Jasna sat before the fireplace, staring blankly at the dancing flames in the hearth without moving.
She had maintained that posture for several hours.
Her frustration and remorse had tormented her for a while, but afterward, emptiness and numbness swallowed all her emotions.
This was different from serving a sentence in Azkaban.
In that prison, she had needed to gather every shred of willpower she possessed to resist the Dementors that gnawed away at her soul every day.
Being deprived of happiness had driven her to despair, but it had also stirred her hatred and fighting spirit.
Yet in this isolated village, no one came to torment her. She could lie safely in a warm bed all day long.
She did not have to rack her brains to complete the tasks her father assigned her; she did not have to play along with those Death Eaters who only pretended to be allied with her; she did not have to fight Aurors to the death.
And that was precisely what made it even more agonizing.
The only thing she seemed able to do was think.
But what did she need to think about? There seemed to be nothing she needed to think about.
And that was the root of her pain.
Jasna considered herself an intelligent witch.
There was no need to say more on that point. For so many years, she had immersed herself in the dark side of the wizarding world, cautiously avoiding the light, completing dangerous missions one after another. Before Breen, she had never left a trace that could expose her. That was enough to prove her intelligence. Or so it seemed.
But then she suddenly realized that, after losing contact with her father—or, worse still, after her father had died and she could no longer receive