Three days later, in the middle of a Traonian winter –travel slowed by the icy and snow-covered roads that, even salted and shoveled, were treacherous– my husband and I arrived at the door to the ancestral Von Shezel manor. Being on my family’s land eased the tension in my back. I’d missed my home country. Overdressed in a thick purple gown, trimmed with bright red fox fur–my husband forced me to wear–perspiration beaded at my neck and lower back.

          I knocked on the door. Snowflakes swirled around, the world awash with white, silent, and endless. The scar on my back ached, not just from the cold.

          An older man in the black uniform of a servant opened the door. “Welcome, Duke Von Lubov,” he bowed. “Consort Duchess Von Lubov.” I was addressed second. Both my last name and title of consort irked me. 

Father greeted us first, waiting at the threshold. Odd. 

          “Claudia.” Duke Lawrence Von Shezel opened his arms, smiled widely, and hugged me. Pressing me to his chest, I wheezed and refused to make another pained sound despite the pressure against my ribs that threatened to crush them into my heart. He pulled back and squeezed my shoulders.  “You’ve done very well for yourself since your marriage. I am pleased with your efforts.”

          Father had never hugged me before. I couldn’t recall a single time he’d ever embraced any of his five children or even a proud clasp on the shoulder. And he was hugging me. Suspicious. He stepped away and clasped my husband on his arm. Apprehension, like ants, crawled up my skin.

          “You seem jolly?” I questioned my father.

          “With Princess, ah, no, Queen Leighton, we will have our war. What a wonderful future shines ahead of us,” Father said, then led Rodion away toward the dining room.

          That didn’t answer my question and brought another to the forefront. Did Father assist in assassinating the king? I thought they’d been friends, not that Father had ever shown any remorse for anyone's death but his brothers.

          “I issue a formal duel challenge upon Bianca,” I shouted at Father’s back.

          Father turned around with a raised eyebrow. “You are a Von Lubov. No one outside the Von Shezel name may challenge another.”

          “My marriage–” I spat the word with a curl of my lip “–can be dissolved. You were not in attendance for our past duel; it should not have stood. I am issuing a formal duel challenge.”

          Bianca lingered nearby. I stuffed my hands in my dress pockets, fingering the knives at both my thighs, ready for a fight. The thick fabric of the dress might hinder me slightly, but I had always been physically stronger and more agile than Bianca.

          At twenty-four, two years my junior, Bianca had grown up beautifully. Hot jealousy and shame rose in my throat like bile. Unlike my granite gray hair, Bianca’s was snow white to match her pale skin. I flushed with color whenever strong emotions overtook me, while she remained pristine like ice. With broad shoulders, a stubborn chin, and dark purple lips, Bianca almost looked like the perfect Traonian. Only my gray-blue eyes could be considered merely pretty. Not that I was jealous.

          Father addressed Rodion. “She has been a good girl. I will consent. If you win the duel, I will allow you to return as my heir, and Bianca will take your place.”

          Rodion shrugged. “What do I care which icicle warms my bed?” He laughed at his own slur. No one joined in. He took his ring off my left hand, but did not return my ring. I tried to take it, and he swatted my hand away.

          “Father,” Bianca protested with a stomp of her foot. 

          “Tomorrow then,” Father decided. “I’ve lacked entertainment. I am curious to see if Claudia recovered enough. She was one of our most talented fighters.”

          He tugged Rodion along. Heads tilted down, whispering. What did I care? Tomorrow I would trounce Bianca, and then she would go with Rodion. A fitting punishment.

          Said nuisance glowered at me, then schooled her face into a happy smile. She held out her arms, palms open in a sign of surrender. “How good it is to see you again, Claudia? How has being a Consort Duchess in Astardosa been?”

          Bitch.

          Playing the game with her, I relaxed my shoulders and smiled at Bianca as if we were loving sisters, parted through a long distance, and finally reunited. 

          “I’ve been busy training the knight's order and recovering. You always struggled with hard labor, so weak.” I leaned forward, studying her pale complexion and the blue bags under her eyes, dry lips, and sharper jawline. “I can only hope you wouldn’t succumb to weakness like our mother and drink to cope with the increase in responsibilities as heir?”

