She jolted upright.
The sheets tangled around her legs like vines. Her breath came in sharp gasps, chest heaving, heart drumming like it was trying to escape her ribs. Moonlight spilled through the tall windows, silver and cold — washing over her skin like the dream hadn't ended at all.
Her hands shook.
She brought them up, staring. Still bare. No blood. No torn dress. Just the thrum of something deep inside her — a memory, maybe. Or something older.
The poem still echoed in her skull, each word stitched into her nerves like a curse:
> "Dancing in blood... she poured on folks..."
She flinched. Her fingers curled into the sheets, trying to breathe past the lump in her throat.
This wasn't the first time she'd dreamed it.
But this time, it felt real. The garden. The voice. The scent of rotting roses. And that presence, lingering just behind her. She could almost feel its breath on her neck still.
She turned, slowly.
Her room was quiet. The canopy above her bed drifted slightly from the breeze slipping through the open balcony doors. The carved wood shimmered faintly, reacting to her aura — the soft glow of half-fae blood responding to her distress. She hated that.
She hated that her blood was only half theirs.
Princess of the Fae Court — but not pure. Not untouched. Her mother had been mortal, and though they never spoke of her, the court never let her forget.
She reached for the vial on her nightstand — essence of moonleaf, brewed to calm the pulse of magic that lived in her veins. She didn't drink it. Just held it. Let it cool her palm.
> Who was the woman in the poem?
> Why did the words come so easily?
She hadn't read them. Hadn't learned them. They had poured from her lips like she'd known them for centuries.
> Was it a dream?
> Or a memory passed down in blood?
The shadows in the corners of her room seemed to lean in, listening.
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