Usurper of flames

Devils Consort

Chapter 2: Devils consort 

The guards lead me through the icy halls of Harlech Castle, and though I keep my face expressionless, every step grates at me. I know they're watching, waiting for a crack, a hint of defiance they can report back to her. I won't give them that. Not yet.

When they stop in front of the Queen Consort's old chambers, I almost laugh. Of course. She has my father's chambers, claiming every corner of his rule—and here I am, tossed into my mother's old rooms, as if this is some twisted jest.

The door groans open, and I step into the dim silence. Shadows cling to the corners, and a draft slips in from a crack in the stained-glass window, carrying the scent of ancient stone and dust. It's quieter than I remember. Colder. The tapestries that line the walls have dulled, their colours leached by time and neglect. The vanity my mother once used sits bare in the corner, its polished wood stripped of her bottles, her brushes—anything that might have belonged to her.

Standing here, I can almost see her again, carefully pinning her hair back, arranging herself with that calm, practised grace she wore like armour. She was younger than I am now when she married my father, a girl brought to this castle to secure peace and family allegiance. I wonder if she felt like this—a pawn placed just so, surrounded by strangers who smiled through their teeth.

I step further into the room, but the walls feel like they're closing in. My stomach tightens. This marriage... This marriage is the only reason my family is safe. Or as safe as they can be with her holding the reins. This is what I have to do. I know that. Marrying the woman who stole my father's throne is the price of keeping my siblings and my mother alive. That's what I keep telling myself.

I step forward, my fingers grazing the edge of the vanity. The wood is polished, rich mahogany—sturdy and beautiful, yet cold as stone beneath my touch. The chill seeps into me, settling deep into my bones, and just like that, it hits me, crashing in like a wave.

My father is gone—slaughtered, like he was nothing, like his life held no meaning beyond what it could gain for her. I see his face in my mind, proud and stern, the man who once stood as a pillar of strength. Now, he's reduced to a memory, his blood spilled in the name of her conquest.

And my fiancée... she's gone too, her life snatched away before it had even fully begun. I didn't know her well; she was little more than a figure I'd been told to wed, a distant promise of an alliance. She was the daughter of one of the most powerful families in the kingdom, a family that are born and bread to protect the nations. But to my sister, she was more than a political match—she was a friend. They were close, the two of them, bound by shared laughter and secrets I'll never know.

It isn't the loss of a future with her that cuts deepest. It's the thought of the girl who was so dear to my sister, someone who had trusted us, whose life was supposed to be part of our family. Now she's gone, her light extinguished by the very throne I'm meant to uphold. I feel no grief for the life I could have had with her, only pity for her, for my sister who mourns her friend, and for the countless others who have paid the price of this usurper's ambition.

And my family... gods, I don't even know if they're alive. My brothers, my mother, my sister—they could be dead, or suffering somewhere in this castle, or even trapped in their own estates. Yet here I am, locked away in my mother's old chambers, held on display like a relic in a castle that's no longer mine.

The weight of it presses down, squeezing the breath from my lungs. I feel trapped, a ghost lingering in a home that's no longer mine, a stranger wandering these halls in search of something—someone—to save. But all that's left are shadows and memories, lingering in the faint scent of my mother's perfume on the walls, in the cold wood of her vanity.