Thalvyn had been standing at those doors for two hours, and he had counted every one of them.

The wedding was over. The hall beyond the doors had gone quiet, the fires had burned down to the colour of a bruise, and the Aurelith princess was still sitting on his prince’s bed in white and gold, wings folded, hands in her lap like a woman waiting to be told what she was for.

He did not look at her. That was the discipline. He looked at Vhaeran, who had not moved from the chair by the fire, and at Zavren, who had draped himself against the bedpost and was enjoying this far too much.

“The council expects this marriage consummated,” his prince said. “More specifically, they expect an heir.”

Thalvyn’s jaw set before he had decided to let it.

“You’re serious.”

“Entirely.”

Something in his chest went cold and stayed cold. He had taken an oath to this house when he was nineteen and he had not once found the bottom of what it covered, and here it was: a wife handed sideways like a duty nobody wanted to hold.

He looked at her then, because not looking had stopped being possible.

“My prince,” he said. “Ask her. Out loud, and let her answer.”