Lorelei

The great hall was suffocating.

I stood beside Nikolai, my hand on his arm, my heart pounding in my chest. The candles flickered, casting dancing shadows across the ancient stone walls, and the air was thick with the scent of incense and flowers—too sweet, too cloying, like a mask trying to hide something dark beneath. The weight of the ceremony pressed down on me, the ancient magic humming in the walls, in the floor, in the very air I breathed. Every breath I took felt shallow, ...