Hiding My Twin Heirs from the Ruthless Prince

CHAPTER 125

POV: Evangeline

I already know what the stone will say.

That does not prepare me for seeing it.

The grave lies beneath an old oak at the edge of the royal cemetery, slightly apart from the others—not isolated, but intentional. Alexandro always existed that way. Close enough to belong. Far enough to be different.

I stop before it, breath locked in my chest.

I was there when he died.

That truth never leaves me. It lives under my skin, in my bones, in the spaces between words when people speak too carefully around me.

This is not closure.

This is confirmation.

I lower myself to the ground slowly, my knees sinking into damp earth. The grass is wet from earlier rain, darkening the hem of my dress. I don’t care. I press my palm flat against the stone as if touch might still matter.

DUKE ALEXANDRO

DIED SHIELDING THE CROWN

Shielding. The word fractures something in me every time.

“You didn’t even hesitate,” I whisper. “Not even for a breath.”

The memory comes back whole, unmerciful, refusing to soften with time.

***

The dining hall was warm that night.

Too warm.

Candles burned low over polished wood, the table crowded with family in a way that felt almost unreal—Sebastian beside me, our sons laughing softly at something Maximilian’s child had said, Alexandro across from me, relaxed in a way I hadn’t seen in years.

We were whole.

For once.

Alexandro had leaned toward me, voice low. “You look tired.”

I smiled. “I always do.”

He smirked. “You were always bad at resting.”

I opened my mouth to reply—

And the doors exploded inward.

Guards shouted. Steel rang. Magic cracked through the air like thunder tearing flesh.

Henry.

I knew him instantly, even before Sebastian stood, even before the children screamed. He walked in with William beside him—too young for the weight in his eyes, too familiar with hatred already. Henry’s gaze locked onto Sebastian with terrifying precision.

“This ends tonight,” Henry said.

Sebastian moved instinctively—toward us, toward the children.

So did Alexandro.

“No!” I screamed.

Henry raised his hand. Magic screamed. And Alexandro stepped in front of Sebastian without a single second of thought.

There was no dramatic struggle. No prolonged suffering. The magic hit him full in the chest. Alexandro fell.

I remember the sound his body made against the floor more clearly than the screams. I remember my chair scraping back violently, my knees slamming down beside him. I remember his eyes—wide, startled, already fading.

“Alex,” I sobbed. “Alex, look at me.”

His mouth opened.

No sound came out.

Blood spread across his shirt, dark and fast and unstoppable.

Sebastian was shouting orders. Guards were moving. Henry was being restrained. William was crying.

None of it mattered.

Alexandro’s hand twitched once, weakly, against my sleeve.

I grabbed it.

“I’m here,” I said desperately. “I’m right here.”

His eyes found mine for half a heartbeat.

And then they didn’t.

***

I suck in a shaky breath and force myself back into the present.

My hand curls against the grave.

“You died protecting him,” I say quietly. “After everything. After running. After coming back. After surviving Father.”

My voice breaks. “You died protecting the man I married. The crown you never wanted.”

Footsteps approach behind me, slow, familiar.

Sebastian does not speak at first. He stops a respectful distance away, as he always does when grief is this raw.

“I told the guards not to follow,” he says finally.

“I know,” I reply.

I don’t turn. I can feel him there anyway—solid, restrained, carrying guilt he never names aloud.

“You were there,” I say.

“Yes,” he answers.

“You saw it.”

“Yes.”

“He didn’t even think,” I continue. “He just moved.”

Sebastian exhales slowly. “He saved my life.”

“And broke mine,” I say, not cruelly. Just honestly.

Silence stretches.

“I see his face every night,” Sebastian admits. “Every time I close my eyes.”

I nod. “So do I. The difference is—I was holding his hand.”

Sebastian does not argue. He never does when I speak like this.

I finally look back at the stone.

“I didn’t lose you to distance,” I whisper. “Or silence. Or pride.”

I swallow hard.

“I lost you to one moment of love.”

I turn my head toward Sebastian. “That’s the cruelest part.”

He meets my gaze. “If I could take it back—”

“No,” I say immediately. “Don’t.”

He stills.

“You don’t get to wish his choice away,” I continue. “It was his. It was who he was.”

Sebastian nods once. “You’re right.”

I rise slowly to my feet, legs unsteady but holding.

“I spent years thinking you abandoned me,” I say to the grave. “Then years forgiving you for it.”

A sad breath leaves me. “Turns out you never stopped choosing us. You just did it in the worst possible way.”

The wind moves through the leaves above, soft and indifferent.

“I was there,” I whisper. “You didn’t die alone. You didn’t die misunderstood.”

I place my palm over my heart.

“You died loved.”

Sebastian steps closer, stopping at my side. Not touching. Never touching unless I invite it.

“I will make sure history remembers him properly,” he says quietly. “Not as collateral. Not as a footnote to vengeance.”

“He deserves that,” I reply.

“And so do you,” he adds.

I look at him then—really look. The man who lived because my brother died. The man I chose, and the man Alexandro chose too, in the end.

“I don’t forgive Henry,” I say. “And I don’t hate him either.”

Sebastian nods. “I understand.”

“I just carry it,” I continue. “All of it.”

“That’s what you’ve always done,” he says softly.

I turn back to the grave one last time.

“Goodbye, Alex,” I whisper. “You kept your promise in the only way you knew how.”

I step away.

Not because the pain fades.

But because staying would turn grief into worship—and he would have hated that.

As we walk back toward the carriage, I feel the past settle into place at last. Not rewritten. Not softened. Not forgiven. Just remembered correctly. And that, I realize, is the only kind of peace people like us are ever allowed to have.