          Bianca’s fake-polite face froze, and her eyes flickered back and forth like a ball between two children before she grinned all teeth. “I have worried so much about your recovery.” She linked my arm in hers, pulling me toward the formal dining room as if I hadn’t lived here my whole life and knew where to go. “Do your scars still cause you distress? Astardosa doesn’t have as advanced medicine as we do, but you shouldn’t suffer.” 

          Fingernails dug into my skin. As if she wasn’t the one who tried to tear my spine out with a knife as Hendricks held me down in a weakened state. Frail and pitiful Bianca has to resort to tricks and betrayal to beat me in a duel. I would shatter her thigh tomorrow. She deserved to suffer as I had. I wanted her crippled for the rest of her life, but not enough to die. Living forever, unable to function as she had before.

          “You are magnanimous for asking, my dear sister. One day, you will empathically understand my pain.” I covered her hand with my own, digging my fingernails into the thin skin, leaving half-moon indents.

          “Oh, will I?” She raised an eyebrow and deposited me at the table. “Or will you run off again–like Hendricks?”

          Seated below my husband, in the place of Hendricks–my older half-brother–I sneered at her for the implications. Hendricks had betrayed me and then run off to the West, freely allowed by Father to discard the Von Shezel name. Despicable. 

          “I am not like him.”

          “You both married a kneeling Sunsetter,” she pointed out.

          “I don’t need deception and betrayal to win a fight,” I countered. “With Father watching, you will be unable to cheat again.”

          “I did not cheat. Intelligence is a skillset, you might not understand.”

          “Girls,” Mother drawled, tiredly waving her full goblet in the air. We ignored her as everyone did.

          The goblet at my seat was already full of some fruit wine. I waved over a servant and demanded another glass. The dead-eyed maid bowed and did as ordered. She returned with a crystal-cut glass and a dryer wine with fewer fruit tones, my preference. She took the customary sip of proof before wiping the rim and handing it to me. The metal cuffs around her wrists caught the light.

          Barely glancing at the green-eyed Astardoses maid, I waved her away and took a sip. Under the bitter fruity tones of the wine, my tongue tasted a sharp tang, and the sides pricked. A paralysis drug? If I recall correctly, it was called Draught of Peace, used by mothers giving birth, for non-surgical procedures, and to calm those incensed by mania or anger. I maintained eye contact with Bianca as I drank the drugged cup. She took a sip of her own cup, lips curling up in a smile. Bianca did prefer her poisons.

          “Intelligence?” I scoffed. “You lack physical strength and discipline.”

          Even slightly inebriated, a drug to which I had built a tolerance, I was still faster than Bianca. My wound wouldn’t heed me either, not after three grueling years of training. One moment alone, and I would stab the knife at my thigh into her heart. Bianca, sensing my thoughts, set down her cup, picked up the meat knife on her left, and twirled it between her fingers, never breaking eye contact with me.

          “Without your strength, you’re nothing,” Bianca hissed across the table. “How could you be the Von Shezel Duchess?”

        A sniffling down the table caught my attention. Cecilia, the youngest, hunched in her seat next to Mother, who was directly across from me. Cecelia’s eyes were bloodshot, her dry purple lips wobbling. She wore a loose pale green dress that hung off one shoulder and was rolled up at the sleeves. I could recall Isla, Cecilia’s twin, wearing the same dress before she’d been sent away–and ultimately died of Madness–to De Fa Gilroy’s arctic fishing village.

          “A toast to victory.” Father stood up at the head of the dining table, raising his golden goblet, overflowing with fruit wine. Alcohol sloshed onto the marble floor and the red tablecloth. “I have received confirmation that with all five Dukedoms and the new queen’s seal of approval, war is on the horizon. Astardosa will join us after the Accord of Ihubet is broken. Tonight, we celebrate our upcoming fortunes and the eradication of those western god-worshiping Sunsetters. The sun rises on Traonia, we are the people of the light.”

          A bead of sweat rolled down the back of my neck. Why was it so hot in the dining room? Wrinkling the thick fabric of my dress in my lap, I pushed down the urge to fan my flushed face. Breathing in deeply and letting out a slow breath, I focused on the table at my father. 

