"Do you like where you'll rest in peace?"
Claudel started at the sudden voice and turned around.
"Butler. Have the gravedigger add gold coins to the engraving. The Duchess seems quite taken with her tombstone."
When the butler glanced at the guard standing behind him, the man bowed his head and hurried out.
Claudel could find no words and pressed her lips shut. Kaian's cold, barely restrained fury silenced not only her but everyone present—no one dared so much as breathe.
At his curt gesture, Claudel stepped back and took her place beside him.
"The right side, not the left. Do you not even know that much?"
Stung by his sharp rebuke, she corrected herself and moved to his left, where he held her arm.
A powerful scent rose from the man beside her—the same masculine scent that had enveloped Claudel the night before.
He had been quite skilled.
Kaian was a strikingly handsome man possessed of an overwhelming presence, and his reputation had traveled even to the distant northern reaches of Valmonde: the woman warming his bed changed with the tides.
It had been her first time, and her body was still unfamiliar with all of it, so when he spoke to her harshly—as though she displeased him, as though he might drive her to madness—every nerve had screamed.
Claudel counted herself fortunate that the man who had taken her virginity was not clumsy. Had he been, the sheer force of him might well have crushed her slight frame and broken a limb or two.
When she had opened her eyes that morning, Kaian had already left the bedroom. This was the first time she had seen him since the wedding night.
There had been no gift waiting for her.
If the groom was satisfied with the first night, it was customary for baskets and boxes overflowing with flowers and presents to line the bride's bedroom and hallway come morning.
Though it was a tradition particular to the Kingdom of Oberon and arguably outdated, it was so deeply entrenched that noblewomen gathered at social events expressly to compete over what their husbands had bestowed upon them after the wedding night.
The nature of the gift could carry meaning—even symbolism. Expensive jewelry to display wealth. Trophies received from the King to signal honor. Heirlooms passed down from the family head's mother, offered as a pledge of fidelity to the woman who would become his wife.
This morning, the space before Claudel's door had been empty.
There were things one could understand perfectly well without a single word being spoken.
She was certain she would not see him in the bedroom again after tonight.
It was a truly wretched state of affairs.
And yet, as she gazed at the stone bearing her name, she felt a quiet gratitude that Kaian was not, at least, planning to cast her out entirely.
Not if he had troubled himself to prepare her a resting place here.
Concealing her sorrow, Claudel calmly laid flowers and poured wine at the graves where the masters of Temnes slumbered.
She had no idea that Kaian was stealing glances at her profile.
After the visit to the catacombs, the celebrations continued much as they had the day before.
Where yesterday the prominent Temnes blood relatives had gathered to drink themselves into oblivion, today it was the sworn vassals' turn.
Only the particular breed of dog had changed—from kin to retainers—but the barking was the same.
The atmosphere of getting drunk while spewing grievances about the Vermont marriage was no different from the night before, and Kaian simply sat at the highest table with an impassive face, slowly wetting his lips with wine.
She is a strange woman.
His thoughts drifted to Claudel as he had found her in the crypt earlier that morning.
Kaian had descended to the basement accompanied by several armed guards. They wore heavy armor, and the clamor of their approach must have been considerable—yet Claudel had stood in a kind of trance, as though her mind had wandered somewhere far away.
She had caressed the cold tombstone with distant eyes.
Her expression had been gentle, almost serene—as though the gravestone pleased her, as though she were dreaming of another world entirely, alone among the dead.
That look had touched something in Kaian.
That was the face she should have worn last night, he thought, when she let my hands move across her body. Not the rigid silence, not the clenched jaw and shuttered eyes, enduring each moment like an ordeal to be survived. She had lain in his arms—arms that countless maidens would have been desperate to occupy—and simply waited for the hours to pass.
And yet, in truth, Kaian had been rather satisfied with his unexpected bride. After Claudel had collapsed into the deep sleep of exhaustion, he had left the bedroom and belatedly prepared flowers and a gift.
This was because he recalled what the butler had said when pestering him about tradition, to which he had replied: "Flowers for Vermont do not grow in Rowen."
Claudel had become his bride. She was his wife now.
Besides, while he had been so repulsed and uneasy beforehand—genuinely uncertain whether he could manage the first night at all—once it was over, even in full sobriety, the discomfort had not been as unbearable as he had feared.
Because she was no longer Vermont.
Because she was Temnes.
He had not felt so terrible when he glanced at the woman who had found her resting place beside his own grave—the one built when he assumed the headship—with her name carved cleanly into the stone.
Except that she was still a damned Vermont.
Yet when he saw that she had not accepted his gift, his wounded pride curdled back into spite.
It was common knowledge that a bride was to wear the morning-after gift immediately when dressing the next day.
If Claudel had accepted him as her husband, she should have placed the flowers he sent in her hair and slipped the ring he sent onto her finger.
The gift Kaian had chosen for Claudel was a large blue diamond ring—the same one his mother had received as a morning-after gift from the previous Duke of Temnes.
It was among the most treasured heirlooms passed down through the Temnes line, but there was no way Claudel could have known that.
Perhaps it was too modest to catch her eye.
The image of Claudel on her wedding day flashed through his mind—draped head to toe in treasure. Tiaras, rings, necklaces, brooches, belts—all of them so extravagant they might have been plundered from some royal treasury.
