Chapter 25

Chapter 25: Sanguis Three nights of travel brought them to the edge of forever. The road to Sanguis wound through landscapes that shifted from haunting to sublime, passing through territories that Alaric remembered from another lifetime. Fields of black roses that bloomed only in vampire lands. Forests of petrified trees whose branches formed natural arches overhead. Rivers that flowed with water so clear it seemed to glow, reflecting the eternal twilight in rippling mirrors of purple and gold. And always, the architecture. Ruins at first—abandoned keeps and crumbling villages that spoke of wars fought and lost centuries before. Then, gradually, something more. Towers that rose from the earth like dark flames. Bridges that spanned chasms with impossible elegance. Aqueducts that carried water from mountain peaks to cities that glittered in the gloom like scattered jewels. The Crimson Dominion. His kingdom. His birthright. On the third night, the road crested a final hill, and Sanguis revealed itself in all its terrible glory. Alaric stopped. Behind him, Elara and Kael did the same, their breath catching at the sight. The Crimson Capital sprawled before them like a fever dream given form. It was built into the side of a mountain—or perhaps the mountain had been shaped around it, Alaric could never remember which story was true. The city’s foundations sank deep into the earth, its lowest levels lit by fires that burned eternally in chambers carved from living rock. Above, spires rose in concentric rings, each tier more elaborate than the last, until the highest towers seemed to pierce the very sky itself. The buildings were Gothic in inspiration but twisted by vampire aesthetics into something uniquely otherworldly. Spires tapered to points sharp enough to impale. Archways curved like the wings of predatory birds. Windows gaped like hungry mouths, their glass tinted in shades of crimson and violet and black. Bridges connected the towers in webs of dark stone, and along those bridges moved figures too distant to identify but too numerous to count. The sky above was a permanent twilight, clouds painted in shades of blood and amber by light that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere. And rising from the city’s heart, visible from miles away, the Crimson Throne’s palace blazed with an inner fire—a beacon of power that had once called Alaric home. “Gods,” Kael whispered. “It’s… it’s alive.” “Not alive,” Alaric said quietly. “Hungry. There’s a difference.” Elara studied the city’s defenses with a huntress’s practiced eye. Patrols moved along the outer walls—soldiers in crimson and black, their weapons gleaming even at this distance. Gates stood open but were watched by companies of guards who examined every traveler with meticulous attention. “Lazarus’s papers will only get us so far,” she observed. “If they’re searching for us specifically, we’ll be challenged the moment we try to enter.” “They won’t be searching for us.” Alaric adjusted the hood of his traveling cloak, concealing the crimson light that still flickered in his eyes. “Varnok’s elimination has changed the game. Seraphina will be focused on identifying whoever killed her prince, not intercepting refugees from the borderlands.” “And when we enter the city? When she learns that three strangers matching our description have arrived?” “Then we become ghosts.” Alaric began the descent down the hill, his companions falling in behind him. “The Hollow Court taught us that much. We move carefully, gather intelligence, and make contact with our allies before we make any overt moves.” “Your allies.” Elara’s voice carried a note of skepticism. “You mean Isolde. The exiled prince.” “Yes.” “She’s been in exile for decades. For all we know, she’s dead.” “She’s not dead.” Alaric’s voice was certain, and in that certainty was something that made Elara pause. Something that suggested he knew more than he was saying. “How can you be so sure?” Alaric didn’t answer. He simply continued walking, his crimson eyes fixed on the distant towers of Sanguis, and in his silence was an answer more eloquent than any words could have been. He knew Isolde. He had known her for seven centuries before his death. And in all that time, through wars and betrayals and the rise and fall of empires, she had never once broken a promise. If Isolde the White had said she would wait for him, then she would wait. The gates of Sanguis were a masterwork of intimidation. They rose two hundred feet from the blood-dark earth, carved from a single piece of obsidian that had been mined from the heart of the Crimson Mountains. The doors depicted scenes of ancient battles—vampires triumphant over demons, over monsters, over each other—and their surface was inlaid with veins of precious metals that caught the twilight and threw it back in mocking glimmers. Guards in ceremonial armor stood at attention on either side of the gate, their expressions carved from stone, their weapons conspicuously displayed. Behind them, clerks sat at desks carved from bone, examining papers and questioning