Page 5 of The Dragon Sacrifice

But not the bishop.

She pushed thoughts of him out of her head, drawing the box with her Selection dress out from under the bed she and her mother shared. She’d worn it every year since she’d been eligible, three to be exact. And this would be her fourth at twenty years old. She was practically a spinster, an old maid. Soon, her marriage prospects would dry up. But Seela couldn’t bring herself to care.

Pulling off her frock and wriggling down to her slip and undergarments, Seela shivered. The dress in the box was a corseted number, tight and constricting, that pinched her waist and thrust her breast to the heavens. She’d worn it for each Selection, then cleaned and stored it. Running her hands over the silk, over the golden dragon embroidered in a serpentine shape around one breast, Seela thought of the care it took to make such a dress. How much it cost. Every family with daughters saved up for years to buy their Selection dresses. How many hours had her father worked cutting down trees, or her mother at healing wounds? And for what?

The clenched fist in her stomach was back. She was not going to be picked.

She slipped the silk over her body, feeling it cling to every curve. The plunging neckline showed off more than she was used to and she tugged, trying to cover as much as she could. The dress was beautiful, a shimmering red, and she knew her dark hair and hazel eyes would flash against the hue.

“Ready?” her mother called from behind the curtain. When she pushed it back, she gasped. “Oh Lords. Every year I forget how beautiful you look in this dress.”

Seela blushed, feeling her mother’s fingers work on the corset strings and then attach the last of the buttons between her shoulder blades. Then she sat on the bed, careful not to wrinkle her skirt as her mother plaited her hair.

“I wish we had a looking glass so you could see what I see,” her mother said, tears in her eyes. “Your father…”

“Don’t get sappy,” Seela said, fighting her own tears. “The dress will be soiled, and I’ll come home smelling like mead and men by tomorrow morning.”

“You know, this could be the night you meet the one.”

“Or it could be the night I get my toes stepped on by every dance partner I meet. Are you ready?”

Her mother nodded, grabbing her bag and leaving the bedroom to get their cloaks. Seela smoothed her dress, sighing as deeply as the corset would allow. Tonight would bring what it would bring. There was nothing to stop the march of fate.

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