The Dragon Warlord's Silent Bride

DIANA’S POV

They began with Selena’s hair.

Queen Maerissa ordered the royal stylist to remove the gold chains from Selena’s dressing table one by one, then stood behind Diana while those same chains were woven through her darker curls.

The chains sat differently in Diana’s curls, and the stylist adjusted them twice before Maerissa finally said, ”Lower. The veil will hide the difference.”

Selena stood near the window in a plain morning dress. Without the red jewel and court powder, she looked younger than she had at the banquet.

Her wedding gown waited on a carved screen behind her.

Diana had seen it before. Selena’s seamstresses had spent months working gold dragons into the sleeves, pearls into the bodice, and the full crest of Valence into the train while princes crossed the South carrying gifts.

Every stitch had been measured for Selena.

Alma stood beside the dressing table holding Diana’s old silver ribbon.

A maid took it from her and placed it inside a box with the rest of Diana’s clothes.

”Those will remain here,” Maerissa said.

Diana watched the lid close over the ribbon.

King Odran entered with the marriage records beneath his arm, followed by two royal guards who took their places beside the door. He did not greet either daughter before setting the documents on the dressing table.

The first page named Princess Selena Valence.

”You will answer to Selena’s title,” Queen Maerissa said. ”You will remain veiled until the covenant is sealed. You will not write unless it becomes necessary. Your father and I will answer questions concerning the court.”

Diana reached for the slate.

Queen Maerissa covered it with two fingers.

”And your true name does not leave this room.”

Diana looked toward Selena, but her sister had turned back to the rain.

King Odran opened the marriage record.

”The Northern delegation has never met Selena. The Grand Duke has seen official portraits, all painted before last winter.”

Diana took the chalk.

Odran could rearrange titles however he pleased inside this room. Raigoro had named Selena.

She wrote:

HE ASKED FOR HER.

King Odran glanced at the slate.

”He asked for the First Princess.”

Diana tried to underline Selena’s name on the marriage record, but Maerissa lifted the page before the chalk could touch it.

”Names are how courts organize blood,” the queen said. ”The covenant will recognize what matters.”

Selena turned from the window.

”Mother.”

Queen Maerissa waited, but Selena said nothing more.

”The rite requires Valence blood,” the queen continued. ”Diana possesses it.”

Diana looked at herself in the mirror. King Odran had erased her from the public record whenever it suited him. Apparently, her blood remained royal whenever he needed something from it.

One question mattered more.

She wrote:

WHY NOT SELENA?

Selena crossed the room before Maerissa could answer.

”Because I am afraid.”

Alma looked up.

Selena stopped beside the dressing screen and touched the gold sleeve prepared for her own arm.

”You have heard the stories. One woman vanished before reaching Blackharrow. Another returned with burns along her neck. A third died on the mountain road.”

Diana held the chalk above the slate.

”He spends half the year beyond the wall,” Selena continued. ”He lives among soldiers and dragons. If the North does not kill his bride, it buries her where no one can see.”

Diana turned the slate toward her.

AND SO YOU CHOSE ME?

Selena read the sentence.

”I chose not to go.”

Diana stared at her.

Selena clearly needed the difference between choosing Diana and saving herself to matter. Perhaps it helped her live with the result.

Diana still had to wear the gown.

Queen Maerissa motioned for the seamstresses to bring it forward.

”A kingdom survives because someone is chosen to pay. Selena has been prepared to rule since childhood. You were spared those duties.”

Diana looked down at the marriage record carrying Selena’s name.

Spared.

She had never known locked doors counted as mercy.

A knock interrupted them. One of the guards opened the door, listened to the messenger outside, then crossed to King Odran.

”The Grand Duke has crossed the western bridge,” Odran said. ”His escort will reach the palace soon.”

Maerissa frowned.

”He was not expected until tomorrow.”

”He did not request permission to travel slowly.”

The seamstresses waited beside Diana with Selena’s gown stretched between them.

King Odran looked at her.

”You will be ready.”

Diana reached for the slate, but Odran closed the marriage record over it.

So she took the chalk and wrote directly across the dressing table.

I WILL NOT GO.

King Odran read the words before looking toward Alma.

”The woman has assisted in concealing a royal daughter from lawful court supervision.”

Alma reached for Diana’s hand.

”She followed your command, Your Majesty.”

”Commands can be revised.”

Diana stepped between them.

”If Diana refuses the covenant,” Odran continued, ”Alma will be charged with treason against the crown.”

Queen Maerissa straightened one of the gold chains in Diana’s hair as though the threat concerned nothing more serious than an uneven ornament.

”A public execution would create questions.”

”Then it will not be public,” Odran said.

