The Vampire & Her Witch

The great hall of Lothian Manor had been transformed into a temple of light and ambition, and Charlotte Otker thought it was the saddest thing she had ever seen.

Gilded chandeliers hung from the high timber-framed ceiling, each one bristling with dozens of expensive beeswax candles whose flames cast a warm, golden glow across the vast chamber. The light caught the threads of the tapestries that lined the walls, depicting generations of Lothian lords in battle and in triumph.

There were even tattered, worn banners captured from the Demon Lord who ruled the eastern hills and his minions more than a hundred years ago when Caun Lothian led the forces of the Second Crusade to seize the verdant hills beyond the borders of Keating Duchy.

Between the tapestries, suits of armor stood on wooden pedestals, polished to a mirror sheen that threw the candlelight back in sharp, bright fragments. Perhaps these things were appropriate for the ascendance of a new Marquis. Charlotte didn’t really have an opinion about that. But at a wedding, all of these monuments to conquest left her feeling like her friend was the captive prize of a warlord...

There was nothing romantic about marrying a man beneath the banners of fallen demons. Lady Ashlynn’s wedding hadn’t been like this. No doubt Countess Blackwell had worked hard to ensure that her eldest daughter received a wedding befitting a maiden’s tender heart, but no one had done that for Jocelynn, which just made Charlotte sadder as she looked around the Great Hall of Lothian Manor.

The long tables that flanked the central aisle were dressed in white linen, though they held nothing yet but crystal decanters of wine that caught the light like liquid rubies and gilded goblets at each place setting. At the center of each table, a small silver cup had been filled with honeyed mead for the toast to the bride and groom that would follow the vows.

The feast itself would come later, after the coronation, when the high table was assembled on the dais and the kitchens sent out the courses that Master Jean and his staff had been preparing since well before dawn.

On the raised dais at the far end of the hall, two thrones sat side by side. The Lothian Throne dominated the space, an elaborate, gilded seat carved from a single piece of Ancient Oak that had been sacred to the demons before a Lothian lord took it as a trophy. It was a heavy thing with a solid, square base and a broad back that rose high enough that the Lothian coat of arms carved into the top of it would be visible above the head of anyone sitting on the throne.

Beside it, smaller and more delicate, a second throne had been brought out of storage for the first time since the death of Owain’s mother several years ago. It had been polished and reupholstered in pale blue silk, and the sight of it made Charlotte’s stomach turn, because she knew exactly who it was meant for, and it didn’t look like a seat of power... It looked like a display stand, positioned half a pace back from the Lothian throne, making it clear that the person sitting on it was in no way equal to the person on the heavy throne in front of it.

Charlotte sat at the Otker table near the middle of the hall, positioned far enough from the dais to be forgettable but close enough to see it clearly. Her father, Baron Serle, sat beside her with the composed, distant expression of a man who had learned long ago to hide his opinions behind a mask of mild interest. Her mother, Melsinde, seemed to be trying very hard to do the same, though her attention seemed to focus more on the other ladies of the court than the celebration itself, or the man who was about to become the Lothian Marquis.

Charlotte’s brother, Serge, sat on her other side, fidgeting with his goblet and casting periodic, longing glances toward the doors to the kitchen corridor, where the serving girls waited to begin bringing out the feast.

At the base of the dais, Lord Owain stood with High Priest Aubin, waiting for his bride. Owain was dressed in a doublet of deep blue and gold, the Lothian colors, with his new sword Fallen Claw hanging at his hip in a surprisingly simple scabbard of blue leather that looked recently made.

Serge had gushed about how sharp and powerful the sword was when he watched Lord Owain kill a massive bull elk in a single stroke during the hunt, but to Charlotte, it just looked oddly plain on the waist of a man who otherwise looked dazzling.

Owain’s chestnut hair had been freshly cut and artfully arranged for the ceremonies today, and his features were composed in the warm, confident smile of a man who was about to receive everything he had ever wanted.

He looked, Charlotte thought, exactly like the hero of a storybook. The handsome lord, the gleaming sword, the golden hall. If she hadn’t spent yesterday afternoon listening to Jocelynn talk about her future while they had their hair washed, their nails trimmed, and their bodies pampered in preparation for today, she might still believe that marrying Owain Lothian was an enviable thing.

But Charlotte had listened closely to what Jocelynn had to say, and Adala had added her own observations afterward, which changed how Charlotte saw the things that were happening today.

Two days ago, she’d sat with Jocelynn while the other ladies drank wine and shared memories of Ashlynn, and she’d watched the way her friend’s hands trembled beneath the table when she thought no one was looking.

She’d heard Jocelynn talk about the carriage service through Otker Canyon, about plans and possibilities and the future of Lothian March, and she’d believed, at the time, that these were signs of a woman looking beyond the wedding toward something better.

Now, watching Jocelynn’s empty chair beside Owain’s, waiting for the bride to walk through those doors, Charlotte was no longer certain that any of those plans had been meant for Jocelynn at all.