The bride of lycaster ly.., p.1
The Bride of Lycaster (Lycaster series Book 1), page 1
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
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First Edition: May 2023
Names: Jay, Perci, author.
Title: The Bride of Lycaster/ by Perci Jay.
Description: First edition.
Audience: Ages 18 and up.
Summary: Serafina Ravenwood must marry, betray, and confront her internal turmoil to find her power in the Dukedom of Lycaster.
ISBNs: 979-8-9881752-0-9 (paperback), 979-8-9881752-1-6 (hardcover), 979-8-9881752-2-3 (ebook)
Printed in the United States of America
For those who shelter in stone.
Let the light in.
This story contains dark fantasy themes and is not recommended for readers under age 18. Although the content is written to uplift and empower survivors of mental illnesses and abuse, reader discretion is advised.
Content Warning: alcohol abuse; anxiety; accidental death; attempted self-sacrifice; attempted murder; blood; death of a family member; depression; emotional manipulation; fantasy violence; grief; familial abuse; implied intimate partner abuse; misogyny; post-traumatic stress disorder; sexual assault by proxy; sexual threat; sexual content; victim-blaming; violence.
I wanted the sun to die.
Three blankets covered my head, but sickly golden afternoon light still crept through the cracks in my defenses and stung my eyes. If I could trade my blankets for bricks and mortar, I would stack a wall into the heavens so high that I would never see sunlight again.
I used to love when the sun stretched across the sky—when my older brothers came home from Heaston Academy every June and they were all mine until September. We would hide in the woods outside of Ravenwood Manor, eat lingonberries in the meadow, and dip our ankles in the rocky stream and scream about how cold the mountain water was.
But then the giants ate my brothers.
I had stopped counting the sunrises after the news of the failed battle against the giants had darkened Ravenwood Manor. Instead, I counted the threads in my green and white quilts, how many times my stomach growled, and the thumps of my heavy heart.
But I did not count my tears. I was too angry to cry.
I pulled the blankets tighter around me as my bedroom lock clicked open. Unmistakable footsteps tapped closer to my nest of torment.
Mother. The liar who promised me my brothers would come home.
She tore the blankets away and yanked me out of bed by my wrist. I did not want to even look at her, but I could not ignore the panic etched in the lines of the corners of her eyes as she spoke. “The Duke is coming.”
She let go before I could pull my arm away and directed the maids to make me presentable. They scrubbed days—maybe even weeks—of stale grime from my skin, raked through my matted hair, and smeared a mixture of red berries and beeswax on my cheeks and lips to make me look alive.
Mother had painted her sallow cheeks and dry lips with the same vermillion grease. She had oiled her dark hair so it shined and traded her dingy nightgown for a green velvet dress. She forced her tears behind sparkling emerald eyes and hid her screams beneath perfect red lips.
She became a lie for the Duke and she turned me into one too.
Mother pulled my dark hair back into a golden comb shaped like a raven in flight and gave me a ghost of a smile. “Now His Excellency will see your pretty face.”
Liar. People often said I looked just like my mother, but I was only a shadow of her famed beauty. My cheeks were sharp as a starving man’s, my hazel eyes were hard, and I was so short and frail I was often mistaken for a much younger girl.
Mother’s beautiful mask disappeared as she noticed my scowl. She grabbed my chin and forced my eyes up to meet hers. “Smile, Serafina. We have everything to lose now.”
A team of horses trotted on the cobblestones outside the manor. The Duke of Lycaster had arrived. Mother hurriedly swiped perfumed oil across my clavicle and the smell of roses punched me in the nose.
Before I could protest, Mother snatched my wrist and led me downstairs. With each step she took, she straightened her back, brightened her eyes, and held out her chest—completing her transformation from a grieving mother to the beautiful Baroness of Ravenwood.
Father waited for us in the foyer with his dark eyes fixed on the wooden doors of the manor. He was still as a sentinel, seemingly counting down the seconds until the man who sent his sons to their deaths walked into our home. His dark green cape that marked him as a member of the House of Ravenwood was fastened with a golden pin of the House emblem—a raven looking over its shoulder—that designated him as the leader of our province.
Mother wanted the last three members of the House of Ravenwood sparkling for the man who ruled Lycaster, but Father went too far. He had put on the family jewels like armor and glittered in the thin strips of orange light that slashed across his chest.
Mother put on a strained smile as she dragged me with her to dutifully stand beside Father. Her voice was sweet as a rose hiding its thorns. “Frederick, we are in mourning. Why are you wearing a dozen rings on your hands and eight amulets around your neck?”
Father glanced down at Mother and kept every other part of his body facing the doors. “I am sending a message, dear Adalia. The House of Ravenwood is still mine as long as I breathe. That rat-bastard takes my province, my home, and my daughter over my dead body.”
“And if you anger him,” Mother replied in a dark hiss, “he will make you a dead body!”
The ache of simmering resentment in my muscles faded into a numbing tingle as my parents transformed from spoons to knives. I had never heard them argue before.
