Sunbeam Lair Never Be Broken

Quiet befell her—a stillness, pressed against a man tattered and torn both internally and externally. She squirmed slightly then, surprise crossing her features at the ruling of the Imperator—marriage.

She had wished for such a thing once upon a time. Had saved herself for years with the belief that one would come along, sweep her off her feet, and make her theirs… Raise a family, and she could be everything to her family that she had missed growing up.

It had never played out that way. Uprooting every few months, everyone she chose to trust would leave… and when she had finally begun to believe her feelings for another were pure—shattered with a reality that sickened her still.

Her suneater, her Solpallur, her home. The very base needs of nature coming above all else when he had come home one day after impregnating another he had come upon in heat.

Promises were never truly real—couldn’t be. And so her heart began to thrum in her chest when he spoke of settling down, of it needing to be spelled out for him. The topic had a dangerous feel to it—one she could not compute in this very moment, and so she tried to remain light. “Spring is a time away…”

It sounded as if he had drawn the conclusion he would indeed do his tour. Gone for a month—in a land where the servants were offered for pleasure and debauchery. And then he could return home with a title with enough merit to make certain demands of what he would like to do… and who he would like to wed.

She suddenly felt sick.