Chapter Three
“ P rincess? Your Highness?”
My eyes fluttered open. Light immediately assaulted them, and I snapped my lids shut.
Everything hurt. From the pads of my aching feet to the top of my throbbing scalp. Even my jaw hurt as though all of my teeth had fallen out, then regrown anew in one night. What was wrong with me? What happened?
“Where... am I?”
“Don’t be silly.” A light giggle tickled my ear followed by the whoosh of curtains. I flipped over as more light pounded my eyes, burrowing my face into something soft and sweet-smelling. “Rise and shine, Princess. You don’t usually sleep in this late. Are you well?”
“Why are you calling me that?” I grunted. My head was a mess of pain. If someone told me a spike had been driven through it, I’d say they were lying. This pain was from three spikes. “Just call me... by my name. All the traditions and rules about names... are silly.”
“Oh.” The person’s shuffling feet paused for a beat. “I... That is very kind of you, Princess, but it wouldn’t be appropriate. I feel it best I address you by your station.”
“Station? What are you talking about? And close those curtains.” Why were Shadi and the others being so silly? Who wanted the sun in their face after a night of drinking rich wines? “My head is killing me. I didn’t think I had too much wine. The palace stuff must be stronger.”
“Wine? But I only brought you one glass with your meal last night,” whoever they were replied. “Have you been imbibing in secret? Oh, Your Eminence, the king would not like that.”
“The king? Why would he care about the likes of me?”
“Princess, are you sure you’re feeling all right?” A cool hand came between me and the pillow. “Hmm. A touch warm. How about I prepare you a rosewater bath? I’ll cancel your tutors for the morning, and prepare you tea on the terrace. A cool bath and a little fresh air, I’m sure you’ll feel much better, Your Majesty.”
“Rosewater? Tutors? Tea on the terrace? What in the name of Meya are you talking about?”
I sat up, and blinked. Large, owlish brown eyes blinked back at me.
“Who are you?”
The stranger laughed, wrinkling her button nose. She looked to be about my age, but that would be where our similarities stopped. She was taller, broader, and wore a plain but expensive tunic, pants, and linen boots. Palace staff.
Girls like her who could get jobs working in the castle were raised nowhere near the Galley. She was likely the daughter of a nobleman, who received the highest-paid work women without magic could get.
Fiona. My mind impossibly supplied the name. How? I did not know the woman.
“That’s very funny, Princess. I forget what a lively sense of humor you have. Now come with me.” She took my hands, ignoring my sputtered questions.
I was in a room that was both familiar and unfamiliar to me. These floors knew my feet. The bed remembered my frame better than any lover, and yet, I’d never been here before.
“If you’re not unwell, you can’t be late to meet with the tutors. King Salman was most insistent.”
“Tutors for what?” My stomach turned. “Tutors to teach me to be a war wife? Will they show me how to—to service the faeriken? That’s hideous! Who would think of such a thing?”
She gaped at me. “Mother Meya, no,” she cried. “Of course not. They’re your usual tutors. Language, history, etiquette, and geography.”
“What usual tutors?” I clutched my head, wincing. “You’re not making sense.”
“Your Eminence, you truly don’t look well. I’ve never seen you so pale.” She took my hand again. “Let’s put this whole conversation of tutors to bed. You’re not meeting with them today. You need your rest. It won’t do for a bride to look sickly on her wedding day.”
My head snapped up.
“ You are here because I am not marrying King Alisdair. You are. ”
“No.”
I ripped away from her, running to an unknown door with steps that were too sure. Bursting inside, I found myself in a wardrobe. What I was looking for stood on the opposite end of a room full of magnificent clothes and shoes. I skidded to a stop in front of the mirror... and screamed.
“No. No, no, no!”
It all came back to me. Every horrible, awful second of it. Trapped, gagged, crawling, begging... and a selfish royal with her besotted lover, offering me up to die in her place. The selfish royal gazing back at me.
It worked. Their evil, twisted curse worked. A mass of red, silky locks covered half my torso. Full, plump lips were dry from just waking up. Lily-pad eyes swam in milky, red-stained ponds, and my too-pale skin bleached whiter than a sheet. This was not me.
“Princess?” Fiona ran inside after me. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
“Don’t call me that!” I snapped, making her jump. “I’m— My name is— My name is—”
I choked, eyes bulging. My name wouldn’t sound. Each attempt to say it, and it was stolen right off my tongue.
She said this would happen. I would not be able to voice things the real Princess Emiana didn’t know. There was a reason the high and lofty heir didn’t bother to ask my name.
