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Prologue: The Ice Duchess’ Redemption

POV: Valeria Estrath
“This time, I will bury them first.”
The Last Supper

The last thing she tasted was honeyed wine.

Not the sweet warmth of celebration, nor the bold bite of power—but honeyed wine, bitter with crushed belladonna, sipped from a goblet handed to her by the boy she had raised as her own.

It was not the worst betrayal.
Just the last one.

The grand dining hall of Estrath Manor was quiet that evening, too quiet, and Valeria—Duchess Consort of the Northern Wards, dowager wife of the late Duke Auren Estrath—had known something was wrong long before her throat began to burn.

Not from the wine. From the silence.

No clatter of cutlery. No footmen standing guard. No polite coughs from corner diplomats, eager to curry favor by pretending to enjoy the family’s miserable food. The long oaken table stretched into the cold beyond the glow of candlelight, and at the far end, Julian Estrath sat with a smile that had not reached his eyes since he was twelve.

"To legacy," he said.

Valeria held his gaze as she raised her goblet. She did not flinch. If this was to be her end, she would meet it the way she had lived: poised, unblinking, and four steps ahead.

But she had not been ahead.
Not this time.

By the time she collapsed against the carved wood of her chair, her limbs trembling and breath growing shallow, the boy had already stood. He didn’t scream. He didn’t run. He walked toward her slowly, as if watching a play he had paid dearly to see.

Her vision flickered. Her fingers curled. Her thoughts scattered like parchment in the wind, memories fluttering loose—court whispers, the cold gaze of her late husband, the rustling of ledgers, the brush of velvet gloves that had once been warm with trust and now held knives.

"Don’t worry," Julian said, crouching beside her. He smoothed a strand of silver hair from her face like a son bidding his mother goodnight. "I made sure it wouldn’t be too painful. You’ll just fall asleep."

Her lips parted. No sound came out.

Julian stood again. “You always said everything had a price. Consider this your bill.”

She died in silence.

Not in her bed.
Not with dignity.
Not even with fear.

Just silence—and a single, broken thought: Auren knew.

He had let it happen.
He let their son kill her.

The darkness swallowed her whole.
The Awakening

Her eyes opened to firelight and snow.

Not the blinding, all-encompassing cold of death. Not the sterile stillness of the crypt. But a familiar kind of warmth—crackling hearth, perfumed candles, linen sheets that hadn’t yet grown rough from age or disuse.

She knew this room. She knew that drape.

She knew that mirror.

Valeria sat up sharply in bed and immediately reached for the side drawer. It was there. Her small ledger notebook—untouched by the gold-foiled embossing of her later years, crisp, sharp-edged, young.

Not old.

She flipped through the pages. The entries were dated in her handwriting. Precise, clean, orderly.

Three days before Auren Estrath’s funeral.
Three days before the will.
Three days before she was widowed.

Her fingers froze.

She hadn’t dreamed it. She hadn’t gone mad. That final supper, that poison, the slow suffocation beneath her ribs—Julian’s voice in her ear, soft as silk. All of it had happened.

And now, it hadn’t.
Or not yet.

Valeria stood.

She crossed to the mirror, clutching the ledger in one hand, and stared at herself. No gray in her hair. No crow’s feet at her eyes. No frown lines carved deep into her skin. Her face was the same one she’d worn at twenty-five: noble, cold, elegant as a blade drawn in silence.

The face she had worn when she first married into the Estrath family.
When she still believed there were rules.
That hard work would be rewarded.
That love, once earned, could not be spent.

Fool.

She touched her reflection. Her hand didn’t tremble.
The Ice Returns

A knock at the door.

"Milady?" a maid called softly. "The estate lawyer has arrived. He’s asked to speak with you about the burial proceedings."

Burial. Yes.

Auren was already dead. That hadn’t changed.

Valeria’s mouth curled. It didn’t reach her eyes.

"Inform him I’ll meet him in the west study. And send for Lord Julian. I’d like to discuss his speech for the funeral."

"Right away, Duchess."

The footsteps faded. The silence returned.

Valeria stood at the mirror for a long moment, watching herself. She drew a breath through her nose, slow and steady. She adjusted her posture—shoulders high, chin forward.

She walked to the wardrobe.

Inside, the mourning white hung in sterile perfection, untouched by dust or time. She reached for the lace collar.

Then paused.

Her fingers moved past the mourning white. Past the ceremonial gray. Past the ivory and plum court silks.

To a deep, unrelenting black.

A color she had not worn since her own mother’s execution.

The Vow

By the time she reached the west study, her gown whispered like shadow. Her gloves were butter-soft kid leather. Her expression was marble.

Julian would smile.
He would lean in to kiss her cheek.
He would ask how she was holding up.
He would lie.

And she would lie back.

Just long enough.

Then she would make him choke on every kindness he ever faked.

Every condolence. Every offer of support. Every script he’d rehearsed before slipping poison into her wine.

This time, there would be no hesitation.

This time, she knew the rules of the game.

And this time, she would not wait to be stabbed.

She paused in the doorway, one gloved hand on the wood. Her voice was low. Measured. Even.

“This time,” Valeria whispered to herself, “I will bury them first.”