Page 27 of Poisoned Vows

“You’re going to be the most beautiful bride,” she tells me gently, as if that makes any difference. As if that makes this better, and not worse. “My brother is very lucky.”

No, your brother is high-handed and demanding.Luck doesn’t factor into it. My father made a play for power, and Nikolai made his own play in return. That’s all that’s going on here.

I don’t say it, though. My “sharp tongue,” as Nikolai has referred to it, is stilled, if for no other reason than that there seems to be no point. Nothing I say will change what’s going to happen. The time to hope that I might get a reprieve is past.

Marika lets out a sigh as she does up the buttons, her fingers moving quickly and nimbly up the back of my dress. “There’s no point in acting like you’re going to your execution,” she tells me, although her voice is kind as she says it. “He won’t hurt you. He’ll try to be a decent husband. And you’ll be treated like the wife of the heir should be. You won’t want for anything.”

“I know.” My voice sounds flat and hollow, not really like my own. “He’s told me all of that.”

“You can try to make the best of it—”

I think Marika feels the way I tense, my jaw tightening as I bite back what I want to say in return, because she goes silent after that, buttoning the last few buttons up the illusion lace in the back of my dress and then stepping back.

“I’m going to go get into my own dress,” she says finally. “I’ll come back and get you, and then we’ll go down to the car.”

I hear the door lock behind her as she leaves. I sink down onto the edge of my bed, not really caring if I wrinkle my dress, and run my fingers over the smooth silk.

I’ve imagined so many scenarios over the years, knowing what was coming for me eventually. But I’d never imagined this one. I imagined it ending in my freedom or my death, but never a wedding.

It sounds dramatic to say that it feels worse. But at that moment, it does.

I’m not sure how much time passes before Marika knocks on the door again and opens it, dressed in a pale rose bridesmaid’s dress, her hair pulled to one side with a diamond clip and her makeup carefully done. She’s holding my bouquet and hers in her hands, and I have to stifle a near-hysterical laugh at the sight of it. It all feels so incredibly stupid to put on such a show for something that we all know is fake.

Or is it?I might not want this, but the marriage itself is real. I will be Nikolai’s wife, very soon. I’ll go to his bed, and eventually, I’ll have to give him an heir. I’ll be expected to play the part of his wife at all times, in all ways, when he expects it.

It’s pageantry—but that doesn’t mean it isn’t horribly, awfully real.

—

I feel hyperaware of everything as we arrive—the brightness of the late-afternoon sun, the click of my heels on the church steps, the thick scent of the flowers, the sound of the music trickling into the nave as Marika and I stand there, waiting for my father to arrive and the doors to open so we can start our procession down the aisle.

I haven’t seen my father since the night he took me to the meeting with thepakhan. I don’t know what I expect when he walks in. Actually, Iexpectnothing. I hope that I might get at least an acknowledgment of what this is getting him. Some sign of affection. Some reward for being the dutiful daughter that he raised—even if I haven’t been given much of a choice. Some recognition that I didn’t make them haul me in here kicking and screaming.

Instead, I get nothing. His face is blank as he walks towards me, as if he doesn’t even recognize me. And then, as his arm slides through mine, hooking my elbow into the crook of his, I feel the tight grip of his other hand on my forearm as he leans in to whisper into my ear, like a father dispensing wisdom to his beloved daughter on her wedding day.

“Don’t fuck this up,” he hisses, his breath hot against my cheek. “The meeting went well, but I can tell I’m on thin fucking ice. You make him happy, whatever you have to do.”

He pulls away, and I catch a glimpse of concern on Marika’s face. Just a little—but not enough to make a difference. Not enough to make her put a stop to all of this—as if she could. It’s the only thing that makes me not hate her. I know at the end of the day, she has as little power as I do in all of this, and eventually, they’ll come for her too.

The doors open, and the bridal march pours down the aisle toward us. Marika starts walking, and I look down at the bouquet spilling over my hands as I count the steps. For a moment, when it’s my turn, I think my feet aren’t going to move. That I’m going to stay rooted to this spot on the carpet, and remain here, frozen.

But my father propels me forward, as I’d known he would. “Fuckingwalk,Lilliana,” he hisses at me. Then he’s all but marching me down the aisle, in step with the music but with a purposeful stride that has the clear intent of getting me to my bridegroom before I can decide to put up a fight.

I don’t look up. I keep my eyes on the bouquet in my hands as we walk, dreading the moment when I’ll see Nikolai. I pick out the names of the flowers I know—roses, that’s obvious; daisies, I think, peonies. Some burgundy flowers in the spray of pink and white that I don’t recognize. Greenery interspersed throughout—and then I see the bouquet being taken out of my hands by Marika’s, and a broad, masculine hand taking one of mine as my father passes it over.

There are men’s shoes in front of me. Expensive-looking ones, polished leather, with dark grey suit trousers above them. I can’t bring myself to look up. All that time staring defiantly back at Nikolai, and now I don’t want to see his face. It will be real, if I do.

His finger touches my chin through the delicate lace of the veil covering it. He tips it up, and I see him, as the priest starts to speak.

“Just repeat the words, Lilliana,” he says quietly, and for a moment, I almost think I hear sympathy in his voice.

But that makes no sense, because if he had any sympathy for me at all, he’d have let me go.

I don’t know how I make it through the ceremony. Nikolai says his vows in a strong, sure voice, and I repeat mine rotely, like a bird parroting words it doesn’t really understand. He slips the wedding band onto my finger without a hitch, but when it’s my turn, I almost drop it. I barely hang on, managing to push it onto his third finger as I repeat the vows the priest tells me to.

With this ring—honor, cherish, love—

It’s all such utter bullshit. I won’t be cherishing Nikolai, and he won’t love me. I won’t be worshiping him with my body, and while he might be endowing me with all his earthly goods, he isn’t going to be honoring me. I find myself wondering when I missed the part where the priest asks if anyone objects, and wishing I’d both heard it, and had the nerve to speak up. To say I’m being forced into this—as if it would make a difference.

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