Page 5 of A Bond of Fire and Roses

My uncle will miss me too, but he’s strong and will get over it. Or maybe he’ll come looking for us and we can be free together. Either way, I have to do this. My fate has been sealed in those papers, and come tomorrow, there will be no going back. Only forward.

I hear his familiar heavy footsteps in the hallway outside. His tone is louder than it usually is, firmer even, when he speaks.

“The princess is getting changed. Can it not wait? I do not think you should just go in?—”

Lochlan jumps off the bed and into the closet, hurrying through the secret door that leads down to the dungeons towards his room. Mere seconds later, my doors are thrust open and Priestess Gabriellia storms in with her hands clasped tightly against her pristine white cloak. She isn’t alone. Two women I have never seen before hurry after her as I stand just as quickly as Lochlan had jumped. A gold veil completely covers their heads all the way down to the gold ball gowns scarcely hidden beneath them, concealing their faces from me. They are like twins by the way they move in unison, their footsteps barely heard, and are the same height and size. I flick my gaze back to the priestess, who sucks on her thinly pressed lips before speaking.

“It has been decided that you shall meet the king earlier than expected. His people are very eager to see you, princess, and I’m sure you are just as eager to see them.” She snaps her bony fingers at me. “The king has kindly sent his seamstresses here to create a wardrobe for you. You will show them the respect they deserve while they make their corrections, which I am sure there are to be plenty of.” She turns her head toward them but keeps her gaze pinned on me. “As I mentioned before, our princess has a rather peculiar palette, and often deemed our meals here unsuitable to her tastes.” Her beady eyes narrow down at me into wrinkled slits. “Hopefully she will find His Majesty’s food more to her liking.”

Every word is like an insult, draped in invisible poison only I’m able to see. The two women ignore her as they walk towards me, and my room quickly fills with rows of hangers filled with beautiful gold dresses. I can guess the colour of the choice for tomorrow. Everything is gold. It almost hurts to look at them.

As I’m forced into gown after gown, measured, poked and prodded until I’m flustered and uncomfortable, the priestess watches me with a look of sadistic glee in her eyes.

“Stand straight and lift your head, princess. We have only a short time to make you befitting and worthy of our king,” she says, her lips barely moving around the syllables, “who will arrive in the morning to escort you personally to his royal palace.”

My heart pounds with dread as I’m whipped around to face the mirror again. I stare wide-eyed at my shocked reflection gazing back at me, unable to think, move, or even breathe. The Dragon King is arriving in the morning… at the same time as my escape.

CHAPTER TWO

They come for me in the middle of the night. They always come for me in the middle of the night, right when the shadows are at their darkest so they can hide their cruelty from their gods.

Even though I expect them, my heart thrashes like it’s the first time they’ve come for me, and fear overtakes my body.

I grip my bedsheets tighter underneath me and flick my gaze to the window. The crescent moon hangs low above the forest, its pale light barely reaching the bars on my window. Of course, they would come for me regardless of if the moon was full.

This is the last night they can do this to me.

They wouldn’t miss out on that.

I’m sure this punishment will be for some insane, made-up reason they will no doubt have gathered witnesses for. Sometimes I think about screaming and running from them—again. Sometimes I think about fighting back like I used to do in the beginning. But if my failed attempts have taught me anything—it’s that no amount of running, screaming, or begging for help will stop them.

Not even my uncle can help me, though he never talks about what happens to me on the night of a full moon. I think he’s too ashamed to admit he can’t protect me like he once did. The former Captain of the King’s Guard is just as powerless as the rest of us. Only Lochlan is able to help me, usually the next day, but even he can’t stop them.

I close my eyes as soon as they enter and picture the life we’ve often talked about—the life that is finally within reach; a home with no bars, a future with no pain, and a place where I can be loved instead of hurting. Lochlan promised to make all that come true, and soon, it will…

It will. It must. Please!

Cold hands grip me by the ankle and pull me out of the bed. I manage to steady myself before they grab my hair to pull me upright again. The priestess’ two favourite acolytes, Sister Breea and Sister Michael, sneer at each other before they each grab one of my shoulders and drag me outside. My bare feet slap the stone ground as I’m dragged off down the familiar, haunting passageways, down the ice-cold stairs, and past the main hall as if I’m being pulled by them through a million sins I never committed. Then they reach the last passageway, the one barely lit with only a single sconce hanging from the wall, and I know we’ve arrived.

The room they use is always the same one. Dark, cold, empty, with no windows or ventilation. The walls are so thick that my screams are never able to leave them. I swear this room is haunted by a thousand echoes of those screams. I’m thrown into the familiar old wicker chair that stands alone, right in the middle of the room, on a damp stone floor. The sisters tie my arms tightly to the arms of the chair, a precaution they adopted early on in case I try to escape again.

I lift my head, looking up at the tiny bit of sunlight that claws through the iron hinges of the door. I always focus on it as if that tiny bit of light is my single ray of hope. Years ago, when they first brought me here, I used to pray to their stupid god to save me from them. He never did either. I soon learned that the only one who could save me was myself. And one day, I’d muster the right amount of courage to do it.

As soon as Priestess Gabriella enters the room, the last of her acolytes, Sister Faye, seals the door behind her and then they all turn to face me. Two of them hold lanterns that she’d just enough light to let me see the flames flickering and dancing across their hooded frames. Their pristinely white robes. I used to think they were ghosts when I was little, sent here to haunt me upon every full moon, until I realised that ghosts were not real and that the figures standing before me were very much real, and they were worse.

The priestess leans down so that her gaze is level with my own, and her murky, almost black eyes bore hatefully into my own. When this first happened, I was ten years old, and I cried for so many nights and days afterward that my eyes remained bloodshot for weeks and I couldn’t see properly. She told me it was a punishment from the gods for simply being who I am—or rather, who my blood says I am—and every punishment since has been for that blood in my veins and the title I never asked for.

I stare back at her. After so many of these torture sessions, I no longer speak, scream, or cry out during them. Silence is all I have to hold on to within these four desolate walls. Silence, and a tiny ray of light.

“Tomorrow, you will receive a great honour from our king. One you do not deserve. One you are unworthy to behold, much less receive. There are many in his kingdom who would agree with that statement, but do you know what I think? I think you were unworthy to be born into this world, let alone our next queen.”

She grabs my chin roughly, forcing me to look at her in case I dare pull away again. Meanwhile, one of her acolytes rips the back of my nightdress to reveal my back. She loves causing me pain there and I assume the others don’t mind watching. None of them flinch or appear even the slightest bit bothered, not even when blood runs from my back and down my legs to the floor.

The priestess stands and clasps her hands behind her back. “Today, in class, you once more displayed how undeserving you are of the honour that awaits you. In fact, I would almost say you seemed… unhappy, about fulfilling your destiny tomorrow. It seems to me that I again must remind you of how happy you should be. How grateful.”

What remains of my dress is torn from my back and I’m completely exposed. I shake from the cold, unable to help it, and I catch the flicker of pure and utter pleasure that gleams in the priestess’ gaze. She loves it when I show even the slightest bit of emotion. But when it’s fear? She all but drowns in it.

“I am happy,” I say, glaring back at her. The lie is repeated so often on my tongue it sounds real this time when it leaves my lips. “I am grateful to accept my destiny, Sister Gabriella.”

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