My Unchosen Ex Chases Reborn Me (Soren and Fiona) novel Chapter 108

Chapter 108 Shifting Alliances.

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“Princess Helen has yet to confirm her granddaughter’s engagement. I suspect she plans to marry the girl to the heir apparent. If she helps the Fourth Prince claim the throne and her granddaughter enters the harem, her estate’s position would be stable.”

A second thought flared in Soren’s mind. Fiona’s sudden insistence on visiting Yondale had coincided perfectly with Pierre’s death. She had lived one life before and carried knowledge that other people could never guess. Perhaps Yondale’s secrets were exactly what drew her there.

When Callum’s footsteps faded, Soren draped a cloak over his shoulders and walked toward Clearsky Pavilion, the confidential wing where plans were forged in ink and midnight silence.

“Lord Soren, the parcels are ready. Shall I send someone to deliver them to Ms. Fiona in Yondale?” Harriet asked, careful not to overstep.

“No. That will not be necessary,” Soren said at last, the words cool as still water.

The sentiments of a previous lifetime still whispered to him, telling him that marrying her would cost him nothing. Yet, clear–headed, he understood the path would be strewn with thorns. Even if he treated Fiona with every ounce of honor, the two of them might one day still stand on opposite sides of a blade.

He had expected Fiona to demand an apology–perhaps even retribution–for the line he crossed that afternoon. Instead, she let the matter drift like dust in lamplight, and her quiet mercy felt like a blessing. Once a road twists, forcing it straight again can snap the traveler in

two.

From the way she carried herself, he could almost glimpse another lifetime in which they never faced hardship hand in hand. Interests had kept them apart then; he saw no reason to walk that weary road again.

Harriet, observing from the wings, could only sigh at how merciless men could be. The other day, Soren had all but worn his heart on his sleeve for Fiona–ears flaming scarlet, lingering outside Crane Tower long after she left, even arranging luggage for her with absurd, almost tender care.

Yet scarcely a month later, he stood once more composed, spring water without ripples, as though nothing had touched him at all. Should he declare he once fancied Fiona, the world would only assume he had ulterior motives.

Two days later, inside the hidden vault, Soren’s gaze landed on the lyric Fiona had penned, still hanging unguarded on the wall. He ordered his men to take it down.

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Chapter 108 Shifting Alliances

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Harriet had paid five thousand gold coins for that scrap at Crane Tower, only for Soren to claim it afterward.

“If you truly have no use for the verses, please return them to me,” Harriet said, unable to hide how much she loved the piece.

“Leave it for now. When she returns, let her come for it herself,” Soren replied, voice low and

sure.

Harriet understood immediately. Soren still wished to see what stance Fiona would take in the end; only then would he decide his own.

Whether that patience rose from guilt–he had, after all, startled her that day—or from a lingering unwillingness to sever the tie, Harriet could not tell.

Soren’s feelings for Fiona had always been a riddle wrapped in courtly restraint.

Come midsummer, envoys from the Steppe Nomads arrived to pay formal homage. Marching in their train was the famed general Garrick Yelton, still bristling over his recent defeat. He shouted challenges the way other men ordered wine, demanding Soren face him again.

Soren had not expected a duel, yet he calmly stripped the sword from a nearby guard and, with a slight nod, said, “After you, General Yelton.”

“Fetch your own blade, Lord Soren,” Garrick snorted, certain that in pure steel against steel the strategist could never match him.

“This one will do,” Soren answered, utterly unruffled.

Garrick bared his teeth. “If you lose, hand over Luna to me. Do we have a bargain?”

Luna had once escaped Garrick’s camp, her beauty haunting him for years. He still smarted at having spared her then, for that mercy delivered her straight into Soren’s hands.

“Luna is not mine to wager–and you cannot defeat me,” Soren replied, his voice cool as mountain ice.

The ease with which he spoke those final words made the boast feel less like arrogance and more like prophecy.

Garrick’s eyes narrowed. He raised his sword in both hands and lunged, the tip aimed three inches below Soren’s throat–a disabling blow, not a fatal one.

Soren flipped his borrowed blade sideways to parry, then, quicker than a blink, switched the hilt to his left hand and countered. Every stroke felt sharpened by the anger he refused to

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12:09 Mon, Oct 13

Chapter 108 Shifting Alliances

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Garrick’s heart hammered, yet Soren’s face remained as calm as winter stone.

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Three exchanges later, Garrick’s sword clattered to the floor; color drained from his checks.

Emperor Aldric, watching with mild amusement, cast Garrick a sideways glance and asked, “And who, exactly, is this Luna?”

Soren did not grant Garrick so much as a flicker of peripheral attention. In one liquid motion, he wiped the bloodless steel on the air, then drove it home into the scabbard held out by an awed guard; the click sounded final, like courtroom doors slamming shut. Only then did he, in a voice as level as winter ice, recite every known detail of Luna’s history for Emperor Aldric alone.

The Scarlet Boutique sat scarcely a stone’s throw from the Imperial Palace, its vermilion eaves almost brushing the shadow of the palace walls, so summons sped between the two like gossip on a summer breeze.

When Luna was ushered through the bronze doors, Emperor Aldric–who had weathered war and treachery–felt his seasoned heart stumble. She was moonlight poured into flesh, a celestial visitor still dusted with stardust, untouched by the least speck of mortal vanity. “No wonder Blaze, hot–blooded as he is, would fly into rage for such a vision,” Emperor Aldric remarked, his smile carrying as much statecraft as admiration.

A faint line tightened between Soren’s brows, yet he offered no defense, the silence itself an acknowledgment as unyielding as granite.

Luna risked a timid glance toward Soren, color blooming across her cheeks like dawn on snow. Then she sank to both knees, forehead pressed to the marble. “Your Majesty, Lord Soren sheltered me only out of pity,” she said, the words trembling yet clear. “Between us, there is neither impropriety nor secret affection—our names remain unentwined.”

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