“Can you believe the nerve? That brat burst into my castle, mistreated my staff, and then had the audacity to order me —me of all people!— to provide aid in the fight against the Republic. So anyway, I bit his head off, but Her Majesty better stop sending such awful messengers or else I might need to remind her why her great grandmother never succeeded in conquering the north.”
-Margrave Diana Ramónescu
Things could certainly be better.
At least, that was the case as far as Dahlia was concerned.
From the moment the ritual ended, the hallucinations she experienced lingered. They nagged at her, teasing her thoughts and making her slip continuously back and forth between lucidity and madness. The events in the church, full of harsh glares and bitter words, could only be recalled as if viewed through fogged pains of glass. And yet, despite slowly returning to her senses within the carriage, her doomed fate never felt more real.
Gradually, as the effects waned and confusion was replaced by dizziness and nausea, other events began to clarify in her memory. She ignored her own sick —her family’s servants unwilling to stop the carriage or let her out of the mobile prison— and tried to distract herself as she vomited and wept.
Her aspect, potent and rare based on everything she knew, was nevertheless still a blot on her record. She was —despite all her potential strengths and value— a screaming fault and desecration of everything that made up the Liontáriou family, and to believe otherwise would be nothing short of self deception. Even disregarding her father’s own quick-to-rise anger, she understood well enough that Kallistan nobility would sooner have a bastard than have their own heir fail on so many fundamental levels, and yet she seemed to be on a direct course to be a disappointment three times over.
Even upon her return to the estate, exiting the carriage and finally standing on firm ground, the world continued to spin. The disconcertment left Dahlia stumbling and lost in the house she had lived her life in, making even the short journey to her room take nearly a knuckle rather than the short trip it should have been. And all the way, her thoughts spun alongside the world.
What could be salvaged? She had desperately clung to so many hopes and dreams like they were a threadbare blanket; how many of those now needed to be discarded? How limited were her choices and how much time did she truly have until everything fell even further apart?
How could she even start to piece back together a semblance of a plan?
Where could she begin to salvage what little remained?
She sloughed off her now disgusting dress, flinging the thing to the floor like it had personally wronged her, before plopping unceremoniously down on her bed. The world still spun of course, as if taunting her with the horrific confusion and vertigo that had plagued her hallucinated nightmare but, at least now while lying down, Dahlia felt she could reign it in, even if just slightly. Taking deep breaths and letting her eyes land on the small shrub on her desk, she let out a huff of self-deprecating laughter.
“Maybe you were right, Kitten. I really was just trying to avoid thinking of what would happen if things went wrong. What was it I said again? ‘Option four: waiting.’ Yeah, really helpful past-me.”
She sighed. Something told her there would be a lot of sighing to come over the next fortnight. Rubbing her face, she spoke her thoughts out loud while using the little shrub as a sounding board.
“Things have become an absolute mess, though that ought to surprise no one. I… didn’t exactly fool myself into believing I’d have a light attributed aspect — not really. Oh, sure, I hoped for it, but deep down I knew better. The issue is, I never really considered how having a darkness attribute might make things worse. I expected my parents to be upset, but that’s hardly new and would have been easy enough for me to make plans for. Business as usual, regardless of how unpleasant, is predictable at least. But now? The reality is even worse than I expected. Not only are they a new and very special variety of outraged, but due to the stigma of having an aspect with an antithetical attribute, they’ll be monitoring me closely to ensure the secret doesn’t get out. Options that I might have had before now may as well be functionally non-existent.”
The thought of running away crossed her mind once again and she scoffed.
“Maybe if I was worthless and just a bit of an eyesore I could get away with escaping; maybe they'd even see it as me doing them a favour. But with how things are, I’m doubtlessly seen as both a huge weakness for the family as well as a massive bargaining chip. If I’m being honest with myself, it’s a shock that they haven’t tried to chain me down somewhere.”
