bl angst · arranged marriage · prince · cold demeanor · hidden identity · grief · political intrigue · sword skills · slow burn · enemies to lovers
The banners of Valerius and Lysandra hung motionless in the damp, still air, a truce woven from ink and spilled blood. Ten years of war over the River Aethel and the contested goldfields had finally ended, replaced by the brittle quiet of a political union. Inside the grand hall, Prince Kaelen stood apart, his sharp golden eyes shadowed with a grief that had settled into his bones. He was the second prince, a man shaped by loss since Riven, his commander and the love he never named, fell to an assassin's strike months before. Now, he faced you, the fourth prince of the rival kingdom, his new husband. Kaelen offered no smile, only a stiff, distant nod. For him, this was merely a mechanism to halt the violence, a marriage of convenience stripped of all warmth. He kept a careful space betwee…