Princess Vionna of Aurenza was dead.

She died in the estate of Theron Thornefell, Warden of the North—buried beneath snow and silence. The blizzard raged for seven days before it eased, uncovering her frostbitten body beneath the drifts.

Even in death, she was curled around her swollen belly, one arm reaching toward the nearest gates.

No one came.

She and the unborn child were frozen to death. Left behind.

As the cold took her, regret cut deep.

She never should've loved him. Never should've bowed.

Because of her, the child never saw the sky.

If she had another life, she'd never look his way again.

"Why are you crying, Vionna? Isn't this what you wanted?!"

The pain at her throat jolted Vionna Valebright awake.

She gasped, eyes flying open—then froze.

She'd been reborn.

It was the day Theron was drugged. Again.

In her last life, she had loved him. Foolishly.

They met during the royal hunt, held once every three years. He rode beside her father, King Aldric—his sworn brother-in-arms. Tall, sharp-eyed, ceremonial robes drawn tight at the waist—Theron Thornefell commanded the field without a word.

When assassins struck and took the king's daughter hostage, it was Theron who loosed an arrow through the captor's throat and caught her mid-fall.

Vionna, wrapped in his cloak, gave him her heart.

At her coming-of-age, she confessed her feelings to Theron—nine years older.

He turned cold. Said she'd confused gratitude with love.

The next day, he requested to leave Crownspire for Stormrest, his stronghold in the North.

Vionna, stubborn to the end, knelt at the palace gates till King Aldric gave in and let her follow.

At first, everyone at Theron's estate in Stormrest treated her with deference. But for a full month, she never once saw him.

So she cast off her gowns for roughspun, took the name Viona Vale, and slipped into his army as a battlefield physician—just another common girl.

In her third year, Theron was drugged by a traitor.

She stepped into his command tent and offered herself as the cure.

By morning, they were discovered—by Marzella Morwynne, his deputy commander and childhood crush.

The girl fled the camp in tears.

On the road, ambushed and cornered, Marzella threw herself from a cliff.

Theron changed after that.

He built a chapel within his estate in her name, posthumously named her Heroic Commander, and later petitioned to marry Vionna.

By the time the royal decree reached Stormrest, the damage had been done.

They called Vionna shameless. Said she'd seduced and drugged the Warden of the North. That she'd murdered Aurenza's finest female commander and used her bloodline to force his hand.

By her wedding day, Vionna was already visibly pregnant.

She'd spent the months before stitching her gown in silence, thinking only of the child.

Only that day did it hit her—Theron despised her.

From then on, the radiant, beloved Princess Vionna was gone.

Only a woman remained—trapped in a distant house within Theron's estate, wasting away day by day.

In three years of marriage, Vionna lost three children.

The first slipped away before the third month. The physician blamed the tonic she'd taken to conceive—said even if the child had lived, it might not have been whole.

The second, lost in the fourth month. She'd spilled the wine in Marzella's chapel and was punished—three days kneeling, wrists bound, bleeding into the dirt.

The last reached eight months.

That winter, a storm came—the worst in a century. Every house on the estate was reinforced. Except hers.

The snow fell through the night. By dawn, the skies cleared.

Stormrest stood unscathed. The townsfolk had prepared.

But Vionna and her unborn child were buried in that storm.

After death, her soul lingered above.

She watched Theron clutch Marzella—miraculously alive—tight in his arms.

Theron's household rejoiced. Their lord had finally gotten what he'd begged the gods for.

And her?

She was the villain who'd stood in the way.

No one mourned her.

Better off dead.

Maybe the heavens took pity. She had saved many in those three years in the camp. Somehow, she was reborn—on the very day Theron was drugged.

In this life, she had only one goal—

To bring Theron and Marzella together.

Just as Theron's hands reached to tear her clothes, Vionna shoved him back with all her strength and bolted from the tent.

"Viona Vale! What are you doing out here? How's Lord Theron?"

His personal guards stood around the command tent, eyes sharp with concern.

Vionna clutched her torn clothes close. Luckily, the northern winter had her wrapped in thick layers.

"He's not doing well. Regular treatment won't work. Fetch Commander Morwynne—now."

Several soldiers barked back.

"If it's that serious, why'd you leave? Calling someone else now just wastes time."

"If something happens to Lord Theron, can a lowly physician like you take the blame?"

She didn't flinch.

Someone had already gone for Marzella. She arrived moments later, dismounting in one fluid motion, dressed in riding leathers.

She stopped in front of Vionna, eyes narrowed.

"Viona Vale, what game is this? You clawed your way into Theron's tent to marry into power. Now, with the chance in your lap, you call for me instead?"

The wind bit hard. Snow pressed down like that final day.

Vionna could barely breathe.

Fists clenched, she met Marzella's gaze. "If you don't go in now, he won't survive."

A low groan rose from within the tent.

Marzella's expression shifted. With a crack of her whip, she shoved Vionna aside and stormed through the flap.

Moments later, fabric tore.

Then came the sounds—raw, unmistakable.

Even the guards turned red.

A man's low growl. A woman's sharp gasp. Furniture crashing.

And then—pleasure. Loud, unashamed. Each cry landed like shards of ice against Vionna's chest.

"Lord Theron's got stamina, I'll give him that."

