Flashback: Five-Year-Old Vivian
The Nan family garden glowed beneath the golden hush of late afternoon. The magnolia trees whispered with secrets, petals trembling in the wind.
Tiny Vivian crouched behind a hedge, her silk shoes damp with dew. In her hand, a drooping peony sagged like an afterthought.
Just beyond, Dowager Nan sat beneath a cherry blossom tree, rocking an infant wrapped in red silk. The baby cooed, unaware that her mere existence was a declaration of war.
"My true heir," the dowager whispered, pressing a kiss to the child's forehead. Her fingers lingered on the crimson birthmark, blooming like a curse across the baby's cheek. "The mark of Nan blood. Blessed by fire."
Vivian looked down at her own smooth, unmarked wrist.
Then she looked at the flower in her hand.
And snapped the stem in half.
Present: Gunpoint Confession
Back in the Lancaster stairwell, the pistol pressed hard against Sienna's temple.
Vivian's hand trembled—but her voice was steel.
"Mother never looked at me like that."
Sienna didn't move.
Vivian leaned in, the cold muzzle now biting skin.
"Even after they took you away, even after I became everything she wanted—the grades, the posture, the piano competitions—she kept your nursery untouched.She kept your name in the family shrine."
Behind them, Silas coughed, blood dribbling down his chin.
He managed a crooked grin.
"All this… because Mommy didn't love you enough?""Tragic."
Vivian's eyes flashed.
"You think I wanted this?To be the replacement?The decoy?Do you know what it's like to live in someone else's shadow, even after they're gone?"
"Do you know what it's like to be second choice in your own family?"
The gun shook in her hand.
Sienna's heartbeat thudded in her throat.
Her vision narrowed.
Then—
"No," she said, "but I do know what it's like to stop playing nice."
CRACK.
Sienna slammed her forehead into Vivian's with all the force of thirteen years of exile.Skull met skull. Pain flared white.
Vivian gasped, staggered back—The pistol clattered down the stairs.
Silas groaned behind them.
Sienna didn't hesitate.
She caught Vivian's wrist mid-swing and twisted, driving her knee upward.
"I didn't ask for the bloodline.But if you want to bleed for it—I'll oblige."
Vivian collapsed with a cry, clutching her side.
Sienna retrieved the gun, hand steady now.
"And Viv?""Mother still wouldn't have been proud of this."