“You are Princess Emiana,” her companion said slowly. “You’re not feeling well today, but that’s understandable. You’re under a lot of pressure. Come with me and I’ll—”
I bolted past her, leaving the shouting attendant in the overstuffed closet. Grabbing the door handle, it gave way as easily as it did the night before. Everything was coming back to me, including how they didn’t bother to lock the door. So absolute was Kaelan’s ability to control me. I never stood a chance.
I ran out—feet so small and foreign slapping the cool stone. I couldn’t voice what she didn’t know, but my mind still belonged to me. My memories were intact. How long until that was no longer the case, I didn’t know. All I knew was that I’d better act fast.
“Princess? Princess!”
Very fast. The unknown attendant was chasing me, and moving much faster than this soft and pampered body.
I skidded into the back stairwell and flew down the steps. The other women weren’t in the little rooms they called sleeping quarters. That left one place they could be.
“Princess, please come back,” Fiona called. She was gaining on me fast. “Whatever is wrong, I’ll help you.”
I threw open the doors to the former storeroom. Over a dozen heads swung to me.
“Help me,” I screamed, making four women in my vicinity jump. “I’m not— I’m not—” My mouth refused to utter the rest of the sentence, confessing that I’m not the princess. “I won’t marry the king! I won’t marry the king!”
The words came out and kept coming. A truth that was real for both me and the princess.
“You have to help me,” I cried, throwing myself on a wide-eyed Shadi. “I can’t marry the king. I can’t marry him.”
Hands seized me, dragging me off the confused woman. Guards lifted me off the ground and on their shoulders, weathering my kicks and punches.
“Get off! Get off me! I won’t marry the king!”
“Please, calm yourself, Princess,” Fiona cried. “New-wife jitters are normal. You’ll feel better after you’ve had some rest.”
Sense seized my tongue. “Olene, Meliora, Gisela, Jaclan, and Savia!” I screamed as they carried me to the door. “Olene, Meliora, Gisela, Jaclan, and Savia!”
“Wait,” a small voice spoke up. “Why does she speak of Olene and her children?”
Hope soared in my chest.
“Just a minute.” Eara, my old friend from the Galley, pushed through the bodies—following after me. “Princess? Princess, do you want to speak to Olene?”
I could’ve cried. I always liked Eara with her kind smile and a joke always on her lips. She then became my most favorite person in this world. “Yes,” I screamed. “Olene. Olene!”
“She isn’t here,” Eara said, “but I can fetch—”
“How dare you!” One of the guards holding my legs snapped around and shoved Eara, sending her flying into Shadi. “You will not address the princess, nor will you leave this room. All of you, face the wall. Now,” he shouted when they didn’t move.
They all turned away from him—from me.
“The princess is ill,” snapped the guard. “She knows not what she’s saying, and you will repeat nothing of what you’ve seen or heard.”
My captors carried me out into the halls—my cries and pleas falling on uncaring ears.
“None of you leaves until the ceremony is over.” The guard stormed out, slamming and locking the door on my only hope.
“Don’t worry, Princess.” Fiona patted my flailing ankle. “I have the perfect thing to calm your nerves and help you sleep. King Salman said to give this to you in case your jitters overtook you. He is as wise as he is kind.”
“Olene, Meliora, Gisela, Jaclan, and Savia!” I screamed to all and anyone who’d hear me. “Olene, Meliora, Gisela, Jaclan, and Savia!”
Away they took me—carrying me back to a gilded cage where a delicate bird always sings their pleas, and no one lets them out.
“PRINCESS EMIANA?”
The door opened, turning my head from the window.
Fiona pushed inside and waved in the trail of servants behind her. I couldn’t keep track of all the things they carried in on pillows and carts. Makeup, shoes, necklaces, bracelets, gowns, hairpins, tiaras. The parade of finery was endless, and my eyes crossed trying to follow it all.
Wincing, I turned away, facing the window and the endless garden beyond it.
I’d been this way for the last few hours, days, weeks? Impossible to know. A fog descended on my mind minutes after the guards dragged me away from the war wives and force-fed me a calming tea that Fiona brewed.
In the brief moments I could string together two thoughts, I understood exactly why Emiana hated her father.
Memories of a life not mine floated through my head the longer I sat at the window, unable to summon the will to run away. Most of them memories of a man who cared not a whit about his wife, and even less for his only child.
Raised by nannies and attendants. Requests to see and speak with her father were put through a dozen staff and advisors, only for those staff and advisors to relay the message that he was busy and didn’t have the time.
Whenever she acted out, spoke up, or tried to exercise the tiniest bit of freedom, King Salman ordered her minders to restrain and punish her—magically. Those bids for attention didn’t draw him out as she wished, so eventually Emiana stopped trying, and played the obedient, silent, out-of-the-way child that he wanted.
