Chapter 14: Long Live the Queen

One year later. The Commission chamber was full — twelve seats, and behind them, standing room only. Every family had sent someone, because word had gotten out about what today was. I stood at the head of the table in white, with the black wolf ring on my left hand and my father's charter open in front of me. And beside me, in his own coat, my husband put a crown of thin gold into my hands. Not a metaphor. An actual crown. Ugly, honestly — three hundred years old, worn by eleven men,...