He was dressed in white, perched high on a branch of a blossoming tree.
With one long, elegant hand, he lifted a branch, revealing his handsome face from behind the flowers.
A breeze rose, sending a blizzard of petals swirling through the air.
1 stood there, stunned, looking at the man in the tree. I couldn’t tell if it was the blossoms that had dazzled my eyes…
Or if it was Damien, who had just crashed into my heart.
In that moment, I fell irrevocably in love.
On the way down the mountain that day, sitting in our carriage, I held my mother’s hand like any young girl whose heart had just been awakened, and told her I had found someone who brought me joy.
J didn’t say love, just joy.
But someone who brings you joy at first sight must also be someone you could love.
My mother’s face changed instantly. She squeezed my hand and said. You must not
Chapter 2
found someone who brought me joy.
I didn’t say love, just joy.
But someone who brings you joy at first sight must also be someone you could love.
My mother’s face changed instantly. She squeezed my hand and said, “You must not.”
But what could a parent’s warning do against a young girl’s determined heart?
I would often sneak away from my parents and run to the hills behind the Abbey to find Damien.
I watched him read. I listened to him play the lute.
Every move he made, every note he played, was perfect in my eyes.
In the thirty–ninth year of the King’s reign, Damien became a trusted confidant of the King himself.
In the Throne Room, he asked the King for a decree of marriage.
I was ecstatic, thinking I could I finally marry the man I loved.
But one night, my mother cried until she had no tears left.
Knowing she couldn’t change what was already set in motion, she could only sit by candlelight, night after night, sewing my wedding gown.
On my wedding day, Damien came for me on a magnificent white stallion.
Peeking at him through the cracks of the swaying wedding carriage, I felt that in all my eighteen years, I had never been so content.
For the next two years, we lived like any other couple, in sweet, loving bliss.
He would paint and practice his swordsmanship; I would write poetry and play my harp.
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