Chapter Text
The cathedral doors opened with a sound like thunder.
Music swelled—the traditional processional, played by the kingdom’s finest musicians. Through the gap in the doors, you could see it all: hundreds of faces turning toward you, the long silk runner stretching impossibly far, candles flickering in elaborate candelabras, flowers—white lilies and orchids, traditional and proper, just as Sungki, your fiancé had insisted—cascading from every surface.
And at the end of that endless aisle, Lord Pak Sungki himself.
Tall and handsome in his formal attire, dark hair perfectly styled, that pleasant, charming smile fixed on his face as he watched you. Everything your parents had hoped for in a match—a powerful nobleman from a wealthy province, politically connected, respected throughout the kingdom. On paper, he was perfect. Your father had practically glowed with pride when the proposal came. Your mother had wept with joy.
Waiting.
Your father appeared at your side, offering his arm. His eyes were bright with unshed tears of pride. He leaned close and pressed a kiss to your temple.
“You’ve made me so proud,” he whispered. “You’re doing the right thing. For yourself. For all of us.”
The right thing.
Your hand curled around his arm, and you felt the tremble in your fingers even through the layers of silk and lace. He patted your hand absently, mistaking your fear for excitement, and then you were moving forward.
One step. Then another.
Cold feet, you told yourself desperately as faces blurred around you. Just cold feet. Every bride feels this way.
But the knot of dread in your chest said otherwise.
The faces around you smiled—noble houses from every corner of the kingdom, all dressed in their finest, all here to witness the crown princess bind herself to Lord Pak Sungki. You recognized some of them—distant cousins, your mother’s ladies-in-waiting, advisors to your father. They looked so happy for you, nodding approvingly, their expressions soft with sentiment.
Another step. Closer to Sungki. Closer to your future.
You remembered the flowers. That moment weeks ago when you’d excitedly shown him your sketches—forget-me-nots for true love, roses for devotion. Small and personal and yours. He’d barely glanced at them before sliding them aside, explaining that the wedding planner had already selected lilies and orchids. Traditional. Proper. He’d smiled that charming, empty smile and kissed your forehead like you were a child who’d suggested something adorably naive.
You’ll thank me when you see how elegant everything looks, he’d said.
You’d told yourself he was right. That you were being silly and sentimental.
But those weren’t your flowers lining the aisle. Nothing about this wedding was yours.
Three more steps.
Your throat felt tight. The bodice of your gown seemed to constrict around your ribs despite being perfectly fitted. The cathedral suddenly felt suffocating, too hot despite the cool spring air drifting through the windows.
You thought about your study. Your sanctuary in the eastern wing where morning light streamed through tall windows, where your books waited—poetry and history and philosophy. Your escapes. Your companions. Your joy.
You won’t have time for that anymore, Sungki had said when you’d mentioned wanting to keep that space. He’d actually laughed. Explained with that patient, condescending tone that you’d have proper duties now—managing the household, hosting dignitaries, producing heirs. Besides, he needed that wing for his personal guards. Security concerns.
We’ll get you some nice poetry collections for your sitting room instead. Something pretty to display.
Like you were a doll to be arranged in his perfect house.
You’d wanted to argue, to insist that those books weren’t decoration, that you were perfectly capable of managing duties and keeping the things that made you you. But you’d swallowed it down. Smiled. Nodded.
Because he was right, wasn’t he? You were being childish. Selfish.
So why does it feel like I’m losing myself?
Two more steps.
Sungki’s smile widened as you drew closer, and something about it made your skin crawl. His eyes tracked your every movement—not with love or even affection, but with something else. Something that made you think of hunters watching trapped prey.
Possessive. Satisfied. Triumphant.
Like he’d already won something.
Like you were already his.
Every decision about this wedding had been his. The flowers. The music. The guest list. Every opinion you’d voiced had been gently, charmingly dismissed. Trust me, he’d say. I know best.
And everyone had agreed with him. Your parents, the wedding planner, the entire court. Lord Pak Sungki was such a good match. So respectful. So proper. You were so lucky.
