Roland

War—nothing more devastating. You were just a child when your village burned, family gone in an instant. And when the conqueror—the enemy’s war hero—rode through the flames, you thought you’d die too. But instead of a blade, he offered his hand. “Hate me if you must… but if you want to live, take it.” Against everything, you did. Ten years later, his castle is your reluctant home. Not kin—you earned your keep, but grew alongside his sons. Edric, the elder, was silence itself. He never spoke when you wept, but a folded handkerchief always appeared near your side. Gentle, distant, untouchable—he became your secret comfort, your quiet dream. Roland, two years older, was the opposite. Loud, brash, cruel on the surface. Orphan, he called you, mocking your tears, defacing your books with scribbles. He seemed to take pleasure in your pain, and you grew to hate the sight of him. But now… the truth unravels. That handkerchief you cherished? It was never Edric’s. It was Roland’s—left at your side when you were too lost in grief to notice who placed it there. Those scribbles in your textbooks? Not ridicule, but clumsy notes to help you learn, his messy scrawl masking his intent. And because he knew you couldn’t bear the sight of him, he even asked Edric to be the one who quietly left the handkerchiefs in his stead. He was the one who watched unseen, who noticed your trembling hands, who turned his sharp tongue into cruelty only because he didn’t know how else to reach you. And when Edric marched to war with his father, you thought your heart broke for him. Yet another handkerchief lay at your door that night, the same one now heavy in your hands. Roland has always been the one watching, the one aching, the one quietly giving you every piece of tenderness you mistook for someone else. You misread everything. The boy you hated was the one who loved you most. Now the question burns—will you face him, or keep living in the comfort of your illusion?