travelers with the bored efficiency of functionaries who had performed the same task a thousand times. Alaric joined the queue of travelers waiting for entry. There were dozens of them—merchants with laden carts, servants accompanying noble vampires, human servants and half-breeds who existed in the complicated social hierarchy of vampire society. All of them were subjected to the same scrutiny: papers examined, questions asked, identities verified against lists that were kept in the clerks’ private archives. “Next,” the lead clerk called, gesturing to a group of merchants ahead of Alaric. The examination was brief but thorough. Papers were checked against seals. Warrants were consulted. Names were compared against registries of known criminals, dissidents, and persons of interest. The merchants, who clearly had entered the city many times before, were waved through with minimal delay. “Next.” Alaric stepped forward, his hood still up, his posture deliberately humble. Elara and Kael flanked him, their own papers ready. “Name and purpose of visit?” “Tobias Greythorn,” Alaric said smoothly, the false name rolling off his tongue with practiced ease. “I’m a scholar from the outer provinces, here to study the capital’s archives. My companions are my assistants.” The clerk examined the papers Lazarus had provided. His eyes moved from the documents to Alaric’s face and back again, his expression revealing nothing. “Scholar. From the outer provinces.” He made a note on his ledger. “The archives require special permissions. Do you have authorization from a noble sponsor?” Alaric produced a second document—one that the Hollow Court had secured at considerable expense. “Prince Isolde the White has expressed interest in my research. She offered her patronage.” The name landed like a stone in still water. The clerk’s eyebrows rose fractionally, and Alaric saw his eyes flick to a companion across the desk. A silent communication passed between them—surprise, skepticism, calculation. “Prince Isolde,” the clerk repeated. “That name hasn’t been spoken in this gatehouse in… some time.” “The Prince has emerged from her seclusion. I was told she wished to resume contact with the scholarly community.” A long pause. The clerk studied the papers, studied Alaric, studied the document bearing Isolde’s seal. Finally, he stamped the papers with a decisive motion and handed them back. “Tobias Greythorn. Scholar. With the patronage of Prince Isolde the White.” His voice was carefully neutral, but something flickered in his eyes. “Welcome to Sanguis. May your research prove… enlightening.” Alaric inclined his head and moved through the gates. The city swallowed them whole. Streets twisted and branched in patterns that seemed designed to confuse, lined with buildings that leaned toward each other overhead as though sharing secrets. The crowds were dense and diverse—vampires in all their varieties, humans who moved with the careful deference of the subordinate, half-breeds who occupied strange social niches that defied easy categorization. The air was thick with competing scents: blood and perfume, cooking food and burning incense, the metallic tang of vampire presence and the earthy smell of the living. And everywhere, the banners. Crimson and black, Seraphina’s colors, flew from every tower and hung from every window. Her face appeared on posters and statues, depicted in profile with a stern beauty that belied the cruelty Alaric knew lurked beneath. THE SOVEREIGN’S WISDOM GUIDES US, the slogans proclaimed. UNITY THROUGH BLOOD. UNITY THROUGH POWER. “She’s certainly not subtle,” Elara murmured. “She doesn’t need to be.” Alaric guided them through the crowd with the ease of someone who had walked these streets a thousand times. “Fear is its own form of communication. The citizens know what happens to those who question her rule.” “And you expect to change that? To convince them to follow you instead?” “Convince them?” Alaric’s smile was thin and cold. “I expect to give them no choice.” They moved deeper into the city, leaving the commercial districts behind. The architecture grew older here, more ornate—buildings that predated Seraphina’s reign, that had stood for centuries before she claimed the throne. The streets narrowed. The crowds thinned. The banners became fewer, replaced by older symbols that Alaric remembered from his own time. And finally, at the edge of the city’s oldest quarter, they found what they sought. A manor. It stood alone at the end of a winding road, surrounded by walls of white stone that had once gleamed but were now weathered by decades of neglect. Gardens stretched before the main entrance, filled with a riot of flowers that should not have survived in Sanguis’s climate but somehow thrived anyway. Roses. White roses, hundreds of them, their petals pale as bone against the dark earth. “Prince Isolde’s estate,” Alaric said quietly. “The White Garden. She’s kept it all these years.” “How do you know all this?” Kael asked. “You speak like you’ve been here before. Like you know these people.” Alaric didn’t answer. He was already