Seraphina
I've been preparing my whole life for this day. I always knew that I was never going to be able to choose a man for myself because I was a lady and a princess too. I did not have any rights at all, all my life, every decision has been made for me either by my parents or people around me.
My feelings and opinions didn't matter to anybody. "Don't do that Sera, that's not ladylike", "women were created for male pleasure", "you don't not have a say in this, Sera"
That's all I ever hear, don't do this, do that, every damn time.
And now I was walking down the hall which smelled of flowers and smoke, a blend that clung to my lungs and made it difficult to breathe. Chandeliers dripped light like golden tears, scattering brilliance across silk gowns and polished boots, but no amount of grandeur could drown out the silence that stretched before me.
All eyes were on us. The prince and I, now standing at the center of the ceremonial dais, our hands bound together with the silver cord that was meant to call forth the glow of destiny.
I could feel the weight of every gaze, every whisper held on bated breath, waiting for the moment that was supposed to prove I was his fated bride. My heart pounded with both dread and hope, thudding so loudly that I swore even the nobles pressed against the gilded walls could hear it.
I forced my chin higher, clinging to the fragile dream that had carried me to this day, that when the mark shimmered alive, I would no longer be just Seraphina, daughter of a disgraced house, I would be the prince's chosen, raised beyond the reach of cruel tongues.
But the moment dragged on, the cord remained dull, no glow, no warmth, only the suffocating silence that spread like fire through the court. My palms were damp, my knees weak beneath my dress, and I glanced up at him, searching his eyes for understanding, kindness, perhaps even pity.
Instead, I found only cold indifference. The prince's jaw tightened, his blue eyes were distant and he pulled his hand from mine with deliberate finality.
Murmurs rippled through the hall, the noise making my stomach churned. This wasn't how it was supposed to happen. The fated bond was written in legend, an undeniable truth. The mark always glowed. Always. Unless…..unless fate itself had rejected me.
"My apologies," the prince said, his voice cutting sharp through the murmurs. Each word was a blade. "It appears fate has spoken otherwise. There is… nothing between us." He did not lower his voice, nor spare me the cruelty of humiliation.
His declaration carried, echoing against marble columns and vaulted ceilings. My breath caught in my throat, and for a heartbeat I could not move. A thousand eyes devoured me, nobles trading smug looks, women hiding their smiles behind jeweled fans. I felt stripped bare, exposed. A trembling heat pooled in my chest, threatening to spill from my eyes, but I swallowed it down. I would not cry. Not here. Not before them.
When he stepped away, the silver cord fell lifeless to the ground, unraveling as though mocking me. My hand hung suspended in the air before I slowly let it drop, fingers curling into a fist.
Whispers swarmed like gnats,"Unworthy… Cursed… The gods deny her…" The words stung more than the prince's rejection.
My family's legacy was already fragile, cracked by debts and scandals whispered behind closed doors. I had been our hope, the fragile bridge back into favor and in a single moment, it all crumbled. I wanted the floor to open beneath me, to swallow me whole and take me far from their eyes. But the world offered no mercy. The court fed on ruin, and tonight, I was the feast.
My mother's gaze burned into me from the crowd, her lips pressed into a thin line. She had pinned her ambitions on me, woven every thread of our redemption around this union, and now I had unraveled it before the world. My father looked stricken, pale as though he'd taken a mortal wound, but his eyes softened when they met mine, filled with sorrow rather than blame.
My knees trembled as I took a step back, the weight of silence pressing heavier with each heartbeat. No one came to comfort me. No one spoke in my defense. The court was a predator's den, and the scent of my humiliation hung in the air.
I stumbled from the dais, my silk skirts tangling around my ankles as I forced myself to walk with dignity I no longer possessed. Each step was a battle against collapse. The nobles parted for me, their silence deafening, their eyes sharp. Some smirked openly, others feigned sympathy with tilted heads and mournful eyes.
I hated them all.
I hated the marble walls that echoed my shame, the roses that suddenly reeked of decay, the chandeliers that poured mocking light over my downfall. My lungs burned as though I had run for miles, yet I had never felt more trapped. Even as I reached the doors, I knew there was no escape.
My disgrace would linger in every whispered rumor, every sly glance, every dinner tale retold until my name itself was nothing but a cruel jest.
In the solitude of my chamber, the walls seemed closer, heavy with silence. I tore the jeweled pins from my hair, one by one, until curls tumbled wildly over my shoulders. My reflection in the mirror mocked me, eyes swollen with unshed tears, cheeks flushed from humiliation, lips trembling despite my efforts to hold firm.
"Why?" I whispered to the empty room. "Why not me?" The gods were cruel, weaving threads of fate only to cut them with such callousness.
Was I truly cursed? Had I been born wrong? Or had fate itself chosen to mark me as unwanted? I pressed my palm to the bare skin of my wrist, where the glow should have bloomed like fire, where nothing but emptiness lingered.
The door creaked open, and my mother swept in, her face carved from ice. "You have ruined us," she hissed, her voice low but dripping venom.
"Do you understand? Do you comprehend what your failure has cost this family?" I flinched, though her words were no surprise.
"It was not my choice," I said softly, though the words sounded weak even to me.
Her laugh was brittle, sharp as shattered glass. "Not your choice? Everything was riding on you, Seraphina. You were meant to be our salvation, and instead you've doomed us to ridicule and ruin." She turned, skirts whipping like storm clouds behind her. "You'll find no sympathy here. You are nothing now." Then she left me with silence colder than her wrath.
Alone again, I sank onto the bed, my chest tight with the weight of her words. Nothing. The court would echo them, repeat them, brand them into my skin until I believed them.
My father might offer comfort, but comfort would not silence the rumors, nor restore what was lost. My future had been ripped from me, the path I had been forced to walk since childhood now ending in ruin.
I closed my eyes, but the image burned within me still, how the prince's hand pulled away, the lifeless cord slipping to the ground, the mark that never came. And beneath it all, a strange hollowness spread within me, as though something long hidden stirred in the shadows of my soul. A whisper, faint, calling from somewhere I could not name.
That night, I did not sleep. I sat by the window, staring into the darkness, listening to the distant sound of revelry as the court celebrated my downfall. Somewhere, fate was laughing at me, mocking me but deep in my chest, under the ache of rejection and shame, something else began to take root.
It was not hope, hope was far too fragile, no, this was different. It was the raw, bitter spark of defiance.
If fate had rejected me, then I would reject fate. If the gods had turned their eyes away, then I would find my own path, with or without their blessing an
d though I did not yet know it, that choice would change everything.