Aleiya flinched at the hollow weight of Sullivan’s words. Chills raced down her spine. She didn’t dare look at the man that voice belonged to. As long as she didn’t see him, she could pretend he couldn’t see her.

  ‘Unsee me. Unknow me.’

  His gaze was impersonal, assessing, like a predator uninterested in weak prey, yet somehow still held her in its jaws. A trophy already claimed.

  She shrank beneath the weight of it. Small and breathless.

  Before her resolve could slip any further, the High Priest’s withering voice asked if she would take Sullivan as her lawfully wedded husband. She almost didn’t register the question fully.

  She was there to be wed after all. What would they gain from asking her for consent?

  How silly.

  Aleiya felt every gaze in the chapel. Their forced smiles, their silent shock, their whispered guesses at what would come next. Her breath caught, her eyes drawn to a single drifting petal—fluttering in weightless peril.

  Much like her will.

  She recoiled, just slightly, at the word husband. The pause in her answer softened Sullivan’s gaze. He knew she had no choice. Centuries old or not, she was still too young to understand what this truly meant.

  For a breath of a moment, Sullivan thought she would actually run this time.

  Aleiya’s gaze fixated on the free-falling petal—dancing—between her and Sullivan. All else blurred. All else hushed. The world held its breath as she was caught within the sliver of time between the beats of her own heart.

  Slowly, deftly, thin twinkling strings reached from the corners of her vision, stitching the world together as they floated before her eyes. She could see the very fabric of fate swirling between them in hushed eagerness at the events to come.

  Not yet settled.

  Not yet broken.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  All the while awaiting her quailed response.

  Such wicked things these strings could be. The tangled knots, the intricate weave between the tucks of reality. They connected everything she saw around her, an ever-present lattice tangled with never-ending patterns.

  Their portents? Unknown. Unwanted.

  Fortune or destruction, it mattered little to them in the end.

  As time resumed, the strings—now as tangible as the man before her—hung in the air.

  Lingering. Waiting. Watching.

  Aleiya had never believed in fate. But she believed in swift and painful consequences. So she gave a quick, solemn nod.

  As if pulled taut by unseen hands, the strings of fate tightened and held, shining bright with scarlet frenzy, as though fate itself had been made to bleed. They connected the two in a foreboding union that only Aleiya could see.

  Lord Sullivan of Clan Drakovich from Elysian and Princess Aleiya of Clan Moirae from the Crystal Forest.

  What a beautiful match they made.

  The priest pronounced them husband and wife, and her soggy wet veil was lifted out of the way. Two gloved hands cradled her cheeks—tender, burning.

  Startling.

  Her glossy gray eyes darted side to side as if to find them. Wide-eyed. Disoriented.

  The tenderness was unfamiliar. A gentleness she had never expected from Sullivan. Or anyone for that matter. The warm, almost burning silk was a stark contrast to the chill of her snow-white skin. His firm, coaxing grip pressed in on her, to the reality of what came next, to the gentle, waking nightmare of her life.

  She did not move.

  She did not struggle.

  She could only accept what was inevitable as his lips met hers—a loveless union sealed in frigid silence. The realization filled her pearl-pale eyes to the brim before a single tear finally spilled over, closed shut to her reality.

  Without pause, as if by script, a white-gloved thumb brushed the tear away. Now lost among the raindrops still dotting the little bride’s face.

  The kiss was so soft yet devoid of any warmth. As lifeless as a pressed flower between two pages. Her lips felt like the petals of roses yet held the frigid rain like a lingering fog. He watched her pupil-less eyes flutter closed, and tightly shut, as if to endure instead of enjoy.

  Yet what did that matter to him? All that he needed was her brother’s obedience. Nothing was more important than what King Ilios had to offer him in return for this union.

  Even if the chill of her rain-soaked skin did what no blood had in months. It quieted the ache.

  As Sullivan slowly pried himself away, the cold bit at his lips—cool, clean, like the first snowfall before it freezes. It curled around his tongue like an open-mouthed kiss. Unwelcome, yet sinfully sweet.

  Fleeting. Delicious. Insidious.

  He willed the taste away before it could fester, before it could twist perilously close into raw desire.

  The organ roused back to life to celebrate their union, signaling the guests to stand and give applause. Sullivan tucked the hand of his new wife into the crook of his arm, guiding her toward the reception hall.

  As he led her forward, Aleiya chewed her bottom lip, trying to chase away the stifling weight of his mouth on hers. The woody musk of his cologne engulfed her, unsettling in its contrast to the chasteness of her first kiss. It left her flushed, abashed, and far too warm.

  She subtly flicked her tongue over her lips, the lingering taste he left behind both invasive and sweet.

  She swallowed.

  The taste remained.