Ficorpio
Chapter 1
When you were six years old, the Whitmore family found you and brought you home.
Twelve years later, they finally learned how miserably Vivian Whitmore, the adopted daughter they had heartlessly cast out, had suffered after she left.
The day Vivian took her own life, everyone regretted what they had done.
Your parents and older brother could no longer bear to look at you. They planned to use you in another arranged family alliance, but Adrian Sterling intervened.
He honored the old betrothal agreement and married you himself, solely so he could torment you with his own hands.
“This is all your fault. When you came back to the Whitmore family that day, why did you cry in front of Vivian? She hadn’t done anything wrong. Why did you insist on driving her away? Why couldn’t you let her stay?”
His voice had been merciless.
“Elena Whitmore, you will spend the rest of your life paying for everything you did to Vivian.”
In the end, you died during a difficult labor.
When you opened your eyes again, you had returned to the morning the Whitmores came to Alder Children’s Home.
The little girl in the bed beside yours stared at the engraved heirloom pendant hanging from your neck. After a moment, she asked cautiously, “Could you… give that to me?”
You froze.
Then, without warning, you smiled.
“Of course. You can have it.”
The girl stared at you, too stunned to react. A moment later, delight burst across her small face.
“Really? Elena, you’ll really give it to me?”
Then uncertainty crept into her expression. She looked you up and down before asking, “But… isn’t this your treasure? You said you had to keep wearing it until your family came to find you.”
Everyone at Alder Children’s Home knew you valued that pendant more than your own life.
Helen Parker, one of the home’s caretakers, had told you that it was already tied around your neck when she found you abandoned as an infant.
“Your mother and father left this with you so you would have something to remember them by.” Helen had stroked your hair, her eyes warm and gentle. “One day, they’ll come looking for you. I’m sure of it.”
From then on, the pendant had become the hope you clung to.
Some of the other children had envied you and tried more than once to steal it. During the worst attempt, when several of them surrounded you at once, you had gritted your teeth and swallowed the pendant rather than let anyone take it. You had nearly ended up in emergency surgery.
After that, no one dared touch it again.
But now, you calmly untied the red cord from around your neck and placed the pendant in the girl’s palm.
You smiled at her. “I mean it. It’s yours now.”
“Then I’m not giving it back.”
The girl instinctively clenched her fist and hugged the pendant tightly to her chest, as though afraid you might regret your decision and snatch it away in the next second.
Chapter 2
You made no move to stop her.
In the previous timeline, that pendant had been how the Whitmore family identified you as their missing biological daughter.
This time, even if it meant giving up everything, you wanted nothing more to do with them.
The Whitmores would still find their biological heiress in this life.
But it would not be you.
When the family arrived at Alder Children’s Home, you claimed your stomach hurt and hid alone in a storage room.
After they left, you heard the news. The powerful Whitmore family of Alder City had finally found the youngest daughter they had lost so many years ago.
It was Sophie Reed, the girl now wearing your heirloom pendant.
No. She was Sophie Whitmore now.
That night, you returned to the cramped dormitory and lay awake, listening to the soft, even breathing of the other girls.
For the first time in either lifetime, your heart was utterly at peace.
You thought that, in this life, you finally owed no one anything.
Only later did you realize how simple-minded you had been.
Two days later, a Whitmore family car stopped outside Alder Children’s Home again.
“We identified the wrong child,” they said.
That was when you understood. The Whitmores hadn’t relied on an engraved heirloom pendant alone when they took you back all those years ago.
They had probably arranged a DNA test in secret before bringing you home in the previous timeline. Back then, you truly had been their daughter.
But in this timeline, Sophie Reed wasn’t.
Helen Parker, the director, lined up all the six- and seven-year-old girls. With her leading the way, Richard and Marianne Whitmore slowly examined each child in turn.
Walking ahead of them was a richly dressed boy with an impatient look on his face. He was Julian Whitmore, your older brother from the previous timeline.
You shrank into the far corner of the line, your head lowered so tightly that your chin nearly touched your chest.
At that age, you were frail, sickly, and rarely had enough to eat. You looked small and painfully thin—so unremarkable that no one would have noticed you.
The Whitmores passed in front of you without the slightest pause. Julian’s gaze swept over you, then drifted away with casual indifference, as though you were nothing more than an object that didn’t matter.
After the Whitmores left, Helen told all of you that the girls would be taken for blood draws the following day.
Your heart clenched.
You had no idea what to do. Then you saw Helen return with another young woman after the Whitmore family had gone.
The woman was dressed plainly and had come alone. She was treated nothing like the Whitmores. No one had summoned every child to stand in a line for her inspection, and there was no grand display surrounding her arrival.
She looked at the girls with hesitant uncertainty, but there was warmth in her eyes.
You recognized her.
Chapter 3
She was one of the Whitmores’ employees—the woman everyone called Margaret Carter. You had seen her at the estate.
In the previous timeline, after Vivian Whitmore took her own life, the Whitmores forbade you from eating dinner.
“I heard that after Vivian was thrown out, she couldn’t even afford food. She never knew where her next meal was coming from, and she developed stomach problems while she was still so young. Meanwhile, you lived in comfort at home, eating the finest food money could buy.” Julian’s expression had been filled with disgust as he stared at you. “The least you can do is experience a little of her suffering!”
After that, you went from being forbidden to eat dinner to being allowed only one meal a day—cold leftovers that had long since gone stale.
At the time, only Margaret had been unable to stand by and watch. She would secretly push a little food through the crack beneath your door.
Remembering that, you suddenly made a reckless decision.
As the woman approached, you reached out, wrapped both arms around her leg, and shouted at the top of your voice:
“Mom!”
The next day, while Helen Parker organized blood tests for the girls at Alder Children’s Home, you left with your new mother and returned to her hometown.
The Whitmore Estate provided accommodations for its household staff, so ordinarily, you should have moved into the Staff Quarters with your mother.
But you told her you were frightened and wanted to wait a little longer.
Meanwhile, the Whitmores remained deeply suspicious. Their daughter had disappeared because of a scheme orchestrated by a political rival, and the experience had taught them to trust no one.
After discovering that Sophie Reed was an impostor, they feared the situation might be another trap. Instead of questioning the other children at the home, they focused all their attention on Sophie.
Sophie insisted that she had worn the engraved heirloom pendant since birth. In the end, the Whitmores sent her away to be adopted by a couple from an extended branch of the family. With that, they lost their only lead to their biological daughter.
By the time you arrived at the Whitmore Estate in the current timeline, two months had passed, and the matter had long since been settled.
On the day you moved in with your mother, you entered the living room to find a young Vivian Whitmore curled up in Julian Whitmore’s arms, crying.
“Julian, Mom and Dad really won’t send me away, will they?” she asked tearfully. “I can still stay here?”
Julian looked uncomfortable, but he continued patting her back.
“Don’t be ridiculous. Even if she comes back, Mom and Dad won’t throw you out.”
He pursed his lips.