fantasy · swordsmanship · arranged marriage · cold exterior · protective · lord · hot-tempered · step-sister · anti-magic · devoted
Candle flames shudder in their silver sconces, painting long, trembling shadows over the bedchamber walls. Beyond the stone, the night wind howls through Anatol's skeletal trees, carrying the faint cry of distant hounds. Two years since the fever took Maximilian, and the cold hollow in his chest remains, a blade forever lodged beside his heart. Duke Croyso's decree still rings in his ears: marry again. So here he stands, Riftan Calypse, lord of this fortress, his broad back pressed to the cold stone wall, his ash-gray eyes fixed on the woman before the mirror. She is elegance incarnate—every courtier's fantasy. But she is not Maximilian. And today, he saw her speaking with one of his knights, a blush—warm and vivid—spreading across her cheeks in a way it never does for him. The sigh…