Raised in a bustling, grand palace surrounded by dozens of people ready and eager to do her will, and Princess Emiana was the loneliest person in Lyrica.
It was my misfortune to know this. Visions, feelings, and memories of Emiana’s broken childhood floated through the paved, empty path the tea made of my mind. I almost felt sympathy for her, if not for the other memories that floated through my head.
The marriage negotiations with the representative of the king of Wind and Wild. Like a certain other aloof, uncaring king, Shadowsoul hadn’t bothered to be present when he listed his demands for the union—from the twelve children I was to bear him to the highly detailed sexual acts I was expected to perform nightly.
That’s who she’s forcing me to marry in her place. If only I could get away. If there was some...
I lost track of the thought as a butterfly fluttered past the window. Delicate, purple wings with tiny spots dancing on their tips. The pretty little thing brought a smile to my lips, chasing unpleasant thoughts away.
What was there to be angry about? It was a gorgeous day. The sun was shining. The flowers were blooming. I didn’t need to go anywhere. Everything I needed was right there at the window.
“Good morning, Princess.” Fiona was suddenly pulling me up and away from my garden. “Forgive me for disturbing you, but it’s time.”
I cocked my head. “Time?”
“Why, for the wedding, ma’am.”
Wedding. The word traveled through my head, incited panic, and screamed at my limbs to run through the open door.
I took a step toward it, then many more as Fiona led me the opposite way.
“Right this way, Princess. Your dress arrived from the weavers this morning. It’s radiant,” she gushed. “You’ll be an absolute vision. The most beautiful bride in a century.”
I could say nothing as she brought me into the bath and undressed me.
Protests rose hot on my lips. I’d been bathing myself since a few short years out of swaddling. I did not need their help.
My mouth formed the words, then a bucket of warm water tipped over my head, and my indignation was carried down the drain in a soapy stream.
They scrubbed, washed, rinsed, scented, and scrubbed again every inch of me—including my most intimate places. I was a doll in their hands. A silent, obedient doll. What the princess of Lyrica was supposed to be.
But I’m not a princess, a voice hissed. Was it mine? You are no one’s doll. You’re no one’s sacrifice. You’re a sister and a daughter, and you have people who need you to WAKE UP!
I jerked up, knocking a scrubbing brush from Fiona’s hand.
What was I doing? Fiona left me unguarded for hours? Days? However long, and I hadn’t tried to escape once. No wonder Emiana felt comfortable using magic to force her way. She’d been raised to believe it was normal to turn someone into your puppet.
“I... have to... go.”
“Oh, yes, you’re right, Princess,” Fiona said. “You have to go and have your breakfast. The king declared that you’ll be leaving the kingdom immediately after the ceremony. It’s fourteen days’ ride to your new home, and who knows what manner of rotting carcasses those beasts pass off as food.”
Murmurs of agreement and scorn passed through the too-filled bathroom. Not even for the sake of the faewoman about to be married off to the beast, would they hide their disdain of faeriken.
Fiona helped me out of the bath and to the dressing room. My mind was coming back in bits and pieces, but my strength wasn’t following. I couldn’t stop her sitting me before the vanity. Helpless, I watched the buzzing swarm of servants transform the famed beauty of Lyrica into a portrait of loveliness so blinding, I tried to hold on to the urge to look away.
Blemishes were banished from my cheeks. Powder paled my skin nearly translucent. Rouge darkened my lips to glittering, bloodred rubies. My hair was combed until it shone, twisted into a multitude of braids, then woven around my scalp like a crown.
While they transformed me, I planned.
Buried in Emiana’s memories was a walk-through of the ceremony.
Fath— King Salman didn’t trust Shadowsoul or his men an inch. The faeriken party would be on the other side of the throne room with a contingent of guards between them and the nobles. Salman would stand beside the altar with guards on either side of him, and I would be led through a side door beside the altar.
I’d walk past the king to my waiting soon-to-be husband, and behind him... would be another door that opened onto the palace gardens.
If I made it that far, I’d be free. All the guards would be inside guarding the king and noblemen. They wouldn’t spare a single able body to protect the plants. Once I broke out, I’d beat it through the garden, leap over the wall, then make it back to my family.
We’d all have to run of course. Emiana’s face was my face, and Salman would have his men hunt this face till land became sea, and beyond.
That was fine. There was nothing left for us in Lyrica. If we have to leave, we’d leave. At least my family would be safe. At least Shadowsoul would slink back into his dark, twisted forest, and find a wife there who was happy to be “seen, not heard” per his contracted request.
I nodded, steeling myself. This will work.