But every bride didn’t wake up at night with a racing heart and a primal urge to run, did they?
Every bride didn’t flinch—just slightly, just for a moment—when her fiancé touched her, even though he’d never been anything but gentlemanly.
Every bride didn’t feel like she was watching her future through thick glass, happening to someone else, some other version of herself who was braver or stupider or simply more resigned to her fate.
One more step.
Your father guided you up to the altar, and you felt his hand slip away from yours. He was giving you away. Literally placing your hand in Sungki’s, transferring you like property to be traded.
Sungki’s fingers closed around yours.
Warm. Firm. Just slightly too tight, his thumb pressing against your pulse point as if measuring your heartbeat, counting the moments until you belonged to him completely.
Your breath caught. Panic clawed at your throat.
You’d tried to talk to your mother once. Just once. Started to express your uncertainty, your doubts, the feeling that something was wrong—
But her face had gone cold immediately. That look she got when you were being difficult.
Not sure about what, exactly? About securing your kingdom’s future? About fulfilling your duty as crown princess? About making the most advantageous match anyone could hope for?
She’d told you she’d been frightened before marrying your father too, but she’d done her duty. You would do the same.
The conversation ended there.
And now here you stood, hand trapped in Sungki’s grip, about to speak vows that would bind you to him forever.
The officiant began to speak, his voice resonating through the vaulted space, echoing off stone and stained glass. Words about duty and honor and the sanctity of marriage. About two houses joining. About the future of the kingdom. About binding oaths and unbreakable vows.
Nothing about love. Nothing about choice.
Nothing about you.
You stared at Sungki’s chest, unable to meet his eyes, unable to do anything but stand there as the world closed in around you like a fist. Your heart hammered against your ribs so hard it hurt, a desperate rhythm that screamed run run run even though there was nowhere to go.
The officiant’s words washed over you, meaningless sounds that sealed your fate with every syllable.
“And do you, Lord Pak Sungki, take this woman—”
The rest was drowned out by the roaring in your ears, blood rushing so loud you could barely hear anything else. You watched as if from very far away as Sungki’s lips moved, forming words you couldn’t hear over your own thundering pulse.
But you saw his expression. That gleam in his dark eyes. The way his grip on your hand tightened just a fraction more.
Possessive. Victorious. Final.
No, something inside you whispered desperately. No, please, not like this—
Then the officiant turned to you.
His mouth was moving. Everyone was looking at you. Waiting. The entire cathedral holding its breath for your answer, for the words that would end everything, that would close the door on any other future you might have had.
Say it, you thought, your throat tight with unshed tears. Just say the words and it will be over. You can stop fighting. Stop doubting. Stop hurting. Just surrender and—
But your lips wouldn’t move. Your voice had died somewhere deep in your chest, smothered by the weight of everything pressing down on you.
“And do you—”
Then the stained glass window exploded.
The sound was deafening—not just glass shattering but the scream of stone cracking, ancient masonry giving way under impossible force. The explosion of noise hit you like a physical blow. Screams erupted from every corner of the cathedral, high and terrified and primal. Your father’s arms wrapped around you instantly, trying to shield you, but something massive and dark blotted out the sun streaming through the destroyed window.
A dragon.
Your mind couldn’t process it at first. Dragons were legends. Stories. Things that hadn’t existed for centuries, if they’d ever existed at all.
But this was real.
Black scales that seemed to drink in light itself, so dark they looked like pieces of night given form. Crimson markings traced along its body—across its chest, down its legs, along the membrane of its wings—glowing like embers, like veins of fire running through living stone. The wings themselves almost spanned the entire width of the cathedral, massive and powerful, sending pews toppling like children’s toys as they beat the air with each movement.
And its eyes—
Burning red eyes, bright as forge-fire, bright as blood, locked onto you with an intensity that stole what little breath you had left.
Not with hunger. Not with malice.
With purpose.