          “Sevulind, Galuven, the Isles–” I side-eyed my husband, staring at his hideous red lips, “– and Astardosa will all learn that giving their lives away to puppet masters, who use and abuse humans like spoiled children playing with dolls, is inane. Gods and magic are meaningless and void, as they should be. With our advanced technology, destroying the altars and freeing the world from gods will be manageable for us.” 

          I nodded my head, sweating and taking another sip of wine. My hand felt lighter without Rodion’s ring.

          Father threw back his head with a laugh. “No longer will the gods steal Traonian children. Traonia will no longer be afflicted by the Madness. Dreams will no longer be a place for them to take us. What happened to my late brother, Claude, and all those who came before us will be avenged. We can topple their temples, force them out, and retrieve the bodies of those missing. They will fear us.” His tone lowered, and his eyes darkened at the last word.  

          I squinted up at my father, momentarily. Over twenty-seven years since father’s older brother went Mad then missing, and he’s still obsessed. Thousands of coins and hundreds of guards and mercenaries were used to search for the previous heir without success.

          “For the late Duke Claude,” Bianca, the suck-up, lifted her goblet higher.

          Across from me, Mother, a native Astarodese and lower noble traded in marriage, finished her glass of wine, and held up her left hand; father’s ring sparkled on her finger. A servant standing against the far wall, like all the others, stepped up to refill her glass. The black-clad servant left the jug of fruit wine next to her. Over the years, Mother’s complexion lost its glow, and her once-plump frame turned skeletal and dark-green eyes unfocused, leading me to always wonder if she was even aware of what happened around her. 

          Her veins pumped more wine than blood.

          Father continued talking, “–filled with plenty of resources, the west lands are ripe for the picking. Queen Leighton will lead us and our allies in Astardosa. We will march like the setting sun and show them darkness.” Father tipped his goblet at my husband.

Speaking of the West and the impending invasion, I pondered if Hendricks, my older bastard brother, would be caught in the war and die? Said family disgrace had cut off his long white hair, and ran away to the West, rejecting the Von Shezel name. I had wanted him gone since the moment he entered our household as an ill-mannered commoner bastard. Yet, his dismissal of our grand house stung. I still could not understand what deal he’d made with Father to be allowed to leave Traonia with his inheritance.

          My stomach twisted with a growl. Delicious smells of cooking meat, soft bread, and glazed fruit drifted through the air from the kitchens. The first course had not even been served yet. I drained my cup. Father kept talking. Would he ever shut up so we could eat? I was growing dizzy from hunger.

          “–where we will once and for all subjugate and gentrify those god-worshiping Sunsetters. Requiring every citizen of Galauven, Sevaulind, and the Isles of Constancio to ingest the Gadlis flower, blocking them from the Eight Gods and their reign over Haltera will be over. We will be free.”

          Father finished his long-winded speech, startling me from my inner thoughts. I met his gaze. My left foot tingled. He grinned down at me, and his eyes crinkled. With his long white hair braided over his left shoulder, he looked refined in his blood-red jacket and black pants, the epitome of nobility and power. 

          Something did not add up.

          I forced myself to chuckle. My temples throbbed, and my stomach grumbled. Father hadn’t sat down yet. Was he going to make another speech? His eyes met mine, and he tipped his glass in my direction, then took a large gulp. Bianca giggled and did the same.

          The wooden doors to the dining room burst open so forcefully that the chandelier on the ceiling rocked, sending shadows flickering across the red-painted walls decorated with paintings and servants in black clothes. A troop of eight guards stormed in, purple shoulder capes over thick, dark brown armor, stamped with the purple crest of Traonian on their breast.

          What are the royal guards doing here?

          “Under the royal decree, Consort-Duchess Claudia Von Lubov, you are under arrest for the assassination of the late King Barnaby,” a commanding voice boomed.

          Two guards stayed by the door, two approached me, three fanned the room, and one addressed my father. 

          “His death?” I asked, a chill creeping over my flushed skin. The goblet in my hand wobbled and then fell out of my numb fingers to break and spill inside the empty plate in front of me. “I just arrived in Traonia. I’ve never been to the palace in my life.”

          Father shook his head, his white eyebrows furrowed. “My daughter would never harm the king. Von Shezel’s have been loyal to the crown for over nine hundred years.”