I’d never get away from this beastly army, but a quick dart around a surprised and unsuspecting Shadowsoul, and this entire nightmare would be over.
I pictured and plotted every step all through a breakfast that I pretended to chew, sip, and swallow. Every time I asked for this or that to be brought to me, I spat the food out while their backs were turned. There would be no calming teas or scones that morning.
After an unfulfilling breakfast, the servants returned me to the dressing room where my wedding gown awaited.
Gossamer silk fell in soft, wispy waves over ivory satin. Something that glittered like diamonds was stitched on the hem of my gown and the sleeves. Wait— They were diamonds. As priceless and coldly beautiful as the diamond tiara Fiona carried over on a pillow.
I almost spat on the thing.
“You will be the most beautiful bride in all the kingdoms,” she whispered, eyes shining, “and... I’m sorry.”
I tensed, looking away. “But I thank you,” I rasped. The words were coming slow, but they were coming. I didn’t speak at all while under the influence of the drugged teas. “Finally, we stop pretending this is a happy day.”
No one knew what to say, least of all Fiona. Least of all me. There was utter silence as they helped me into my dress, did up two dozen diamond buttons going up my back, and settled the tiara on my crown of braids.
Fiona is right , I thought as I gazed into the mirror. Never had there been a more beautiful bride.
“Would you give me some time alone?” I heard myself say. “This is to be my last day in this room. On my own. I’d like a minute to say goodbye.”
“I don’t know if—”
“Of course, Princess,” Fiona sliced in, cutting off one of the women. “It is the least we, your people, can do for you before you set off to the brutal lands for all our sakes. We thank you, Princess Emiana, as deeply as we love you.”
Fiona bowed deeply and the gesture cascaded around the room, bringing all of their heads down. Memories floated through my head of interacting with these women and Fiona throughout my daily routines and before special functions. I had wondered why I couldn’t recall most of their names, then it came to me that I never asked.
They all bowed and showed the highest deference to a princess who saw them as nothing more than helpful decoration, because they knew what was awaiting me on the other side of the gnarled, dead trees and perilous cliffs that surrounded the kingdom of Wind and Wild.
I would sacrifice and be put through so much worse than staff forced to serve an arrogant royal.
“Five minutes, if you permit, Princess,” said Anice, the dressmaker. “His Royal Highness was most insistent that you not be late for the ceremony.”
“Has Shadowsoul and his people already arrived?” I asked.
“They arrived three days ago, ma’am.”
Three days. For three days at least I’d been sitting in front of the window like a houseplant, wasting precious time while my family worried, Kirwan tightened his grip, and Emiana got farther away.
“What...?” It wasn’t the tea that slowed my tongue. “What are they like?”
Anice’s smile wiped away. Looking me in the eye, she said, “They’re even worse than we feared.”
Her words hung in the air after the servants left, Fiona the final one to walk out and close the door.
Emiana saved me from days of being passed around by feral beasts, only to see me married off to the worst one.
I fixed on all the bits and bobs the servants left behind, most of all the scissors. They—Princess Emiana, Kirwan, King Salman, Alisdair Shadowsoul—believed I could be bought and sold without a fight, even if it meant chaining me down.
“Not quite.”
I REACHED FOR THE KNOB as it opened.
“Excuse me, Princess? We really must go. Are you read—?” Fiona choked, eyes bugging. “Princess!?”
Lifting my chin high, I smiled. “I’m ready. Let’s go. We mustn’t keep my betrothed waiting.”
“B-b-b-but—”
I brushed past her, marching out of the room and into the hall. One of my escorting guards dropped his sword. He swore foully as he scrambled to pick it up, then pointed his gaze over my head—his face reddening.
“Princess,” Fiona half-screamed. “You mustn’t— You can’t—”
“How dare you say can’t to me,” I snapped, so easily adopting the tone the true princess used on nearly everyone she met. “It is your job to escort me to the ballroom. Do so, and keep your opinions to yourself, servant.”
Fiona’s eyes darted around, chest heaving. I could tell she was looking for the guards to step in and help her.
Swallowing hard, she faced me. “Princess, if I may, please return inside so that I may help you finish preparing for your wedding. I know it is your desire as well as all of Lyrica’s that your wedding ceremony is a beautiful, pleasant affair.”
“Why wouldn’t the ceremony be beautiful and pleasant?” I asked. “Am I not the famed beauty of the east? Is not my mere presence pleasurable? My betrothed will swoon at the sight of me, and all watching will sing of the wonder and majesty of this day, and the woman who became a bride at the end of it.” I stared her down. “Or will you dare to say otherwise?”
Her jaw worked, skin paling. “Please,” she whispered. “I beg of you, Your Majesty.”
