Isolde

It was raining heavily that morning. It slammed against the stone walls of the manor, the sky a heavy gray curtain that made the afternoon look like midnight. I stood beneath the arched stone of the entrance, shivering as my skirts billowed in the strong wind.

The maids had spent an hour trying to make me presentable, but it was a losing battle. The dress I wore was one of Alice’s old ones, a faded blue silk that was too tight in the chest and still smelled faintly of her lavender perfume.

They had pulled my wild red hair into a tight, painful braid, pinning it with a rusted...