune-hungry nobles. It was a game he had mastered: smile just enough, say just enough.

But now, he finally came face to face with the two people Berith had been meaning to find all evening: his mother and uncle.

Elyria was the first to speak, her tone as delicate as the lace trimming her sleeves. "My son," she purred, lifting her glass. "Are you enjoying the evening? You disappeared with the duchess midway. I do hope it wasn’t the music that drove you to the corridors."

Berith didn’t return the smile. "It wasn’t the music," he said coolly. "Though something did tear through the moment." 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Lady Elyria tilted her head, feigning concern. "Oh? How unfortunate. I hope nothing... improper?"

Lord Cassar, standing beside her, gave a lazy chuckle. "Ballgowns are such fragile things. One wrong thread and.." he drew a slicing gesture in the air, "..they fall apart."

"Cut the crap!" Berith steered the conversation to the main topic. "You underestimated who she is to me and dared to act behind my back." He swept his gaze over both of them.

Cassar raised a brow, still wearing that insufferable smirk. "You’re angry, nephew. That’s unlike you."

Elyria gave him a wry look. "You act as if we put her on fire. All we did was light a match and observe. If she burned, that would’ve been her own weakness."

"Next time you try to strip her dignity in public," A lethal warning crept in his voice. "Remember who shielded her and what that makes her now."

Elyria narrowed her eyes, pulling up a smirk, "Your shield does not make her your equal." she snapped. "She’s nothing, Berith. A flame, yes but even fire dies when there’s no more air. She will flicker out like the rest."

The dark fire in his chest flared, but he smothered it. "Then you would best pray you’re not the one gasping for breath when she does."

"You’re making a dangerous habit of defending her, my nephew." Cassar wiggled his brows, mildly amused.

Berith stepped back, adjusting his cuff. "I won’t warn you again," His mouth tugged up, even more annoyed growl. "She is mine to protect. Harm her again and I promise even the titles won’t save you."