I turned my back on her, marching away. “You begged me not to be late, and now you’re wasting time. Let’s go. My king awaits.”
It was a deathly tense and silent group that followed me through halls I shouldn’t know, but that my feet remembered with ease. Assuredly, the king sent all ten of these guards to pen me in like cattle, making sure I had no escape.
Instead, they all walked at least a pace away from me, looking like they’d get farther if they could.
Fiona muttered and fussed on my heels, hissing pleas for me to return to my room, stop this, let her help me—the begging went on.
I’m sorry, Fiona. Rounding a corner, the door to the throne room came into view. I swear, I will not let you be punished for what I’ve done, but I must do this. Anything to get back to my faywens.
I may be a liar, but I never break a promise.
Two of the guards drew ahead and swept open my doors. “Good luck to you, Princess.”
“Thank you,” I said, and stepped out onto the dais.
King Salman, ruler of Lyrica, champion of the battle of Ryen, and grand sorcerer of the Meya order, took one look at me and choked on his wine.
Hacking and wheezing, he doubled over—clutching his collar and straining as two attendants rushed to help him up and pound his back.
I couldn’t blame him for the undignified reaction. For a man who saw his daughter very little, it would still surprise him to see her like this.
Emiana’s radiant, fire-kissed hair was gone.
Well, not so much gone as hacked and cut like a blindfolded madwoman went at it with a pair of scissors. Some patches of hair were as long as my middle finger, some were barely longer than the tip. I left myself a few braids to hang over my face and behind my ears, but the rest were on my dressing room floor.
After making short work of her hair, the scissors transformed the wedding dress. I sliced through the bodice, ripped the hem, cut off the sleeves, and scattered the diamonds. I attacked the vanity with equal vigor, snatching up the rouge and face paints, and smearing them all over my ivory gown and ivory cheeks.
It was to compliment me to say I looked like the wild street jesters who danced and jumped around in dirty rags for any coin thrown at them.
My audience went deathly silent at the sight of me, and I went silent at the sight of them.
“Faeriken,” I rasped.
An army of guards stood between them, the nobles, and the altar as promised, but they were paper before a flood.
Feathers, fangs, horns, tusks, claws, beaks, whiskers, eyes of every type and color—latched on to me. Seeing straight through me. These people weren’t fae. They’d left behind their faemanity a long time ago, giving way to the beast within.
Women with feathers for hair and claws for hands. Men with leathery rhino skin and horns growing out of their foreheads to match. Cat eyes peering above small, wet noses and twitching whiskers. One man hunched over, bent at the waist. The oversize tortoise shell growing out of his back was clearly too heavy to bear. These were the faeriken, and if I didn’t stop this. If I didn’t get free, I’d be sent away to live with them—to become one of them—forever.
I forced myself to look away and ahead, and our eyes met.
Stories of Alisdair Shadowsoul had been told across the land for generations, and grew more terrifying and frightening with each mass slaughter and unbelievable defeat he won on the battlefield. Mama would croon his story late at night while Meli and I clung to each other under the covers, afraid he’d burst in right then.
Everything Mama said was so horrifically right... and wrong.
Curling, raven locks swept back from his forehead and were tightly bound, revealing the ivory horns poking from his scalp. His pointed fae ears were slightly too pointed, giving away that he wasn’t quite the same as us—if the unnaturally long, lethal nails at the tip of strong, powerful hands didn’t do a perfect job saying the same. Mama was right. He was half faeman, half beast.
He was also shockingly, heart-stoppingly, breathtakingly gorgeous.
Full, dusky lips set in a small frown, carried by a strong, sculpted jaw. He had a long, regal nose that had never known a pimple or blemish. I didn’t know how I knew, but I did. This face had never known an imperfection.
I drew closer to him—captured in his glittering, amber eyes like a bird caught in a sticky, molasses trap. I could go nowhere. I could do nothing... but go to him.
And with every step that brought me closer, his thick brows climbed higher and higher.
King Salman couldn’t speak. He’d have to haul his jaw off the floor for that.
“I—I—I have no words to explain this display,” Emiana’s father wheezed. “Believe me, Lord Alisdair, this is a bewildering mistake.” Salman shot in front of me, bringing his half a dozen guards with him. They all got between me and Shadowsoul. “We want nothing more than to see this union through. She will go back and change immediately. ”
“There is no need.”
I blinked, confused for a moment. That deep, smooth, honeyed voice could not have come from the monster who haunted my dreams for the last week, and yet it was his lips moving.
Shadowsoul waved his hand, making the guards grab at their crystals. I gasped, eyes bugging.
