"The marriage arrangement is final. You will marry Duke Vincent Kalder and move to his Duchy in the North."
Lorelai's stepmother, Queen Althea Erelith, did not even look at her stepdaughter while uttering these words. In the quiet embrace of her bedroom, they sounded more like a sentence than a happy announcement.
Once the princess got ready, instead of assuming her usual duties for the day, she was suddenly called into the queen's chambers. The messenger insisted that the matter was urgent and she had to see her stepmother immediately.
Now she understood why.
Lorelai shifted nervously as she stood before Althea's couch, clutching her cane with her right hand, and finally mustered the courage to speak.
"Duke Kalder of the Northern Duchy?" She repeated his name, still not quite believing that the queen was indeed talking about him.
"Yes, Duke Vincent Kalder. Why? You do not think he is good enough for you? A barren girl like yourself should be happy about such a fortunate arrangement!"
At last, Althea moved her eyes to the young lady standing in front of her and looked at her anxious face from underneath her perfectly shaped eyebrows. She set aside her half-empty goblet of red wine, then leaned back against the couch, and tapped her long, sharp nails on the wooden ornament of the couch's frame.
There was always something bohemian about that woman; though already in her forties, she was tall, slender, and beautiful, with her white skin, long red hair, and dark brown eyes sparkling under the soft light of the crystal chandelier.
And yet, every time she would open her mouth to speak, it felt as if she was a venomous snake, spitting words like deadly poison.
"You were aware of this agreement. Did you really think I was joking about it? You better get a hold of yourself, Lorelai; this marriage is important to the royal family's political stance, so don't you dare screw this up for us."
Althea rose to her feet and slowly walked up to her stepdaughter, towering over her like a menacing predator. Lorelai hated that she always made her feel incredibly small and insignificant with her mere presence alone.
Compared to everyone else, she always felt the smallest.
Pausing mere centimeters from the young woman's body, Althea fixed her glaring red eyes on hers and spread her thin, red lips into a vile smile as she almost hissed her next words.
"This is what your father, the King, wants too, Lorelai. I don't think you want to go against your father's final wishes, am I wrong?"
"... no."
It was true, she did not want to defy her father, the only blood relative she still had, but with each passing year, it has been harder and harder to be a good daughter to him. And now that the king was dying, it would be a sin to go against his will.
Ever since she was a child, as long as she could remember, Lorelai had only one purpose in life––to serve her family; to be a perfect daughter so that in the future, she could be a perfect wife.
It was already burdensome enough that she was diagnosed as infertile thus shattering her chances of producing an offspring, but she was also crippled––due to an unfortunate incident the details of which she did not remember, her right leg was broken causing her to limp and use a cane while walking.
She could never be a perfect wife. Althea was right, she was lucky to have someone who wanted to marry her. Even if that someone was the most disgusting and perverted man in the entire Erelith Kingdom.
The queen spread her red lips into another vile smile and Lorelai felt like dying.
A strong, suffocating sensation crept up to her throat, and she began to choke on her own feelings of betrayal and disgust. She really wanted to die.
But was it really what she deserved?
Suddenly, she remembered her dream. The feelings of sickness and disgust evoked by her unknown groom resurfaced, adding to the already overwhelming struggle.
Duke Kalder as her fiance. Her stomach was tied in knots.
No matter how hard Lorelai tried to shake that unpleasant feeling off, at the end of the day, she was nothing but a tool to help others accomplish their selfish, greedy goals. If the queen said she was to marry him, she had to obey.
Duke Vincent Kalder, the man she was supposed to marry, could easily pass as her grandfather, and although as a royal princess, she reserved the right to select her future husband, Lorelai could not help but feel trapped as she never had a choice to begin with.
The duke was a powerful figure. Reigning over the entire east-northern border, he was overseeing the biggest royal army that guarded Erelith against any possible danger roaming around that border line.
Having such a strong political figure supporting the royal family was incredibly important to Althea, especially since the king's poor health had proven how weak and unstable to crown truly was.
But no matter how rich or powerful Duke Kalder was, it did not erase the fact that he was a disgusting sixty-year-old pervert who had been drooling over Lorelai's body ever since she reached adolescence.
And now, thanks to the queen's greedy ambitions, he would finally have his chance to crush her.
"Good," Althea trapped her daughter's chin between the long fingers of her left hand and leaned closer, glaring straight into the princess' green eyes. "Remember your role, Lorelai. Serve your family. Serve your kingdom. You do not want to be completely useless, right?"
Lorelai closed her eyes, leaning heavily onto her cane as the pain from standing for so long had finally got to her.
She gritted her teeth, fighting the annoying sensation, and forced a response.
"No... Your Majesty."
Althea pushed her chin away forcing the princess to stumble from the impact. Watching her struggling to retain her balance, the queen chuckled and nodded, picking up her goblet.
"Good. Smart girl."