Chapter 127: The stranger
The air smelled like freshly baked pastries. Warm butter, sugar and something sweet drifted through the room, wrapping around Yuki even before consciousness fully returned. Her eyelids fluttered. A faint groan escaped her lips as she slowly opened her eyes.
For a few seconds, everything around her remained blurred. She blinked repeatedly until the shapes began to sharpen, and the first thing she saw was the ceiling. Wooden boards. Yuki frowned. This was not the ceiling of her room at Ravencourt.
A sharp wave of panic hit her at once.
She pushed herself up slowly, expecting pain to tear through her body the moment she moved. But nothing happened. Her muscles felt strangely light, almost weightless. There was no agony in her chest. No burning sensation from the three rejections. No lingering pain from the backlash that had nearly torn her apart. Her brows drew together.
"Where am I?" she murmured, her voice still rough with sleep.
Yuki sat upright, her gaze sweeping across the unfamiliar room. The bed beneath her was enormous, covered in soft white sheets and several thick blankets. The room itself was luxurious, but there was something distinctly homely about it.
Warm wooden furniture filled the space without making it feel crowded. A small table stood beside the bed, and a soft rug covered the floor. There were no extravagant decorations meant to flaunt wealth, only carefully chosen pieces that made the room feel lived in.
Yuki slowly lifted a hand to her chest. Her brows furrowed. She closed her eyes and reached inward.
Her wolf.
Yuki searched for her presence, expecting to feel the familiar warmth of another consciousness nestled inside her mind. There was nothing.
Yuki’s eyes flew open. Panic surged through her.
"Where are you?" she muttered, her brows pulling together.
She reached for her wolf again, pushing deeper into the bond they had shared for as long as she could remember. There was nothing. Her breath caught.
"No," she gasped.
Her wolf couldn’t be dead from the backlash...
She didn’t want to imagine it.
Yuki threw the blankets aside and stumbled out of bed. Her bare feet landed on the soft rug, the thick fibres cushioning every step. She barely noticed how pleasant it felt beneath her soles. Her wolf was gone. Or at least, Yuki could no longer feel her. The thought sent a cold shiver down her spine. She needed answers now.
Yuki hurried towards the door and pushed it open. Her bare feet touched the polished wooden floor outside. She froze. The corridor took her breath away. The interior was breathtaking, built with the elegance of a luxurious glass villa, with enormous windows stretching from floor to ceiling and allowing the fading light of evening to spill inside. Yet the view beyond them was far more beautiful than anything inside.
Yuki slowly approached the nearest window. Her mouth parted. An endless meadow stretched towards the horizon. Tall wildflowers covered the land as far as she could see, their delicate stems swaying gently beneath the evening breeze. The sky above them was caught between twilight and night, the last traces of daylight fading into deep shades of blue and violet, while stars had already begun appearing overhead.
But the flowers were what truly captivated her. They glowed in the twilight. Tiny points of light shimmered among the endless field, creating the illusion of a sea of stars beneath the sky. Some flowers glowed faintly, while others shone brightly enough to illuminate the grass surrounding them. Fireflies drifted above the meadow in countless numbers, their lights blinking lazily across the horizon.
Yuki stared in complete wonder. She had never seen anything like this. There was no road or visible path. Nothing connected the villa to the outside world. The house appeared to sit in the middle of an endless wilderness.
Where was she?
The question returned to her mind. What had happened after the rejection ceremony? Yuki’s stomach twisted.
She turned away from the window and began walking down the corridor. Her bare feet made almost no sound against the polished floor, though the wooden stairs creaked softly beneath her weight as she descended. The scent of freshly baked pastries grew stronger. Yuki followed it.
At the bottom of the stairs, she found a doorway leading into a large kitchen. The sound of pots clinking together came from inside. She hesitated. Her hand hovered over the door for a moment before she finally pushed it open. The name almost slipped from her lips.
"Aevia..."
Yuki froze. The man standing inside the kitchen had his back to her, but something about him had immediately reminded her of her sister. It made no sense. Aevia was a woman, and this man was unmistakably male.
Yet there was something familiar about his presence, something in the shape of his features that had made Yuki think of her sister the moment she saw him. But the longer Yuki stared, the more she realised he wasn’t Aevia at all. He was simply... devastatingly beautiful.
The man was extraordinarily tall, nearly two metres, around 6 feet 7 inches, with a broad, well proportioned build that made his presence naturally imposing. Long snow-white hair fell down his back, reaching his waist in a smooth curtain.
Even dressed in simple clothes, he looked like someone who could command an entire room without raising his voice. His loose, dark trousers and soft shirt were clearly expensive despite their homely appearance, yet somehow, they suited him perfectly.
Yuki’s gaze moved towards his face. His profile was striking. He possessed a sharp, masculine jaw and a straight, elegant nose, but there was a softness to his features that gave him an almost ethereal beauty.
His lashes were long and white, catching the light and looking almost translucent, framing eyes that Yuki couldn’t yet see properly from where she stood. His cheekbones were defined without appearing harsh, and his lips were perfectly shaped. The combination should not have worked. It did.
Yuki had always thought the Ravencourt brothers were intimidating. Their presence alone could silence a room. But they didn’t hold a candle to this man. The stranger stood at the kitchen counter, calmly decorating pastries as though he hadn’t just been interrupted by a half dead girl wandering barefoot into his kitchen.
Yuki stared, struck by his beauty. She had completely forgotten what she had intended to ask. The man carefully placed the final piece of decoration onto the pastry before setting down the utensil.
"I can actually hear you staring," he remarked calmly, his deep voice carrying quiet amusement.
Yuki froze.
"But I haven’t said a thing," she whispered, her voice small with shock.
A smile touched his lips. Then he finally turned around. Yuki’s breath caught. His full face was even more unfairly beautiful. For one ridiculous second, she could only stare. How could someone be this good-looking? The thought had barely formed when the man laughed. It was a deep, warm sound that filled the kitchen.
"Enough gushing," he said with an amused glint in his voice. "I know I’m good-looking, but I advise you not to fall for someone who reminds you of Aevia."