Mangled, hacked locks flowed whole and new from my scalp. The face paints vanished from my gown, leaving nothing but delicate, gossamer white. Diamonds reappeared at the hem, and the thick, heavy weight of all the goop slapped on my face disappeared.
I was the shining beauty of Lyrica once again, and I could’ve screamed.
“Let us proceed,” Alisdair drawled. He turned on the officiant, who I swear shrunk under his gaze. “Begin.”
His command set up a flurry of movement. Salman pounced on me, dragging me none-too-gently the rest of the way down the aisle, and forcing his guards to squeeze and trip over themselves to remain surrounding him. Meya forbid they give the faeriken a clear shot.
“A valiant attempt, girl, but nothing, nothing , will prevent what will happen here today,” he hissed in my ear. “You think yourself worthy enough to rule? These pathetic antics reveal you. A true monarch knows that to rule is to sacrifice.”
My lips parted. I’m not your daughter. I’m not Emiana! She cursed me. Let me go, please!
Nothing came out.
“You embarrass me.”
My heart panged. Emiana’s memories had yet to crowd out mine, but those words I knew. I couldn’t recall when, why, or what happened, but King Salman had said those words to his only child many times. For as long as she had memory.
“I don’t want to do this,” I got out—a truth that was both Emiana’s and mine. “I won’t marry him.”
“You will do as you’re told,” he snapped, planting me in front of him, and leaving his guards behind. They surrounded me on all sides—boxing me in. Cutting off all chance at escape.
For all the hatred, blood, and tears between our two people, the king honored this joining of our nations and the end to the war with a ceremony beyond compare.
A golden dais rose as high as the arched windows, catching the streaming sunlight in its opulent reflection, and making the entire altar glitter. Rare, red dahlia roses tickled my gown, spreading their sweet, calming scent into the air.
I breathed it in hard, wishing for that calm as I looked anywhere but at Shadowsoul. To be near him was to stand humbled before a mountain, and know that for all your screaming, pounding, and fighting, you would never beat him.
Power radiated off him like heat off the sun—more confusing for the fact that there wasn’t a single coudarian crystal on him. What did it mean that this man didn’t need to store power, or worry about accessing it quickly.
He towered over me, rising at least a foot taller, and as wide as two of me put together. I could run through him, and break my neck in the attempt.
But you must attempt. You have to do something, my inner voice cried, eyes darting around. Kirwan told the steward that your fictitious debt would pass to Meliora, forcing her to become a war wife in your place. Emiana will not take care of my family. It’ll look like I simply disappeared, and Meliora would be left to the horror I tried to save her from.
The officiant cleared his throat. A short, stooped man with thick, broken veins in his nose, and hands that shook too much. He somehow looked even more uncomfortable than me. “Let us begin,” he said, opening his tome. “One and all, we are gathered here in these hallowed halls to witness the joining of Princess Emiana Graycloud and Lord Alisdair Shadowsoul.”
Hands reached out and took mine, making me jump. I stiffened as Shadowsoul laced our fingers together. It was such a sudden, intimate gesture, I couldn’t hear for a full minute for the sudden roaring in my ears and blood rushing to my face.
“Meya, we ask your blessings for this union.” The officiant brushed an oil-covered thumb across my forehead, then made a gesture in Shadowsoul’s direction. He couldn’t summon the courage to touch him. “Princess Emiana, it is time,” he intoned. “Make your vows before the All Mother.
“Do you, Princess, vow to care, honor, and obey his Lord Shadowsoul?”
“I do not.”
“D-do— Excuse me?” He blinked at me, trembling harder. He wasn’t expecting that. “I said, do you, Princess, vow to care, honor, and obey his Lord Shadowsoul?”
“Not a chance in hell.”
He choked, whipping around to King Salman while cries and gasps filled the room.
I didn’t know Shadowsoul’s reaction. I couldn’t seem to lift my gaze higher than the firm, muscled chest barely concealed by his ceremonial wedding uniform.
“Continue,” Salman barked, striking fear that didn’t belong to me in my chest.
Emiana was afraid of her father. I hated that I would eventually know why.
“Do you, Lord Shadowsoul, vow to care, honor, and obey Her Eminence, Princess Emiana?”
“I do solemnly vow,” he said easily.
“Do you, Princess, vow to give your title, your love, and your life to the king of Wind and Wild and his people, forsaking your claim to successor of Lyrica with hope it will pass to your son and heir?” He leaned in. “Repeat after me. I do solemnly vow to give my title, love, and life to the king of Wind and Wild and his people.”
“I don’t vow any such thing,” I said, lifting my head and looking Shadowsoul straight in the eyes. “I’ll be keeping my title, my life, and my love, thank you very much. You can fuck off back where you came from.”
