“We’ll be married in two weeks,” he says, voice light and final. “A private ceremony. For the family. Discreet.”
“No.”
“Yes,” he says. “It’s already arranged. You’ll have the best physicians, the best protection. And afterward, if you insist on playing the rebellious wife, I won’t stop you. But I will have my heir.”
“You disgusting bastard?—”
“Oh, come now,” he interrupts smoothly, “for people of our class, marriage is never about love. It’s about lineage. Power. Appearances. All I care about is the heir thing. After that? You can rot in a library for all I care.”
I want to scream.
I want to claw his eyes out.
But I do neither.
Because my child is still inside me. Because Kallus would tell me to survive first. Fight smart.
I nod.
Just once.
And he smiles.
“Good girl.”
He leaves, and I sit down slowly on the edge of the bed, hands shaking.
I press my palm over my stomach.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I’ll keep us safe. I promise.”
But I don’t feel strong.
I don’t feel brave.
I feel lost.
Broken.
A shadow pretending to be a woman.
I close my eyes and remember him—his voice, his laugh, the way he’d look at me like I was the only star in his sky.
I want to believe he’s alive.
I want to believe he’s coming.
But tonight, all I can do is cry quietly into my pillow and pray to the stars that somewhere, somehow, he’s fighting to find his way back to us.
The gown is white.
Of course it is.
Lace spun from silkworms that never saw daylight. Imported pearls. A train long enough to trail my sins across the courtyard cobblestones. I stare at my reflection in the antique mirror, wondering how something so soft can feel like shackles.
The ceremony is short. Sanitized. Watched by more cameras than people.
Frederick kisses my hand instead of my lips, whispering in that self-satisfied tone of his, “You’ve made the right choice, darling.”
