【PROLOGUE】

HOW ADALYSA YEARNED FOR THE LAPPING WATERS OF THE HONEYWINE, to immerse herself within the depths of godly ichor, to perhaps allow herself the mercy of drowning, on this night of awaiting terrors.

The haunting swish of an owl's wings flapping as it groaned just outside the iron bars of her window sent a shiver to crawl up her spine, nestling against her skin slowly, letting the anticipation of when it might pass fester at the curve of her neck. She rolled her shoulders, attempting to lightly shake the creature off──as any lady of high virtue may do──but it remained, claws digging into her flesh, scratching steadily upwards to a nameless destination on her body. It wasn't until the goblet of sour Dornish red that was being shakily pressed to her lips by the trembling Ellyn Cuy, slipped, tumbling onto the cold, stony floor with a great clang, that the shiver made itself a ghost, vanishing from her person as though some mere folly of a child's imagination.

"Forgive me, my lady." Ellyn, one of the many fools fumbling about her person pleaded, eyes darting about the room as though awaiting her own end by some fearsome cretin or──Adalysa couldn't be bothered much to think, whatever Ellyn's thoughts were, those were true follies.

Beneath dim amber light, she was left to contemplate her mortality, while Melessa Bulwer busied herself fussing over the thin sleeves of her billowing nightgown. I cannot imagine he could put one in me. She grimaced at the thought, her unsettled frown reflected back to her in the looking glass behind Elinor's small head. Humfrey says he is better than impotent with his age, perhaps I have no need to worry? Meanwhile her hands were still stinging after she had scraped off a good deal of the skin from her palms in a fit of fretful mania the night before.

Her father had once explained it to her, "Think of it this way, you give him a son, he dies not long after," he had made some grand hand gesture, "you hold the power, your own little kingdom." and then promptly he wed her to Blind Ben of House Beesbury, a man sixty-four years her elder. There had been a brief squabble with the Martells over it, but Arianne had been pleasant enough to send Adalysa a letter of congratulations upon her marriage.

It had been barely a year since, and as her sister, Alerie might describe it, not a prick had marred the pretty rose bush, it remained holy and unblemished by bestial──or in this case shriveled──thorn.

That would be until that night, when her husband had finally requested her presence in the bedchamber the dinner before last.

The sound of flesh-on-flesh tore away any thoughts she held close, greeting her with the sight of a red-cheeked Ellyn faced with Melessa, who had a rageful glint to her eyes, "How can you be so foolish?" the disgruntled girl demanded, "How?" and she pointed to the skirt of Adalysa's nightgown, which felt wet.

Now why is that? She glanced down at herself, discovering the goblet that had previously been shoved to her lips now discarded onto the floor, still rolling along the stones with a soft clicking sound, with each turn, more wine dribbled from its lip, though bare specks when compared to the dripping stain at the end of her skirt forming a small puddle at her feet.

It looked almost like blood, her blood.

"Now we must get her a new nightdress!" Melessa threw her hands up in exasperation, "Lia, fetch that one with the ruffles from that chest over there." she said, directing the bastard girl to a gilded chest that laid at the foot of Adalysa's bed. "Ellyn, can you help our lady out of her dress, or might you ruin that as well?"

Adalysa's eyes widened, in the mirror before her they glared back in realization. This is my savior. "Wait-" She tossed her hands out, just as the tiny Lia began to unlatch the chest of garments, and Ellyn had situated herself behind her. "can't we tell Lord Ben I have come down with a chill? No doubt I may, and I do not think he would like to lay with a girl as frozen as an icicle."

"It is summer." Ellyn noted in a voice devoid of anything remotely intelligent.

"Yes," Melessa conceded, for the first time agreeing with Ellyn in the year she has known her. "and Lord Ben as of yet has no direct heir."

Adalysa could hear Rhea's loud scoff as she rested on a gold settee. "My father is still alive, is he not?" She was the only one who had not prodded at her throughout all of this, seemingly preferring to watch and relax.

"He is but a nephew, Lady Rhea." She looked down at Rhea, as though she were a avaricious queen glaring at some peasant that had stolen bread from her table of endless wonders, "Without a male heir."

The 'peasant' did not even spare the 'queen' a look, "Remind me of that when I am the lady of this house, Melessa," she said, filing down her nails with a slim blade, "and you are wed off to a lord you only love for what he can give you-" she paused, letting out a wry cackle, "and that will not be love in return, I can assure you of that."

Their argument continued on, muffled as Adalysa told herself, I will not cry, although feeling she undoubtedly would when the time came, she was no brave knight, she was only a girl who had never been treated as one. I will not cry.

She clutched courage to her breast, for a time at least, not weeping until Ellyn's worrisome hands tore her nightgown while attempting to unbutton it. Her hands became fists. She is an imbecile, it is only her nature. Yet still, she wondered, if the Gods gave her such fools, why could they not also grant her mercy?

Had she ever cursed them? Ever spoke ill of them in any way? No, no, she could not recall a time where she was ever anything but loyal to them, ever penitent.

And so the fragile word left her lips, a question every girl asks at least once, "Why?" and at that moment, she was as shuddersome as Ellyn, as angry as Melessa, and as timid as Lia. "Please," she fell to her knees, a light who had lost her way. "please, I don't want this." Her gaze fluttered over every one of them, as a butterfly flapped rapidly in her heart, urging her toward an early grave, "You must know, I don't-" a sob fell from her throat, "I don't want this."