The officiant swayed on his feet. I thought he might faint.
“What is she doing?” my side of the ballroom cried.
“She’s going to ruin everything.”
“We were finally going to see an end to the war.”
Lamentations sounded behind me, but behind Shadowsoul, was nothing. The faeriken didn’t twitch, speak, or acknowledge in any way that something out of the ordinary was happening. They were as silent as their ruler—staring at me like I was an uninteresting bug that would soon enough be caught in his web.
“And—and do you, Lord Shadowsoul, solemnly vow to give your life and love to the princess of Lyrica?”
“I do solemnly vow.”
“Do you, Princess, vow to take this man as your lawfully wedded husband, forsaking all others, for as long as you both shall live?” The loose-jowled, shaking old man turned on me with a hard set to his weak chin. “Princess, you will repeat after me: I do vow—”
I slapped the book of vows out of his hands, sending him flying after it with a cry. “I’ll take over from here,” I dropped. “I vow to be nothing but a nightmare, a festering sore, a gnawing ache, a splitting headache for the rest of our short union.
“I vow to spend every day and night running from you—fighting to get back to my true home and freedom.” Visions of my family spun in my mind. “I vow that I will never love you, want you, or delight in a single peaceful, pleasant moment with you.
“I vow that I will make this enduring Thousand-Year War seem like child’s play,” I said, loud and clear. “Every day with me will be a battle to the end. I will gray your hairs, wrinkle your eyes, hunch your back, and grind away your will.
“I vow, Lord Shadowsoul, High King of Blood and Evil, to kill you.”
You could hear a mouse scurry across the floor of a room on the other side of the castle, it was so deathly quiet.
This is it. The moment he takes his court of half-beasts, gets into his carriage, and rolls away for good. Emiana thought her only way out of this marriage was to flee with my face, but there was always another way, I thought, smile tugging to my lips. Make Shadowsoul dump me at the altar. Let him be the one doing the fleeing.
Shadowsoul’s expression suddenly changed, and I reeled back—heart jumping in my throat.
He smirked.
“A festering sore, you say? A splitting headache. An enemy to my peace, youth, will, and eventually, my life. You claim these as your vows?”
I didn’t break. I didn’t look away. “I do.”
“Well.” He released my hands, knocking me off-balance. “I won’t stand for my wife to break her first vow to me, so...” Shadowsoul unsheathed his sword and presented it to me—hilt first.
My mind spun in the split second it took his and Salman’s guards to move. I’d never killed anyone before. I’d never even seen anyone be killed. It was a hard life in Gutter Galley, but a peaceful one. Everyone was too tired and hungry to stir up trouble.
What life in Gutter Galley is... is mine. It’s my life, and Emiana sought to steal it from me to save herself. If I let this monster marry and whisk me away, she’ll have succeeded.
I had to get back to my family. I just had to. This was one promise I would not break.
I snatched the sword. Without pausing for breath, thought, or regret, I plunged it in his chest.
“Ahhh!”
Screams rang out in the ballroom. Shadowsoul folded over like a puppet with cut strings—his mountainous, head-scrambling presence disappearing in a blink. The faeriken ended their silent vigil—snapping, snarling, and barking as they madly climbed and stampeded over each other, surging toward me.
“Guards,” Salman bellowed. “Guards! Take her away!”
A noise sounded high above the calamity, striking fear the likes of which neither me nor Princess Emiana had ever known.
Alisdair Shadowsoul laughed.
Shoulders shaking, chest rumbling, breath catching—he laughed out loud, striking a dong for stunned silence over fae, faeriken, and me.
Straightening, he pulled the sword out of his chest—unharmed. “You, little bird.” My breath caught when he cupped my cheek—a smile as beatific as it was terrifying stretching his full lips. “I must have you.”
Shadowsoul snapped his fingers. The book of vows flew off the ground and dropped on his outstretched palm. “I do vow to take this woman as my lawfully wedded wife—”
“No,” I rasped, scream trapped between my teeth. What was he doing? He couldn’t do this!
“—forsaking all others, for as long as we both shall live.” He snapped the book shut, smiling wider if possible. “This I vow to you, little bird. Not peace, or happiness, or love, or friendship, but I do vow you will never be bored... and you will always be mine. This I promise for the rest of my days—may they be many or few.” He swooped down and kissed my lips so fast, he was already pulling back when I squawked and jumped away. “I leave that up to you.”
“No, y-you can’t do this.” My lips were numb. Did I speak out loud? Because I couldn’t feel them move.
A weight settled on my wrist. My head wrenched down to see a silver bracelet clutching a sparkling black stone. The first gift bestowed to his bride.
