*In the summer, seven years earlier.*
"Duke of Carlisle!"
That day, Juliet's world turned upside down.
She never forgot the summer of that year.
---
"Juliet! Are you listening to me?!"
The indignant voice shattered her concentration. Juliet's pen halted mid-stroke, and she raised her head.
Fatima stood before her with both hands planted firmly on her hips, glaring. The fitted dress she wore bristled with a constellation of colorful pins, the fabric still unfinished and pulling awkwardly at the seams.
"Oh — sorry. What did you say?" Juliet blinked. "Something about a party?"
Fatima's frown deepened.
"I *asked* you which dress is the most beautiful!"
"Oh. Yes."
Juliet peered past Fatima's shoulder, quietly folding the letter in her hands beneath the table.
"Well, I think…"
Behind Fatima, the tailors — looking thoroughly exhausted after three hours of captivity in the Earl of Glenfield's drawing room — caught Juliet's eye. One of them held up a dress and shook it frantically, mouthing something she couldn't quite make out.
*Rustle-rustle.*
"…Pink?"
"You're sure?"
It seemed this was the correct answer.
Fatima whirled away with a triumphant expression and turned to the nearest tailor, her chin lifted with the authority of someone twice her age.
"I'll take the pink one. Can you have it fitted to my figure by tomorrow morning?"
"Of course, Miss Glenfield."
"The ball begins at seven in the evening, so it *must* be delivered to me by noon. Not a moment later."
The tailors — who, after three grueling hours, had finally been granted their freedom — looked as though they might weep with relief. They worked at the renowned Camilla boutique, which had recently become the darling of high society, and had visited the Glenfield estate at Fatima's personal summons. The Earl of Glenfield's young daughter was the same age as Juliet; they had been friends since they were ten.
With the dress crisis resolved, Fatima's mood lifted considerably. She ordered a maid to bring tea to the living room, and when the tray arrived — porcelain cups, a steaming pot, and a plate of delicate sugar cookies — Juliet gathered her scattered stationery and settled onto the sofa.
"What about you?" Fatima plucked a cookie from the plate and bit into it. "Aren't you going to choose a dress?"
"No, everything's already sorted."
"Then what will you wear tomorrow?"
"I decided to alter one of my mother's dresses and wear that."
"Alter a dress…" Fatima paused mid-chew, her expression frozen somewhere between horror and disbelief. "And *wear* it?"
Remaking a dress — especially one that someone had *already worn* — was simply unthinkable.
"Yes." Juliet shrugged, reaching for her teacup. "That's exactly what I'm going to do."
It was a ball held to celebrate the close of the summer season. Every girl who received her first invitation after turning eighteen wanted to look her most radiant, since this event marked the end of her debut. New gowns were not merely expected — they were practically required.
When Fatima spoke again, unmistakable sympathy softened her voice.
"You can choose a new dress for yourself, you know. I'll ask my father to buy it for you."
Across the room, the boutique staff — who had been hastily packing their things, intent on escaping the house as quickly as possible — instantly perked up.
Juliet smiled, unbothered, and waved the offer away.
"No, truly. Mother's dress is beautiful. I'll show you tomorrow."
One of the tailors paused while folding a gown into a leather case and looked up with careful interest. "Forgive me, but would this happen to be the light cornflower blue dress that belonged to the Countess of Montagu?"
"That's the one. How did you know?"
"The Countess has exquisite taste. I have no doubt it will look wonderful on you as well."
*How boring…*
Fatima sat in silence, listening to their exchange, and felt irritation crawl up her spine like an itch she couldn't reach.
One day — she couldn't pinpoint exactly when — Juliet had gone from being a fun, amusing friend to being ***incredibly*** dull.
*But everything was different before.*
Juliet had been Fatima's first friend after her family moved to the capital. Fatima's father, ever the strategist, had been eager to cultivate ties with the empire's ancient houses, and the Montagu family boasted a distinguished lineage stretching back to the country's founding. By fortunate coincidence, he'd discovered that the Count of Montagu had a daughter precisely Fatima's age.