          Was it Yna? That black-hearted kneeler.. She knew I didn’t approve of her union with the second prince. Of all the available girls, Prince Callum should have chosen me or at least another Traonian instead of a god-worshiping Sunsetter as his future bride. 

          Two guards lurched forward, grabbed my arms in tight grips, and hauled me up and out of my seat. My husband scooted his chair away, chin resting in the palm of his hand. Down the table, Cecilia covered her face with her hands. Mother poured another glass of wine. Bianca threw back her head and laughed.

          The tip of my fingers buzzed with electricity.

          “The evidence was found in your position,” the head guard stated.

          “There must be some other reason as to why Claudia had a vial of Dahala,” Father defended me in a show of caring he had never given me in my life. “I’ll speak with Princess–ah, no, Queen Leighton. These charges are false.”

          It was known that the Von Shezel’s were the first noble house established in Traonian, our line longer than the crowns. The Duke’s words had equal sway at the Kings, occasionally more. But, wait, how did he know that I had the Dahala poison? Only Rodion and Edwith, my supplier, knew. 

          Ice consume me, I was betrayed again. 

          A look passed between the guards, yet they didn’t speak up at the odd display. The Von Shezels are not a family of love or loyalty. The strongest won, and that was it. My morals are not on the most ethical side, easily bent for my own personal gain. I had framed a Western noble for the youngest princess's assassination; pushed my own sister down a flight of stairs; stabbed my older brother; publicly slandered Yna and the royal family; and poisoned, beaten, humiliated, and socially ostracized countless people. 

          Yet, I did not have a single hand in the king’s murder or the planning of said death. If I were to be arrested, it should have at least been for something I did. I would kneel before a god before I was arrested or executed for someone else's crime.

          “Her trial will be set a week from today in the capital city,” the head guard, a tall woman with a long braid down her back and a red scar on her neck, told my father. “After the mourning of the late king and the coronation of the new Queen.”

          “I didn’t do–”

          “It’s around her neck,” Rodion offered.

          The guard yanked at my necklace to reveal the vial. She nodded and, with a sharp tug, broke the chain off my neck and stuffed it in the pocket at her breast. My vision wavered. 

          “The Madness must have taken her,” Father lamented, his acting overly saccharine. “My own brother woke up one morning, screaming, then a week later tried to attack our mother with a hatchet in the middle of the night. I know Madness, it has taken her.”

          Madness? Was he going to blame the Madness? Darkness take him.

          How absolutely stupid I was. There was no loyalty. No one was worthy of my trust. Their betrayals were engraved upon my heart, reminders not to fall for the same traps again. Twice now, I had trusted only for the person to let me fall. 

          Never. Again. 

          “You betrayed me, you scumsucking kneeler. Madness, I’ll show you–” 

          One of the maids standing silently against the red wall collapsed on the floor. The same dead-eyed maid who’d taken a sip from my cup. Bianca wheezed, her eyes glittered with tears and mirth. Poison. The drug I had detected covered up a nastier concoction. The same trick twice?

          “Oh, no. There won’t be a duel tomorrow,” Bianca badly lamented, unable to frown fully with a smile tugging her lips up.

          They would not pin this on me. Inhaling, I found my center, pushed down the heat blooming in my head, then exhaled and burst into movement. Crouching, I pulled the two guards down, twisting my body to knee the one on my left right in the nose. He released me and fell back with a gush of blood. The guard on my right exclaimed, and with my free left hand, I dug my fingers into her long white hair and slammed her temple into the side of the table. The third guard lunged at me. I side-stepped the man, delivering a hard kick of my knee to his groin. He fell to his knees. He dropped to the floor when I punched his jaw.

          Just the captain and the two guards left. Easy.

          The captain pulled out her sword, and I grabbed the empty plate at my seat, making sure to elbow Rodion in the nose before charging at the captain. Best take out the biggest threat first. My left hand reached into my pocket and retrieved the blade at my thigh. 

          “You don’t want to do this,” the captain warned.

          Not wasting breath, I advanced and dodged the bow aimed at my neck. Slow. Stepping into the guard's personal space, plate held at my chest, I stabbed the knife in my hand at her side. I was getting out of here. She twisted just in time for it only to graze her. They would not take me.