In the eyes of a woman accustomed to such finery, a simple ring set with a rare blue diamond might not have seemed worth wearing. But the slight to his pride stung all the same.
"I wish a year had already passed."
One of the vassals groaned.
"Once the required marriage period is fulfilled, we must drive Vermont from Rowen soil at the earliest opportunity."
"Hear, hear. Only three hundred and sixty-four days remain."
When Kaian offered no response, they chattered on excitedly, as though Claudel's expulsion from the castle in a year's time were already a settled matter.
"Your Excellency."
Among them, a middle-aged, gaunt man with dark gray hair and a neatly trimmed beard approached, rubbing his hands together ingratiatingly. It was Burbrook Kanden, overseer of the estate's orchards.
"I have been pondering the matter of the annulment."
"Is that something to celebrate?"
"Well, not to celebrate, precisely. But consider—why did the Duke of Vermont offer up his least-favored daughter? Even Vermont would turn a blind eye to the dismissal of an adopted child."
Burbrook studied Kaian's expression carefully.
"Everyone knows Claudel is the pariah of that family. Had he sent Princess Irena—the daughter rumored to be his true favorite—he would never have dared treat her so harshly. He would have dispatched his own life force to Rowen Castle to protect her."
"You seem remarkably well-informed about Vermont."
Burbrook brightened when Kaian responded.
Until the moment he had entered the bridal chamber the previous night, Kaian had not even known the name of the woman he married.
All he knew was that he had been forced to wed a Vermont woman for the sake of that damned King Oberon, and he had no intention of taking the arrangement seriously or in good faith.
Claudel was the adopted daughter of the Duke of Vermont.
The Duke had a younger brother, but fearing a succession dispute, he had banished the man to the outskirts of the estate, where he lived as a commoner.
The daughter this younger brother had fathered with a common-born woman was Claudel.
In practice, however, marriage between a noble and a commoner was not recognized under Oberon's law, so Claudel had grown up without any social standing until she was past the age of ten.
Then her mother had died in an accident, and her father—carrying young Claudel in his arms—had returned to the castle of Vermont. He entrusted his daughter to his elder brother and, leaving behind a will saying he wished to be with his beloved wife, took his own life.
Fortunately, Claudel possessed the red hair and golden eyes that Vermont tradition held could only manifest in the direct bloodline.
Rumors abounded that the Duke had paid a considerable price to the Duchess in exchange for registering Claudel within the House of Vermont.
Kaian's original plan had been to annihilate Vermont through territorial war.
His aim had been to ensure that the name Vermont would never appear again in the future of Oberon—the long-cherished ambition of every Temnes lord.
King Oberon, however, was a shrewd political operator and had no desire to see Vermont exterminated.
Yet at the same time—as Burbrook had astutely noted—it was a calculated and intelligent King who had selected the current Vermont patriarch's adopted daughter, not his biological one, as the sacrifice for this arranged marriage. To Kaian, the message was clear enough: the Crown would look the other way when the annulment inevitably came.
As Kaian sat lost in thought, Burbrook—clearly harboring a wish of his own—hovered at his side, unable to tear himself away.
"That is why, Your Excellency... when you discard the Vermont woman after the marriage period, I humbly ask that you send her to me."
"When I was young, I had a dalliance with a Vermont woman." His eyes grew distant. "I tried so desperately to find her again, but a red-haired northern girl married into enemy territory... I have remained a widower ever since."
A cruel smile creased the skin around Burbrook's weathered eyes.
"She'll be an outcast even to Vermont, won't she? Once the Duke discards her, she'll have nowhere to go. So please—allow me to take her in."
Kaian raised his glass with an air of indifference.
A drunken retainer stumbled forward and bowed his head before the Duke, elbowing aside Burbrook, who was still flushed with emotion.
"This marriage is an insult! Grant me your leave, and I shall ride north this very hour and slaughter those Vermont scum—"
The butler peered into the chaos unfolding before Kaian and leaned in.
"Your Excellency. The Duke of Vermont has just arrived at the castle."
Kaian sneered, as though the timing were perfectly predictable.
"When it comes to collecting the bride price, he runs here like a debtor chasing payment."
Now that the first night was over, the time had come to hand over the promised grain to starving Vermont.
Kaian drained his glass and rose to his feet.
The Duchess of Temnes' chambers were stately and luminous.
Rose carvings sculpted from bright pink jade adorned the white stone pillars, framed in gold that blazed with particular brilliance in the afternoon light.
Claudel, seated within, looked all the paler and thinner by comparison.
"Damned Temnes bastards. Drowning in a swamp of luxury."
In the flesh, her uncle—the Duke of Vermont—was a man who bore the same red hair and golden eyes as Claudel.
The reason his niece had been accepted into the Vermont registry at all was precisely because Claudel possessed the unmistakable coloring said to appear only in the direct line.
Had she lacked the red hair and golden eyes, she would never have been sent to Rowen.
This peace had hinged on delivering a daughter of Vermont.
The Duke, who had been cursing the Temnes name while surveying her room—without once looking at Claudel herself—finally settled onto the sofa across from her and raised his teacup.
"How is your health?"
When Claudel did not answer, he pressed her impatiently.
"Are you not really asking whether I am ready to die?"