“His father would have never done this,” Father said in a low voice. “Alastar the Wise would have never forced all those boys to—”
Father cut himself off as soon as our doormen opened the manor doors. Mother quickly tapped me on the back and I straightened my spine.
Shoulders back, eyes down, mouth shut. Stay frozen. Stay hidden.
The Duke’s entourage of more than a dozen men flooded into the foyer, each one wearing the rich blue color of the House of Hyton. A small man hurried to the front of the crowd and his booming voice echoed off the dark wooden panels of the foyer. “Announcing His Excellency, Alastar XI, the Duke of Lycaster!”
Through the manor doors, I watched as a tall man with a round belly stepped out of a golden carriage that gleamed like starfire in the fading daylight. The man wore a flowing Hyton Blue cape trimmed with fur and the golden crown of Lycaster on top of his salt and pepper hair—Alastar Anders Hyton, the man who would take Ravenwood.
My mother had warned that he would also own me if I did not marry. The suffocating numbness in my body kept me from shuddering at the thought as the Duke stomped into the foyer.
The announcer’s voice rang out like a bell again. “Announcing the heir to the House of Hyton and the Dukedom of Lycaster, Lord Alastar Derrick Pervale Hyton!”
I shocked myself out of the numbness. Mother clapped her hand over my wrist to keep me from jumping out of my skin. We did not know he would come to the manor!
I had spent my entire life imagining what the famed heir to Lycaster looked like. He would have just turned fifteen, but I still braced myself for the broad shoulders, sharp eyes, and cocky smile that was sure to swagger into my home.
Another figure emerged from the golden carriage and I finally laid eyes on the boy I needed to marry. I let a tiny breath pass my lips—he was thinner than I thought he would be.
Lord Hyton timidly followed behind his father into the manor with his white-gloved hands clasped in front of him. He walked with his chin dipped, like he wanted to disappear behind his dark curls that softly fell to his shoulders.
What his hair could not hide, even though he looked only at the floor, were the most beautiful blue eyes I could ever imagine—dark and dynamic, like the sea. I suddenly could not breathe.
Only Duke Hyton’s brash voice could tear my eyes off his son. “Baron and Baroness Ravenwood, the House of Hyton offers our deepest condolences for your loss. So sorry we could not attend the funerals.”
“We did not have funerals,” Father clipped bitterly. “We had no bodies.”
Duke Hyton’s eyes narrowed and he lowered his voice. “Do not forget to whom you speak, Frederick. Besides, no one is
My stomach dropped. If Duke Hyton had ordered every son of Ravenwood and Bloodstone provinces to fight the giants with no provocation, what would he do if someone actually made him angry?
Mother smiled and inched closer to Father—a silent plea to not provoke the Duke.
“Due to Ravenwood’s and Bloodstone’s failure on the mountain,” Duke Hyton said with a low, pointed voice. “I had to do a little…damage control.”
Duke Hyton snapped his fingers. His announcer unfurled a large scroll and proudly read: “The last sons of the House of Ravenwood valiantly led the mighty Ravenwood militia to fight alongside His Excellency’s army on a righteous quest against the giants of Nordingaard mountain. Erik Frederick Ravenwood, twenty years of age, and Endre Kristofer Ravenwood, seventeen years of age, fell as heroes in battle. May they conquer in another life.”
I clenched my fists together so tightly I thought my fingernails would pierce my palms. Valiant. Righteous. Heroes. Nothing in Duke Hyton’s proclamation told the truth about the battle. There was no mighty Ravenwood militia—only the sons of herders and woodsmen forced into battle. Erik and Endre had unknowingly led thousands of knob-kneed and wide-eyed imitations of soldiers into a bloodbath. Not a single giant fell.
The numbness in my body grew until it threw me into the memory of cold fog at dawn. Endre stood in front of me with his dark green cape around his shoulders and his new sword against his hip. His freckled cheeks rose up to his mossy eyes that shone with valor. He gave me a nearly bone-crushing hug goodbye and his merry laugh tickled my ear. He smelled like mint and fresh smoke.
His cheek brushed against my hair and I could hear his signature bright smile in his voice. “The first giant I kill is for you, Sera. I love you.”
I was so foolish to believe him. No one had ever killed a giant.
Father’s curt voice snapped me back to the present. “How does spreading that scroll of lies around the Dukedom solve anything? Ravenwood lost half its boys. No one can work the land. My people will starve!”
Mother grabbed Father’s wrist as quickly as the strike of a viper. I hated standing motionless with a frozen tongue and a shattered heart as my family crumbled before my eyes, but I had no power to change anything and I never would. I belonged to my father, with no money and no choices for my life, and then when I graduated from school and married at age twenty-one, I belonged to my husband.
All I could do for the rest of my life was what my mother had commanded—smile.