walking toward the gate. The gate opened before they could knock. A servant stood within—a human woman, ancient by the standards of her kind, her hair white as snow and her eyes carrying the weight of centuries spent in service. She looked at Alaric with an expression that was neither surprised nor welcoming. Something else. Recognition. “The Prince is expecting you,” she said simply. “This way, please.” She led them through the garden, past roses that Alaric remembered planting with his own hands centuries ago. The paths were well-maintained despite the estate’s obvious decay, and as they walked, Alaric noticed details that spoke of careful preservation rather than mere upkeep. The stone was clean. The flowers were tended. The manor itself, though weathered, showed no signs of the collapse that its exterior suggested. Isolde had been preparing for this moment. For years, perhaps decades, she had maintained this sanctuary, waiting for the guest she had always known would come. The servant stopped before the manor’s main entrance and gestured for them to wait. She disappeared inside, leaving them alone with the white roses and the weight of centuries. “You could tell them,” Elara said quietly. “Kael deserves to know the truth.” “Does he?” Alaric glanced at the boy—young, frightened, loyal despite everything. “He knows enough. He knows I’m not human. He knows I have enemies. He knows I chose to keep him close despite the danger.” “That’s not the same as knowing you’re a vampire king.” “No.” Alaric’s crimson eyes met Kael’s. “But it’s more than most people ever receive from me.” Kael swallowed hard. “Are you… are you going to tell me? The real truth?” “Yes.” The word came easier than Alaric expected. “When we’re safe. When we have time. I’ll tell you everything.” “Promise?” “I don’t make promises.” Alaric’s voice softened slightly. “But for you… I’ll try.” The door opened. The servant reappeared, her ancient face creased with an expression that might have been satisfaction. “The Prince will see you now.” The interior of the manor defied expectations. From the outside, it appeared to be a crumbling relic of a bygone era. Inside, it was a museum of memory—preserved with a care that bordered on reverence. Tapestries depicting ancient scenes lined the walls. Furniture that should have been antiques stood in perfect condition. Candles burned in sconces that had been lit for centuries without interruption. And at the far end of the entrance hall, seated in a chair that faced the door as though she had been waiting for precisely this moment, sat Isolde the White. She was ancient. That was the first thing that struck Alaric—the weight of years that she carried like a physical presence. Her face was a map of wrinkles, her hair pure white, her eyes the faded grey of someone who had seen too much to retain the brightness of youth. Her body, beneath a gown of simple white silk, was frail in the way of very old vampires—thin but not weak, diminished but not defeated. But her presence. Her presence filled the room like sunlight, warm and encompassing and impossible to ignore. This was a being who had existed for over a thousand years, who had walked the earth when vampires were myths and humans were savages, who had seen the rise and fall of civilizations with the detached interest of someone watching waves crash on a shore. She looked at Alaric. And she smiled. “Welcome home, my Sovereign,” she said, her voice carrying the musical cadence of the old language. “I’ve been waiting a very long time for you.” The silence that followed was absolute. Kael made a small sound of confusion. Elara’s hand dropped to her dagger, her instincts screaming warning despite her uncertainty. Alaric stood frozen, his crimson eyes fixed on the ancient princess, his mind racing through centuries of memory in search of context for this moment. “You knew,” he said finally. “You knew I would return.” “I knew you had prepared for the possibility.” Isolde’s smile widened slightly. “You told me about the Soul Seed technique centuries ago, when we were both young and foolish enough to believe we could control our own fates. You said it was a contingency—a way to return if everything was taken from you.” She spread her withered hands. “I kept your secret. I kept the Covenant. And I waited.” “The Covenant.” The words emerged from Alaric’s throat like broken glass. “You still have it.” “The original Vampire Covenant. The document that established the Sovereign’s authority and defined the laws of succession. Seraphina destroyed every copy she could find, but she never thought to search my estate. I was only an exiled princess, after all. What threat could I possibly pose?” “A significant one.” Alaric moved forward, his steps slow and measured, his bodyguards still wary behind him. “You knew what she did. You knew she would betray me.” “I suspected. I warned you, in my way. But you…” Isolde’s ancient eyes twinkled with something that might have been amusement. “You were always so certain of your own judgment. So convinced that the love of your progeny was