There were other underlying mysteries too. No one told her what exactly had happened while the ritual occurred, but it was easy enough to make some base assumptions. Perhaps the most obvious clue was the way everyone in the room behaved when she woke up; even before she revealed her aspect, she could remember there being plenty of whispered conversations and intrigued expressions. Add on that far more time passed than she would have expected and it became fairly obvious that her magical affinity was quite high, though the gods only knew to what extent.
Adding to the mysteries, her own bloodline remained something of an unknown, despite the clear signs of having blood work performed while unconscious. That part didn’t particularly bother her: it wasn’t unusual to have blood samples taken upon magical awakening to determine bloodline and purity. What did raise some questions, however, was that she hadn’t heard anything yet. If she somehow, miraculously, did end up possessing the burning lion bloodline, things would have been far more celebratory when she woke, and if she had a more common bloodline then that would have been determined quickly as well, well within the duration of her ritual. And yet…
She let out another sigh and tried to redirect her focus. Learning whatever her muddy bloodline was would certainly be interesting, but it lacked the kind of importance that other events had. As far as Dahlia was concerned, it may as well be at the very bottom of her priority list, especially when weighed against the more applicable knowledge she had on her aspect and the more pressing matter of arranged marriages.
Already she could feel the looming threat of the metaphorical guillotine, poised to rip away what little remained of her agency if she were to be wed. Were that to happen, she already knew that she might as well be destined for either imprisonment or death if she were to rebel. Despite that rather dire outlook however, the girl had no intent to simply roll over and give up: she would rebel and escape — she just needed to ensure that she would succeed first.
“Ok… So. First things first, I need to make sure I don’t anger my parents. Right now I’m obedient and they let me wander around the manor unattended, but if I show a single hint of resistance then I can kiss that freedom goodbye.”
She looked around briefly and let her new-found mana flow through her. Casting spells right now would be caught in a heartbeat; if the untested magic didn’t leave behind an obvious trace, then the guards would still likely sense the sudden flow of mana in her room. Circulating mana for practice or to enable her eyes to see mana however… well, that was far less likely to be caught, and the girl had no reservations on taking advantage of that. It didn’t come to her immediately: like flexing muscles that had never been used before, channeling mana initially felt sluggish but, nevertheless, it was still a part of her and after a bit of effort she began to feel the unfamiliar sensation rush through her. Only moments later, the world’s colour shifted.
Hues of shifting colours and refracted light flitted through the air, shimmering in motes of glittering particles and hazy mist-like banks. An entirely new perspective on the world opened up before her and it was glorious, even if it acted as only a taste of what her new abilities might lead to. There was something… impossibly satisfying with that new sense of sight; it just felt so undeniably right that it felt as though a piece of her was finally fitting into place for the first time. Nevermind the yearning that still remained and the deeper desire for more — already, Dahlia was finding herself enraptured by what she saw.
Despite the beauty of it however, the girl didn’t let it distract her from her initial purpose. The particles drifted in the air, listless like sparkling jellyfish, and the mist banks shifted beneath the ebbing flowing of slow unseen currents. There was no sign of magical tampering present or, if there was, the fact she couldn’t detect anything raised far more concerning flags than she cared to consider.
“Alright… considering I only just got back, maybe it’s a bit premature to be celebrating, but so far there’s no sign of divination or magical tampering. So at least for now they’ve settled on monitoring me only via mundane means. With that in mind however, I wouldn’t be surprised if they start ordering guards and servants to eavesdrop and monitor me more directly from now on. Hmm…”
She couldn’t help but pout at her plant as she bit off the words she was about to say.
‘Right.’ She kept the conversation running in her head, desperate not to lose her train of thought, ‘Guess I should keep my thoughts to myself for now. Sorry lil’ Kitten, no plant talking allowed. Looks like you’ll have to be lonely for a bit.’
A part of her genuinely felt bad for not talking to the shrub, but her pragmatism won out. In the worst case scenario, she figured that she could always make up for the negligence with extra fertiliser later on. Focussing on the matter at hand however, it quickly became obvious that escaping marriage or gaining any sense of freedom at this point was going to be a huge issue.
