Celestina sat in the nursery, rocking Arden gently as her mother, Isolde, sat across from her with a determined look. The soft glow of the evening sun filtered through the curtains, casting a warm light on the room. But Celestina’s heart was cold.

“I can’t do it, Mother,” she said, her voice low but firm. “I can’t invite him here after everything he’s done.”

Isolde leaned forward, her expression calm but her eyes serious. “You have to think about Arden, not yourself.”

Celestina scoffed. “Arden will have all the love she needs from me. She doesn’t need a father who abandoned us the moment things got hard.”

Isolde shook her head. “You’re not being fair.”

Celestina’s tone sharpened. “Fair? He chose her, Mother. He chose the doppelgänger over me. He betrayed me.”

For a moment, Isolde’s lips tightened, her gaze softening with a mixture of pain and understanding. “And your father chose other women over me,” she said quietly. “But that didn’t make me want to take you from him. No matter what he did to me, I couldn’t let that hurt destroy the bond you had with him. You deserved to know your father, even if he didn’t deserve us.”

Celestina opened her mouth to argue but closed it again. The weight of her mother’s words settled heavily on her chest.

Later that evening, Isolde joined Celestina in the library, carrying a tray with two cups of tea. She placed it on the table and sat beside her daughter, her demeanor softening.

“Do you know what hurt the most about your father sending me away?” Isolde asked, her voice trembling slightly.

Celestina glanced at her, surprised by the sudden shift. “What?”

“It wasn’t the betrayal,” Isolde said, her eyes filling with tears. “It was being