The Dragon's Heart: Unspoken Passion-Chapter 136: Occupied Thoughts

On the raised dais, the atmosphere was a sharp departure from the perfumed chatter of the ballroom floor. Here, the air smelled of aged oak, bitter Noctharian wine, and the cold, metallic scent of unspoken strategies.

Lord Peregrine Stormlow leaned forward, his fist resting on the table beside a heavy silver goblet. His gaze was fixed on Levan, not as a subject to a Prince, but as one commander to another.

"The border reports from the Western Pass are troubling but not yet beyond control," Lord Sormlow muttered, his voice low enough to be drowned out by the orchestra. "The Blithe has retreated from the soil, but the mountain tribes are restless. They see our recovery as a weakness to be exploited before the new alliance fully hardens."

"What have you done about it?" Levan asked calmly.

He leaned over the map spread between them, tapping a gloved finger against the jagged line marking the Western Pass. "I’ve doubled the scouts along the ridge and rotated the eastern cavalry through Frostwatch. If the tribes so much as breathe in our direction, we will hear it before their boots touch the snow."

Levan nodded faintly, absorbing the information without visible reaction. "And the garrisons?"

"Fed, armed, and bored," Stormlow replied. "Which is exactly how I prefer my soldiers."

That earned the faintest curve at the corner of Levan’s mouth.

Lord Stormlow straightened, folding his arms as he studied the prince for a moment. "You know how these mountain chiefs think. They smell blood and assume the beast is dying."

"They mistake mercy for exhaustion," Levan agreed. "Noctharis has bled, Peregrine, but our steel is still sharp. If they move against the Pass, I will personally see to it that they find no transition, only a dead end."

"Well, then I suppose you wouldn’t like what I was about to say," Lord Stormlow took a sip of his wine, eyeing the Prince tentatively, who in return frowned at him.

"The latest missive from the Capital arrived an hour before you did. Apparently, the King’s Council is concerned. They believe the Winter Garrison should be halved and the funds redirected to fortifying the Inner Wall of Obsidianhold instead. They’re calling it a ’precautionary consolidation’."

Levan leaned back in his chair as a long, slow exhale escaping him. He should have seen it coming from the last council meeting. He did not look surprised though, he looked deeply, bone-wearily bored. He swirled the dark wine in his glass, watching the way the candlelight caught the deep red of the liquid.

"Of course they are," Levan replied, his voice dripping with a dry, tired irony. "My father and his advisors love nothing more than the safety of a high wall. They would have us pull our steel back to the city gates and let the border villages freeze in the dark, simply because they fear the shadows of the Western Pass."

Lord Stormlow nodded, his expression grim. "They say the King has already drafted the order, and he expects your signature of concurrence by the first snow."

"Then he will be waiting a very long time," Levan said flatly. He did not even blink as he delivered the defiance. "I have spent months listening to the Council talk about ’safety’ while the common folk were buried in plague pits. I will not cede the Western Pass to the mountain tribes just to appease a group of old men who are afraid of the cold."

He took a slow sip of the wine, the bitterness of it matching his mood as he scowled. "Let my father send his messengers. The garrison stays exactly where it is. If the King wants to move the men, he’ll have to ride to the Pass and command them himself."

Lord Stormlow merely huffed, part shock, part genuine respect. "You’re going to give the Royal Chamberlain a stroke, Your Highness. That’s the third policy of the King’s you’ve openly disregarded this month."

"Then let us hope the Chamberlain has a capable physician," Levan returned mildly, his gaze drifting away from the maps and toward the ballroom floor.

He was tired of the posturing; tired of the letters. But as his eyes locked onto the midnight-blue gown moving through the crowd, the exhaustion in his features softened into something much sharper. He watched Ilaria navigate the room, her joy a stark contrast to the stagnant politics of the dais.

But then, he saw the flash of wine-red hair. He saw Lady Seraphine step into the circle and the way the surrounding noblewomen suddenly looked like they were facing a firing squad. And just like that, the headache he thought would only be mild suddenly doubled.

"It seems," Levan said, his voice dropping into a dangerous rumble as he watched them interact, "that my father isn’t the only one testing my patience tonight."

Lord Stormlow followed his line of sight. "Ah." He leaned back in his chair, already catching the culprit behind his sudden foul mood. "Dorovian trouble?"

Levan’s gaze lingered on the gathering of noblewomen below, though his tone remained casual. Who else could it be? "I did not see Lord Dorovian among the guests this evening. I assumed perhaps you had chosen not to extend an invitation." 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

Lord Stormlow turned his head slowly. For a moment he simply stared at the Prince, his brows drawing together in clear offense.

"Your Highness," he said flatly, "I may feud with the man across half the kingdom’s borders, but I am not so petty as to break royal protocol in my own hall."

Levan said nothing. The faint arch of his brow alone suggested he was not entirely convinced.

Lord Stormlow snorted, reaching for his goblet again. "Lord Dorovian received the same invitation as every other great house," he emphasized. "Sealed properly. Delivered properly. Witnessed by half my staff."

