Chapter 21

Camille's point of view

Victoria's gaze sharpened. "Yes. Every lesson, every challenge, every seemingly excessive demand,they all serve that purpose. To make you stronger than Sophia was. More prepared for the dangers wealth and power attract."

"And to make me capable of the revenge you've planned."

"That too," she acknowledged. "The people who hurt you must pay for what they've done. But beyond revenge lies something more important, your future. What you'll build after justice is served."

I considered her words, understanding for the first time that Victoria's vision extended beyond my usefulness as an instrument of revenge. She was investing in me for reasons beyond my resemblance to Sophia or my vendetta against Rose.

"I still shouldn't have come in here without permission,"Isaid after a moment. "This space is sacred to you.I violated that."

Victoria sighed, tension visibly leaving her shoulders. "Perhaps it was inevitable. Perhaps it was even necessary." She turned fully toward me. "You cannot become who you need to be while seeing me as merely a mentor or benefactor. You need to understand who I am beneath the power and wealth."

"A mother who lost her child," I said softly.

"Yes." The simple acknowledgment carried volumes of pain. "A woman who built an empire, then watched it become meaningless in an instant when her daughter's heart stopped beating."

She stepped into Sophia's room, beckoning me to follow. This time the invitation was deliberate, conscious.She moved to the closet, sliding open the door to reveal clothing still hanging neatly, designer dresses,casual wear, university sweatshirts.

"She was taller than you," Victoria observed. "More athletic build. Preferred blues and greens to the warm tones that suit your coloring."

From a high shelf, she removed a small wooden box inlaid with mother-of-pearl. "Sophia's jewelry. Things she cherished, mostly for sentimental rather than monetary value."

She opened the box, revealing an eclectic collection, some fine pieces but also quirky earrings, friendship bracelets, the kind of personal treasures that told a life's story.

Victoria selected something from the box, a delicate silver bracelet with a single charm, a tiny chess piece.A knight.

"Her favorite piece," Victoria explained. "She said knights were the most interesting because they move differently than everything else on the board. Unconventional. Less direct but sometimes more effective."

She held out the bracelet to me. "She would want you to have this."

The gesture stunned me, Victoria offering something that had belonged to Sophia, inviting me to carry a piece of her daughter's memory.

"I couldn't possibly..."

"You can," Victoria interrupted firmly."And you will. Not because you're replacing her, no one could. But because you're continuing something she valued, the courage to move in unexpected ways across the board."

With trembling fingers, I accepted the bracelet, feeling its weight, physical and symbolic, in my palm.Victoria watched as l.fastened it around my wrist, the tiny silver knight catching the light.

"Thank you," I whispered, understanding the magnitude of the gesture.

Victoria nodded once, then glanced around the room with a long, measuring look. "Ten years," she said softly. "A decade of preserving everything exactly as it was on her last day."

Something in her voice had changed, a note of finality, of decision.

"Perhaps," she continued slowly, "it's time to begin letting go. Not forgetting, never forgetting. But acknowledging that preserving rooms exactly as they were won't bring her back."

She moved to the curtains, pulling them further open to allow more sunlight to flood the room. Dust motes danced in the golden light, bringing warmth to the long-closed space.

"A mausoleum serves no one," Victoria said, more to herself than to me. "Not the dead, certainly not the living."

I watched as she straightened a picture frame, adjusted a book on the nightstand, small gestures that seemed to signify a shift in her decade-long relationship with grief.

"| come here to remember," she continued. "But memory doesn't require that time stand still." She turned to me, eyes clearer than I'd ever seen them. "Sophia would hate knowing l've kept her rooms like this,unchanged, unbreathing. She was always moving forward, always evolving."

"What will you do?" |asked.

"Not erase her," Victoria clarified quickly. "Never that. But perhaps... begin to interact with her memory differently. Keep what matters most, let go of the rest."

She gathered the framed photo from the bedside table, the one showing mother and daughter with foreheads touching, and held it carefully in both hands.

"This comes with me. The chest pieces we were playing with. Her journals. The things that captured her essence." Victoria's voice remained steady, though I could see the cost of this decision in the tightness around her eyes. "The rest... perhaps it's time to consider what might honor her memory better than preservation in amber."

As we left Sophia's rooms together, Victoria paused at the chess set. With deliberate movements, she completed the move she'd been contemplating, the white pawn advancing rather than retreating.

"She would have countered brilliantly," Victoria said with quiet certainty. "She always did."

In the hallway, I waited as Victoria locked the door behind us, the soft click of the mechanism somehow less final than when I'd unlocked it earlier. Something had shifted between us, some barrier falling away to reveal the woman beneath the formidable exterior.

"I have one question," I said as we walked toward the main part of the house.

Victoria raised an eyebrow, the familiar gesture almost comforting after the emotional intensity of the past hour.

"The phoenix pendant you gave me when I first arrived, it matches the one Sophia wore in many of her photos."

"Yes," Victoria confirmed. "It was a design I commissioned when she graduated fromn MIT. A symbol of transformation, of emerging stronger through fire." She glanced at the bracelet now circling my wrist. "You now wear both symbols, the knight who moves unpredictably and the phoenix who rises from destruction."

The significance wasn't lost on me. "Is that how you see me? A combination of Sophia's unconventional thinking and my own rebirth through adversity?"

Victoria stopped walking, turning to face me fullyin the grand hallway. Afternoon sun streamed through tall windows, highlighting the silver in her hair, the fine lines around her eyes, signs of humanity often obscured by her powerful presence.

"What I see," she said carefully, "is someone finding her own path while carrying meaningful symbols from those who came before. Not a replacement for my daughter. Not merely a vehicle for revenge.But a young woman becoming something unique, something powerful,something entirely her own."

She touched the phoenix pendant at my throat lightly, then the knight charm on my wrist. "These are reminders, not definitions. You'll forge your own symbols in time."

As we continued walking, side by side through the mansion that had become my home, I felt a subtle but significant change in our relationship. For the first time, Victoria had allowed me to see beyond her carefully constructed facade to the wounded heart beneath. For the first time, I understood that her demanding nature came not just from perfectionism but from fear, fear of failing to protect another young woman under her care.

And for the first time, I wondered if revenge alone would satisfy either of us. If perhaps something more complex, more healing might lie beyond the destruction we'd planned for those who had wounded us.