We hadn't been planning to visit the Saintess of Kima during our time at the temple. The meeting hadn't been on our itinerary, and Arvid hadn't mentioned any such appointment when we'd discussed our plans for the day. But as it turned out, we didn't need to seek her out—she found us instead, appearing with her entourage as though she had been actively searching for us.
The queen and saintess of Kima went by the name Fiona Kima, having taken the name of her kingdom as her own surname after ascending to her dual role as both spiritual and temporal leader. It was tradition here, Arvid had mentioned in passing—the saintess surrendered her family name upon taking office and adopted the kingdom's name instead, symbolizing that she belonged now to the realm and its people rather than to any particular bloodline.
She appeared before us quite suddenly with her attendants trailing behind her, moving quickly as though she had some urgent appointment to catch or a carriage waiting that couldn't be delayed. That sense of hurried purpose should probably have been my first clue that something was amiss, that this supposedly chance encounter had been carefully orchestrated.
Fiona Kima was, objectively speaking, a beautiful woman. She possessed rich brown hair that fell in carefully styled waves past her shoulders, and striking emerald eyes that stood out vividly against her fair complexion. She appeared to be no older than eighteen, though given her position, she must have been at least of legal age to assume such responsibilities. There was something youthful and unformed about her features still, a softness that suggested she hadn't quite finished growing into her adult face.
When her gaze fell upon Arvid, her entire expression transformed. She absolutely beamed with uncomplicated delight, her face lighting up like a child spotting a beloved family member after a long absence.
"Brother Arvid!" she exclaimed with obvious happiness, her voice carrying clearly across the garden space separating us. She immediately walked—nearly ran, really—over to where Arvid stood beside me.
And then, right before my eyes, with no hesitation or sense of impropriety whatsoever, she simply threw herself into his arms. She wrapped herself around him in an embrace that was far too familiar, far too intimate for a greeting between casual acquaintances or even ordinary friends.
Arvid was visibly taken aback by the sudden assault. I could see the shock register on his features, could watch him processing what was happening and clearly not knowing quite how to respond. He tried—genuinely tried—to create some distance between them, to extricate himself from the embrace without causing offense. His hands came up as though to gently push her away, his body leaning backward in an attempt to break the contact.
But she held onto his arm with what could only be described as a death grip, her fingers digging into his sleeve, clearly having no intention whatsoever of letting go voluntarily. My eyes tracked downward and fixed on their intertwined hands—her smaller, delicate fingers wrapped possessively around his, holding on with determined strength.
I felt rage beginning to brew inside me, a hot, dangerous emotion rising up from somewhere deep in my chest.
"Who the hell is this vixen?" Aiona's voice exploded in my mind, her anger manifesting even faster than my own. She was already furious, already preparing for violence.
"Who the hell indeed?" I echoed silently, my own fury matching and feeding off hers in a vicious cycle.
"I'm going to burn her alive!" Aiona declared with absolute conviction. "I'm going to reduce her to ash right here in this garden, consequences be damned!"
I found myself seriously considering allowing Aiona to do exactly that. The mental image of flames consuming this presumptuous woman who dared to touch what was mine held considerable appeal. But before either of us could put that violent thought into action, before I could surrender control to Aiona or channel magic myself, the supposed high priest intervened.
Elian stepped forward smoothly, his movement casual but his timing impeccable, as though he had been anticipating exactly this scenario and had positioned himself to interrupt it.
"Saintess," he said, his voice carrying that peculiar quality of sounding sweet while simultaneously conveying unmistakable steel beneath the honey. "Have you not learned your lessons yet? You've been counseled about this behavior before, I believe. It's extraordinarily out of proper manners to embrace a man who is already taken, much less one who is formally married. Surely you understand how inappropriate this appears?"
His words were delivered with perfect politeness, but the reprimand was clear and the intention unmistakable. He was publicly calling out her behavior as unacceptable.
The saintess finally seemed to register that other people existed beyond herself and Arvid. She acknowledged our presence—mine specifically—for the first time, her emerald eyes sweeping over me with an assessing look that carried more calculation than I liked. She reluctantly released Arvid from her embrace, though her hands lingered perhaps a moment longer than strictly necessary before finally letting go.
And then—I could barely believe what I was witnessing—she actually blushed! Her cheeks colored prettily as though she were some innocent maiden caught in a harmless mistake rather than a grown woman who had just deliberately violated social boundaries.
Aiona practically seethed at the audacity, at the performance of innocence when the transgression had been so blatant.
"I'm so sorry!" Fiona said in what I immediately recognized as an affected, childish manner—a deliberately cultivated tone meant to make her seem younger and more innocent than she actually was. "It's been years since I last saw Brother Arvid! I simply got too excited seeing him again after so long! I couldn't help myself!"
