The Dark Bride

Chapter One

Lucetta

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The noble home of Baron Valentinus was no longer the shining example it was when his father ruled as Marquess. As soon as the son took over the family name after the father’s sudden death, the family quickly lost their land, fortune, rank, and reputation. Now Baron Justin Valentinus was facing the odds of no longer being a nobleman and being ranked a commoner. He and his wife, Baroness Primrose, decided that the only course of action for them to take was to have a daughter and marry her off to a dragon. And not just any dragon, but a royal dragon! The dowry from a dragon prince would put them back on top. Things like the Testing of Blood by the different kingdom temples were not a matter for them to worry about. The Valentinus family was one of the first noble families of the Kingdom of Light, so there was no way that the Sun God wouldn’t give them a daughter that would be perfect for the royal family. And the fact that the current king and queen of Bengolarrea were nearing their deathbeds couldn’t have made the timing more perfect.

So the young couple started trying for a daughter. When the Baroness first got pregnant, she gave birth to a healthy and hearty baby boy that they named Ebner. It was the kingdom’s tradition that the firstborn child would have a name meaning light. When the Baroness got pregnant the second time, the easy pregnancy was overshadowed by the fact that the child was a few weeks late on the expected due date. However, on the day of the Summer Soltis, the longest day of the year, Celyn Addam was born. His name, which means holy and earth, was a play on words because his mother kept shouting such holy profanity during labor and then was sure that what she gave birth to was a small boulder due to his size and weight. With her third pregnancy, the Baroness became supremely superstitious and did everything that she heard about or read to increase her chances of having a girl. It didn’t matter how outlandish it sounded, Primrose tried it thrice over. And thus, Briar was born much to the Baron and Baroness’s displeasure. They were hoping to call the potential daughter Briar Rose after the Baroness’s name, but shortened it when they learned that they had a third boy.

It was when Baroness Primrose got pregnant for the fourth time did they finally had a daughter, and they named me Lucetta. My older brothers all called me Lulu for short. From the moment I could walk and talk my parents put me into training to become the perfect bride. They had gotten me tutors at first, but when their money dried up the tutors left and my parents decided to educate me themselves. It wasn’t so bad at first, from what I was told. It wasn’t until my mother tried training me in dancing and keeping up with fashion trends that things got bad. It started with a switch that she would strike me with whenever I messed up or said the wrong thing. I had a slight stutter that my parents were disgusted by, so they decided that I was a lost cause and to try having another child. When my mother was about five months pregnant, she got into a terrible accident which resulted in her losing the baby. It was only after my mother woke up from the surgery that my parents learned that the child that passed would have been a girl. The worst news was that there was so little that the healers could do as the most experienced ones were helping those caught in the recent rogue dragon attacks. So my mother lost the ability to have any more children due to the state of her injuries. That was when life for me got worse.

Seeing as I was the family’s only hope in their minds, my parents went back to training me with harsher punishments. The worst one was locked in the old closet in the maid’s room that was no longer in use. Not only was it small and dark, but it was full of spiders and other bugs that crawled all over me. I was forced to stay in that closet for anywhere from hours to days, without a sound from the outside world to let me know that my cries for help were heard. My older brothers would save me from the closet when they could, but more often than not I was stuck in that closet for a long time.

The experiences became so traumatic for me that I couldn’t go to sleep unless I had a candle lit in my room. Mom often stole my candle, saying that I was wasting valuable money on a childish fear. So often I slept in one of my brothers’ rooms, usually with Ebner. Most of the time, he was up late anyway studying so he allowed me to sleep in his room. He always offered me his bed, but the training that my mother drilled into my head about not sleeping in a bed that didn’t belong to me or my husband was strong. So he made me a mound of pillows to sleep on when I went to his room. It was my personal little space in an area that was his to control. Not everything about my life was bad, I had three loving brothers who looked after me. They helped make bridal training easier and even took me out into town whenever they could. That was how I met my first love and my best and only friend.

Celyn Addam wanted to go into the world of trade and at the age of ten became associated with the best in the business. The LaVough family was considered new money, yet were able to reach the rank of Viscount in no time. Their home base was the Kingdom of Wind, our neighbors from across the ocean. They weren’t that far away actually. Rumor was that on the clearest of nights, just after the sun had set, you could see the faint lights from the Kingdom of Wind’s harbor. What got me connected to the LaVough family was their daughter Shea Georgiana LaVough. Once my brother learned that they had a daughter about my age and that they brought her with them everywhere they went, Celyn got permission from Viscount LaVough to bring me along whenever he could. He thought it was a wonderful idea and allowed it.

Now, their daughter Shea was a special case, as she didn’t act like your normal child. She didn’t even act like the child of a noble family. It seemed as though that even in her waking moments, Shea was walking in one of her dreams. The things she said never made sense to anyone and she described things in truly strange ways. I found her strange at first but didn’t dare express my opinion to anyone. Not only was my brother getting me out of the house for short periods, but I didn’t want to ruin his job with Viscount LaVough by saying something negative about his daughter.

Soon, however, Shea grew on me and I quickly learned how to peek into her world. I couldn’t see things the way she did completely, but I at least understood what she was saying. Shea’s biggest love was adventure so we explored many places in my hometown and I got to see them in a brighter light. Some things that Shea was into were kind of scary, like things that lived in the dark. She also liked to find bugs and give them different names and abilities. If Shea ever became a goddess, I feared for what creatures she would create. It was on one of our adventures through town that I bumped into the dragon prince of the Kingdom of Light.

Lysander Elrath, the kind and charming prince of my home lived in the valley not far from the town so he visited often. I made the careless mistake of running into his leg at the age of six. Fearing the wrath of the dragons that I knew about from the stories told by my father, I sat there shaking as I awaited my instant death. When Lysander knelt and reached out his hand, I flinched, shut my eyes tight, and waited for the dreaded slap to my face similar to what my father had done to me countless times before. But the slap never came, instead, his sweet voice called out to me and asked if I was harmed. When I opened my eyes, I looked up to see the sweetest of smiles on his face as he offered me his hand to help me back up. It was at that moment that I fell in love.

I worked even harder at my bride training with the hopes that I would become Lysander’s bride when I got older. It wasn’t the last time that I saw him either. As Viscount and Viscountess LaVough were such key players in keeping a strong connection between the Kingdoms of Light and Wind, Prince Lysander paid a few visits to them when they were in the area. Over the years, the prince and I talked more and more until I believed us to be friends by the time I turned twenty. Though he was hundreds of years older than me, we were roughly in the same stage of our life span as young adults. Not long after, news of the king and queen of Bengolarrea passing spread quickly, and the Testing of Blood ceremonies soon started.