          “Claudia, stop before the Madness sinks any further into your body.” Father wrung his hands together in front of him, appearing anxious yet demurring. “I’ll travel behind you and speak to the queen myself. We are the household of the first rays of light; the royals will listen to me. This will be settled.”

          “I’m not Mad. I didn’t kill the king.” I stabbed at the captain with every word, slashing air as she dodged. My last strike sank into her soft flesh. She hissed, sword cutting at the sides of my thick dress, ripping the beautiful fabric. 

          I stumbled, woozy. Before the drug took effect, I had to run. Once outside, I would easily escape and hide.

          “This is gold embroidered, you heathen.” I pulled out the knife to stab her again when a hot flush crawled up my spine, and the world spun.

          No. No. No. 

          I would not be captured like a rabid dog to be shot in the woods.

          Slapping the captain with a plate, she staggered back, giving me open room to sprint out of the dining hall. The two guards at the doors attempted to block my exit with their spears. Yanking one of the spears, I swung it around my waist, hitting them both. My feet pounded against the black tile floors, breaths were heavy. The door to freedom was a few paces away. 

          A set of arms wrapped around my waist and tackled me to the ground. My knees were bruised against the tiled floor, my left shoulder took the brunt of the fall, and something popped. Nausea shook my stomach. One of the guards –I lost track of which – crawled up my body, pressing me into the floor with their weight as I wiggled and kicked, attempting to dislodge them. 

          “Get off.” I scratched at their face, raking my fingers across the woman's skin, aiming my nails at her eyes. She closed them. Two other guards knelt, holding back my arms, my left shoulder wrenched back at an agonizing angle. 

          “Gag her.”

          I screamed, and a dirty cloth smelt of grease and oil was shoved into my mouth. My hands were forced forward, my wrists bound with iron shackles. Twisting as a fish dropped on land, ignoring the sharp pain in my shoulder and knees, I resisted, and my efforts were futile.  The limping captain was escorted from the dining room, supported by Bianca and Rodion. A servant rushed to telegraph a doctor.

          “Since my daughter hurt you in her Madness, it is only proper I take care of you,” Father explained to the pained captain, her hand pressing a napkin to the bleeding wound on her side.

          “Obviously, it's her own fault; she didn’t take the Gadlis for three years. It’s no wonder a god has snuck into her mind and dreams and made her insane,” Bianca explained.

          “I never saw her take Gadlis,” Rodion supplied.

          Lies. Lies. I ate the flower every day. 

          What was the point of pantomiming fake concern with a twisted story? Servants gathered in groups, whispering and watching. The dead-eyed maid who'd drunk from my cup and passed out was dragged to the back of the house, unconscious. 

          Gods Bless me, Claudia, you are so incredibly brainless it’s a wonder you lived to be twenty-six. How could you miss something so obvious and have the same tactic used on you twice, successfully? 

          Heat flushed my face. Betrayed by Bianca, Father, Hendricks, Rodion, Hidler, Edwith, gods bless me. Mother could have a hand in it. 

          No one stood by my side. 

          Stupid. Mornonic. Silly, useless child. All the strength and might of a warrior, and still bested twice. Alone while they ganged up on me. Tears watered my eyes, but I refused to cry. They would not have the privilege of seeing my breakdown.

          I turned my head over my shoulder as I was hauled up, staring back at my family. Mother grabbed the wine jug, stood up, and walked in the opposite direction up the stairs to her bedroom. Bianca waved with a happy smile as Cecelia began crying. Rodion ate more of his dinner.

          Father, still carrying a cup in his hands, raised it to toast me. “To Claudia, without her, our plans would not have bloomed into fruition or prosperity so quickly.”

          Shackled, gagged, and dragged like a carcass to the door, my feet limply scraped against the floor, all feeling lost in my lower limbs. The gas lamps in the house hissed like angry cats.

          Outside in the heavy snow of winter, a mechanical cart sat at the front door, smoke billowing out from the top. I was shoved inside, the door shut behind me, and the cart cranked.

          This was wrong, I yelled through the gag, my screams muffled.  

          They betrayed me. I walked into their trap willingly, thinking I had the upper hand. They used me. I hadn’t done anything.

          For this one crime, I was completely innocent.