Her Highness, By Mistake

Chapter 4

Chapter 4: Whispers of War and Selection

Velandria’s skies were bruised with stormlight, as if the heavens themselves held their breath.

Eira stood at the tower window of Lady Selis Valenhart’s bedchamber—her bedchamber now—gazing down at the city below. Stone roofs and merchant banners swayed beneath the gathering clouds. The cathedral bells had tolled once that morning, a low sound like a warning. She pressed her palm against the cold glass, watching the courtyard fill with courtiers in jewel-toned cloaks, their laughter brittle in the sharp breeze.

Today marked three weeks since she’d awoken in this strange world.

Three weeks of pretending to be someone else. Of smiling when she wanted to scream. Of keeping her voice steady while her soul fractured under the weight of another’s name.

Selis Valenhart.

The name still tasted like iron in her mouth.

Behind her, Marion adjusted the folds of a sapphire cloak, humming under her breath as she prepared Eira for another council session. Mira had already left to relay messages to the steward about the prince’s arrival. He was returning from the eastern border early—Alric, the Crown Prince of Velandria, the man whose mere glance pulled heat through Eira’s veins like fire through dry grass.

And the one who looked at her as if she were a riddle wrapped in a memory he couldn't place.

Eira turned from the window, trying to suppress the flutter in her chest. “What is this meeting about again?”

Marion frowned slightly as she clipped a silver brooch to the collar of Eira’s cloak. “A matter of succession and the approaching Selection. The nobles are restless, and the King grows weaker by the day. There are… whispers.”

Eira arched a brow. “What kind of whispers?”

“Of war,” Marion said softly. “And of betrayal.”

A chill danced down Eira’s spine.

She had read enough scrolls in the library to understand that Velandria stood precariously between peace and chaos. The kingdom’s borders stretched into disputed territory, and recent skirmishes in the north—quietly omitted from the council minutes—hinted at something festering beneath the surface. And now, with the Selection looming—a political event dressed as romance—the nobles had begun circling the palace like vultures.

And yet, despite the storm clouds of politics, it was Alric who lingered at the edges of her thoughts.

Their last encounter, brief as it was, still hummed in her skin. The prince had approached her during the courtyard archery demonstration. His words had been courteous, almost indifferent. But his eyes had betrayed something—recognition, confusion, and beneath that, something darker. Hunger, perhaps. Or suspicion.

He’d said her name like it didn’t belong to her.

“Lady Selis… have you changed your perfume?”

She hadn’t known how to answer. She’d only managed a weak smile and a muttered excuse about the gardens.

The truth was, everything about her had changed. Her mannerisms. Her gait. Her reactions to his touch.

And yet, the prince hadn’t called her out—not yet.

Maybe he was waiting for her to falter.

“Lady Selis?” Marion’s voice cut through the fog. “The Duke is waiting.”

Of course he was.

Duke Valenhart—the coldest man in the palace. Her supposed father. He regarded her with clipped words and narrowed eyes, always formal, always distant. He never once called her daughter. He never once looked at her as anything more than an obligation.

And she couldn’t blame him.

Eira descended the marble steps toward the war chamber, her heart echoing louder than her footsteps. As she passed through the double doors, the air turned sharp with incense and cold metal. The chamber was all stone and shadow, with crimson banners trailing like blood from the rafters.

The Duke stood at the head of the council table, flanked by several noblemen with eyes like wolves. Their gazes swept over her as if measuring her worth in coin or power.

Alric stood near the hearth.

She faltered. He was dressed in travel leathers, damp from the road, his cloak flung carelessly over one shoulder. He looked exhausted. Dangerous. Unreadable.

Their eyes met.

For a second, the room vanished. The noise, the banners, the tension—they blurred into silence.

Then he looked away.

The Duke cleared his throat. “Lady Selis. Join us.”

Eira stepped forward and sat, ignoring the quickening of her pulse. She studied the table as maps were unrolled—territories marked in red, coastal forts circled with ink.

“The Aestaran emissaries have withdrawn from the western coast,” one noble muttered. “And the Kharovian scouts were spotted near Blackreed Pass. It is not a coincidence.”

“We’re being tested,” said Lord Narren. “Prodded for weakness.”

“The King’s absence only invites pressure,” another chimed in. “He hasn’t addressed the court in over a fortnight.”

Eira listened, her thoughts racing. She didn’t know these politics, these border disputes. But she did know tension. Fear. The way the air thickened when something terrible hovered just out of sight.

And when the Duke spoke again, the words fell like hammers.

“With His Majesty unwell, the Council must move forward. The Selection will proceed as planned. The prince must choose a bride by summer’s end.”

A silence followed, taut and brittle.

Eira’s breath caught.

She glanced at Alric. His jaw was clenched, eyes fixed on the fire.

Someone chuckled. “Perhaps His Highness already has a favorite.”