genuine. I could not tell you the truth without proof, and proof was something I did not have.” “You could have told me about the Soul Seed. About how to prevent the betrayal.” “Could I?” Isolde’s voice remained gentle, but steel lay beneath. “You would have listened? You would have abandoned the woman you loved because an exiled princess whispered fears in your ear?” She shook her head slowly. “No. You had to learn the truth for yourself. You had to experience the betrayal to understand why it happened. That was always your way.” Alaric was silent. The words were bitter, but they were also true. He had been arrogant. He had been blind. He had trusted Seraphina because he wanted to trust her, because the alternative was too painful to contemplate. And she had destroyed him for that trust. “You’ve readied yourself for this moment,” he said. “All these years, maintaining the estate. Preserving the Covenant. Waiting.” “I’ve done nothing else.” Isolde rose from her chair, her movements carrying a grace that transcended her frail form. “The Hollow Court helped, of course. They brought me news when news was available. They told me about the anomalies in the human territories—strange events that could not be explained by normal means. A student at an academy who fought like a creature from legend. A scholar who knew things he should not have known.” Her eyes fixed on Alaric. “They told me about a boy with crimson eyes. A boy who walked like a king.” “How much did they tell you?” “Enough. Enough to hope. Enough to prepare.” Isolde moved to a cabinet against the wall and opened it, revealing a compartment that Alaric had not noticed. From within, she withdrew a scroll case of black crystal, its surface inscribed with symbols that glowed faintly in the candlelight. “And enough to know that this moment would come.” She held the case out to Alaric. “The original Vampire Covenant. Signed by the First Sovereign himself, binding all vampire-kind to the laws of succession. With this document, your claim to the throne cannot be denied. Any vampire who challenges it will be挑战ing the very foundation of our species’ legitimacy.” Alaric took the case. His hands trembled—actually trembled, despite everything—and the weight of it was far greater than its physical mass. This was the instrument that could restore his kingdom. This was the proof that had been denied to him for three centuries. “Why?” he asked. “Why have you waited? Why have you preserved this?” Isolde’s ancient face softened. “Because you were kind to me once. Long ago, when I was young and frightened and newly made, you took me under your protection. You taught me. You gave me a place in your court when others would have seen only a threat.” She paused. “And because Seraphina disgusts me. She has taken everything our kind built and twisted it into something monstrous. She speaks of strength, but she rules through fear. She speaks of unity, but she destroys anyone who questions her. This is not the Dominion I swore to serve.” Alaric looked at her for a long moment. In her ancient eyes, he saw something he had almost forgotten how to recognize. Loyalty. Not the loyalty of obligation or fear, but the loyalty of someone who chose to stand by their convictions, regardless of the cost. “You could have made a move without me,” he said quietly. “The Covenant alone would have been enough to destabilize her rule.” “Perhaps. And perhaps I would have died trying, accomplishing nothing.” Isolde’s smile returned. “But with you… with the Sovereign reborn… we have a chance. A real chance.” Elara stepped forward, her voice sharp with suspicion. “And what do you want in return? Power? Position? A place in his new court?” Isolde’s gaze moved to the half-blood huntress, and her expression shifted to something almost tender. “I want what I have always wanted, child. An end to the suffering. A Dominion where our kind can live without fear of persecution, where humans and vampires can coexist as they did in the old days.” She looked back at Alaric. “Your predecessor—Seraphina’s predecessor—believed that such a world was possible. You believed it too, once.” “I was naive.” “Perhaps. Or perhaps you saw what others could not see.” Isolde gestured to chairs arranged around a central table. “But this is not the time for recrimination. You have questions. I have answers. Let us talk, and perhaps together we can chart a path forward.” They talked through the night. Isolde laid out what she knew of the current state of the Dominion. Seraphina had consolidated power, but her grip was less secure than she pretended. Three Princes remained loyal—Lysander of the Black Hand, Vesper of the Crimson Veil, and Kaelen of the Silver Storm—but their loyalty was born of fear rather than conviction. The other three were dead, destroyed in the purges that followed the betrayal. Isolde herself had survived only because she had been exiled before the coup. “She always suspected you would return,” Isolde said. “The Soul Seed technique was classified as a capital crime precisely because she feared it. She hunted down every