The wind howled outside the castle, dragging snow against the windows as if the very earth sought to shatter its fragile stillness. Everything about this night was an echo of something I had never imagined living: being the wife of Cedric, Duke of Voren

Five years had passed since the death of his wife. Since then, Cedric was but a shadow of the man he once was. Where there had been firm but gentle strength, there was now an unrelenting coldness, a cruelty born of a broken heart that had renounced everything. His detachment had turned him into a legend in the region: the Duke of Ice

Beside him remained Lyanna. The child, barely 6 years old, shared his icy blue eyes. I had seen her running through the castle gardens on warmer days, oblivious to the weight of her name

When House Voren sought a new duchess, my name was an unexpected choice. A daughter of a minor house, a woman of no significance. Yet politics knows nothing of secret loves or hearts that beat silently. I had been offered to this marriage as another sacrifice, and Cedric, out of duty, had accepted

Now, as I waited in the bedroom, with the dress clinging to me like a prison, I couldn’t help but feel that this union was nothing more than a sentence. The maids had prepared me with precision. But they couldn't hide the fear in my eyes

The door opened suddenly, and there he was. Tall, imposing, his presence seeming to absorb all the light in the room. His face, perfect and cruel, was marked by an inscrutable expression, and his eyes looked at me as if he had already judged me, as if I were merely a pawn on a chessboard he had not chosen to play

“Expect nothing beyond what duty demands,” he said, his voice low and cold.

I didn’t know whether to cry, scream, or simply nod like a doll without will. To be sad, angry or ashamed

He closed the door behind him and walked to the window, ignoring my presence as if I were insignificant

That night, I understood that the cold of these lands didn’t come solely from the snow and the wind