“She stood where I wasn’t allowed to go.”
Lena
I was staring at the ceiling again.
It had become a habit of mine these past few days.
I’d just lie on my back in the pre-dawn shadows before Rosie arrived, running through my head all the things she told me about the palace.
Rosie has been a massive help to me; she’s the one who helped me adjust to this place.
At the very least, she’s the only thing keeping me from dying of boredom in this gilded cage.
The ceiling never had anything useful to say, but I consulted it anyway.
My mind drifted back to that night in the corridor.
It had been two days since that charged, impossible moment outside my door when his hand had reached out, hovered, and then curled into a fist before he walked away.
For the past few days, I’ve been haunted by a feeling that makes me yearn for his touch again.
I try to keep my mind off it, but my brain and my body aren’t on the same team.
My mind keeps telling me he’s a man I should be afraid of, but my body just whispers, He is your mate.
I’d been asking Rosie a lot about werewolves and what “mates” actually are.
I needed to add more to the little information I’d gathered from the books I’d read, and she was helpful in her own way, which I truly appreciated.
Rosie arrived with her usual clockwork efficiency and a soft click of the door.
She always wore a smile on her face, and sometimes I wondered if I’d ever seen her look sad.
I sat up.
“You’re awake already, My Lady,” she noted.
She’d stopped being surprised by my early hours.
“I couldn’t sleep. The ceiling and I had things to discuss,” I said bluntly.
This time, she gave me a small, careful almost-smile.
It was the kind that lived somewhere between professional distance and genuine friendship.
“And what did the ceiling say?”
“Nothing useful. I just used it to pass the time.”
I watched her move toward the wardrobe.
Without either of us ever deciding it, Rosie had become the only consistent thing in my life.
She brought my breakfast and helped me into clothes that didn’t feel like mine, but she also knew which topics I wanted to talk about and which ones I wanted to leave in the dark.
She never pushed.
I appreciated that more than I knew how to say.
“What’s the schedule for today?” I asked.
“Queen Astrid at the tenth hour,” Rosie said.
“Then the afternoon is yours.”
I let out a long, low breath.
“Not today again.”
“My Lady,” Rosie said carefully, “the Queen Mother is not…”
“I know. She’s not unkind. She’s just… thorough. I’ve heard you say that before.”
“Relentlessly so,” Rosie agreed, her tone suggesting she had opinions she was far too smart to share out loud.
I stretched, and my back protested immediately.
This queenly posture training was a special kind of torture.
Though she never raised her voice; she simply corrected me.
Again and again.
It was exhausting.
This royal etiquette wasn’t what I had signed up for.
Back home, I wasn’t what you’d call a “classic lady.” I couldn’t even walk in heels and I hated any dress that wasn’t comfortable.
It was mostly Tessa who forced that lifestyle on me.
I was a simple girl, and I liked it that way.
Who would have thought this simple girl would one day be in a kingdom where I’m forced to wear corsets and ball gowns almost every day of my life?
I hissed at the soreness in my muscles as Rosie began to prep me. This chapter is updated first at g.com.
“Your eyes are too direct,” Queen Astrid had told me on the first day.
“Not with me,” she’d added, a hint of dry humor surfacing.
“In general. In court, direct eye contact is a challenge. You are not there to challenge; you are there to observe. You must learn to show the difference on your face.”
“How do I look less challenging without looking less present?” I had asked.
She had looked at me then with those sharp, reading eyes, eyes that looked authoritative and different.
“That,” she whispered, “is actually the answer.”
“I have a lot to practice,” I told Rosie now.
“Maybe you could become my personal teacher aside from the Queen?”
Rosie laughed and went to lay out a dress.
It was a deep forest green.
It wasn’t a heavy corset gown; this one was a bit simpler, and I was grateful for that.
As Rosie prepped the laces, my mind betrayed me again.
It didn’t ask permission; it just went straight back to the corridor.
His face, which I’d spent the last few days obsessing over, his arms, and that electric feeling I felt when our bodies touched.
I felt an instant flash of heat.
