Chapter 23: Beneath the Council’s Gaze
Annora
The door opened.
And there he was.
Alaric stepped inside as if the room had been holding its breath for him. The air shifted, denser now, edged with something electric. His presence pressed against the walls, unsettling every corner until nothing felt untouched.
His gaze swept over me once, slow and deliberate. It lingered on the slope of my bare shoulders, the loosened fall of my hair, the way my hands had stilled in my lap as if they, too, understood that something sacred stood on the verge of breaking.
“Tomorrow,” he said, voice low, velvet layered over iron. “You’ll be introduced to the Council.”
My breath caught, but I didn’t speak.
He stepped closer. Not enough to touch, but enough that the space between us pulsed with tension. The air felt like the instant before a storm breaks. Thrumming with potential, threaded with warning.
“I want you prepared. Composed.”
A pause. Then, the timbre of his voice sharpened, like a blade unsheathed.
“Dressed well. And in a way that makes it unmistakable… you were chosen.”
My heart beat harder. “What do you mean?”
He tilted his head slightly, eyes catching the low light like smoke curling in the dark.
“I mean,” he said, “wear one of the finest gowns I’ve had made for you. Let them see you as I see you. Let them understand who you are… and who you already belong to.”
I nodded slowly, though I wasn’t sure I’d taken a breath.
His hand lifted, fingertips brushing the line of my jaw, barely a whisper of contact. But my skin ignited where he touched, as if the air itself had turned to flame.
Then he turned to leave.
At the door, he paused without looking back.
“They’ll expect weakness,” he said. “Don’t give it to them.”
And then he was gone.
But the room didn’t breathe again.
The silence was not empty.
It was thick, scented with possession and the promise of something neither of us had dared name.
I didn’t sleep.
My dreams hovered like mist, present, but never landing. Shadows without shape. Longing without language.
When the sun finally rose, the world felt quieter. Like it was holding its breath. Waiting to see what I would become.
Elsa and Livia arrived with wide eyes and careful movements, their hands wrapped around brushes and silks like offerings to something divine. But I left no space for hesitation.
There was no room for nerves today.
“Not the braids,” I said softly to Elsa. “Leave it down. But… do the sides the way he likes.”
She nodded once, understanding like only someone who’s listened to longing behind locked doors could understand.
My curls were tamed, parted, the front sections twisted and pinned away from my face with gold combs shaped like roses and thorns. Just as Alaric once said suited me best. The rest of my hair fell in dark, commanding waves down my back. Soft. Regal. Untouchable.
I wore one of the gowns he had spoken of.
Silk the color of honeyed cream, sleeveless and sculpted to fit the exact shape of me, fitted through the bodice, curving like breath over my chest, then sweeping down with effortless grace. The embroidery shimmered in the light, gold thread catching with every subtle movement, like a spell laced into the seams.
The collar stood high at my throat, fastened with a single garnet.
Not just a gemstone.
A seal. A signal. A silent mark of royal favor.
But more than that, it was the fit, the way it hugged my shape too precisely, too intimately to be anything but intentional.
Not just chosen.
Crafted.
By him.
A silent claim that needed no announcement.
The kind of claim nobles understood before a single word was spoken.
I didn’t wear a crown.
I wasn’t his queen.
But I looked like something that should never be touched without consequence.
When I stepped into the corridor, Edric was already there, waiting. His eyes widened for just a second then narrowed with a grin that said he saw more than he’d ever say aloud.
“You do realize,” he murmured, not offering an arm, just standing close enough to cast a shadow beside mine, “you’re about to walk into a room full of predators… dressed like bait wrapped in blood and silk.”
I didn’t flinch. My gaze held steady. “Then let’s hope they like what they see.”
He let out a low laugh. “Oh, little rose… I’m certain they will.”
The Council chamber was colder than I’d imagined.
Not just in temperature, but in spirit.
Stone walls climbed high above like ancient sentinels, their faces etched with the weight of centuries. Torches lined the room in even intervals, their flames restless, casting shifting shadows across stained glass windows that depicted forgotten battles and blood-bound vows.
The Council sat in a crescent arc. Twelve cloaked figures draped in black and crimson, their presence as still as it was suffocating. They watched like wolves pretending to be men.
And at the center: Elder Vasilis.
Flanked by the King.
Alaric did not look at me.
Not at first.
But I felt him.
The shift in the air the moment I crossed the threshold. The coiling tension beneath his stillness. The way every pair of eyes followed each step I took, the silk, the hair, the set of my chin.
Every detail whispered a single truth.
His.
It was Alaric’s mother who spoke first. Her tone was smooth, but it glided over something sharp.
“Your name?”
“Annora, my lady.”
“You serve in the royal chambers?”
“Yes.”
“And who raised you?”
“No one… not really. I was brought to the palace as a child and later trained under Lady Elenne.”
She nodded once.
“You enjoy your duties?”
“I do.”
Alaric’s father leaned forward, his gaze appraising.
“You wear your dress well.”
My eyes flicked to him, steady. “It was a gift.”
“From whom?”
A beat of silence.
Then, without faltering, I looked straight at Alaric.
“From the King.”
The pause that followed was thick with meaning.
The Council knew.
They all knew.
But it was the woman again who pierced the stillness.
“You’re very composed.”
“I was told to be.”
A flicker passed over her features. Approval? Caution? Something colder?
Then Vasilis’s voice cut through, colder than the rest.
“Has the King ever spoken to you of our laws?”
“No, my lord.”
“Do you fear him?”
I hesitated. Just long enough to draw breath.
Then softly, clearly, I shook my head.
“No. I revere him.”
It was the truth and it was the only answer they would accept.
There was a pause. Then, with a nod that felt like a blade being sheathed, Vasilis said, “You may go.”
I curtsied low.
Only then, only once I was dismissed. I allowed myself to look directly at Alaric.
His gaze didn’t waver.
Not once.