That meant there was only one thing left to do. “I don’t accept this.” I threw myself at the wall of guards, my hands straining and flailing through the gaps of their bodies. “I will not marry y—!”
“By the power granted to me by the All Mother, Meya,” the officiant cried, scrambling up. “I name you husband and wife.” He sliced his hand down between us—a coudarian crystal clutched in his hand.
“No!”
It was much too late. Magic washed over me, searing into my skin. I cried out as a black symbol etched into my pores—burning the rune for married deep into my forearm where it would always be, denoting me as the very thing Shadowsoul named me— his .
I lost it.
Screaming, I rammed my head into their armor—opening a dozen cuts on my forehead and cheeks. I pounded every hand that tried to grab me. I kicked and flailed as I was lifted into the air, catching two guards across the face.
Shadowsoul couldn’t take me away or Meliora and my family would lose the only thing they had left to lose—freedom from Kirwan’s iron fist.
“I won’t go!” Running at Shadowsoul, I fell on him, and gripped his sword.
I turned on my attackers, weapon held high. I wouldn’t let the last thought my family had of me be that, in the end, I was nothing but a liar. “I promised,” I screamed, slicing the air and sending my chargers scattering. I darted through the space they stupidly provided me, racing for the doors. “Olene, Meliora, Gisela, Jaclan, and Savia!”
The guards stumbled over themselves chasing after me—torn between stopping me and blocking the cursed faeriken from the royal and noble fae.
I seized the door handle. “Olene, Meliora, Gisel—!” An unseen force hooked me around the middle, lifting me off my feet. I flew back and slammed against a hard chest—the wind whooshing out of me.
“Little bunny might be a more apt name for you.” His deep tremble sent a chill up my spine. “Dangerous little thing, aren’t you?”
My face hardened. “You have no idea.”
Spinning around, my stolen sword fell in an arc, swinging straight for his neck. The bastard may not have a heart to stab, but cutting the head off a snake always worked.
Alisdair was the slaughterer of millions. His selfish and greedy bid for power warped innocent fae into feral beasts, and the curse spreads farther still—dragging us all into his hatred. Every kingdom of the fae would rejoice and honor me for getting rid of our greatest threat, and even so... I wasn’t doing it for them.
Kingdoms had warriors and soldiers to fight their battles. My family only had me. I would not be Shadowsoul’s queen of the beasts. This was always going to end one way—either he left this palace a widower, or I left a widow.
Shadowsoul lazily threw up his palm, and the bronze blade halted just short of it—hanging still and obedient in the air. I tugged, wrenched, and pulled with all my strength. It didn’t budge.
“That is enough!”
Rough hands hauled me around. I had time to see Salman’s furious, purpling face, and the shadow of his backhand falling across it, before it fell.
Movement flashed out of the corner of my eye.
Shadowsoul’s claws shredded Salman’s sleeve and pierced his skin, staining the fine fabric with pinpricks of blood.
“That is the last time you attempt to lay a hand on my wife.” Alisdair struck his chest with an open palm, and Salman blasted off his feet and crashed through the wall.
Someone screamed. I think it was me.
No— It was everyone.
Through the man-sized hole, the palace harem wives bolted from their beds and lounges, running screaming for the door. Their cries were the only sounds coming from the room. The floating mound of silk, blood, and plaster in their bathing pool didn’t speak or move.
“And for your sake and the sake of that worthless parchment the treaty is written on,” Alisdair finished, “it’d better have been the first time.”
“Argh!” Guards, nobles, and Lyricans roared to life.
Coudarian crystals on their clothes, weapons, and staffs blazed with power, and the world lit on fire.
I stood stock-still as explosions burst and danced all over me, greedily headed for us, then forced away—streaming around an invisible barrier.
“Ah,” I cried when the world spun.
Shadowsoul tossed me over his shoulder. “Let us away, little bird. We’ve overstayed our welcome.”
“Put me down!” I clasped my fists and smashed them against his spine—kicking and fighting with all my might. “I’m not going anywhere with you! Let me go. Let me go!”
“No.”
He spoke so calmly and with such finality, my protests clogged in my throat. I could not make this man do a single thing he did not wish to do. I knew that as surely as the explosions crashing over our heads, repelled by an invisible barrier.
Alisdair Shadowsoul could not be touched. He could not be stopped. I was a dandelion before a storm. My only hope was for the soil to remember me after I was washed away.
A wave of exhaustion bowled me over. My lids drew heavy over my eyes, begging to close. This was no one else’s doing but his.
“And to think,” he said as black crept into my vision. “I had every intention of leaving you at the altar...”
I flopped against his back—gone.