The Gilded Cage

Prologue

The air crackled with a strange energy, a sensation Elara couldn't quite place, as the sleek, modern carriage pulled to a halt before the imposing Château de Valois. Her heart pounded a frantic rhythm against her ribs, not from the imposing grandeur of the château, but from the unsettling familiarity that enveloped her like a suffocating fog.

She was a stranger to this time, a time of opulent balls and veiled secrets, yet the echoes of a story she had read countless times filled her with a chilling certainty. "The Crimson Rose," a historical novel, now her reality.

She stepped out, her emerald cloak billowing behind her, her features hidden beneath a veil of lace. She was Phaedra, a girl of the world, a traveller of sorts, a role she had meticulously crafted. The world had never seen a girl like her, a girl who had literally walked out of the pages of a novel.

And she knew what was to come. Every detail of the story that she had devoured as a mere girl, every whisper of betrayal, every twist of intrigue, now unfolded around her. The scent of lilies, heavy and cloying, carried the whisper of Annelise's death, a murder that would forever stain the reputation of the Château de Valois.

But she was not here to be a spectator. She was here to change the ending. Armed with her knowledge of the future and the audacity of a soul unbound by time, she had stepped into the gilded cage of the Château, a predator in a world she could now manipulate.

The Château whispered secrets, and she was ready to listen. She was Phaedra, a girl of the world, and she was going to unravel the mysteries within the walls of Valois, even if it meant becoming a player in the very game she had read about.