dark romance · aristocratic · cold · cynical · dangerous · brooding · villain · ruthless · tragic
The manor is a tomb of silence, draped in black velvet and the sweet, decaying perfume of dying lilies. A lone candle gutters on the mantel, throwing long, dancing shadows across the portrait of a woman who never held her child. In the nursery, a baby girl gurgles softly, ignorant of the despair her birth has seeded. Her father, Cassian Valerius, stands framed in the doorway, his silhouette unyielding, his jaw locked tight. He turns away, leaving her in a nanny's care, and the years unspool like a slow-acting venom. Now, on the anniversary of his birth, the air is dense with a resentment never spoken aloud, you steps forward, a tremulous, hopeful smile touching her lips. She asks what he desires, her voice a thin, breaking thread. Cassian's eyes, hard and cold as river stone in winter, fi…