Chapter 2 The Life That Stole Mine

The bus rumbled through the city, the windows fogged with breath and condensation, blurring the world outside into streaks of grey. Seraphina sat near the back, her hood up, fingers clenched tight around the hospital wristband like it was the only solid thing left in her life.

C. A. V.

She had stared at those letters until they burned into her skull.

Celestine Avarelle.

She didn't know what scared her more-the resemblance, the name, or the undeniable truth her instincts refused to deny: she had been switched. Replaced. Discarded like a broken doll while someone else took her place in the golden cradle of the Avarelle empire.

A family with enough power to erase the past.

But they didn't erase her.

Not completely.

Not well enough.

She stepped off the bus in West Durnham-Avarelle territory. The streets here were cleaner. The buildings taller, glassier. No crumbling bricks, no rusted fences, no people begging for coins with sunken cheeks and dead eyes. Everything screamed wealth.

Seraphina had never belonged in this world.

But she was here now.

And she didn't plan on leaving quietly.

She stood across the street from the Avarelle estate, watching from beneath the shelter of a small bookstore awning. The mansion loomed behind the iron gates, ivy crawling up stone columns, windows tall and reflective like eyes watching her. The kind of house people only saw in magazines.

Guards paced at the entrance.

Motion sensors lined the gates.

Her blood simmered with something close to hatred.

She didn't even know these people.

But they had stolen something from her.

Everything.

And worse, they had given it to someone else.

---

Inside the estate, Celestine sipped tea on the balcony, legs crossed, perfectly dressed in a cream silk blouse and pearls. A private tutor recited lines from a history book while she idly scrolled through her phone.

She wasn't listening.

Her mind was elsewhere.

She couldn't shake the image from the night before-those eyes, that face. Her own, but not hers.

It had been a dream, she told herself again.

Maybe.

Her parents had never mentioned a twin. Not once. There were no baby photos of another child. No stories, no slip-ups, nothing. Still... something about the feeling wouldn't let her go.

"Celestine, are you alright?" her tutor asked.

She nodded. "Just a headache."

She got up, walked away, leaving the man calling her name behind.

She had to see Dr. Halberd.

The family physician. The one who was always too involved. Who never looked her in the eye when she asked about her birth.

---

Seraphina moved that night.

She returned after sunset, the guards thinning with the shift change.

She scaled the fence like she'd done it a hundred times in her dreams.

Quiet. Focused. Fury guiding her hands.

She slipped through the garden, hiding between hedges and marble fountains, eyes locked on the glowing window above-the one that had to be Celestine's room. She didn't know what she expected to do. Yell? Confront her? Demand her life back?

The plan ended at the window.

But fate didn't wait for plans.

A soft voice rang through the garden.

"You're not supposed to be here."

Seraphina froze.

Celestine stood near the archway, a flashlight in one hand, a phone in the other. She looked like a painting in motion-elegant, calm, untouchable.

Their eyes met.

The air cracked.

For a long moment, neither of them moved.

It was like staring into a mirror warped by time and circumstance.

"You..." Celestine's voice wavered. "Who are you?"

Seraphina stepped out from the shadows. "The girl who should've been in that room."

Celestine's face went pale.

"What did you say?"

Seraphina reached into her coat and pulled out the wristband.

Held it up like a weapon.

"You were born the same day I was. At the same hospital. And somehow, I ended up in a trash bin while you got handed everything."

"That's not true," Celestine whispered, but her voice shook.

"You think I'm lying?" Seraphina stepped closer. "Look at me. Look at my face and tell me I don't belong here."

Celestine stared.

She couldn't.

Because it was true.

Every instinct, every memory that never felt quite right-it all rushed into her like cold water.

"I didn't know," she whispered. "I swear, I didn't know."

Seraphina laughed bitterly. "Of course you didn't. You were too busy living my life."

Silence hung heavy between them.

"Then what do you want?" Celestine asked, almost pleading. "Revenge?"

Seraphina didn't answer at first. Her hand trembled around the wristband.

She wanted to scream yes.

She wanted to burn it all down.

But instead, she said, "I want answers. I want to know who did this. And why."

Celestine nodded slowly, tears gathering in her eyes. "Then we both need the truth."

They stood there, two strangers bound by a broken past.

Enemies born of the same blood.

And as the wind howled around them, Seraphina knew one thing for sure:

This wasn't the end.

It was the beginning.