The explanation was delivered with wide-eyed enthusiasm that would have been charming if it weren't so transparently calculated. My blood boiled at the manipulation, at the way she was trying to frame deliberate impropriety as innocent exuberance.
Then, before I could formulate a response, she took a decisive step forward and grabbed both of my hands in hers, holding them with the same determined grip she had used on Arvid moments before.
"It's so wonderful to meet you, Sister!" she exclaimed, her voice rising to an even higher pitch that grated against my ears like nails on slate. "Please, come walk with me! Just the two of us, woman to woman! I'll tell you absolutely everything about Brother Arvid and all of our childhood stories together! We have so many memories to share!"
I could detect the malice hidden beneath those sweet words as clearly as I could hear the words themselves. The false enthusiasm, the possessive way she referred to "our" memories, the implication that she had a longer and deeper connection to Arvid than I did—it was all calculated to undermine and upset me.
But I decided in that moment to play along, to act as though I couldn't perceive the venom beneath the honey. Sometimes the best way to deal with a schemer was to pretend to be more naive than you actually were, to let them think they were succeeding while you gathered information and planned your actual response.
"Is that so?" I replied with a smile I hoped appeared genuine and eager. "Then please, yes, tell me all the stories about Arvid! I'm absolutely eager to listen to anything you have to share! It's so rare to meet someone who knew him in his younger years!"
I matched her false enthusiasm with my own performance, and apparently, I was convincing enough. She beamed as though she had won some victory.
We bid goodbye to Arvid and Elian—I caught Arvid's eye briefly and saw concern there, but I gave him a subtle nod to indicate I could handle this situation—and then Fiona and I set off on what she had called a "merry walk" through the temple gardens.
We maintained our performances, both of us smiling and projecting friendliness, at least until we had passed beyond a massive weeping willow tree whose drooping branches created a natural curtain. We turned toward what appeared to be a tulip garden—a section of the grounds that was notably more secluded, positioned well away from the main paths where Arvid and Elian might observe us.
The moment we were safely out of their line of sight, Fiona abruptly released my hands as though my touch had burned her, as though she were allergic to physical contact with me. The disgust on her face was no longer hidden.
"Wet handkerchief!" she barked at her attendants, her voice transformed from that sweet, high-pitched tone to something sharp and demanding. "Immediately!"
One of the young women attending her quickly produced a damp cloth and handed it over with practiced efficiency. Fiona seized it and began wiping her hands vigorously, scrubbing at her skin as though she had touched something profoundly filthy, something contaminated that needed to be removed as quickly as possible. The theatrical display of revulsion was clearly meant to insult me.
"Dry towel!" she snapped next, not even waiting to finish with the first cloth. Another attendant immediately provided the requested item, and Fiona repeated the same vigorous wiping process, this time presumably to remove the moisture left by the first towel.
"Throw both of those into the garbage!" she commanded when she had finished, flinging the used cloths at her attendants as though they were now as contaminated as she had pretended I was. "Burn them if necessary. I don't want them touching anything else."
I had watched this entire performance in silence, observing what was unfolding before me with a kind of detached fascination even as genuine rage began brewing inside me with increasing intensity. The sheer disrespect of it, the calculated cruelty—it was breathtaking in its audacity.
Then she opened her mouth to speak, and whatever remaining patience I possessed evaporated completely.
"Cancel the wedding," were the first words that emerged. Not a request. Not even phrased as advice. A command, delivered with absolute conviction that I would comply.
So we weren't even going to pretend anymore, apparently. The mask was off entirely now.
"You aren't worthy of Brother Arvid," Fiona continued, her voice dripping with contempt that she no longer bothered to disguise. "A northern wench marrying a southern emperor? The very idea is absolutely unbelievable, completely unacceptable! I should be the one marrying him! My mother always told me—promised me—that I would become the next empress of Selon! It was supposed to be my destiny, my rightful position! You aren't even a southerner, yet somehow you're seated in that role? The council of Selon will never accept this travesty! They'll oppose you, undermine you, make your life miserable until you're forced to leave in disgrace!"
She waved her hand dismissively in front of my face, the gesture meant to convey that I was beneath her notice, insignificant.
"So go back to whatever gutter you crawled out of and leave matters of the South to those who actually belong here," she finished with a sneer.
For a long moment, I simply stared at her, letting her words hang in the air between us. Then I spoke, and my voice emerged cold—absolutely glacial, carrying none of the warmth or friendliness I had been performing moments before.
"Are you quite finished talking?" I asked softly.
I couldn't contain the rage inside me any longer. I had tried to be diplomatic, had attempted to handle this situation with grace and patience. But there were limits to what I could tolerate, and this spoiled, delusional woman had just obliterated every single one of those limits.
