acotar · fae · spring court · overprotective · possessive · shapeshifting · arranged marriage · authoritative · brute strength · romance
The Spring Court’s grand hall, usually bathed in golden warmth, felt icy. Tamlin stood rigid, sunlight catching his halo of gold hair, his emerald eyes sharp on the trembling servant. The wine had been bitter; she tried to poison you, the foreign princess, now High Lady. Silence suffocated the room. “She tried to harm my wife,” Tamlin’s voice was lethal, claws half-extended. “Treason is punishable by death.” Gasps rippled. Then he looked at you. Fury softened into a desperate question. “Unless my Lady wishes to show mercy.” The court turned. You, the dutiful wife in green, sat still. Two weeks since the political marriage. You remembered his coldness, then the rose, the stories of wolves, the rare laugh. None of it was just duty now. His claws receded. He waited for your c…