If I killed him now, would anyone really blame me?
The thought arrives unbidden as I enter the lesser dining hall, as natural as breathing. As reasonable as any response to being sold, married, and abandoned in the span of a day.
The knife beside my plate gleams with possibility.
I've learned he drinks pomegranate wine to weaken himself. How much more vulnerable might he be now, after days of drinking himself toward death?
One strike between the ribs. One moment of courage, and I'd be free.
Widow sounds so much better than wife.
"My lady," Mira appears at my elbow, her voice barely a whisper. "They've been asking about you. About your... temperament."
"And what did you tell them?"
"That you survive." She pauses, glancing at the assembled predators. "That counts for something here."
The vampires watch our exchange with lazy interest, nostrils flaring slightly. They've seen me before, these past three nights, but still they react to my humanity—offensive and enticing in equal measure.
I am the curiosity that never grows stale, the lamb that refuses to bleat.
Dorian sits at the head of the table, a beautiful corpse presiding over a feast of the damned. He doesn't acknowledge my arrival, but the empty chair to his right waits like an open grave.
"Our little human finally graces us," Lydia says from Dorian's left, her voice bright with malice. "I was beginning to think you'd fled. Though where would you go? The forests would eat you alive. Or perhaps that would be kinder than what waits here."
The Ashfords occupy seats further down, their matched beauty terrible in the candlelight. Corin raises her goblet in mock salute. "The new Lady North. Still breathing, I see. How refreshing."
"Breathing is rather essential to my continued existence," I reply, forcing myself to walk to that awful chair. "Though I understand it's been so long since any of you required it, you might have forgotten."
Lady Ravenna laughs across the table. "Such spirit. Tell me, child, does your husband appreciate your wit? Or does he simply endure it whilst contemplating which vein to open first?"
‘Elias would laugh at this,’ I think. ‘My brother always said I'd die from a clever remark at the wrong moment.’
But Elias fights with the rebels now, somewhere beyond these walls, whilst I sit at the monsters' table wearing silk.
I sit, the chair cold even through my dress. A servant—human, I note with sick relief—places a plate before me. Real food, whilst the others sip from goblets that smell of copper and death.
I'm the only one eating. The only one who needs to.
"The rebellions grow bolder," a male vampire says. Lord something—I've already lost track of names, titles, the complex hierarchy of the dead. "Two villages this month. They're organising."
My pulse quickens. Elias's work, I know with certainty. The calculated strikes, the careful timing—it carries his signature like a letter I'll never receive.
"Let them organise," Lydia says. "What can cattle do against their butchers except bleat more loudly?"
"These cattle have stakes. Silver. Fire." The male vampire's expression darkens.
Dorian finally speaks, his voice cutting through the chatter like a blade through silk. "Which is why we're here. The human kingdoms must be reminded of their place."
"Through marriage treaties?" Lady Ravenna's tone drips scepticism. "And how's that working for you, Your Grace? Does your wife make you feel more in control of the situation?"
All eyes turn to me. I feel the weight of their attention like hands around my throat.
"I imagine I make him feel many things," I say, meeting Lady Ravenna's gaze. "Control likely isn't one of them."
Callum laughs, genuine delight in the sound. "Oh, she's magnificent. Where did you find her, Dorian? I simply must know which kingdom produces such delightfully suicidal women."
"The Carrow line," Dorian says, and something in his tone warns against further inquiry. "Her father was... amenable to negotiation."
Amenable. I taste bile in this word.
My father sold me to save his kingdom from these creatures. And somewhere, Elias fights to undo everything our father negotiated.
I wonder if word has reached the rebels that the Carrow daughter has been fed to the wolves. Would he mourn me?
"Your silence speaks volumes," Lady Ravenna observes, studying me with those frozen eyes. "Tell me, child, do you think your sacrifice will matter?"
"I think," I say carefully, "that every sacrifice matters."
"How perfectly, pathetically human," Lydia interjects, her voice like glass breaking. "This notion that suffering has meaning. You'll learn differently. You all do, in the end."
"Perhaps," I concede. "But I haven't reached the end yet."
Corin leans forward, her beautiful face alight with interest. "You know what we could give you, don't you? Immortality. Power. Freedom from all this terrible fragility."
"At what cost?"
"Only everything you are," Callum answers, his smile sharp as winter. "But then, what is that worth, really? You're already dying, moment by moment. We could make it stop."
"Death," I say quietly, "is the only thing that makes any of this bearable. Knowing it ends."
The room falls silent. Dorian rises abruptly. "The hour grows late. We'll continue discussions tomorrow."
The dismissal is clear. The vampires drift from the room like smoke, but the Ashfords linger near my chair.
"You fascinate us," Corin murmurs, trailing cold fingers across the back of my chair. "Such fire in something so breakable."
"We're hosting a smaller gathering tomorrow," Callum adds, his gaze never leaving my face. "Something more... intimate. You should join us."
"Intimate?"
"Just select company," Corin purrs. "Those of us who understand that eternity requires... diversions."
The invitation hangs between them, heavy with implications I don't fully grasp. But I see the hunger in their synchronised attention, the way they watch me like cats who've found something interesting to play with before it breaks.
"I'll consider it," I lie, though part of me—the part slowly dying of isolation in this tomb—means it.
"Do," Corin says. "We so rarely find humans worth keeping conscious."
When I finally return to my chambers, I find a single red rose, its thorns carefully removed, and beside it, a slim volume of poetry. No signature needed. Only Dorian would leave poetry as a chain.
The message is clear: refuse the Ashfords. Stay in your rooms. Remain alone rather than seek company he hasn't approved.
I should burn them. Should throw both rose and book into the fireplace as the insult they are.
He won't look at me, but he'll monitor my every movement and plant warnings when I step toward anything resembling autonomy.
Instead, I place the rose in water and set the book on my nightstand. Not because I'm accepting his silent command. But because now I know he's watching.
And perhaps that's the most dangerous trap of all.