Dahlia would either need to somehow convince her parents to let her go or she would need to get support from someone with substantially more influence than them. Considering how the Liontáriou’s were only a baronial family, finding nobles with more influence shouldn’t have been too difficult but that came accompanied by two caveats. The first was the concern that her father might be inclined to disregard those of higher peerage due to Dahlia’s worth. At what point he’d actually obey his superior was entirely guesswork but, considering how tenuous the barony’s current standing was and how much value Dahlia offered, she’d be shocked if he would even listen to a count if it came down to it, which drastically reduced the number of people the girl could rely on.
Add on the second issue of needing to find someone with influence who’d actually have any desire to help her, and it made a once daunting issue now seem nearly impossible.
‘This all leads back to an important aspect of it all. My lack of awareness outside as well as needing support from external sources. I already figured I’d be waiting until the debutante before doing anything, but considering how my worth makes running away infeasible, finding good connections is going to be far more important than I originally expected.’
She slammed a pillow on her face and screamed in frustration. Feeling her futility and lack of control like this was common, but now that there were added factors as well as a timeframe, things had only grown more stressful. She could already feel it sinking in: the deep seated dread of being pushed further back into a corner. It was all she could do to try and shift her focus and prioritise finding a solution; everything else —fears, anxiety, and uncertainties— could all wait until she had the more pressing matters figured out.
‘Considering how I’ll need to effectively betray my parents in order to escape… It's not like I love them or anything. I really, really hate them, but… despite that, wanting to be loved by them one day is what’s kept me going for so long. That desire for approval —that purpose— has been all I’ve ever had. It’s not just a matter of leaving behind a home; I’ll be leaving behind purpose and drive too and that’s… scarier than I expected; it shouldn’t be, but it is. As much as I couldn’t stand them, I've also been completely dependent on my parents, both financially as well as providing something to live for, and leaving that behind is terrifying. It wouldn’t just be them I’d be leaving behind either…’
Peeking over her pillow, she looked at the small plant on her desk.
‘Maybe I’m just being silly, but leaving behind my garden and greenhouse feels heartbreaking. The only things that ever defined who I am were my studies and my plants, and it’s not like I’d be able to take the greenhouse with me. Even if I manage to escape this place to a new ‘happy’ life, I’ll have given up every single thing that defines me and gives me purpose. Can I really even live like that?’
The question was mildly concerning, and not just because of the sacrifices and concerns it raised; it also highlighted how the girl had gravitated to more than a few worrying tendencies. It’s not that Dahlia wasn’t self aware enough to realise it —she knew she had developed some unhealthy habits— but knowing that hardly made things simpler. The girl had come to use dependency as both a crutch and a foundation and, based on her own self-perception, she had doubts on how well she could continue to function without relying on those dependencies and fixations. Yes, she might border on obsessive with her passions, but that’s what still kept her going after so many years of torment: her obsession is what gave her purpose, and the intensity of it all drove her forward. The very thought that she would need to leave it all behind left her terrified.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
A part of her proposed she just go and find a new obsession; something to latch onto and keep her stable when she might otherwise fall apart, but she quickly tried to silence that part of her brain. No matter how prone to dependency she was and no matter how tempting that idea may be, she didn’t want to actively seek it out; that only felt like a recipe for disaster.
‘It really does raise the question though… What will I rely on once I leave? It might feel like an exaggeration, but I genuinely do need something to keep me grounded. There’s no way I can bring my plants with me… maybe there’s a local gardening group? I could join them, make friends, and take care of plants...’
She let herself smile at the thought. It didn’t sound too bad. In fact, it even had the potential to be really nice, but how often was there a powerful noble who was willing to be your friend while also running the local gardening club? Surely they existed, Dahlia was certain of that. Nobility was notoriously filled with excentrics of all kinds, but that didn’t mean that she could narrow her choices down by that metric; that was the kind of wishful thinking that would only hurt her in the long run if she actually began to believe it was a possibility.
‘You know… maybe I should just join a cult. A valuable aspect combined with noble blood? I bet they’d absolutely love that. If they got me, they’d probably protect me from my parents too and not let me go as well. I’d practically have a bunch of free bodyguards in that case!’
