Charlotte's Unexpected Adventure

Prologue

Charlotte La Bouff had always believed love would arrive dramatically.

Preferably with flowers. Maybe a horse. Definitely good hair.

Instead, she got sucked into a portal and landed beside a half-dead man floating in the river.

"Well," Lottie muttered as she struggled to drag him onto the dock, "this feels medically concerning."

The stranger wore a torn military coat stained with blood and ash. Even unconscious, he looked dangerous-the kind of man who belonged on battlefields instead of New Orleans.

Suddenly, his hand shot out and grabbed her wrist.

Lottie nearly screamed herself into the river.

The man's gray eyes flew open, cold and sharp with instinct before confusion slowly replaced them.

"Where... am I?" he asked weakly.

Lottie stared at him, breathless and soaked.

"I'd also like to know," she admitted. "Five minutes ago, I was not rescuing mysterious dying men from rivers."

For a moment, the stranger simply looked at her, as if he could not decide whether she was real or another fever dream.

"You're alive," Lottie continued, trying to steady her racing heart. "Which, frankly, seems temporary if you keep frightening people like that."

The man pushed himself up slightly before wincing, as though he were fighting pain far deeper than his visible injuries.

Far across the docks, hidden beneath the shadows, someone quietly loaded a gun.

The missing general had been found.

( A.N.: the story is created with my imagination and the assistance of AI. )