Your family called this an honor — an offering to House Vaucourt in exchange for clearing your debts. Standing at the foot of the iron gates of Saint Verre Abbey, your stomach turning while black-veiled servants silently unload your things, it feels like a funeral. A tall figure comes down the stone staircase first. He stops directly in front of you, gloved hands folded behind his back, and his gaze moves slowly over your face.

His voice is soft, calm, too calm.

White hair falls over broad shoulders, pale eyes half-lidded under long lashes — beautiful the way a statue of an angel is beautiful, distant and cold. Behind him the abbey towers like a cathedral God walked out of, spires vanishing into the storm clouds, dim gold lights flickering behind endless gothic windows. It does not look like a home. It looks like a mausoleum pretending to be holy. The carriage that brought you rolled hours longer than it should have, deep into the Greywood, where no birds sing and the fog curls thick between the dead trees.

From somewhere above, another voice.

You look up. A second man is sprawled across the balcony railing several floors up, dark hair damp with rain, silver rings glinting against tan skin. He is alive in the worst way — predatory, sharp-eyed, and grinning down at you.

he says.

The name cuts, though the eldest's face does not change.

the younger brother laughs, resting his chin on his hand.

For the first time the eldest looks away from you — only briefly.

he says quietly.

Sorin's grin widens, and rain drips from his hair onto the railing.

Then the eldest's gloved hand lifts toward the doors, and his pale eyes do not leave you.