He took a measured sip of wine before adding tersely, "I was informed this afternoon that His Lordship declined to attend."

Levan’s gaze flicked briefly toward the ballroom floor, the slight tilt of his chin indicating the direction before his eyes returned to the Lord. "And yet."

Lord Stormlow followed the direction of his gaze again. There was Seraphine Dorovian, the cherished first daughter of House Dorovian and the one her father trusted most openly among his children, a woman many believed would one day command the banners of that formidable house.

He exhaled slowly through his nose.

"Yes. And yet." He clicked his tongue, the sound edged with irritation. "The Dorovians have always had creative interpretations of courtesy. I suppose consistency would be too much to expect."

Levan watched as Seraphine spoke, the circle of women around her stiffening like soldiers awaiting an incoming strike. Well, she had never entered a room without intending to set something on fire. He had seen that particular performance far too many times to mistake it for anything else.

A long pause stretched between the two men.

Then the Lord muttered, "I assume you did not extend that invitation personally."

The question was delivered with careful neutrality. Lord Peregrine Stormlow had served the Crown long enough to remember the court when House Dorovian had nearly become the royal family by marriage. The broken betrothal between the Prince and Seraphine had hardly been a quiet affair.

Levan’s expression cooled another degree. He did not even want to entertain the thought. "No, I have a wife now."

Lord Stormlow grimaced. "Then allow me to apologize in advance for whatever trouble she intends to start in my house. Dorovians have never been fond of respecting another man’s walls."

He watched with a mixture of quiet awe and mounting amusement as his wife tenderly guided the Princess toward the banquet tables, away from the retreating shadow of the Dorovian girl after whatever they had been discussing about.

From the corner of his eyes, the Prince’s attention was already gone, his entire being anchored to the Princess as she hovered over the silver platters of delicacies, her fingers fluttering over the pastries with the same uncontainable life she had brought into the hall.

Ah... It seems his estate has become the center of the world tonight.

He looked out over the sea of guests. The air was thick with the frantic energy of people who knew they were witnessing a turning point. He could almost see the invisible ink flowing already. By dawn, the couriers would be exhausted, and every news-monger and ink-stained gossip in Obsidianhold would be racing to publish their accounts.

The story was too perfect to resist. In fact, it would be so good. The hidden Princess, the fierce protection of the Crown Prince, and the stunning jealousy of Lady Seraphine. His own house, which he had built as a military stronghold, had just become the stage for the most significant social shift in a decade.

"I must admit," he observed, "it did strike me as curious... that the Princess was kept from the public eye for so long after the wedding. And then, tonight, you arrive with her at your side as if announcing the world cannot look away."

​He tapped a gloved finger against the arm of his chair, a rhythmic thump that matched the cadence of his thoughts. "One would think a man so devoted would want to keep her safe from the endless scrutiny. Yet here she is, standing in the center of a storm and still she seems unshaken. I take it, Your Highness, that you are rather fond of your wife."

"I am." Levan did not deny it. He did not even look away. His eyes had been locked on her figure from the moment Lady Stormlow guided her away, tracking the sway of her gown as if she were the only fixed point in a spinning room. Damn it. The dress fit her so perfectly it was difficult to pretend the sight had not stolen his attention entirely.

Lord Stormlow let out a heavy, frustrated huff, the sound of a man who had spent the last hour managing a silent catastrophe. "Fonder than the rumours suggested, it seems. However..." He tilted his head, his expression turning absolutely pointed.

"I do recall your response to my invitation. You accepted with the brevity of a military report. Not a single mention of a guest, let alone that the guest would be the Crown Princess herself," he said. "My household staff spent the last hour in a state of near-riot trying to adjust the seating and the menu. A little warning would have been traditional, wouldn’t you say?"

Levan remained silent for a long beat.

His mind returned to the moment he had sat at his desk and looked at the invitation. He remembered the way Ilaria had looked at the window that morning, her eyes trailing the flight of a bird with such longing that it had felt like a physical weight on his chest. He remembered calling for Marion and telling him he will attend the Stormlow banquet without adding a single other detail.

He had not been thinking about protocol. He had not been thinking about seating charts or the King’s inevitable aggravation. In fact, he did not bother informing anyone at all. He had only been thinking about the way the light would catch her eyes if she finally got to see the stars from somewhere other than a balcony.

Levan sighed, his expression as unreadable as a stone wall. "I suppose I must apologize... I forgot."

Lord Stormlow stared at him, his goblet halfway to his lips. "You forgot?"

"I was occupied with matters of greater importance." Levan finally set his glass down. He did not elaborate on the fact that those ’important thoughts’ mostly involved whether Ilaria would prefer the silver butterflies or the gold ones.

Lord Stormlow allowed himself a rare, genuine exhale of surprise. He had invited a Prince and his guest, but he had received a Queen in the making.

"The capital will be in an uproar by morning, my Prince," he noted, lifting his goblet in a final, respectful salute to the chaos the prince had unleashed. "I hope your father has his coffee early. He’s going to have a very long day."