Chaos exploded around you. People were running, shoving, trampling each other in their blind panic to escape. Guards shouted orders that no one heard, drawing swords that looked pathetic and small compared to the creature descending into the cathedral like a living nightmare. Your father was yelling something—your name maybe, or orders, or prayers—pulling you backward toward a side exit, but your legs wouldn’t move.
You were frozen. Rooted to the ground. Staring up at this impossible thing that shouldn’t exist, that couldn’t exist, and yet was here, real and terrifying and—
The dragon’s massive head swung toward you with frightening precision, as if it knew exactly where you were, as if you were the only thing in this cathedral that mattered. Those red eyes met yours, and something passed between you in that moment—something you couldn’t name, couldn’t understand, that felt like recognition even though that made no sense.
Then everything happened at once.
Guards rushed forward with spears and swords, their armor clanking, their screams brave and desperate and utterly futile. Your father tried to drag you toward safety, his grip bruising on your arm. Through the chaos, you caught a glimpse of Sungki—your almost-husband, the man who was supposed to protect you—shoving through the crowd in the opposite direction, using nobles as shields, protecting himself and only himself.
Not even looking back at you.
The dragon moved.
It was so fast for something so massive, defying physics and logic and everything you thought you knew about how the world worked. Its tail swept aside a line of advancing guards like they weighed nothing, sending them tumbling into pews. One wing stretched out, blocking the path of guests trying to flee through the main doors, corralling them away from its target.
Away from you.
Because it was coming straight for you, and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.
A scream built in your throat but stuck there, trapped behind shock and terror. The creature was enormous—death itself given form, a force of nature, unstoppable and terrifying and beautiful in the way that avalanches and lightning strikes are beautiful—and it was reaching for you—
Your father shoved you behind him, drawing his ceremonial sword with shaking hands. “Stay back!” he roared at the dragon, his voice cracking. “You’ll have to go through me first!”
The dragon paused.
For one impossible moment, it looked at your father—this small, brave man with his useless sword—and something like regret flickered across its massive face.
Then it moved again, but carefully this time, deliberately. One claw extended past your father, moving slowly enough that he could see it coming, could dodge out of the way as those massive talons—each one longer than your forearm, curved and wickedly sharp—reached for you with impossible, heartbreaking gentleness.
“No!” Your father swung his sword. The blade connected with the dragon’s scales and shattered like glass.
The dragon didn’t even flinch. Those claws closed around you—around your waist, your shoulders, cradling you like something precious and fragile—and lifted.
Your feet left the ground. Your father’s desperate fingers slipped from your arm. You heard him scream your name, heard your mother’s answering wail from somewhere in the crowd, heard guards shouting and weapons clattering and the world descending into absolute chaos—
But it didn’t matter because you were rising, the dragon’s wings beating once, twice, with such power that the remaining windows shattered outward and the candelabras toppled and everything that wasn’t nailed down went flying.
And then you were through the broken window, out into the open air, the cathedral falling away beneath you with dizzying speed.
You were airborne.
“No!” The word finally tore from your throat, raw and desperate. Your hands scrabbled uselessly at the claws holding you, but they might as well have been carved from mountain stone. “No, no, no—put me down! Put me down!!”
The dragon climbed higher, powerful wings carrying you up and up and up until the cathedral looked like a child’s toy below. You caught a dizzying glimpse of the chaos you’d left behind—overturned pews, your wedding guests scattering like ants, guards streaming out of the building, tiny figures pointing up at the sky. At you.
Your kingdom spread out below like a map. The castle where you’d spent your entire life. The city where you’d walked among your people. The forests where you’d ridden as a girl. All of it shrinking, becoming distant, being stolen away from you with every beat of the dragon’s wings.
“Help!” You screamed it with everything you had, until your throat burned and your voice cracked. “Somebody help me!”
But there was no one. Just sky and clouds and wind whipping your veil away, sending it spiraling down like a white flag of surrender.
“Please!” Tears streamed down your face, hot against your wind-chilled cheeks. Your whole body shook—with terror, with shock, with the adrenaline that flooded your veins and made your heart feel like it might explode. “Please, I don’t—I don’t understand—why are you doing this?”