Red wine beneath her, stained white nightdress──she looked like a virginal sacrifice. She felt like a virginal sacrifice. Am I? She wondered as a sleeve slipped from her shoulder. Help me, Gods! Help me! Her head drooped, sagging to the floor. Let me understand your ways so that I might frolic in your fields, under your blue, blue skies, I beg of you!

There were arms around her, and then Rhea stood before her, resolve flowing in her eyes, the sweetest honey. "You will be alright." She stated, hands on Adalysa's shoulders. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, hands in her lap. Had Rhea placed her there, or someone else? "Go," She bowed her head in mockery toward the other ladies, when Melessa lingered, her voice raised, "all of you!" and then the beasts──the exception being Lia, who was rather pleasant when not pushed by Ellyn or Melessa──were gone.

"Oh Rhea," She fell into her arms, her companion's hands tangled in her curls, "save me!" the words were feeble, but there were no other words that her thoughts whispered.

The lady in yellow pulled away after some time, her big eyes now staring into hers, "Alysa," she cupped her face in her hands, "I'll send for some sweetmilk and ready you, hm? Perhaps by the time we are done, he will be asleep?" a rare, gentle smile blossomed on her lips, and her hands left Adalysa's face to join their hands, "He is but a corpse walking, after all."

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

When the hour of the ghosts came near, Adalysa's ladies returned to her so that they may send her off to sit upon her pyre. Lia, the bastard, was muttering half-hearted prayers as they walked along the honey-colored stones, while Melessa rattled on a flurry of instructions she could not hear, for there was a stillness in Adalysa's heart, deathly at ease in her fate.

Rhea had woven her arm into the crook of Adalysa's elbow, holding her steady as her eyes felt oh-so heavy. She grasped her silken sleeve, resting her head upon her shoulder. Sleep will come for me, she could feel Melessa's stare, if not him first, and when it did, she would be free.

Only for a time, but what a blessed time that will be.

The procession approached the door of the Lord's chamber. It was engraved with Beesbury's sigil, a jaggedly carved bee. Poorly done, she thought, father wouldn't have it so. Beneath the sigil was the house words in glowing gold, 'beware our sting'

Beware it indeed.

Her ladies ushered her into the chamber like an offering to something holy──there was nothing holy about Ben Beesbury, for why would the Gods forsake him with blindness and other torments of the elderly, were he a goodly man?

It caused a flurry upon her mind pondering what cruelty the Gods awaited to toss unto herself once she had one foot in the grave. She prayed to them so often, maybe they would show mercy?

The heavy door behind her shut with a thud, and she was 'welcomed' with the sight of crackling fire which glowed so dimly within the chamber, it did not reach her feet. The flames fluttered low, embers blinking at her, and she imagined the falsely imagined foe asking her, "Who are you girl? You do not belong here."

Her father didn't seem to understand that, nor her husband. Would mother? Did she herself understand that? She knew──for she believed she belonged at the side of a much younger and handsomer lord than her husband──and that was well and good, but was knowing something compared to understanding it?

There had been little else but the flickering fire held within the room that met her ears, until a snore like that of a tree tumbling resounded throughout. She looked to her left, where she knew the bed to be and found her husband asleep. The Gods are merciful! Through the sluggish calm that the sweetmilk brought her, a soft laugh bubbled up her throat──she clapped a hand to her mouth as though it were the loudest sound the world had ever heard.

For another night she was saved, and another night she was closer to being free of the rotten man entirely.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

Black was not to Adalysa's taste, she preferred the pale pink Qartheen silks her father had sent for when she was first learning to sew, but alas, she was in 'mourning', and as a widow, she would be forsaken to this dreaded fabric for a year.

Lord Ben Beesbury died in his sleep on the fifth night of the fourth moon two-hundred and ninety-seven years after Aegon's conquest. He was discovered dead in his bed by his loving wife, who wept as she had opened the door to his bedchamber, screaming for her lady, Rhea──or so the whispers claim.

Nevertheless, there was one truth hidden within the curious circumstances behind Lord Ben's death. The girl would be free, if only she could bear her husband's spirit forcing her to wallow for a year in near seclusion.

Light hung low, the world stood quiet, and for once she could breathe, as she stared upon the stones put in place of her husband's eyes. The ancient man looked back at her, without will to pat her face and roll pretty names off his vile tongue. With a curious tilt of her head she carefully approached the perch where his body rested.

Are the stones as cold as him? She wondered, brows furrowing. She plucked the painted pebbles from his face, gazing into eyes that would never see again──they weren't frozen, nor frigid, but tepid.

"What life was there ever in you?" Alysa asked the dead and unseen, "How could one laugh so heartily without thought that you have brought another to their misery?"

She sniffled, and a tear ran down her cheek, splashing onto the surface of one of the eyes, racing down the smooth surface as though his own──was she not the very same hours ago? She covered the mocking eyes as her lip trembled. I am better than this.

There was a great clattering sound that echoed throughout Honeyholt's small sept as she tossed the rocks against one of the seven walls. Her hands brushed the silken skirt of her dress before she turned and left without another moment to spare for the man rotting before her.

The corpse did not deserve her tears nor sight──he had not deserved her at all.