Hades' Cursed Luna novel Chapter 282

Hades

The silence stretched so long it felt like the walls were closing in.

Felicia stared at us.

At the tablet.

At the truth.

And for a breath—just a single breath—her face crumpled in horror.

Then—

It hardened.

"I saved myself," she said sharply, her voice cracking through the room like a whip. "What was I supposed to do? Let her kill me? Let her kill all of us?"

She slammed her palm against the glass, making Lucinda flinch.

"You think I wanted this?" she snarled. "I had to survive! I had to!"

Her eyes darted desperately between her parents, landing harder on Montegue, then Lucinda—pleading, demanding.

"I'm your daughter," she spat. "Your only daughter now. Would you really throw me away for a corpse? For someone who's been rotting in a capsule all this time?"

Montegue's jaw tightened, but he said nothing.

Lucinda sobbed harder, her body folding in on itself like a dying thing.

Felicia didn't stop.

She pressed harder against the glass, breathing faster now, frantic.

"You're going to let some twisted sense of justice destroy your family?" she hissed. "You're going to let me rot in here, while the beast that murdered two royals walks free because she cried about being forced to kill?"

Her mouth twisted into something sharp, something ugly.

"She still killed them," Felicia said viciously. "She still tore them apart. Injection or not. Mind control or not."

She slammed her hand against the glass again.

"That bitch still ripped people apart while you're standing here mourning her like a saint!"

Kael stepped closer to Montegue, steadying him when his knees buckled slightly.

But Felicia wasn't looking anymore.

She only saw herself now.

Saw her world slipping through her fingers.

"You owe me!" she shouted, voice rising. "I did what I had to do! I survived! I kept the family together! I kept Elliot safe when no one else could!"

Her mouth trembled—but not with sorrow.

With rage.

"Danielle would have forgiven me," she said, almost sweetly. Almost laughing. "She always did, didn't she? I slept with her fiancé and she forgave me. So what if—" she hiccuped, breathless, "—so what if I got angry? So what if I snapped? I raised her son!"

She spread her hands as if waiting for applause.

"I gave up everything to raise him. I sacrificed years of my life for him. For you. For all of you."

The words curdled into something poisonous.

"So what if I killed her? She would have forgiven me anyway."

Lucinda's hands fell limp at her sides.

She simply stared at Felicia—her mouth working soundlessly, her body rocking slightly where she knelt.

Montegue looked older than I had ever seen him.

So much older.

"I am your daughter," Felicia said again, more viciously now. "Not her."

She slammed her palm against the glass once more, harder this time, rattling the frame.

"You want to throw me away?" she spat. "You want to toss away the only child you have left because of some stupid, outdated morality?"

She panted, chest heaving.

"I made a mistake," she said savagely. "Fine. I made a mistake. But family forgives. Danielle would have. So should you."

She smiled then—a sharp, broken thing, too many teeth and no warmth.

"We can still plan her anniversary," she said, voice trembling on the edge of hysteria. "We can still pick the flowers. Orchids and asters. Remember, Mother? Orchids and asters. Just like she wanted. It'll be beautiful. We'll make it perfect for her."

Lucinda moaned low in her throat and turned into Montegue's arms, sobbing uncontrollably.

Montegue just stood there.

Frozen.

Ruined.

He didn't speak.

Didn't move.

And Felicia—

Felicia just kept smiling.

Believing—desperately, violently—that if she smiled enough, if she pretended hard enough, the world would stitch itself back into the fantasy she wanted.

But it wouldn't.

It couldn't.

Because we had all seen it now.

We had all seen her tear her sister apart like an animal.

And no number of orchids or asters would ever hide the blood on her hands.

The silence after Felicia's desperate smile fractured was heavier than any scream.

Lucinda lifted her head, her voice cracking through the heavy air.