Hiding My Twin Heirs from the Ruthless Prince

CHAPTER 69

POV: Maximilian

They tell me my sister is dead on a morning that smells like incense.

The palace wakes differently that day. Servants move too quietly. Bells ring at the wrong hour. Black ribbons appear overnight along the corridors, pinned with precise, practiced hands. I know something is wrong before anyone speaks to me, before my tutor knocks and tells me I am summoned to the small chapel.

I walk there alone.

The doors are already open when I arrive. Candles line the walls in careful rows, their flames steady and obedient. At the front of the chapel rests a coffin—polished wood, carved with the Astorian crest. It is closed. Of course it is.

My mother stands beside it, her hands clasped together so tightly her knuckles have gone white. My father is a step behind her, his face carved into something rigid and unyielding. Council elders fill the pews, their heads bowed, their expressions solemn and unreadable.

No one looks surprised to see me.

“Maximilian,” my mother says softly. Her voice trembles despite her effort to keep it steady. “Come here.”

I walk forward, every step heavier than the last. My eyes never leave the coffin.

“What is this?” I ask.

The answer comes too quickly.

“Our beloved daughter, Princess Celeste, passed in the night,” Father says. “A sudden illness.”

The words hit me like a physical blow.

“No,” I say.

Silence ripples through the chapel. A few elders shift uncomfortably in their seats.

“I saw her yesterday,” I continue. “She was fine.”

My mother’s eyes glisten. “She was very ill, my love. We did not want to frighten you.”

My gaze snaps back to the coffin.

“Open it,” I say.

A murmur spreads through the room. Father’s jaw tightens.

“That will not be necessary.”

“Yes,” I insist, my voice rising. “It is.”

He steps closer to me, lowering his voice. “This is not appropriate.”

“For who?” I demand. “For me, or for you?”

My mother reaches for my arm. I pull away.

“You’re lying,” I say. “You told everyone she was sick because it was easier than telling them the truth.”

One of the elders clears his throat. “Prince Maximilian, grief can—”

“Stop,” I snap. “Don’t.”

My heart is pounding so loudly I can barely hear myself think. I look from face to face, searching for something—guilt, fear, hesitation. I find none of it. Only resolve.

“Open the coffin,” I say again, slower this time.

Father’s voice turns cold. “You will sit down.”

I don’t.

For a moment, I think he might strike me. Instead, he straightens and turns away.

“The ceremony will proceed,” he says. “You will honor your sister by showing restraint.”

Honor.

I stare at the coffin, at the carved crest I have seen a thousand times. I know without touching it that it is empty. I know it the way you know when a storm is coming—deep in your bones, impossible to ignore.

The prayers begin.

I do not hear them.

---

The funeral is private. No crowds. No citizens lining the streets. Only the court, cloaked in black, moving through the motions with grim efficiency. The coffin is carried out of the chapel and lowered into a family crypt that already feels too full.

I stand at the edge, my fists clenched, watching the stone slab slide into place.

“She loved the gardens,” someone murmurs behind me.

I whirl around. “Did she?”

The elder startles. “I—I meant—”

“You didn’t know her,” I say. “None of you did.”

They avert their eyes.

Afterward, the palace returns to its routine with alarming speed. The ribbons remain. The candles burn. But Celeste’s name is already being spoken in the past tense, carefully and politely, like a story that has reached its end.

I retreat to my room and lock the door.

For hours, I sit on the floor staring at the wall, replaying everything I know. The last time I saw her. The guards near her wing. The way Father avoided my eyes whenever I asked questions.

A sudden illness.

It doesn’t fit.

Celeste was never ill. She was frightened. Isolated. Watched. Contained.

The words from the council session echo in my mind like a drumbeat.

Containment. Sacrifice.

I stand abruptly, heart racing.

“No,” I whisper.

I pace the room, my thoughts snapping into sharp focus. If Celeste truly died of illness, there would be records. Physicians. Witnesses. There would have been time—time to tell me, time to prepare.

There was none.

I grab my journal from beneath the mattress and flip through the pages, scanning my own handwriting. Dates. Observations. Patterns. Guards posted where they hadn’t been before. Servants reassigned. Doors closed.

She didn’t die.

She was removed.

The realization settles cold and heavy in my chest.

That night, long after the palace has gone quiet, I leave my room.

I know the routes by heart now—the servants’ corridors, the staircases that creak less than others. I move like a shadow, keeping to the edges, my heart hammering with every step.

I go to her chambers first.

The door is sealed. A wax crest pressed into place, unbroken. Two guards stand watch, their expressions rigid.

I do not approach.

I turn instead toward the older wing of the palace, the one no one uses anymore. The one whispered about by servants who think children do not listen.

The abandoned tower.

I reach the base just before dawn, breathless, my pulse racing. The door is barred. Heavy. New.

I press my ear to the cold wood.

Nothing.

No sound. No movement. No answer when I whisper her name.

“Celeste,” I breathe.

The tower does not respond.

I step back, dread coiling tight in my gut. If she is not here, then she is somewhere worse.

I return to my room just before the bells ring for morning prayers.

When the sun rises, I sit at my desk and open my journal to a new page.

I write everything.

The coffin. The sealed chamber. The guards. The tower door. I write until my hand cramps and the ink smears. I write because if I don’t, the truth might disappear the way they want Celeste to disappear.

I close the book and press my palm against the cover, grounding myself.

They think I will accept this.

They think I will mourn and move on and become the heir they want without asking questions.

They are wrong.

My sister is not dead.

And if they have hidden her away, then I will find her.

Even if I have to tear this palace apart stone by stone to do it.