After that, her father had instructed her — firmly — to befriend the girl, and so Fatima began inviting Juliet to the house under every pretext she could invent.
At first, she hadn't relished the idea of some half-impoverished nobleman's daughter wandering through their lavish rooms. But when she actually met Juliet, she found she didn't regret the invitation at all.
To be precise, Fatima had taken a private, guilty pleasure in watching Juliet during their visits — the way the girl's fingers lingered over expensive jewelry, the way her eyes widened at the shimmer of silk, the envy she tried so hard to hide and failed.
It had made Fatima feel *magnificent*.
But then, roughly three years ago, everything shifted.
At fifteen, Juliet suffered a terrible accident. She was gravely injured — so gravely that the doctors whispered she might not survive. For weeks, the Montagu household held its breath.
She lived. But the girl who emerged from that sickbed was not quite the same.
At first, Fatima assumed it was merely the toll of a long recovery — months confined to bed, muscles wasted, spirit dimmed. But even after Juliet regained her strength, nothing returned to the way it had been. Sometimes, sitting across from her in this very room, Fatima felt a chill of strangeness, as though the person before her wore Juliet's face but gazed out from behind entirely different eyes.
From that point on, Juliet no longer envied her. Not the dresses, not the jewels, not the sprawling estate or the mountains of gold her father piled higher each year.
Nothing.
Whenever Fatima invited her over — always under the guise of needing help choosing a dress — Juliet simply sat in the corner, buried in letters, scribbling endlessly in that cramped, careful hand of hers.
*Well, it doesn't matter.* Fatima sipped her tea and allowed herself a small, private smirk. *She is, after all, the daughter of an almost-ruined count.*
The Glenfield family had not been born into aristocracy. Fatima's father was a shrewd merchant who had amassed a considerable fortune through ruthless business acumen and, eventually, purchased his earldom outright — title, crest, and all.
Fatima had once loved to flaunt that wealth and title. But as she grew older, she came to understand the whispers that trailed her family through every ballroom and salon: *nouveau riche.* The old families smiled to their faces and sneered behind their backs. And yet — maddeningly — those same families continued to shower invitations upon the impoverished Earl of Montagu, though he rarely deigned to accept.
Still, deep down, none of this truly troubled Fatima. She had what mattered: money, influence, and a future she intended to seize by the throat.
"A very important guest will be attending the ball tomorrow," she announced, setting down her cup with a deliberate *clink*. "The Emperor's niece. Princess Priscilla herself is planning to come."
"Really? Princess Priscilla?" Juliet murmured, gathering her letters into a neat stack without looking up.
Priscilla was technically only the Emperor's niece, but society treated her with the deference reserved for royalty — a princess in everything but official title.
Fatima's lips pressed into a tight, angry pout. Juliet seemed *utterly* indifferent to the news.
"You don't care who's there, do you?"
"Mm?"
"Well, *you* already have a handsome groom waiting for you."
At that, Juliet stopped. She looked up slowly, and something sly — almost mischievous — flickered across her features.
"Do you think so?"
"What are you talking about?"
"My fiancé." Juliet tilted her head, the ghost of a smile playing at her lips. "Do you really think he's handsome?"
Juliet's fiancé was Vincent, the Duke's second son — a young man whose striking appearance had earned him considerable popularity in high society despite his youth.
"You know, you've been simply *unbearable* lately!" Fatima snapped, casting an indignant glare across the table.
She could not fathom how anyone — *anyone* — could fail to consider such a fiancé a worthy match.
Juliet noticed the genuine displeasure darkening her friend's face and softened. She leaned forward, her voice steady and warm.
"Fatima, you will marry a man far more worthy than Vincent someday."
"How could you *possibly* know that?"
"I just do."
"Hmph."
There was no mockery in the words — not a trace. Juliet spoke with such quiet conviction that Fatima, for some inexplicable reason, felt the knot of irritation in her chest loosen.
She believed her.
"Do you want me to lend you my carriage?" Fatima asked, her voice gentler now.
