My Husband, the Dead Dragon King

　　I was born on Halloween in 2003, under a sky bruised with storm clouds and weeping a constant, dreary rain. My mother, on her way back from visiting her ancestors'graves, went into labor and delivered me right beside a lone, forgotten headstone in the old cemetery. 　　I was more than two months premature. Everyone knows preemies are fragile, and my parents, terrified I wouldn’t make it, practically raised me in a constant bath of medicines and remedies. 　　The year I turned ten, a strange sickness took hold of me. A relentless, high fever left me in a year-long daze, drifting in and out of consciousness. My parents dragged me from the state’s top pediatric specialists to backwoods folk healers, but no one could find a cause. Some doctors even told my parents to go home and prepare for the worst. 　　My mother and father were lost in a sea of tears, utterly helpless. 　　Then, a young seer passed through our small town. Seeing him as their last hope, my parents invited him to our home. 　　The moment the seer saw me, his expression hardened. He pulled my parents aside, his voice grave.“This girl was born under a bad sign. This is no ordinary illness; it’s a spiritual affliction. Your medicines are useless. It needs a…specific cure.” 　　My parents stared, stunned. When they finally found their voices, they pleaded,“What do we do? Please, you have to save our daughter!” 　　My mother fell to her knees right there. The seer, moved by their desperation, let out a heavy sigh and asked them to step outside with him. 　　I never found out what he told them, but when they came back into my room, their faces were a storm of emotions—a flicker of hope warring with a deep, unsettling fear. 　　Three nights later, our house was transformed. Red lanterns and silk ribbons hung from every corner. The festive decorations should have felt joyous, but in the dead of night, they cast an eerie, almost sinister glow over the yard. 　　My mother dressed me in a new red dress. Her lips were pressed into a thin, silent line. I asked her what was wrong, but she wouldn’t answer, though I could see the tell-tale redness rimming her eyes. 　　Once I was dressed, she instructed me to stay in my room and not come out, no matter what, until she came for me. It was all part of the“cure,”she said. 　　I didn’t understand why a cure had to be so strange, but I trusted my mom. 　　A little later, the seer arrived. I peeked through a c***k in my door, my curiosity piqued. He was holding a magnificent rooster, its feathers a brilliant crimson, its comb as red as a drop of blood. A large red bow was tied around its chest. The bird stood proud and alert, radiating a strange vitality. 　　To my astonishment, the moon hanging in the sky outside was a haunting shade of blood-red. It was a terrifying sight, but I was just a child, and the true strangeness of it all was lost on me. 　　I don’t know how much time passed, but the silence of the night was suddenly shattered by the sound of drums and haunting pipes. The noise jolted me from my sleepy haze. 　　Just then, my mother entered the room, her voice hoarse.“Elara, it’s time. Come with me.” 　　“Okay,”I said, my mind clouded with confusion.“Mom, where are we going?” 　　She didn’t answer. Her grip was strong, almost painfully tight, as she led me out into the yard. 　　Only a few strangers were gathered there, their faces unfamiliar in the flickering lantern light. As soon as I appeared, the music stopped. The seer stood before me, the red rooster cradled in his arms, a faint, knowing smile on his face. 　　“The hour is upon us,”he said, his eyes fixed on me with a peculiar intensity. 　　Before I could even process his words, my parents forced my head down, making me kneel and bow towards the seer and the rooster. 　　I had no idea what was happening. But in the moment my forehead touched the ground, the drums erupted in a deafening crash, and the seer’s sharp voice cut through the air, chanting words that seemed to echo from another time. 　　“On this night of the blood moon’s rise, 　　The River King shall take his bride. 　　A daughter of the Miller clan, 　　Bound by vow, sealed by hand. 　　Break the pact, and your soul is his. 　　The rite is done!” 　　After it was over, my parents released me. The seer handed the rooster to them, instructing them to care for it until the day it died of old age. 　　Then, he gave me a pendant:a smooth, dark river stone, the size of a silver dollar, etched with a swirling, serpentine symbol and strung on a red cord. He told me it would keep me safe and protect me from the sickness forever. 　　My mother placed the stone around my neck, her hands trembling slightly. She made me promise never, ever to take it off. 　　Confused but obedient, I nodded. And from that night on, just as he’d promised, my illness began to fade. Our family’s fortunes turned, too. We prospered, and it seemed like a strange luck followed me. Every time I found myself in danger, I would somehow emerge unscathed. 　　When I was twelve, I was at the town market with my mom. As I crossed the street, a massive semi-truck came barreling towards me. I froze, paralyzed with fear. But at the very last second, just as it was about to hit me, the truck swerved violently, crashing into a tree on the side of the road. I was left standing there without a single scratch. 　　Then there was the time my sixth-grade class went on a camping trip. The morning we were supposed to leave, I set out for the school, a walk I’d made a thousand times. But somehow, I got completely lost. The familiar path seemed to twist and turn, and it took me two hours to make a ten-minute walk. By the time I finally reached the school, the bus was long gone. Later that day, that same bus was involved in a multi-car pile-up on the bridge. Nine of my classmates died. The rest were seriously injured. I had been saved. 　　People in town always said I was blessed, that I had a guardian angel. I started to believe it myself. 　　But as I grew older, a shadow of worry began to cloud my mother’s eyes whenever she looked at me. She became vehemently opposed to me dating. The moment any boy showed the slightest interest, she would become hostile, on high alert. 　　She was constantly whispering in my ear,“Stay away from boys, Elara. They’ll only bring you misfortune.” 　　It was bizarre. My mom was usually so open-minded, but on the subject of romance, she was an immovable wall. 　　In my freshman year of high school, a really cute guy in my class started talking to me. I liked him too, and we made plans to go to the amusement park that weekend. 　　The very next day, I learned he’d been in a terrible accident. He was in the hospital, in a coma, and the doctors didn’t know if he would ever wake up. 　　When my mother found out, she was furious. She made me kneel on the hard floor of my room all night as punishment. Fueled by teenage rebellion, I kept demanding to know why she was so against me having a boyfriend. 　　Finally, worn down by my questions, she stared at me, her eyes filled with a desperate intensity.“Elara, you can’t! You already have a husband. You cannot have feelings for any other boy! You must be faithful!” 　　Her words hit me like a physical blow, leaving me breathless and dizzy. 　　“A…a husband?”I stammered, my mouth hanging open in disbelief. 　　My mother’s eyes welled with tears. And it was then, on that night, that I finally learned the truth. At ten years old, I had been bound in a warding vow, married off to a husband I had never met to save my life. 　　The seer had proposed it as the only way to cleanse the spiritual sickness that clung to me. 　　I had always thought of such things as superstitious nonsense from a bygone era. I never imagined something so insane could happen to me. My mom, however, was a true believer. After all, the ceremony had worked. My illness had vanished. 　　But I was convinced it had all been a coincidence. 　　“If you insist on dating,”my mother warned, her voice trembling,“you won’t just be harming yourself. You’ll be harming the one you love, too.” 　　“So I can never get married? Not for my whole life?”I asked, the reality of it crashing down on me. 　　Tears streamed down her face.“Elara, please don’t blame us. We were just trying to keep you alive.” 　　I nodded numbly, the fight draining out of me. I never brought up the topic of dating again. 　　But a burning curiosity about my so-called husband remained. I asked her where he was, what he looked like. A flicker of fear, or something like it, crossed her face. 　　“He’s always with you, Elara,”she whispered, her eyes darting around the room as if he were listening.“He sees everything you do.”