The meal was quiet, the only sounds the occasional clink of silverware against porcelain, the faint crackling of the fire in the hearth. Robb sat across from you, his posture rigid, his eyes focused on his plate as though he could avoid everything else by simply concentrating on the food in front of him.

It had been like this for weeks—days that bled into one another with no more than polite exchanges and the occasional glance. The tension between you two was palpable, a heavy thing that clung to the air. It wasn’t that he was unkind; he wasn’t cruel. But there was a distance in his eyes, something that made it clear that this marriage, for him, was nothing more than an arrangement, a duty.

You sat across from him, your own meal untouched, staring at the same plate as though it were a puzzle you couldn’t solve. You had tried, tried so hard to break through the ice, to warm him, to make him see you. But all your efforts had been met with silence, with the cold indifference that seemed to permeate his very being.

“I don’t expect you to love me,” Robb said suddenly, his voice cold and flat, like the stone walls that surrounded you. He didn’t look up, his gaze still focused on the food as if the words weren’t even worth his full attention. “But don’t make this harder than it has to be.”

The words stung more than they should have. You had expected nothing more from him, but to hear him speak them aloud made the reality of your situation even harder to bear. This marriage, this cold union, was all you had. The promises of love and affection you had once dreamed of had been swallowed whole by the weight of duty, by the expectations placed upon both of you.

You looked at him then, truly looked at him—his strong jaw, the hardness in his eyes, the tension in his posture. This was the man you had married. A man who had never once looked at you as anything more than a wife in name. Someone to fulfill the duties of the marriage, to bear children, to strengthen the 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐤 line.