Jovita POV:
I huddled in a small copse of trees on the hill behind the estate, the cold night air a welcome shock to my system. My lungs burned. The hem of my wedding dress was now filthy, stained with mud and dead leaves. Just like me.
I could hear the faint shouts of guards from the manor below. They were looking for me. I knew Martha Harrison. She would never let this humiliation go unanswered.
Running home was not an option. My father, Arthur Sullivan, the King's Treasurer, had arranged this marriage for his own benefit. He wouldn't risk offending the powerful Harrisons for me. Our relationship was as cold as the gold he counted.
I was a Dragonless. A commoner in a kingdom where dragon blood determined everything. Damian and Katlin could crush me like an insect.
Unless...
Unless I could acquire a status so unshakable, so revered, that even they couldn't touch me.
A mad idea sparked in the darkness of my mind. Gideon Harrison. The family's fallen hero. The Dragon Marshal.
I remembered the whispers about him. The pride of the family, the King's own sword, a man whose death had cast a long shadow. If I were his wife... even his widow...
It was a gamble of epic proportions. But what other choice did I have? Be dragged back and tortured by Martha, or seize my own fate?
I made my decision.
I smoothed down my ruined dress, my heart hammering with a terrifying resolve, and walked out of the woods.
I didn't run. I walked directly toward the Harrison ancestral hall, the place where they honored their dead. I tore off the heavy, mud-caked overskirt of my wedding gown, leaving me in the simple white underdress, like a woman in mourning.
The guards found me kneeling on the cold stone floor, directly before the memorial tablet of Gideon Harrison. His portrait hung above it, the man in the painting fierce and commanding, with eyes that seemed to see right through you.
My presence caused a stir. Soon, the family matriarch, Eleanor Harrison, arrived, her attendants trailing behind her. She looked at me, kneeling there in my dishevelment, her expression unreadable.
"Jovita Sullivan," she said, her voice calm. "What are you doing here?"
I lifted my chin and met her gaze. My voice didn't tremble. "My Lady, Damian Harrison has betrayed me, and with me, he has betrayed the honor of this family. I am no longer fit to be his bride."
I took a deep breath, the cold air stinging my lungs. "But I am still willing to devote myself to the honor of House Harrison."
I let the silence hang for a moment before delivering my master stroke.
"I request permission to complete the binding ceremony with your late son, the great Lord Gideon Harrison."
A collective gasp went through the room. Eleanor's eyes widened almost imperceptibly.
"I will be his wife," I declared, my voice ringing with conviction. "I will be his widow. I will guard his final honor and, in doing so, wash away the stain of shame Damian has brought upon you all."
Marry a dead man? They thought I was insane. But I saw the flicker of calculation in Eleanor's eyes. The Harrisons needed to save face, and Gideon was their greatest source of pride.
She was silent for a long time. My future hung in that silence.
"You understand," she finally said, her voice low, "that as Gideon's ritual widow, you would be bound to him for life. You could never remarry. You would inherit none of his material wealth."
"I know," I said without hesitation. "I do not seek wealth. I seek the honor of being Gideon Harrison's wife. A shield to protect me."
A flicker of something—admiration, perhaps—crossed her face. She gave a slow, deliberate nod. "Very well. I agree. The Harrison family has need of such loyalty."
It happened quickly.
With the family elders as witnesses, I was dressed in a simple black gown. An elder pricked my finger with a silver pin. I pressed my bleeding fingertip to Gideon's family sigil, a heavy, cold seal carved with the image of a roaring dragon.
As my blood seeped into the grooves of the metal, I could have sworn I heard a faint, distant roar, like the echo of a dragon's call.
The elder pronounced the binding complete in the old Dragon Tongue.
I, Jovita Sullivan, was now the wife of Gideon Harrison.
The way the servants looked at me had changed. Pity was replaced by a mixture of awe and confusion.
I had done it. I had turned myself from a cast-off bride into a hero's widow.
When Martha's men finally found the hall, they stopped dead in their tracks. They saw me in my black mourning dress, with Lady Eleanor standing behind me like a sentinel. They dared not take another step.
I looked up at Gideon's portrait. Gideon Harrison, I thought, from this day forward, your honor is my weapon. I hope you don't mind.
At that exact moment, the candle flame before his tablet flickered wildly, as if stirred by a sudden wind, though the air in the hall was perfectly still.
Then, just as quickly, it settled.
The doors to the hall burst open. A knight in dusty armor, bearing Gideon's personal crest, stumbled inside, his face alight with a look of frantic, disbelieving joy.