One glance from him was enough. A guard seized Alma by the arm, and Diana caught his wrist before he could drag her away.

The man was stronger. He could have thrown Diana aside easily, but he looked toward the king for instruction.

King Odran gave none.

Alma had been the first person to understand Diana after her voice disappeared. She had learned the movements of Diana’s hands when everyone else stopped trying, and she had remained after the portraits came down and the palace began speaking of Diana as though she had never existed.

King Odran was not threatening a servant.

He was threatening the last person in Valence who still knew her name.

Behind Diana, the four words remained across Selena’s dressing table.

I WILL NOT GO.

Alma met her eyes.

”Do not.”

The guard tightened his grip.

Diana released his wrist.

Alma was still breathing, and Diana intended to keep her that way.

She turned back to the dressing table and pressed her sleeve against the first word. Chalk smeared across the white fabric as she wiped until the refusal disappeared.

It felt like erasing her voice a second time.

King Odran watched the last mark vanish.

”Good.”

The guard released Alma.

”You have spent your life protected by these walls,” Odran said. ”Now you will repay them.”

Diana pointed toward Selena, then toward the marriage record carrying her name.

Odran understood her well enough.

”Selena has a kingdom to inherit.”

He caught Diana’s chin and turned her toward the mirror.

”Blackharrow asked for a princess. I am giving them one.”

Then he released her and stepped away.

”Dress her.”

Alma opened the first fastening of Diana’s pale dress, and the seamstresses raised Selena’s wedding gown over her head.

The sleeves stopped above Diana’s wrists. The waist would not close. Two women pulled the fabric together while another secured it with hidden pins, reshaping a gown built for Selena until it could remain on Diana long enough to fool a stranger through the veil.

A maid shortened the hem and fastened Selena’s crest over Diana’s heart, pushing the pin deep enough to draw a spot of blood under its edge. She adjusted the crest and moved on.

Alma adjusted the final fastening with careful hands. She lingered at Diana’s back before stepping away.

In the mirror, Selena’s gold covered Diana’s body, and Selena’s crest covered her heart.

The face beneath them was still hers.

Selena lifted the dragonstone necklace from its box.

Its black surface caught the firelight.

”These are the stones worn in the covenant portraits.”

Diana did not lower her head, so Selena stepped onto the platform to fasten it herself.

Her hands paused near Diana’s throat.

”I did not ask them to choose you.”

Diana met her eyes in the mirror.

”I could have refused.”

Diana waited.

Selena looked toward her mother, then toward the guards behind Alma.

”But I did not stop them.”

Diana lowered her eyes to the necklace in Selena’s hands. That answer, at least, belonged to both of them.

Selena closed the clasp.

The first stone settled against the scar at Diana’s throat. Heat spread beneath it, and black gathered at the center of every candle flame.

A sound followed, though Diana did not hear it through her ears. It seemed to travel through the dragonstone, through her skin, and into the bones of her throat.

It sounded like a dragon calling from somewhere far beyond the palace.

An older memory swallowed the room.

Diana was six years old again, surrounded by stone walls beneath the palace while chains scraped across the floor. Men shouted around a great scaled shape twisting in the darkness.

She had not been meant to see them.

One of the men turned toward her.

The dragon moved first.

A black wing came down around Diana just as fire crossed the chamber. Stone broke overhead, striking the creature instead of the child sheltered by its wing.

Then Queen Elara was beside her.

Blood ran from her mother’s nose and across her lips as she pulled Diana away.

”You must never tell them what you saw.”

The memory broke apart.

What followed had always been less clear: a locked room, Alma crying beside her bed, and the terrible stillness after Diana woke.

When she woke, Queen Elara was dead, and Diana could no longer speak.

The bridal chamber returned around her.

Several candles had burned out. Selena had backed away, while Maerissa stared at the necklace against Diana’s throat.

”What did you do?” Selena whispered.

Diana touched the old scar.

The distant cry had faded, but the dragonstone remained warm.

The palace had called the loss of her voice grief and refused every question that followed. Diana knew only what memory had left her: a dragon had protected her, her mother had died, and everyone with answers had helped bury the truth.

Queen Maerissa recovered before anyone else.

”Relight the candles.”

No maid moved.

”Now.”

Alma climbed onto the platform and caught Diana by the shoulders just as armored footsteps sounded in the passage outside.

The measured tread came closer until a guard entered the room.

”Grand Duke Raigoro Kael has entered the palace. He is being taken directly to the Flame Chapel.”

The head seamstress lowered the veil over Diana’s face.

Queen Maerissa signaled to the guards.

By the time the inner doors opened, Diana’s name no longer existed inside the room.