Dahlia tried to maintain a serious expression before falling into a small fit of giggles. She was a little embarrassed to admit it, but she may have actually considered that option for a moment. Realising how dumb it sounded in retrospect however, she decided to put a pin in that one.
‘Worst case scenario, if I don’t get along with a single person outside the family, maybe I’ll try to hunt down a cult or something. I say that as if it’s an easy option though. It’s not like people walk around with signs saying ‘cultist’ on their foreheads. Frankly, I’m not even sure how common cults are? They’re discussed in books I read all the time, but I feel like that might be skewing my perspective… Right, let’s ignore that for now and loop back once I’m extra desperate!’
Rubbing her temples and grumbling, Dahlia sat up and took a deep breath. The world was, thankfully, spinning far less than it was when she first arrived back home and now she finally felt as though she could move without instantly regretting it. Letting her thoughts wander, she tried to imagine what life might be like in just a month or two. Everything would change. She had the choice to either accept that or to hold on to the past and suffer for it.
No, she wouldn’t let herself see that as an option anymore. She refused to bow down and accept a future without purpose. Moving to her desk, she took out a scratch pad and started to make some quick notes. Soon a grain’s worth of work extended and turned into an hour, and then a full candle after that, but by the end she couldn’t help but smile. It wasn’t nearly as detailed as the girl would have liked, but Dahlia had created a bare bones structure of how to gain the aid of an influential noble. Without knowing more about the individual nobles in attendance, she lacked the details that would flesh things out but, given the circumstances, she would have to make do. Even with that limitation, she still found herself remarkably proud of what she’d created.
Were they female or male? Old or young? What type of noble were they, what region did they originate from, and what kind of influence could they have on the Liontáriou family? These questions and more formed a progressively more precise series of branching paths that led to different anticipated personality profiles as well as how to best interact with any given person. The girl didn’t know modern politics —hell, she didn’t even know recent history— but she knew how people worked and so, as she profiled each and every noble, she convinced herself that this might just work.
By the end of it all, Dahlia wore a massive grin as she looked at all of her hard work. Stuff like this was exhilarating to her, in a way few other things were. Who needed action, adventure, excitement, and romance? Sure, she’s read those books in the library and they were all wonderful in their own way, but none of them gave the same thrill as making a good ol’ spreadsheet or creating a complex psychological profile. It was the act of taking things apart, piece by piece, and finding just the perfect way they all came together into a whole. It was finding the fulcrum of a system and knowing precisely just how to push. There was something just so exhilarating to it that she couldn’t even begin to describe.
‘I wonder how other people choose things like adventure or romance over doing analytical paperwork? I feel like people’s priorities in society must be messed up.’
It’s not that she didn’t fully understand. Dahlia lived nearly all her life searching for the praise of others, but things like praise could always be earned through hard work and impressive calculations: as far as she was concerned, that was how praise worked. It was… transactory, at least so far as she’d experienced. The whole ‘relationship’ part often romanticised in novels always seemed to overcomplicate things while also making them so much more vague. There was a part of her —a twinging longing— that taunted her and whispered false promises of how there could be something more, but she strangled those thoughts before they caught purchase.
‘If I want someone to praise me, then I’ll give them reason to praise me; everything else is just unnecessary. If I don’t then… well, it’s not like there’d be any reason for them to treat me well, right? This way just makes more sense. Besides, what’s up with the whole hot-and-cold chase that lovers do to garner attention, anyway? Books love that shit but it just feels like a waste of time.’
She shrugged, and tried to take her mind off of it. There was never an instance where she felt particularly comfortable being pursued by the few men she’d interacted with and, frankly, the idea of romance at those times was as far from her thoughts as possible. Instead, she’d much rather hide and avoid human interaction altogether.
Looking back at the sheets she had written though, she couldn’t help but grimace. Some of her possible plans involved flirting and trying for the romance aspect of things but… she really, really didn’t want to go down that route. Just the thought was enough to make her skin crawl and memories of leering guards and her father’s friends left her feeling nauseous. Letting her eyes skim all of the options she had listed however, her eyes fixed on a couple different people that shared a similar profile: nice old ladies.