Heat surged to her cheeks.

“Enough,” Alric said coldly. “This is not a game.”

“But marriage is a matter of state,” Lord Narren insisted. “A binding of alliances. We need to show strength. Stability.”

Eira’s hands curled in her lap.

She had known the Selection was coming. She’d read about it in the scrolls. A ceremonial choosing of a noble bride for the Crown Prince—veiled in courtly romance, but driven by political survival.

But to hear it spoken aloud, so clinically—so soon—was like being shoved into ice.

She wasn’t Selis. She wasn’t meant to be a piece on this board.

And yet she was trapped in the center of it.

When the meeting adjourned, Alric was the last to leave.

Eira lingered near the window, feigning interest in the storm rolling in.

She didn’t hear his steps until he was beside her.

“You seemed quiet,” he said softly.

Eira didn’t answer at first. The words tangled in her throat. Finally, she said, “There was little for me to add.”

Alric studied her face. “That’s not like you.”

Her heart skipped. “Perhaps I’m learning restraint.”

He smiled faintly, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Or perhaps you’re hiding something.”

She flinched. Just slightly.

Alric leaned closer, his voice a whisper. “I’ve seen shadows that mimic light before. They burn brightest before they vanish.”

Her breath caught. “Is that a warning?”

“A memory,” he murmured. “You’ve changed, Selis.”

She turned to him then, slowly, deliberately. “And if I told you people change when they’ve died once already?”

His expression flickered—surprise, confusion, the faintest trace of something like fear.

But before he could speak, the bell tolled.

Not the cathedral bell this time.

The Oracle’s bell.

The summons had come.

The Oracle—Velandria’s seer—spoke only when the weave of fate tangled too tightly.

And Eira, it seemed, was next to be unraveled.

__________________

The heavy doors of the Oracle’s chamber creaked open like the sigh of a dying star.

Eira stepped inside, heart pounding. The room was shrouded in shadow and candlelight, the air thick with incense that smelled of ash and wild herbs. Walls hung with woven tapestries, each embroidered with arcane symbols that seemed to shift when she looked away.

At the center of the room, the Oracle awaited—a slight figure draped in silver robes that shimmered like moonlight on water. Her eyes were pale, almost translucent, and held an unsettling stillness, as if she saw not just the present, but every thread of past and future tangled before her.

“Lady Selis Valenhart,” the Oracle intoned, voice echoing softly like a distant bell.

Eira bowed her head, struggling to steady her breath. “I am here.”

The Oracle’s gaze seemed to pierce her very soul.

“You walk a path forged by fire and shadow,” the seer said. “A fate intertwined with stolen light.”

Eira blinked. Stolen light?

“Your soul is a mirror fractured,” the Oracle whispered, “caught between worlds. The curse you bear is ancient—woven by those who fear what is lost, and what might be reclaimed.”

A cold shiver traced Eira’s spine.

“Who cursed me?” she asked, voice barely a whisper.

The Oracle’s eyes flickered, as if recalling a memory that burned her. “The soul curse is not a simple chain, but a tapestry of betrayal.

It binds you to a destiny not your own—a stolen inheritance wrapped in flame and shadow.”

“Why me?” Eira demanded, heart aching with frustration and fear. “I did not ask for this.”

“No one chooses the threads they inherit,” the Oracle said. “But the weave can be broken. Or reforged.”

She extended a trembling hand, and from beneath her robes, produced a small, glowing shard of crystal. It pulsed with a flickering light that seemed to breathe.

“Within this shard lies a fragment of your true soul,” the Oracle explained. “Find its twin—before the fire consumes you.”

Eira stared, mesmerized.

“Fire?” she repeated.

“The flames will come,” the Oracle said solemnly. “Not just of war, but of spirit. They will test your will, your heart. The prince you fear and desire walks his own shadowed path. His fate—and yours—are entwined like twin stars circling a storm.”

Eira felt a surge of confusion and something darker—a spark of hope, twisted with dread.

“What happens if I fail?” she asked, voice trembling.

The Oracle’s lips curled faintly, almost a smile. “Failure is a release. But also a beginning.”

A breath of wind stirred the candles, and the tapestries seemed to ripple as if alive.

Eira swallowed hard, clutching the glowing shard. It was warm, almost comforting, yet heavy with promise.

“You must choose,” the Oracle said, “between embracing the fire or surrendering to the shadow. But beware—those who walk in darkness may find the light is the true prison.”

The chamber fell silent, save for the faint crackle of flame.

Eira’s mind raced. The prince. The war. The Selection.

The stolen soul.

The shard pulsed again in her palm—a heartbeat calling her forward.

When she finally stepped out of the chamber, the storm outside had broken.

Rain poured over the palace, washing away dust and lies.

And beneath the tempest, Eira felt the weight of a destiny far greater—and darker—than she had ever imagined.