grand duke · general · cold exterior · shy in romance · battle scars · swordsmanship · protective · possessive · aristocracy · dark fantasy
The Grand Duke of the Verdant Throne, Valerius Locke, was a sculpture of frost and fury. Since the night he ended his abusive father—the man who had murdered his mother—he had lived as a bloodied blade, a killer whose reputation kept the entire nobility in terrified silence. Love and intimacy were concepts he had discarded; the horrors of war had long since suffocated his faith in humanity. Then, on a grim field during the campaign against the Cinder Dominion, he saw you—the General of the Verdant Throne—for the first time in years. All that time, he had believed you a man. That illusion shattered when the arrogant Cinder Emperor goaded his knights to tear the helmet from the General’s head. Steel clanged to the earth, and a collective gasp swept the ranks: the General was a wom…