What was I thinking?
I pressed my fingers against my cheek, feeling the ghost of that warmth.
Stop it, I told myself.
He hadn’t come back.
The silence was an answer, even if I hadn’t asked the question.
“My Lady?” Rosie was watching me.
“I’m fine,” I said, taking the dress.
She didn’t believe me, and I didn’t blame her, because I didn’t even believe myself.
Queen Astrid was already seated when I arrived at the south corridor.
She was so perfect that I wondered if I could ever actually be like her.
She did everything with such grace, as if it were a reflex rather than a choice.
“You’re holding your left shoulder higher than your right,” she said before I’d even crossed the room.
It’s still too early for this, I thought inwardly.
I adjusted.
“Better. Sit.”
We moved through the political geography of the court.
She explained how women were also members of the Council, who sat where, and what their distance from the throne whispered about their loyalty.
She even mentioned that one day, I would sit on that same Council.
I asked a question that had been on my mind for a while.
“What do I do if a Council member asks me something I don’t know?”
“In your world, what would you do?” she asked.
I hesitated.
I was always a truthful person, so I blurted out, “I’d tell them I don’t know and then find out.”
“Then do that, but frame it,” she said.
“Instead of saying ‘I don’t know,’ use ‘That requires consideration.’ Instead of ‘I’ll find out,’ use ‘I will consult the relevant parties.’ The content is the same, but the framing is everything.”
“That seems exhausting,” I admitted.
She smiled at me and tapped my shoulder.
“You have huge potential, Lena. Trust me, when the time is right, you will bring it out.”
The training continued until my body felt broken.
***
I stopped at a gallery window and spotted two women in the courtyard below.
It was Kira, moving with that easy, earned athleticism.
She was walking with someone, laughing.
Seraphina.
She moved with the kind of unconsidered grace I was currently killing myself to learn.
She looked like she belonged there, while I was still trying to figure out how to stand, walk, and sit without looking like a disaster.
Watching them made my confidence sink.
“Rosie,” I said, trying to keep my voice casual.
“That’s Seraphina with Kira, right?”
“Yes, My Lady. She’s on the Council. Her father was the late King’s closest advisor.”
“And Kira? They seem… close.”
“They’ve known each other a long time,” Rosie said neutrally.
I already knew Kira was Riven’s mate; Rosie had told me that, and it had shocked me.
I traced back to the dinner and remembered how she sat near Riven.
I didn’t know why, but I could feel her strength.
She had the aura of a warrior.
They matched.
I knew Riven was like Kael, though I felt he wasn’t quite as cold.
I watched Seraphina say something that made Kira let out a full, genuine laugh.
“Does Seraphina spend a lot of time here? In the evenings?” I didn’t know why I blurted that out.
I just…
I didn’t like her.
Rosie paused and took a breath.
“She has duties. She is often in the King’s study, sometimes quite late.”
The words felt like a physical weight.
A feeling rose up in me—the same hot jealousy I’d felt when I saw her near Kael in that corridor.
What would they be doing in the study so late at night?
I asked myself.
While I was upstairs learning how to sit properly, Seraphina was in the room I wasn’t even allowed in, helping the man who wouldn’t even visit me.
I pressed my lips together and looked away from the window, but I was too late.
Kira had looked up.
Our eyes locked across the distance.
She didn’t look away.
She held my gaze for a heartbeat, smiled at me, and then turned back to Seraphina and walked away.
I went back to my room and sat on the edge of the bed, still in that green dress.
I looked at the ceiling, waiting for it to speak.
It didn’t.
I pressed my hand against my chest.
It was aching, but I didn’t know why.
It was a low, persistent, inconvenient ache for a man I didn’t even know, a man who had left me yearning for him for days.
I lay back, lost in deep thought.
I had spent two days training to be a Queen for a King who seemed to be ruling with someone else.
I didn’t know then that by the next day, the silence would be broken by the sound of blood hitting the floor.
The tension is building!
Is Kael really ruling with someone else, or is Lena just getting started?
Thanks you for the supports