The atmosphere shifted dramatically as I deliberately released the tight control I had been maintaining over the magical power constantly churning within me. I let go of the rage I had been holding back, allowed it to manifest in the physical world around us. The sky itself responded to my fury, darkening abruptly as though clouds had materialized from nothing. The wind transformed from a gentle breeze to something biting and cold, carrying the promise of winter even in this warm climate. And then snow began falling—actual snow, in a kingdom that probably had never experienced such weather, fat white flakes appearing from the suddenly dark sky and beginning to accumulate on the ground.
Fiona and all of her attendants gasped in horror and took several stumbling steps backward, their eyes widening with genuine fear as they witnessed the impossible occurring before them. The very air seemed to vibrate and shudder because of the immense quantity of raw magical power I was pouring out, allowing to saturate the environment.
"Why would I go back to the gutter you claim I came from when I have the power to create an equivalent gutter right here?" I asked pleasantly, my tone conversational despite the magical storm swirling around us. "And as for the council you mentioned—I genuinely don't care what they think or want. There's a first time for everything, isn't there? I suppose the South will simply have to adjust to welcoming its first northern-born empress. They'll learn to accept it, or they'll learn what happens when they oppose me. Either outcome is acceptable."
I walked toward her slowly, deliberately, watching her face contort with pure horror as I approached. She looked absolutely terrified now, all her earlier haughtiness evaporated in the face of demonstrated power that dwarfed anything she could possibly command.
"Whatever delusional fantasies you've been nursing about Arvid, whatever promises your mother made you about your supposed destiny," I said, my voice dropping to something quiet but infinitely more dangerous than shouting would have been, "you need to let them go immediately. That future doesn't exist. It never existed. It was a fiction created to comfort you, and clinging to it will only bring you pain."
I reached out and grabbed her chin, forcing her to look directly at me, to meet my eyes and see the absolute seriousness of what I was about to say.
"And understand this clearly: the next time you grab my husband the way you did today, the next time you touch what belongs to me, you will not have arms remaining to grab anything ever again. I will ensure that personally. Do I make myself sufficiently clear?"
I released her chin and stepped back. She immediately collapsed to the ground, her legs apparently unable to support her weight any longer. She gasped for air as though she had forgotten how to breathe properly, her entire body trembling.
"Mon—monster," she managed to stammer out, the word barely intelligible through her fear and the chattering of her teeth.
By this point, everything around us had been covered by heavy layers of snow. The tulip garden that had been in full bloom moments before was now completely frozen. I reached out casually and touched one of the tulip petals—it immediately crumbled into crystalline fragments, destroyed beyond any hope of recovery by the cold I had summoned.
I looked back at Fiona where she sat shivering on the snow-covered ground, her fine clothes already soaked through and providing inadequate protection against the unnatural cold.
"If you know that I'm a monster," I asked her sweetly, deliberately imitating the childish, high-pitched manner she had used earlier, "then why would you be foolish enough to pick a fight with something so dangerous? That seems like remarkably poor judgment, doesn't it?"
I didn't wait for a response. I simply turned and walked away, humming a northern tune under my breath—an old song from my childhood, something cheerful and light that contrasted beautifully with the frozen devastation I was leaving behind. I felt genuinely good, my mood considerably improved now that I had addressed the situation appropriately.
When I reached the area where I had left Arvid, I noticed that Elian had already departed. Perfect. That meant I had Arvid to myself. I approached him quietly from behind and wrapped my arms around him, pressing myself against his back in an embrace.
"Rhia?" he said, his voice carrying obvious confusion. He hadn't heard me approach and was clearly surprised by the sudden contact.
"How did you know it was me?" I asked, genuinely curious. I hadn't announced myself in any way.
"I can see your hands wrapped around me," he replied with amusement coloring his tone. "No one in the South has hands quite that pale. Your skin tone gives you away immediately."
I pressed a kiss against his back through the fabric of his clothing, then reluctantly released him from the embrace. Arvid turned to face me, his expression showing both pleasure at my affection and confusion about what had prompted such a display.
"What's going on?" he asked, studying my face. "You look remarkably happy. Did something good happen during your walk with Fiona?"
"I don't know exactly," I replied honestly, unable to fully explain why I felt so satisfied. "I just feel happy somehow. Content. Like something that needed to happen has happened."
I clung to his arm—the same arm that wretched woman had held earlier—and deliberately nuzzled against it, pressing my face against the fabric. I left a trail of soft kisses along his sleeve, reclaiming territory that had been temporarily violated, making it clear to any residual magical signature that this man belonged to me and me alone.
Arvid's face colored dramatically, a deep red flush spreading across his cheeks as embarrassment overtook him.
"We're in public," he mumbled, glancing around to see if anyone was observing our display. "People can see us. This isn't appropriate behavior for—"
"Then we'll just have to find somewhere with no people around," I interrupted, rising on my toes to plant one final kiss on his jaw. "Problem solved. Come on, I'm sure this temple complex has plenty of secluded corners."
His blush deepened even further, but I noticed he didn't actually object to the suggestion.