Sarisa stepped into the council chamber expecting old men, ledgers, and a headache.
Instead, she stopped just past the threshold and blinked.
There were no ministers. No grey-bearded advisers. No military officials, no Vaelen, not even her mother at the head of the table. The room was full of women.
Young women.
Beautiful, expensively dressed, carefully arranged women seated in clusters across the long chamber like flowers placed for display.
Some were her cousins, some daughters of allied houses, some familiar enough to place after a second glance.
A few were around her age, most slightly younger, all of them very obviously there for something that had nothing to do with statecraft.
What kind of meeting was this?
Sarisa kept her expression neutral and moved farther inside, every inch the princess she had been raised to be.
The lamps had been dimmed to a warm glow, and instead of documents and sealed decrees, the table had been laid with wine, sweets, little crystal bowls of sugared fruit, and embroidered cards written in gold ink.
It looked less like a council session and more like the beginning of a society gathering curated by women with too much time and far too many opinions.
One of her cousins rose first, all golden curls and dramatic excitement. Lineth, if Sarisa remembered correctly.
Twenty-two, recently engaged, and perpetually delighted by anything that smelled like romance, gossip, or scandal.
"Sarisa!" Lineth exclaimed, clasping her hands together. "I'm so happy you're getting married after all this time."
A murmur of agreement rose around the room.
Sarisa smiled with the smoothness of long practice. "Thank you. This is… unexpected."
Lineth laughed as if that were charming. "Auntie thought you needed something softer than another dreadful political briefing. Since the wedding is so soon, she said it was time for a more intimate family conversation."
Sarisa's stomach sank.
Of course.
This was not a meeting. This was an ambush dressed in silk.
She took the empty seat nearest the middle of the table, careful and composed, while inside her mind she was already considering whether it was too late to fake a sudden illness. Probably. Her mother's timing was always too perfect for that.
Across from her sat another cousin, Nerise, dark-haired and elegant in a severe blue gown. She lifted her goblet with a smile that looked almost kind.
"You do seem surprised," Nerise said. "Surely you knew this would happen eventually. You're the future queen. You can't marry quietly."
"I had hoped to discuss port security before flower arrangements," Sarisa replied lightly.
That won a ripple of laughter.
"Oh, don't be dull," said another woman near the far end of the table. Sarisa recognized her as Lady Mirelle, a second cousin by marriage and a menace by temperament. "There are people for security. This is far more important."
"Is it?" Sarisa asked.
"Yes," Mirelle said, delighted to have an audience. "You are finally doing the sensible thing."
Sarisa had heard enough versions of that phrase to know exactly what it meant. Sensible. Appropriate. Acceptable. Safe.
All the words used when people wanted to praise a decision without ever asking whether it made her happy.
Lineth leaned forward. "We've all been waiting for this for years, you know. You and Prince Vaelen suit each other. He is gentle, refined, politically useful, and handsome in a non-threatening way."
Sarisa almost laughed at that last part. Non-threatening. A stunning qualification for a husband.
Another cousin, Ysel, sighed dreamily. "And so well-mannered. He always listens when women speak. That alone makes him rare enough to preserve in crystal."
More laughter.
Sarisa folded her hands in her lap and forced herself to sit still. "You all seem very invested."
"Well, yes," Lineth said. "You're family."
No, Sarisa thought. You're vultures with perfume.
She smiled anyway.
The talk drifted quickly from congratulations into all the horrors she had anticipated.
Dresses, guest lists, jewels, ceremony, whether the wedding feast should include imported citrus or locally sugared figs, whether Vaelen preferred silver thread to pearl embroidery, whether Sarisa herself would wear her hair up or down on the night.
They spoke about the wedding as if it were already a completed fact, something polished and sealed and impossible to stop.
Sarisa answered where she had to. Deflected where she could. Sipped wine she did not want.
And then, because the world was apparently not finished testing her patience, Mirelle leaned back in her chair and said, with lazy satisfaction, "Still, I'm relieved you finally decided to let that demon rascal go."
The room did not quite fall silent, but something sharpened.
Sarisa turned her head slowly.
Mirelle, encouraged by the attention, lifted one shoulder in a tiny shrug.
"Oh, come now. Everyone knew there was some sort of… attachment there. She does look quite hot, I'll grant that. Very dramatic. Could probably be a good fuck." She smiled into her glass. "But really, she's not marriage material."
A few of the women laughed. One hid it behind her hand.
Sarisa stared at them.
Those bitches.
Internally, and with perfect royal calm, she rolled her eyes so hard she nearly saw her own brain.
Outwardly, she only tilted her head.
"Interesting," she said.
Mirelle mistook the tone for invitation. "Surely you agree. Demons are exciting, yes, but they are hardly built for stability. They're all appetite and impulse. Fine for an indiscretion, disastrous for a throne."
Lineth made a weak little sound. "Mirelle…"
But Mirelle was enjoying herself too much to stop. "And honestly, can you imagine introducing someone like Lara as royal consort? Half the court would faint before dessert. No offense, of course. She's useful, I'm sure. And certainly striking. But there are people you sleep with, and people you build a kingdom with."
Sarisa's smile sharpened.
It was a dangerous thing, that smile. Cool and elegant and just shy of cruel.
"Mirelle," she said softly, "you speak with impressive confidence for someone discussing matters she clearly does not understand."
The room went still.
Mirelle blinked. "I only meant—"
"I know what you meant." Sarisa reached for her goblet and took a measured sip, never once raising her voice.
"You meant to reduce a woman who has bled for this family, protected this realm, and saved more lives than most people in this room have ever touched, into something decorative and disposable because that is easier than admitting you are intimidated by her."
No one laughed now.
Sarisa set the goblet down with exquisite care.
"Lara is many things. Unruly, infuriating, shamelessly difficult, occasionally unbearable." The corner of her mouth twitched, almost fondly. "But she is not a toy, and she is not a topic for cheap conversation over sugared fruit."
Mirelle's face colored. "I didn't mean—"
"Yes, you did," Sarisa said. "And if you speak of her like that again in my presence, I will stop pretending I believe you were merely being stupid."
That landed.
Lineth choked softly into her wine.
Nerise lowered her eyes, hiding what might have been a smile.
Sarisa leaned back, every inch the princess, every inch the future queen, and thought with vicious satisfaction: Good. Let them feel that.
The chamber remained quiet for a breath too long, until Ysel attempted, nervously, to redirect.
"Well," she said, "I suppose passion does cloud judgment at times."
Sarisa looked at her and smiled again, this one colder.
"Only in people who have never learned the difference between passion and loyalty."
No one had anything useful to say after that.
The conversation stumbled onward, more fragile now, skirts and flowers and lace offered up with forced brightness, but Sarisa heard very little of it. Her pulse had not yet settled. Beneath the table her fingers curled once against her palm.
Not marriage material.
She almost wanted to laugh.
If only they knew.