Chapter 2
The Visit
My father keeps his study above the east gallery, as if height alone makes his decisions righteous. The heavy doors are thick enough to keep servants out and secrets in. I learned long ago where the sound slips through. A girl not meant to exist can still hear her own future bartered away.
The room always smells faintly of oil and old smoke, the remnants of long negotiations and longer grudges. Today the lamps burn low, and their shadows stretch tall against the ceiling beams, making the men inside seem larger than they are.
I stand barefoot behind a column, veil pulled low, hands folded neatly at my waist. I am very still. Illegitimate daughters survive by not being noticed. Noticed things are used, but unnoticed things endure. Or I do, anyway.
Inside, my father speaks first. “You asked for my support,” Baron Dyvarin says, smooth and confident. “My gold. My ships. My soldiers. House Dyvarin will stand with Rathmor, as it always has.”
There is a pause. Then a man answers him.
I do not need to see them to know which brother speaks. The King sounds amused. The Prince does not.
Prince Colsar keeps slightly apart from the others, shoulders squared, arms folded behind his back, his expression offering nothing resembling courtesy.
King Sevrin’s voice is deep, careless, edged with amusement. “You mistake generosity for leverage,” he says. “I did not summon you to purchase my crown.”
I have never seen King Sevrin up close, but I know his voice. Everyone does. It carries the weight of a man who has never been told no and never learned restraint.
“As tradition dictates, I offer my eldest daughter for marriage,” my father says. “You need my forces,” he continues. “The southern war bleeds you by the day.”
“And yet,” Sevrin says mildly, “I remain unconvinced that marriage is the price I must pay.”
“She is veiled,” the Baron says, “which makes her expendable, your Majesty.”
He does not say illegitimate. He does not have to. The veil is tradition, the mark given to daughters born outside lawful vows, but tradition does not dull the sting of hearing myself discussed as though the cloth has already reduced me to something less.
Sevrin does not answer at once. Instead, he says, almost casually, “I am already bedding your youngest, Lady Yvara.” The words scrape across the wood and silk and pride of the room as though they belong there.
No one gasps. No one protests. It is said plainly, as if discussing trade routes.
“I will not wed a woman until I know she can carry heirs,” he continues.
“Rathmor does not gamble with succession.”
The bluntness of it turns my stomach.
“She will conceive,” my father says.
“If she does,” Sevrin replies, “I will marry her.”
“And if she does not?”
“Then I choose elsewhere.”
“You leave my house exposed,” my father says. “My armies do not stand on uncertainty.”
“I will not bind myself to a wife who may prove barren,” Sevrin answers. “I confirm before I crown.”
My father’s tone shifts, colder now. “Then take the eldest,” he says evenly. “If Yvara swells with your child, you may set the other aside. The alliance remains.”
King Sevrin releases a quiet breath that almost resembles amusement.
“You part with her easily,” Sevrin observes.
“My house will endure the whispers,” my father says. “I require certainty, not delicacy. The eldest satisfies the custom. She is my firstborn. The offer stands.”
Sevrin’s voice cools. “I will not marry blind. I am already testing the younger. If I wed the elder while the other carries my child, your house becomes a spectacle.”
Let us be a spectacle. I would rather scrub the King’s chamber pots than remain here, where I am tolerated like a stain no one can quite remove.
“My house survives,” my father says flatly. “Wed the eldest. Secure my fleets. Should Yvara prove fruitful, the crown has never struggled to undo an inconvenient marriage.”
My father does not soften. “She has worn a veil since childhood. No one expects her to remain queen. Let her warm the throne until the rightful one is ready.”
“No.” The word falls flat and final, leaving no room for negotiation.
My father stiffens. “Then what assurance do you offer in return for my armies?”
The King is silent for a moment. Then, “Rathmor Palace has more than one son.”
“Go fuck yourself, Sevrin,” Prince Colsar says.
The King laughs, unoffended. “For the realm, dear brother. An act of strategic genius, if you ask me.”
“You would marry me to a veiled bastard with rumors of a marred face and call it strategy?”
My father does not defend me. The veil hides my face, but it cannot hide the heat that climbs up my throat. I do not know which cuts deeper, my father’s indifference or the Prince’s disgust.
Sevrin laughs softly. “All speculation, brother.”
“I do not care about her face,” Colsar replies. “But I will not be saddled with a political apology.”
“You will do as you are instructed,” Sevrin says, and this time there is no amusement left in him.
“I will do my duty,” Colsar answers. “Nothing more.”
The finality in his voice chills even through the door.
“If she fails to conceive,” he continues, “the embarrassment belongs to your throne, not to me.”
“You presume you will touch her long enough for that to matter,” Sevrin says.
The room waits.
“Fine,” Colsar says at last. “On conditions.”
Even from the hallway, I feel the shift. Whatever agreement forms now will bind me more tightly than any veil ever has.
“There will be no affection,” he says.
Good. Affection is a currency I do not possess.
“She enters under my conditions, in writing.”
He speaks as though I am already a burden. Perhaps I will learn to be one.
“But decide now, brother.”
The King exhales a faint laugh. “Decide what?”
“If you saddle this burden onto me,” Colsar says, his voice level and stripped of warmth, “you do not reach for her later. You do not decide you chose the wrong sister. Not because she proves fertile, or more interesting or beautiful than you expected.”
He pauses.
“If you marry her to me,” he finishes, “she is off limits to you. Entirely. That includes curiosity.”
“You think I would want her?” Sevrin asks.
“You always want what is denied to you,” Colsar answers. “And she will be the only woman at court you cannot take.”
The air in the chamber tightens.
“And if she is deformed and barren?” Sevrin asks, almost amused again.
“Then she remains my burden,” Colsar says. “Unlike this house, I do not sell women for sport. But do not mistake that for sentiment. I will endure what you place in my path. Nothing more.”
I suppose that is the closest thing to affection I am going to get.
Sevrin is quiet for a moment, then lets out a slow breath. “Very well,” he says at last. “You may keep your veiled mystery.”
“And you may keep my fleets,” the Baron interjects quickly.
And just like that, my future is decided by men who do not even bother to look at me.
The meeting ends soon after. Chairs scrape. Footsteps approach.
As I turn to leave, a voice stops me. “Do you always spy on conversations meant to exclude you?”
I freeze. King Sevrin stands in the shadowed hall, tall, broad, watching me with open interest. His eyes move to my bare feet, then back to my face. “So,” he says softly, smiling. “You must be the Baron’s little secret.”
The rumors are true. He is unfairly beautiful, and I resent that I notice. Heat floods my cheeks. “Majesty.”
He steps closer. I do not move. “I have never taken a veiled woman before,” he muses. “Care to be interesting?”
Disgust and shock crash through me. “I would rather take my chances with your brother.”
He laughs, the sound bright and infuriating. “My brother does not crave what he has not claimed. You will not suffer his enthusiasm.”
I swallow. “You smell like my sister.” That wipes the smile from his face.
I curtsy, low and proper. “Good day, Majesty.”
And I walk away before he can stop me.