The dragon’s head turned, one massive eye focusing on you with disturbing intelligence. The crimson glow softened somehow, the harsh fire banking to something almost… gentle.
Then it spoke.
“You are safe.”
The voice rumbled through its entire body, so deep you felt it in your bones, in your chest, vibrating through the claws that held you. It wasn’t quite words—more like meaning translated directly into your mind, bypassing language entirely.
Male. Definitely male. And… concerned?
“I will not harm you,” it continued, and this time you heard something underneath the words. Something that sounded almost like… an apology? “I know you are frightened. I am sorry. But you are safe now.”
Safe? SAFE?
“You kidnapped me!” Your voice cracked on the words, high and broken and edged with hysteria. “You destroyed my wedding—you—my parents—” A sob cut you off. You couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. “How is any of this safe?”
The dragon’s eye closed briefly, something like pain flickering across its massive features. When it spoke again, its voice was softer, gentler, almost… tender.
“The wedding would have been your death.”
The words hit you like a slap. “What? No—no, that’s—Sungki wouldn’t—”
“I will explain everything,” the dragon promised. “When we arrive. When you are calm enough to hear it. But please—” and here its voice became almost pleading, “please believe that I am not your enemy. I know what you have lost today. I know what I have taken from you. But I swear to you—on everything I am—that I did this to save you.”
You wanted to scream at it that it was lying, that nothing about this made sense, that you didn’t need saving. But the words wouldn’t come. Because some traitorous part of you—that same part that had been screaming at you to run during the ceremony—whispered that maybe, just maybe, this creature was telling the truth.
And that thought was somehow more terrifying than anything else.
“Where are you taking me?” You tried to sound commanding, tried to channel every ounce of royal authority you possessed, but it came out as a broken, desperate whisper. “What do you want from me?”
“Somewhere you cannot be reached. Somewhere you will be protected.” The dragon adjusted its grip slightly, and you tensed—but the movement was so careful, so deliberate, like it was terrified of hurting you. “I want nothing from you except your safety. I swear it.”
One massive wing shifted, curving slightly to block the worst of the wind from hitting you directly. The cold air had been making you shiver violently—whether from temperature or shock, you couldn’t tell—but now the dragon’s own body heat radiated through its scales, warming you. Protecting you even from discomfort.
It was such a gentle gesture from something so fearsome that it broke something inside you.
A sob tore from your throat. Then another. And suddenly you were crying in earnest—great heaving sobs that shook your whole body. For your ruined wedding. For your terrified parents. For the life you’d just lost. For the fear that still gripped your heart. For the confusion that made your head spin.
For everything.
“Breathe,” the dragon murmured, its voice impossibly soft for something so large. “Just breathe. You are safe. I have you.”
But you couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t do anything but cry and shake and feel like your entire world had just shattered into a thousand pieces that you’d never be able to put back together.
Your vision started to blur—not just from tears but from something else. The adrenaline that had been keeping you conscious, keeping you fighting, began to drain away like water through your fingers. The crash came hard and fast, leaving behind a crushing wave of exhaustion so complete you couldn’t fight it.
“I don’t—” Your voice sounded distant to your own ears, weak and fading. “I can’t—”
The dragon made a concerned sound, a low rumble that might have been soothing if you could focus on it. You felt one claw shift, adjusting its hold so you were cradled more securely against its chest, where its heart beat slow and steady—so much calmer than your own racing pulse.
“Rest,” it said gently. “I will keep you safe. I promise.”
Your eyes fluttered closed. You tried to fight it, tried to stay conscious, to stay alert, because surely falling asleep in the grip of a dragon was the worst possible thing you could do—
But your body had other ideas.
The world tilted and swayed. The wind became a distant roar. Even your fear felt far away now, muffled by the grey fog creeping in at the edges of your consciousness.
The last thing you registered before darkness took you completely was warmth. The steady beat of the dragon’s heart. The gentle, protective curve of its claws around you.
And those burning red eyes, glancing down one more time to ensure you were secure, that soft glow of concern the last thing you saw before everything went black.