I clutched my hands even tighter as Duke Hyton chuckled low. “You requested my army to destroy the giants that plagued your lands and all I asked in return was that the Northern provinces send their sons up the mountain as well. Unless you want to hand full control of Ravenwood over to me now, I suggest you solve your own problems.” His eyes flicked down to the sparkling gems on Father’s chest. “Regardless of what your peasants produce at harvest without their sons, I think you will find a way to pay Ravenwood’s taxes this year.”
Father’s jaw tightened but Mother cut in before the tension could grow. “We are delighted you traveled all the way from the capital city to stay with us, Your Excellency!” Her voice was bright as a meadowlark song with no sign of the strained growl from moments before. “While we are certainly not as grand as Hyton Palace, we will ensure you are just as comfortable for the next two weeks.”
Duke Hyton’s eyes wandered down my mother’s body. He looked somehow…hungry. My stomach flipped as I fought the urge to run away.
As if he sensed my fear, Duke Hyton’s blue eyes swept from my mother to me. He smiled in a way that did not seem friendly. “Adalia, is this charming young lady your daughter? How old is she?”
The question made my stomach turn over and I had no idea why. Mother took a step toward Duke Hyton, shielding part of my body with her shoulder. “She is fourteen, Your Excellency. She is set to start at the Ashmore Academy for Young Ladies in September.”
Propriety forced me to keep my eyes on the Duke while I really wanted to shrink into my skirt and disappear. The last thing I wanted from His Excellency was his attention.
Duke Hyton clapped his hand on Lord Hyton’s shoulder—who winced at the touch—and his voice was sickeningly sweet. “Why, that would make her in the same class as my son! How fortunate that they could meet before they left for the academies.”
Mother responded with a coy smile that did not reach her eyes.
I did not know why everyone pretended it was a surprise that I was one of the three girls eligible to be Lord Hyton’s bride. Anyone who knew I was only six months younger than the heir also knew Lord Hyton could choose me to be the next Duchess of Lycaster when we graduated from school.
Not that he had any reason to.
The numbness enveloped me again as Mother’s and the Duke’s voices faded into the background. Suddenly my fists were not clutching each other, but instead clinging to Erik’s dark green cape as I silently begged him to stay.
Erik’s permanently serious brow was sullen and his black eyes swam. I breathed in the scent of charcoal and tea leaves on his chest as he gently embraced me. He rested his chin on the top of my head one final time and his low voice surrounded me.
“The Duke’s heir should marry you and take care of you. You will survive.”
The memory of Erik faded back into the fog as Mother placed her hand on my back. The Duke left Lord Hyton in the foyer while he raided Father’s wine stores and talked of Ravenwood’s affairs.
Lord Hyton politely stepped toward us at Mother’s behest. As soon as he was within arms reach of me, he inhaled and his eyes widened. My heart pounded against my ribs—he had smelled the rose oil on my chest. He threw his gaze back to the floor and I did the same, but Mother’s hand imperiously pushed on my spine as she led us into the sitting room.
Her touch conveyed everything her smiling mouth of lies could not—charm him.
As I struggled through the mental fog to form a plan, Mother twittered at Lord Hyton about the upcoming school year, failing to coax him to speak. She sat Lord Hyton and I in wooden chairs across from each other and made up a flimsy excuse about procuring refreshments.
Charm him, what a joke. I was as charming as a nettle in a stocking. Mother, on the other hand, could sprinkle sugar onto a demand and serve it like dessert. I had neither her allure nor her beauty, and she somehow wanted me to charm the next Duke of Lycaster?
The fire popped in the stone fireplace and punctuated the heavy silence. I tugged at a loose thread on my sleeve as I tried to begin a flattering conversation, but Father’s harsh words kept repeating in my head.
Ravenwood lost half its sons. Our heirs were gone. The province would starve.
And I could do nothing about it.
My heart jumped as Lord Hyton cleared his throat. He slowly took his eyes off his polished leather shoes and looked me in the face.
“I am…terribly sorry for your loss, Miss Ravenwood,” he stuttered quietly. “I…I miss my sisters very much. I understand how you feel.”
An earthquake in my chest rocked me out of the numbness and fury spiked through my throat. “No, you cannot understand!”
Lord Hyton froze. My chest went tight. My whole life of preparation to allure the heir was wasted with one burst of stupid emotion. Damn it all!
Lord Hyton’s eyes darted to the wooden floor and his cheeks turned red. “My…my sincerest apologies.”
I had to salvage the situation. I placed my hands delicately in my lap and leaned forward. “No, my Lord, I—”
“No, you are right,” he interjected as he closed his eyes and shook his head slightly. “My elder sisters are about to be married in foreign kingdoms. That is not the same as…as being…”
“Dead,” I finished. The word was heavy as a boulder as it left my lips.
He swallowed and looked back up at me. His freckled cheeks were still scarlet and he trembled like a leaf in autumn. I could not believe it, he was terrified of me.
I ran my thumb over the embroidery on the hem of my sleeve. Lord Hyton was everything and I was nothing, and yet he was scared of me?