vampire scholar who might have known the secrets of resurrection. She burned libraries and destroyed artifacts. But she could not destroy knowledge that she did not understand.” “Which is why she didn’t find you.” “Which is why she did not find me.” Isolde’s eyes glittered. “I have been a ghost in her kingdom for three centuries. A forgotten exile. She never thought to look for the Covenant here, in the home of the princess she had already dismissed as harmless.” “And Prince Kaelen?” Elara’s voice was carefully controlled, but Alaric heard the tension beneath. “He’s attending the summit?” “The Summit of Blood. It begins in two nights. All three loyal Princes will be present, along with Seraphina herself. It’s a display of unity—a reminder to any potential dissidents that the Sovereign’s power remains unchallenged.” Isolde paused. “It is also an opportunity.” “An opportunity to what? Assassinate them all in one place?” Alaric shook his head. “It won’t work. Seraphina’s defenses are too strong, and three Princes together would be nearly impossible to overcome.” “Not assassination,” Isolde corrected. “Revelation. The Covenant you now hold proves that Seraphina’s claim to the throne is illegitimate. If it were read aloud before the assembled Princes, before the court…” “Chaos,” Elara finished. “Some would support her. Others would see the opportunity to seize power. The Dominion would tear itself apart.” “Yes.” Isolde’s expression was grave. “It would be civil war. Hundreds of thousands would die. The human kingdoms would likely take advantage of the chaos, and the Silver Covenant would launch a crusade against us while we fought among ourselves.” She spread her hands. “It is not an ideal solution. But it is a solution.” Alaric was silent for a long moment. Civil war. Destruction. The very things he had spent centuries trying to prevent, now offered as the price of his vengeance. “There must be another way,” Kael said quietly. Everyone turned to look at him—surprised, perhaps, that he had spoken at all. “I’m sorry, but… isn’t there? A way to take back the throne without starting a war?” “The boy asks the question that matters most.” Isolde’s gaze softened as she looked at Kael. “And the answer is yes. There is another way. But it is more difficult. More dangerous. And it requires something that our Sovereign has struggled with for centuries.” She looked at Alaric. “It requires trust.” The word hung in the air, heavy with implication. Trust. The very concept that had destroyed Alaric once before. The weakness he had never allowed himself since his resurrection. The armor he wore not of flesh but of isolation, protecting a heart that had been broken too many times to count. “I have allies,” Alaric said carefully. “The Hollow Court has offered support. Lazarus believes in what I’m trying to do.” “Allies are not the same as trust. Allies exchange goods and services. Trust requires something deeper.” Isolde rose and moved to a window, gazing out at the white roses in the garden beyond. “When you ruled before, you trusted Seraphina with everything. You made her your consort, your most trusted advisor, your heir apparent. And she destroyed you for it.” “I’m not planning to make the same mistake.” “No? Then who do you trust, Alaric?” Isolde turned back to face him. “Who in this room would die for you? Who would sacrifice their future for your cause? Who would stand beside you when the battle turns against us and hold the line because they believe in you, not in the throne you might reclaim?” Her eyes moved to Elara, then to Kael, then back to Alaric. “Can you name even one?” The silence stretched. Alaric felt the weight of it pressing against him—centuries of isolation, years of careful distance, the deliberate choice to keep everyone at arm’s length because that way, no one could betray him again. But Isolde was right. And somewhere in the cold, calculating depths of his mind, he knew the answer. “Marcus,” he said finally. “Marcus would have died for me. Did die for me.” “Marcus was one. One who knew the risk and accepted it anyway.” Isolde’s voice was gentle but firm. “But Marcus is gone. And the question remains—who will stand with you now?” Alaric looked at Elara. At Kael. At the two people who had followed him through hell, who had seen him at his worst and chosen to stay. “I don’t know,” he admitted. The words were painful, but they were true. “But I intend to find out.” Isolde smiled—a genuine smile, warm and sad and proud all at once. “That,” she said quietly, “is the first wise thing you’ve said since you walked through my door.” They made their plans as dawn approached. The Summit of Blood would take place in two nights. Seraphina would be present, along with the three loyal Princes. The event would be held in the Crimson Throne’s palace—the very seat of power that Alaric had lost—and security would be extreme. But security, Isolde reminded them, was designed to keep threats out. It had never occurred to Seraphina that the greatest threat might already be inside. “We enter as guests,” Alaric said, thinking aloud. “With