Dinner with Duke Phideus's family has become a nightly ritual.
And each evening I'm struck by how different it is from anything I've known before.
These meals overflow with laughter and argument and the comfortable familiarity of genuine affection. Nothing like the formal dinners I remember, where every word was measured and every gesture calculated for advantage.
Nothing like the cold, silent meals at Reaton's palace after Leander started taking Cecily to his bed.
Here, conversations overlap and interrupt each other.
Duke Phideus tells stories from his youth with King Clement, gesturing with his wine glass for emphasis. Kyrell debates political strategy with his father while simultaneously trying to get Maren to eat her vegetables while she dominates most conversations with the force of her personality and bright laughter.
Tonight, she's in rare form.
"I've told you a thousand times, Kyrell." She stabs her fork into a piece of roasted pheasant with enough force to make the china clink. "I'm not interested in marriage. Not now, not ever. The very idea of being sold to some lord who wants me for family connections and my womb is absolutely revolting!"
Kyrell sets down his wine glass with measured precision. His voice comes calm but persistent. The tone of someone who's had this argument many times before, and expects to have it many times again.
"Marriage is duty for someone of your station, Maren. Every noblewoman goes through it. It's not about what you want—it's about what's expected, what's necessary for the family."
"How convenient for you to say, brother dear." Maren's retort cuts sharp as the knife she's holding. "Especially when you're not the one who'll be shipped off to some stranger's estate to produce heirs until your body gives out."
"That's not fair," he says.
"Isn't it? You get to choose your purpose, your duty, get to train and fight and prepare for grand destinies. And what do I get? " She leans forward, eyes flashing. "The honor of spreading my legs on command for whichever lord offers the best political alliance, and hoping I don't die in childbirth. How magnifisent…"
"Maren." Duke Phideus's voice cuts through the rising tension, firm but not harsh. "That's quite enough. Both of you. Dinner is for pleasant conversation, not for rehashing the same argument for the hundredth time. Let her be, Kyrell."
Kyrell's jaw tightens, but he nods and returns his attention to his plate. Maren slouches back in her chair with a dramatic sigh and after showing her brother a tongue quickly, but I notice her hands are shaking slightly as she grips her fork.
I watch her carefully as the conversation shifts to safer topics—trade negotiations with the western provinces, repairs needed on the north tower. Beneath Maren's rebellion, beneath the sharp words and defiant posture, I recognize something intimately familiar.
Fear. Real, visceral fear.
Not just avoiding duty or being difficult for the sake of it—this is the terror of ending up trapped, powerless, used up and discarded. Terror of becoming exactly what I was.
A wife valued only for her womb and ability to give birth.
A woman whose worth was measured in living babies, whose failure meant exile and erasure.
When dinner ends, Maren insists on helping clear the dishes despite multiple servants offering to handle it.
"I need to move," she mutters, gathering plates with more force than necessary. "Need to do something with my hands or I'll say something I'll regret."
I follow her to the small adjoining pantry where dishes are temporarily staged before being carried to the kitchens. The space is cramped, intimate, lit by a single lamp that casts warm shadows across the walls.
We work in silence for a moment, stacking plates with careful precision. Then I speak quietly, keeping my eyes on the china in my hands.
"I was married very young, you know. At seventeen. To Leander it was love at first—real love, I thought. He chose me himself despite my supposed minor nobility. Those first years were..." I pause, searching for words. "They were everything I'd dreamed marriage could be."
Maren's hands still on the glass she's holding. She doesn't look at me, but I feel her attention sharpen.
"But I can imagine how terrifying duty-bound marriage must be when there's no choice in the matter," I continue. "When you're just a piece on someone else's board, moved around to serve purposes you had no say in choosing."
For a long moment, Maren doesn't respond. Then her usual irreverence drops completely. She sets down the glass and turns to face me, her expression raw with unexpected vulnerability.
"Thank you," she says simply. "For understanding. Everyone else just tells me to accept it, to stop being difficult, to do my duty like a good noble daughter. But you..." She trails off, swallowing hard. "You actually get it."
I set down my own stack of plates, meeting her eyes directly.
"I do get it. I lived it, even when I thought I'd chosen freely. The moment I couldn't give Leander what he needed, I became expendable, replaceable. And there was nothing I could do about it because my entire identity, my entire worth, was tied to my function as his wife."
"That's what terrifies me." Maren's voice drops to barely above a whisper. "Not marriage itself, but becoming… that. Becoming nothing except someone's wife, someone's broodmare. Losing everything I am until there's nothing left but duty and failure and…"
She stops abruptly, pressing her lips together.
"I know," I say softly. "Believe me, I know."
We stand in the quiet pantry, two women who've seen different versions of the same prison, understanding each other in ways words can barely capture.
Then I add, carefully, "Though I'll say Kyrell seems to argue because he cares, because he worries. He's not trying to control you, not really. He's trying to protect you in the only way he knows how."
Maren's smile returns, smaller but genuine. "I know. He's insufferable about it, but he's a good brother. Most of the time. When he's not trying to marry me off to every eligible lord within two kingdoms."
"He does seem rather determined about that."
"Because he thinks marriage will make me safe." She picks up the glass again, examining it in the lamplight. "He just doesn't understand that safety can be a different kind of prison."
The moment passes, but something has shifted between us.
Perhaps we can become friends—real friends. Forged in the understanding of shared fear and mutual respect.
We return to the dining room carrying fresh wine, and Maren immediately links her arm through mine with conspiratorial warmth. Duke Phideus and Kyrell are deep in conversation about supply lines, paying us no attention.
"I'm so happy to have another woman here now. Do you know how exhausting it is being surrounded by men constantly?" Maren declares, her voice bright with genuine joy. "Father and Kyrell. The guards. Even the stable boys."
Despite everything, I find myself laughing.
"Now we can discuss female things," Maren continues with exaggerated enthusiasm. "Like the overvaluation of the male sex and their absurd belief they know what's best for everyone. Or how ridiculous it is that we're expected to smile and nod while they pontificate about subjects we understand better than they do."
"I think we're going to be excellent friends," I say, my smile feeling real for the first time in weeks.
"Oh, absolutely!" Maren squeezes my arm. "I have so many complaints to share! Years of them, all bottled up with no one to properly appreciate their validity."
Kyrell glances over at us, his expression shifting from mild concern to cautious relief as he sees me smiling. His eyes meet mine across the room, and something warm passes between us. Gratitude, maybe, or understanding.
Maren pulled me toward our seats and as we settled back at the table, for the first time since I left the Reaton I felt something other than grief and rage.
I feel the tentative beginnings of belonging.
The fragile hope that maybe, just maybe, I'm not alone in this impossible fight ahead.
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