Chapter 349: The Twins

As soon as she cut the corner after leaving the stage,

Paige

pulled out her phone.

Her thumbs moved fast. Practiced. The betting dashboard was already open—she’d had it ready before the cheerleading competition even started—and now she was placing numbers that would make their allowance look like pocket change.

All of it on

Phei

.

"What the

fuck

are you doing?"

Brielle’s

voice came sharp from behind her. Not scandalized—

confused.

The tone of someone watching a person they thought they knew do something completely incomprehensible—

like watching your twin sister burn a family heirloom while

humming

a tune.

Paige didn’t look up.

"Betting."

"I can see that, Captain Obvious." Brielle moved closer, eyes on the screen. When she saw the name next to the wager, she went still. "You’re betting against

Marcus

. Against our team. Against our family. We just won a competition supporting them and you’re—"

"Brielle."

Paige finally looked at her. The expression on her face wasn’t condescending or pitying—it was

tired.

The exhaustion of someone who’d been carrying a weight her twin didn’t even know existed—the exhaustion of seeing the chains while your sister still thought they were jewelry.

"When are you going to start thinking for yourself instead of being the obedient slave of Heavenchild?"

Brielle’s jaw tightened.

"News flash, wild princess—that’s our family. Like,

duh

?"

"Is it?"

The question hung in the air—heavy, sharp, the kind of question that cuts deeper because it sounds innocent.

Brielle stared at her. "What’s that supposed to mean?"

Paige pocketed her phone. The bet was placed. Now she had time to explain—if Brielle was capable of hearing it without immediately running to tattle.

"We’re

Immediates

, Brie. Do you understand what that means?

Really

understand it?"

"It means we’re part of the Heavenchild dynasty. We carry the name. We have the blood."

"It means we’re close enough to be useful and far enough to be

disposable

." Paige’s voice was flat. Matter-of-fact. The tone of someone who’d had this conversation with herself in the mirror too many nights. "We’re not heirs. We’re not even backups to the heirs.

"We’re... decorations... cheerleaders for Marcus. Pretty girls with the right last name who get trotted out for photo ops and cheerleading competitions and family functions where we smile and wave and pretend we matter."

Brielle opened her mouth to argue.

Paige kept going—

relentless

, like she’d been waiting years to say this out loud.

"When was the last time anyone from the main branch asked your opinion on anything before ordering you to do it like how we were ordered to dance and look pretty for Marcus’s entrance today? When was the last time your thoughts mattered in a family meeting? When was the last time

Marcus

even looked at you like you were a person instead of part of the furniture he’s using to run his fans and cheerleaders?"

Silence.

"That’s what I thought."

Brielle’s hands curled into fists at her sides. "So what? You’re betting against Marcus out of

spite?

Because you feel overlooked? That’s petty, Paige. That’s beneath you."

"It’s not

spite."

Paige shook her head. "It’s strategy."

"Strategy for what?"

"For surviving whatever comes next."

Brielle crossed her arms. Her expression had shifted from confusion to something harder. Colder. The look of a Heavenchild preparing to defend her house—even if that house had never really let her inside.

"Explain."

Paige leaned against the corridor wall. The muffled roar of the stadium leaked through—two hundred thousand people waiting for a game that would change more than any of them realized—two hundred thousand people who thought they were watching sports when they were actually watching a coronation.

"The Heavenchilds have ruled for a long time," she said slowly. "Longer than most families can even trace their histories. And they’ve done it by being smart. By reading the winds. By knowing when to consolidate power and when to let go of things that were already lost."

"Marcus isn’t lost. Marcus is

undefeated

."

"On the court, sure. But this isn’t about basketball anymore, Brie. This is about something

bigger

." Paige met her twin’s eyes.

"Phei, who they call a nobody walked into this academy three weeks ago after years of being nothing.

No name. No money. No connections

. And in less than a month, he’s got two princesses wrapped around his finger, the people silently pulling strings for him, a fan club that organized an event like this—" she gestured vaguely toward the stadium

"—and enough momentum that the Main Family felt threatened enough to pull Marcus out of retirement."

She let that sink in.

"The Main Family felt

threatened

. By Phei. Don’t you think that’s strange?"

Brielle’s expression flickered. Just for a moment.

"They’re not threatened. They’re making an example."

"Are they? Or are they

scared

?" Paige pushed off the wall. "I’ve been watching, Brie. While you’ve been cheering and following orders and being the perfect Immediate, I’ve been paying attention. And what I see is a family that’s scrambling. A family that didn’t see this coming and is now trying to control a narrative that’s already slipping away from them. They’re using their influence as the world’s leaders so that the entire world watches as Phei’s used as an example and PR to boast Marcus’s name even more to every teen out there. Next Generation preparation"

"You’re reading too much into it."

"Am I?" Paige tilted her head. "Then why did they need Marcus? If Phei is just a nobody, if this is just a joke, why couldn’t Danton handle it? Or Brett? Or any of the other players? Why did they need to bring out the prince himself? Why did they make sure it became a whole world sensation in just a few hours?"

Brielle had no answer.

"Here’s what I know," Paige continued, voice dropping to a register that belonged in boardrooms and bedrooms alike—low, deliberate, the tone of someone who’d already weighed the corpses and decided which ones were worth burying.

"If

Marcus

wins—and maybe he might, I am not sure—then nothing changes. The Heavenchilds stay on top, his image engraved more in everyone out there, the charity case gets humiliated, and life goes on. My bet loses, I eat the cost, no one ever knows."

"And if

Phei

wins?"

"If

Phei

wins..." Paige smiled. Thin. Sharp. The smile of a woman who’d just calculated the odds and found them deliciously tilted. "Then the world shifts. Then people start questioning things they never questioned before. Then whoever was smart enough to see it coming gets to position themselves on the right side of history."

"The right side of—" Brielle laughed, but there was no humor in it—only the brittle sound of someone realizing their twin might be willing to burn the family tree for warmth. "You’re talking about

betraying

our family over a basketball game."

"I’m talking about

hedging

. About keeping options open. About not being so blindly loyal to people who would throw us away the moment we stopped being useful."

"You don’t know that."

"Don’t I?"

Paige

’s eyes hardened—cold, clear, the gaze of someone who’d already seen the guillotine drop on someone else’s neck. "Remember Aunt Cecilia? Remember how quickly she disappeared from family photos after she married someone the main family didn’t approve of? Remember how we’re not even allowed to say her name at gatherings anymore? Or have you forgotten what happened to our parents, Brie?"

Brielle

flinched—a small, involuntary movement, the kind that betrays a wound still raw under the scar.

"That’s what happens to us

Immediates

who stop being convenient, Brie. We don’t get exiled dramatically. We don’t get public fallings-out. We just... vanish. Quietly. Completely. Like we never existed."

"That won’t happen to us."

"It won’t happen to us if we’re

smart

."

Paige

stepped closer—close enough that

Brielle

could smell her perfume, the same one their mother wore, the same one that cost more than most people’s rent. "And being smart means not putting all our eggs in one basket. It means watching for opportunities. It means being ready to pivot when the winds change."

Brielle

was quiet for a long moment.