’Thank you Arven’ She flashed a bright smile, ’My life has become about this inheritance,’ she explained, her gaze shifted off to the middle distance and her brow furrowed in self contemplation. ’It was a lot money, life changing.’ and it had been. A bakers daughter had had the chance to raise her station in life, and at one time, to be viewed as someone worthy of someone like Handsome. It was ridiculous! ’But the caveat, the requirement that I marry has changed my life.’ she took a beat and snapped out in what was obvious annoyance, ’and not in a good way.’ She could feel a rant about Ana and Georgi whispering at the back of her throat, but she held it back – if not for them she wouldn’t have met Mister Fisk. She paced as she spoke, her steps quickening in pace as she strode back and forth in front of Antonia’s plinth.

She stopped, turning away from him her frame deflated a little, her shoulders slumping, the realisation washing over her like a tide ’I can’t do this anymore’ she half whispered to herself, ’I can’t pretend.’ It was all things she knew, objectively in her head, but saying them out loud, giving them voice and air, and space to breath here in this muffeled sanctuary made them real, and brought them to life. If it meant forgoing the inheritance, the life her grandfather had gifted her to spite her father then that would be that. She leaned heavily on antonias plinth as though physically exhausted by the sudden realisation.

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