‘Maybe if I play my cards right, I can get a doting grandmother? I hear that grandparents like to spoil their grandkids, make tasty food, and enjoy gardening. Honestly, the more I think about it, the nicer it sounds…’
The fact that flirting or attempts at seduction would be off the table went unsaid and unthought, but already Dahlia took to the idea with far more enthusiasm than any other option she had laid out. With her desired profile in mind, the girl began looking over a history of the Empire's noble houses and started cross referencing them with the debutante’s attendee list. Considering how her parents restricted her access to modern knowledge, none of the family trees she had access to were particularly up to date, but she figured that their basic history could at least act as a solid place to work off of.
From what she could find, of all the empire’s nobility that she had the chance to interact with, there were only a handful of matriarchal households. Of these, the most impressive were the Margrave to the Northern Territory of Stare Nemiloas? and the Archduchess of the Amarei Grand Duchy. If she was being entirely honest with herself, Dahlia was well aware that she might have been setting her sights on a pair of particularly ambitious targets but… well, the girl couldn’t resist the temptation. In both cases, the women leading these families would have immense sway that few people in the entire Empire could oppose, and allying with them could open doors for Dahlia that might have never been possible to consider previously.
Glancing over what little information she had, Dahlia only became more interested as she took in the details. Both families were ancient and continued to hold sway into the modern era. Not only that but, as was so-often tradition, both families possessed potent and long lived bloodlines which made them even more valuable; those being draconic and vampiric respectively. It would be one thing if their matriarchs changed regularly but, with such high longevity, there was hope that the family trees Dahlia looked over weren’t as inaccurate as they could have been, not to mention how it drastically improved the chances for the current matriarchs to fill the role of ‘prospective grandmother’.
Without missing a beat, she pulled out the portfolios her father had given the other day and quickly flipped to the attendee list of the debutante. She did her best to ignore how her prospective suitor Lord Carphopoulos would be there, and instead focussed on names she had previously only skimmed past. It came in two parts, interestingly enough: the first list included each and every person invited to attend the debutante and it was a horrifically long list. Glancing to the second, far shorter list however, gave the girl a much better picture of what to expect.
There was no mention of a Ramónescu who might attend, quickly eliminating any hope of contacting the Margrave, but Dahlia wasn’t left entirely disappointed. There —right near the bottom— looking like it must have been added at the last moment, there was a name that brought an excited smile to the girl’s face.
“There we go! Archduchess Valentina Amarei! Oh, I can’t wait to meet you.”
She was practically kicking her legs in her excitement. Not only was something actually going the way she wanted for once but, of the two options she was considering, the Archduchess felt far more realistic to her anyway. It almost felt too good to be true, but she quickly nipped that thought in the bud; no need to look gift horses in the mouth, and all that. Instead she decided to shift her attention back to her notes, and read through the small amount of information she had on the Archduchess.
The Amareis used to be royalty in their own right, being one of the three largest kingdoms that were conquered and absorbed into what was now known as the Kallisto Empire. Despite how the Empire’s formation spanned the entirety of the Unity War, the conflict had ended with a shocking degree of peace. Even at the time of being conquered, the Amareis were taken in and granted an archducal title with their old kingdom now turned into a grand duchy.
The actual negotiations back then are still completely unknown, but it was clear that something acceptable was found. Despite starting on such rough terms, the Amarei family quickly became one of the most trusted noble houses by the imperial family and, as a result, their power skyrocketed throughout the empire with only the Lévesque and Vasiliev Grand Duchies being remotely comparable in influence. When compared to the weaker and far more isolationist Northern Territory, the Amareis quickly became the more promising of her two options.
As she continued to read over the information, the girl couldn’t help but feel progressively more overwhelmed. She had read all this before —none of it was new— but looking it over with the thought of endearing herself to their family left her feeling… at least a little out of her depth. This was a family so tightly woven into history that they were a foundational monolith of the Empire, and she just wanted to… what? Join them? It felt absurd but, considering her desperation and the revulsion she had for other alternatives, facing this wasn’t quite so bad.
