Supreme Spouse System.
Chapter 194: Before to the Moon Claims Her [Part-2]

Her dress accentuates her hourglass figure. A white velvet of kings, with off-the-shoulder sleeves and corseted waist, embroidered with silver moons and sapphire dust flecks. It hugged her body with eternal elegance. Tonight, however, she donned it not to blind...

...but to survive.

Standing in front of the mirror, her fingers trailed the rim of the glass. They shook.

Under the mirror, on the marble top, lay a purple velvet box of jewelry—formed like a lotus, adorned with twilight amethysts and rimmed with slender golden vines. She took it very slowly—nearly religiously—and opened it.

Her hands caressed the soft velvet lining as she opened the box. Within reclined a stunning necklace.

It was beautiful. Pale violet opals were cut into delicate petal forms and threaded by silken silver strings. Suspended at its heart was one amethyst, the shape of a starlight tear—encased in silver, suspended upon a crystal twilight chain. It shone not only with light—but with memory.

The necklace, a flower crystal with a star-encore core, glowed softly where the light brushed it.

Sona held the necklace in her hand.

Her breath caught.

Leon. He’d given her this—yesterday. Following all. following all the years. he’d put it in her palm. Not as a Duke bestowing gift upon his Queen, but as Leon—the boy who spent hours with her in the garden, following dragonflies and hopes.

The boy who had promised never to make her cry.

Her first love. Her only love.

"Why now?" The words flashed unbidden into her mind, a sudden, pointed thought.

She stroked her fingers across the cool pendant, the flower pattern catching the dim light. Her eyes gentled. Her lips parted, the words spilling out like a confide.

"...You actually gave this to me," she breathed, voice as delicate as the breeze riffing through the open window.

It wasn’t merely a present.

It was his. Something he had selected. Something he remembered.

Leon. The boy who had stolen her heart with a wooden sword and a slanted grin. The man who still possessed it, even now—with nothing but silence and heat.

Memories flooded in. A thousand small moments.

The way he’d carefully wrapped her knee when she fell during training.

The way he’d roll his eyes when she attempted to behave like a lady.

And once—oh, gods, she still recalled—he’d given her a tiny box with an awkward grin. In it were dainty earrings, a pale purple. Not her favorite color, but—

She’d inquired as to why.

"You look lovely in purple," he’d grumbled, cheeks flushed, voice cracking like a boy attempting too earnestly to be a man.

And now. this necklace. That same purple color shot through with emerald shades, sparkling in the light—and snagging her heart along the way.

Too much.

Too generous.

Too merciless.

For once, she had envisioned being his bride. Of sharing laughter in battles, of growing old and gray together—just Sona and Leon, side by side. But fate did not see it that way. Her family did not see it that way. They wedded her to a king.

A king who desired a queen—not a woman. Not her.

So she did her part. Wore the crown. Held her head high. Ruled.

But the pain never faded.

Leon never faulted her. Not ever.

And she? Never spoke a word. Never inquired what resided in his heart.

She believed... there would be time.

But whenever they met, he smiled—not at her, but at her crown.

As if something unseen stood between them.

An unseen wall that neither had the courage to call.

And it made matters worse.

Because she had spent so many years suppressing those feelings, hiding behind manners and responsibility. Pretending to have moved on.

But she hadn’t.

Not for a day.

And time hadn’t mended her.

It had merely shown her how to survive the pain with a smile.

Yesterday, in the garden—

When he smiled at her...

That same smile.

The one that got past her armor and broke all the pieces she’d worked so hard to put back together.

And when he departed...

She didn’t even put the box on a shelf. She made her way directly to her room, clutching it like a secret. Like a pulse.

She ran her fingers over its edges, again and again, till they were sore.

And then—when she couldn’t lie anymore, she was okay—she put it on.

Just to be near him.

"Yesterday, I thought we were just... us again," she breathed, fingertips caressing the starry gem at the pendant’s center as if daring it to sparkle for her. "Like nothing was different."

She released a soft breath—tremulous, low.

Then, a smile. Not harsh. Not bitter.

Just... weary.

"But we both know," she breathed, "we’ll never return to what we were... or what I used to hope we could be."

The room plunged into silence, heavy and complete.

It hung—long enough that time itself grew and softened.

Then—

Knock. Knock.

Harsh and abrupt, the knock broke the silence.

She jumped back, surprised.

But remained silent.

A hesitation.

Then another knock, this one softer. Tentative.

"Your Majesty?" said a gentle voice on the other side of the door. "I’ve brought the gowns for this evening’s feast. May I come in?"

Sona blinked, as if waking from a dream.

She shut her eyes and took a deep breath, collected herself.

Her voice was not very loud when she spoke once more—but it bore the authority of her crown.

"...Enter," she replied, soft, but regal.

The heavy doors groaned open.

A maiden maid stepped in first, curtsying with practiced ease. Two others followed behind her, each of them bearing silk-covered wooden rods upon which dangled an array of fine evening dresses—gleaming folds in colors of sapphire, pearl, and shadow. With them were accompanying gloves, a lacy hair ornament woven from moonlace, and a pair of silver shoes that glimmered like moonlight on water.

Their steps were silent on the shining marble floor.

Sona was standing in front of the great mirror, frozen like a statue. She turned slowly, her eyes fixed on one gown.

Midnight blue.

Off-shoulder.

Liquid night flowing down her skin.

The material was lined with tiny constellations, each one stitched with thread-of-light so fine that it glittered—like the stars themselves had been brought down from heaven and embroidered into silk.

Her breath hitched.

She said nothing, but her hand strayed automatically to the necklace lying in her hand—a chain of violet amethyst. She raised it, just below the neckline of the gown, observing the way the gem appeared to burn softly in the light of the dying day.

A perfect fit.

Too close to perfect.

Her mouth fell open, but nothing emerged. Only a soft exhalation.

For an instant, she pictured it—on her, tonight—if he were in the throng, eyes upon her. If he saw. If he smiled.

A sharp pang tugged at her ribs.

She wrapped the necklace in her fist, then slowly unwrapped it and put it back in its velvet box.

Her fingers lingered.

"Leon..." The idea came, still and hurting. "If you smile at me like that again this evening... I don’t think I’ll be able to keep to myself what I still feel."

She said nothing, though.

She merely smiled softly at the maids, moving away from the mirror with silence.

The women stepped with quiet care, setting out the gowns before her like gifts before a goddess. The only noise in the room was the faint whisper of fine cloth.

And Sona stood among them—not as a monarch.

But as a woman.

A woman whose heart was slowly shattering under the weight of what could have been.

As they tied the laces of the gown and arranged her jewelry, Sona’s mind drifted—not to the banquet, nor to the nobles who waited beyond the palace gates.

But to the man who had been her universe.

And perhaps—still was.

And outside, night crept closer.

Moonspire was prepared.