"Good thing it was Commander Morwynne. If it'd been Viona, she wouldn't survive the night. Be dead before morning. So much for chasing rank."

The guards' vulgar talk choked the breath from her lungs.

Drained and hollow, Vionna drifted from the tent.

Only once she stepped into the warmth of her own shelter did the tears fall—hot, unstoppable.

First came the quiet sobs. Then the wails—raw, broken, as if she were coughing up two lifetimes of shame.

That night, the lights in Theron's tent never dimmed.

And she never slept.

***

By dawn, Vionna had washed and dressed. She left the physicians' quarters under the guise of gathering herbs and rode straight to the city's largest apothecary.

The moment the shopkeeper saw her, her eyes welled with tears. "Your Highness... what happened to you?"

Vionna didn't need a mirror. Her eyes were swollen from crying. Her clothes, torn by Marzella's whip, had been clumsily stitched back together.

There wasn't a trace of a princess left.

But the woman before her wasn't just any shopkeeper—she was Elsha Grey, the Shadowguard her father had secretly assigned to protect her since childhood.

Elsha had raised her. Of course she saw the wreckage.

But Vionna had no words left to explain.

She collapsed into Elsha's arms, voice barely a whisper.

"Elsha... send word to my father. I want to go home."

"Good, good. You've finally come to your senses."

Elsha's voice trembled as she looked at the girl she'd protected her whole life—now worn thin by grief.

"His Majesty said it from the start—Theron Thornefell was never right for you. If you hadn't clung to that hope, none of this would've happened.

"But thank the stars you saw it in time. Once you're back in Crownspire, His Majesty will choose a proper husband. With him behind you, no one will dare lay a finger on you again."

Tears welled in Vionna's already swollen eyes.

Her father had warned her, long ago.

She hadn't listened. She'd knelt at the palace gates, begging to be sent to Stormrest—only to waste a lifetime.

She died without ever seeing him again.

Vionna clenched her fists and forced a smile. "I was foolish then. I won't let my father worry like that again."

She wouldn't cling to Theron anymore.

She didn't even dare.

***

After leaving the apothecary, Vionna returned to camp by carriage.

Her name was still on the army's rolls. She couldn't just vanish and follow Elsha back to Crownspire. If she meant to leave Stormrest, she had to settle things first—tend the wounded, tie up her duties.

And one border report needed to reach her father.

Elsha was the only one she trusted. So Vionna wrote the letter and placed it in her hands for immediate delivery.

All she had to do now was wait.

Wait for someone who loved her... to bring her home.

The thought alone eased the weight in her chest. For the first time in days, she let herself smile.

But as she lifted the flap of her tent, she walked straight into someone.

Theron.

Clad only in an undershirt, his bare torso showed a fresh wound—and scattered above it, a tangle of marks.

Vionna didn't need to ask what they were.

She'd lived through too many nights with him not to know.

Her smile vanished. She turned away. "Why are you in my tent?"

Theron narrowed his eyes, lingering on the redness around hers before letting out a cold snort.

"You're my physician. I'm injured. Isn't it natural I come for treatment?"

Vionna frowned.

He wasn't wrong—tending his wounds was part of her role.

But before, he'd always summoned her to the command tent.

Theron coming to her? That was rare.

Vionna said nothing. She opened her kit and got to work.

The gash on his side was ugly—deep, jagged, torn wider after last night's exertion. Blood had soaked through the bandages. She peeled them back and found a mess of red and ruin.

Once, a sight like that would've rattled her.

Now, she didn't even blink.

As Vionna scattered healing powder over the wound, Theron broke the silence.

"You've heard, I'm sure. It's done. I'll marry Marzella. Since you're still stationed here, I expect no more foolishness."

She didn't look up. "Understood, Uncle Theron."

He stiffened.

She hadn't called him that in years.

Back in Crownspire, she'd trail after him with wide eyes and that silly, soft voice—'Uncle Theron' this, 'Uncle Theron' that. Later, when her heart turned, she tried every name but that one.

Until now.

Theron frowned, ready to speak—but the tent flap lifted, slicing through the silence.

"Theron, I've already moved my things. Did you tell Miss Vale?"

He snapped out of it, brushing past Vionna as he rose to meet Marzella.

"I told you to rest. Someone else could've done that."

His voice softened—for Marzella.

Then his gaze cut back to Vionna, still on one knee from the shove. The warmth vanished.

"This tent's closest to mine. Marzella will stay here now. Pack your things. You're moving to the physicians' quarters."

Marzella nestled into him, murmuring like they were alone. "Theron, that's a bit much, isn't it? She's been here nearly three years... Maybe I should just stay in my old tent?"

She turned to go, but he looped an arm around her waist.

"You'll be my bride soon. You can stay wherever you please. If we were already wed, I'd move you into my tent itself."

Then he looked at Vionna—stone-cold.

"As for Miss Vale... she'd do well to remember her place."

And that was it.

He hadn't come for treatment. He'd come to remind her—she no longer had a place here.

He wanted her gone. He wanted Marzella close.

Vionna swallowed the bitter taste rising in her throat. Brushed off her robes. Rose.

"I'll pack now."

She'd leave this tent. Leave Stormrest.

And soon—she'd return to Crownspire—to her father.

She wouldn't come back.