Besides, it wasn’t like they were exclusively ancient royalty. They were also a family of vampires, and that had all sorts of connotations that Dahlia had yet to unpack.
Naturally, most wouldn’t be pureblooded vampires but, as far as bloodlines are concerned, anything ninety percent and above was a force to be reckoned with and a noble peerage like theirs would be unlikely to have anything lower. Most families with such high natural purities invest absurd amounts of wealth throughout their lives until they finally purify their blood and become the real thing. And while most nobles never achieve that goal, nor even get close to it, a house as long lived and as wealthy as the Amarei family would almost certainly be led by a true vampire, and something about that idea made Dahlia shiver.
She couldn’t tell whether it was fear, or some strange type of anticipation —perhaps it was even both— but there was something about a vampiric bloodline that intrigued the girl to no end.
‘I wonder if they’d bite me. Is that just in fiction, or do real vampires do that? I really like garlic too… hmmmm, I sure hope that isn’t an issue. Assuming they’d want to bite of course. Yeah…’
She chuckled a bit as she quietly reached over to pamper the lonely shrub beside her, softly rubbing its leaves as she suppressed a smile and tried to move past that train of thought.
‘I guess I can be thankful I have a dark attribute instead of light. Maybe it’ll make them like me more. Actually… I remember reading something about vampiric aspects. What was it again?’
She flipped through a couple other books she had as references until she found what she was looking for. Apparently, all vampires born with a high enough purity would develop the ‘blood’ aspect. It comprised the attributes of life, death, and a sub-category of water, and the Amareis appeared to have mastered it, turning it into a force to be reckoned with. Honestly, the fact that something so powerful was so easily inherited showed why high quality bloodlines were both prized and feared in equal measure. There were plenty of reasons the peasants and commoners failed to revolt over the centuries, but the sheer power of the nobility was no small factor.
Looking closer, Dahlia also found that, while schemas were theoretically entirely independent of lineage, apparently the Amarei family had developed their own unique schema passed down through generations called ‘vampiric bloodlord’. It was apparently highly specialised, highly perfected and, she had to admit, felt a tad much. Perhaps it was her inner magic-nerd coming out, or perhaps it was just because she never had a knack for naming schemas, but ‘vampiric bloodlord’ just felt a little too extra and broody for her tastes.
Much to her dismay though, the actual magical theory of the schema wasn’t even discussed and so she had to close the page feeling dissatisfied. Despite not getting to learn as much as she would have liked however, a wry grin broke out as she thought over everything and came to an answer to one of her previous questions.
‘Blood this, blood that. Yup. They’re definitely going to bite me.’
Ooooooo, a chapter with a bit of plant yapping as well as a hint for things to come~ Sorry, I'm just excited!
Now if you want, feel free to stick around for some good 'ol etymology. My favourite!
Ok, sooooo, I'll touch on the name Amarei some other time but I think the word in this chap that really stood out was "Stare Nemiloas?". It's the name of the Northern Territory further north and even the Amarei Grand Duchy (I'll create a map at share it on my discord at some point but regardless!) and the name directly translates in Romanian to "ruthless state". This originally came from their way of life and culture but —I must admit— the north being "cold-hearted" may have had something to do with the naming choice. Regardless, the way it would be pronounced (roughly, given my floundering phonetics) is something like sta?-ay neh-mee-lee-oh-ass-uh, with the weird looking ? approximating a softer r sound.
Anyways, I imagine anyone who actually studies this will be pulling their hair out but I hope this is fun! As mentioned before, if there's a term that stands out and you want me to go over, feel free to let me know and I'll see what I can do!
If you're enjoying what you see and want to read ahead, I do have a Patreon that will maintain eight chapters in advance of what is public. If that interests you, you can find a link to it
And if you're interested in talking to me about the novel or if you'd like to join a community of other delightful readers, I'd be happy to see you over at my Discord. You can find the link
And as always, I hope you're having a wonderful day!