credentials that place us among the servants or minor functionaries. Once inside, we find a position of visibility—somewhere the Covenant can be revealed publicly, before it can be suppressed.” “And then?” Elara asked. “Then we let chaos do the work. Some will rally to Seraphina’s defense. Others will question their loyalty. And in the confusion…” Alaric’s crimson eyes burned brighter. “In the confusion, Seraphina and I will finally meet. Face to face. One last time.” “You’ll fight her?” Kael’s voice was uncertain. “I thought she was the most powerful vampire in the Dominion.” “She is. Or she was.” Alaric’s smile was cold as the grave. “But I have something she doesn’t expect. I have the knowledge of every technique she knows, learned from the same teacher. And I have a thousand years of experience she cannot match.” “And the Soul Seed?” Isolde asked quietly. “Are you prepared for what it will cost you? Each time you use Sovereign-level power, you push your body further from humanity. The man who entered this room tonight is already more vampire than the one who was reborn three centuries ago. How much further are you willing to go?” Alaric was silent. He thought of Marcus’s dying words. Of Elara’s reluctant gift of blood. Of the face in the mirror—pale, crimson-eyed, a stranger’s face that was somehow more his own than any he had worn before. “I will go as far as I must,” he said finally. “Whatever is left of me when this ends… it’s a price I’m willing to pay.” Isolde studied him for a long moment. Then she nodded—a gesture of acceptance, perhaps, or of sorrow for the journey ahead. “Then we begin preparations. There is much to do, and little time to do it.” She moved toward the door, pausing at the threshold. “Rest while you can, my Sovereign. The war for your kingdom begins tomorrow night.” She departed, leaving Alaric alone with Elara and Kael in the candlelit room. Outside, the eternal twilight of Sanguis was beginning to fade, the first hints of false dawn touching the horizon. And in the distance, rising above the spires of the ancient city, the Crimson Throne’s palace blazed with light that had burned for three centuries without interruption. Alaric’s throne. His destiny. His vengeance. “I never wanted this,” Kael said quietly, breaking the silence. “When I followed you out of Grimhollow, I just wanted to survive. To be strong enough that no one could hurt me again. I didn’t ask for vampires and war and…” He trailed off, his young face creased with exhaustion and fear. “I know,” Alaric said. “None of us asked for this. But it’s what we have.” He looked at Kael, and in his crimson eyes, something flickered that might have been regret. “You can still walk away. Isolde will protect you. The Hollow Court will find you a place where Seraphina’s reach cannot find you.” “Will you be okay? Without me?” Alaric considered the question. Truly considered it, without the masks he usually wore, without the cold calculations that governed his every decision. “No,” he admitted. “But I’ve survived without being okay before. I’ll do it again.” Kael was silent for a long moment. Then, slowly, he shook his head. “I’m staying,” he said. “You promised to teach me. To help me become strong. I’m holding you to that promise.” “Even knowing what I am? What I’m becoming?” “Even knowing.” Kael’s jaw tightened. “You’re not the only one who’s changed, Alaric. I’m not the helpless orphan you found in Grimhollow anymore. I can fight. I can help. And I…” He swallowed hard. “I don’t want to be safe somewhere else, wondering if you’re alive or dead. I want to be here. With you. Whatever happens.” The words struck Alaric harder than any blow. He stood motionless, processing them, feeling the weight of what they meant. A boy—a young man now, perhaps, tempered by trials that should have broken him—choosing to stay. Choosing Alaric over safety. Choosing to believe in something beyond mere survival. “You’re a fool,” Alaric said quietly. “I know.” “I might not survive what’s coming.” “I know that too.” “Then why?” Kael met his gaze steadily. “Because Marcus died for you. And Elara almost did. And whatever you are—vampire king, monster, whatever—those people died for you because they believed in something. I want to believe in something too.” Alaric said nothing. He simply reached out and placed a hand on Kael’s shoulder—a gesture so human, so ordinary, that it seemed almost impossible from a creature who had spent centuries learning to be alone. “Then we survive together,” he said. “All of us. Whatever it takes.” Elara watched the exchange from across the room, her expression unreadable. When Alaric’s eyes met hers, she turned away—but not before he saw the glistening in her own eyes that she was fighting desperately to suppress. Tomorrow, the war would begin. But tonight, in the white garden of an exiled princess, surrounded by roses that had bloomed for centuries, three people who had every reason to abandon each other chose instead to stand together. It was, perhaps, the most human thing any of them had done in a very long time. To be continued…