---
## — The Carriage Home —
The Glenfield carriage rattled over cobblestones as the capital slid past the windows in a blur of gaslight and shadow. Juliet gazed at her own reflection in the glass — pale skin, dark eyes, an expression far too composed for a girl of eighteen.
The truth was, Juliet knew a great deal about the future. Far more than she had told Fatima.
Fatima would become a princess one day.
But Juliet — Juliet would die at twenty-five, at the hands of the man she had loved with a desperation that consumed her entire being.
*No. I'd be lucky if I simply died.*
This was not her first life.
Juliet had returned to her childhood carrying every memory of her previous existence — the suffering, the betrayals, the long and agonizing way she had died.
---
Her first life had been a **nightmare**.
When Juliet's parents died, her world collapsed into ruin. Her uncle, Baron Gaspard, assumed guardianship — and with it, absolute control over her fate.
*"I'm doing all this for you, Juliet."*
Those were the words he had spoken. She could still hear them, gentle as silk, rotten underneath.
In her first life, Juliet was married **five times**.
The first thing Baron Gaspard did upon becoming guardian to his orphaned niece was sell her. Not *marry her off* — **sell** her, to the highest bidder who would pay for the privilege of a young bride with noble blood.
Juliet, who had understood nothing, who had trusted the only family she had left, put on the wedding dress and veil her uncle laid out for her without question.
Her first husband was a man past eighty — so frail that death hovered at his bedside like an impatient guest.
Naturally, he died soon after the ceremony.
Juliet became a wealthy widow, but Baron Gaspard did not release his grip. Convinced that his niece's beauty and bloodline were assets to be leveraged again and again, he turned marriage into a business.
Four more husbands followed.
None of them were decent men. The sort of person willing to *purchase* a young noblewoman — to buy her pedigree like livestock at auction — was never the sort inclined toward kindness or moral restraint.
While her uncle grew richer and more powerful with each transaction, Juliet was hollowed out. Repeated forced marriages to men devoid of conscience broke something fundamental inside her. Her natural beauty, which should have been a blessing, became a poison — corroding her mind and body until she could no longer think clearly, could no longer distinguish between survival and surrender.
She had been close — *so close* — to ending her own life when he appeared.
An arrogant nobleman, cold-eyed and indifferent, who likely had no intention of saving anyone. But Baron Gaspard and her fifth husband had made the fatal mistake of disturbing the Grand Duke of the North. He disposed of them as one might swat away gnats — not for Juliet's sake, but because they had irritated him.
And yet, accident or not, he had pulled her from the wreckage of her existence.
*Perhaps it was only natural that I fell in love with the man who dragged me out of that hell.*
But that was then. That was the life she had already lived and died in.
In *this* life, she had never met him. The memories remained — vivid, brutal, carved into her bones — but the meeting had not yet happened. The suffering had not yet begun.
---
"We've arrived, my lady."
"Thank you."
Juliet pushed open the carriage door and stepped down onto the gravel path.
She lived in a modest old mansion just beyond the capital's edge — its walls softened by ivy, its gardens overgrown but fragrant with honeysuckle and wild roses. It was not grand. It was not impressive.
It was *home*.
In her first life, Juliet had lost both her parents the year she turned fifteen. That single, devastating loss had set everything else in motion — the uncle, the marriages, the slow unraveling of her soul.
"I'm back," Juliet called softly as she stepped into the living room.
"Welcome home, Juliet!"
An elegant woman with red hair swept into a graceful updo looked up from her embroidery and smiled — the kind of smile that filled every corner of the room with warmth.
It was Juliet's mother. Countess Lilian Montagu. Alive. Whole. Her eyes bright, her cheeks flushed with color, a silver thimble still perched on her finger.
"How was your time with your friend? Did you enjoy yourself?"
"Yes," Juliet replied.
A slight smile touched her lips — small and private and trembling at its edges with something too vast to name.
"It was fun."
Last winter, Juliet had come of age and celebrated her eighteenth birthday. Both her parents had been there — her father raising a glass of wine, her mother laughing as candle wax dripped onto the frosting.
They were still alive. Still well.
She had managed to change the future that was supposed to destroy her.