I am not Dhalia.
I am Raya.
She had to remind herself of that, even if the weight of the lie suffocated her.
She wasn’t Dhalia. She had never been Dhalia.
She was born as Raya, in the ruthless Northern Star Kingdom, one of the most brutal, power-hungry kingdoms that existed. A kingdom where weakness was crushed, and bloodlines were worshiped.
From the moment she took her first breath, she was marked as an outcast. A mistake.
Because she was a bastard.
Her mother, Aly, had been nothing more than a royal maid, an insignificant speck in the grand halls of the Northern Star palace. A naive girl who made the mistake of falling in love with the wrong man.
King Rufus.
For him, it had been nothing more than another night of indulgence, another conquest to satisfy his endless appetite. But
