THE DOLL PRINCESS

Chapter Three: A Date with Death

The Queen Mother’s private tea took place in a room designed to make every visitor feel small.

The walls were covered in dark green silk, the ceiling was painted with scenes of angels carrying golden crowns, and the furniture had been arranged so that the person who entered had to cross an open stretch of marble before reaching the seating area. There were no comfortable corners. No curtains thick enough to hide behind. No table large enough to conceal the expression on a person’s face.

Catherine noticed these details as soon as she entered.

The original Catherine would have noticed them too, perhaps, but she would not have understood why they mattered. Melanie had spent years studying people and places without meaning to. In the modern world, she had learned to judge a restaurant by its exits and a stranger by the way he treated waiters. Now those small habits felt like the only weapons she possessed.

Queen Mother Seraphine sat beside the windows with a cup of tea balanced between two elegant fingers.

She was beautiful in the way winter was beautiful: pale, distant, and capable of killing anything that remained outside too long. Her hair was silver-blond, lighter than Lucien’s, and arranged in a crown of braids. Her gown was the color of dark wine. A single ruby rested at her throat.

She looked up when Catherine entered.

“My dear,” Seraphine said. “Come closer.”

Catherine approached, allowing her steps to remain measured. The blue gown’s skirts whispered around her ankles. The silver-rose necklace rested against her throat, its crystal warm from the tracking charm.

She wondered whether Seraphine knew it was active.

In the novel, the Queen Mother had never been described as magical. But then, the novel had hidden many things until it was too late.

Catherine curtsied. “Your Majesty.”

“Still formal with me?” Seraphine’s lips curved. “You have called me Mother since you were a child.”

“I thought you preferred formal manners in private audiences.”

Seraphine’s gaze moved over her face. “Do I?”

Catherine lowered her eyes. “I may be mistaken.”

“Sit.”

Catherine sat in the chair opposite her.

A servant poured tea. Catherine recognized the porcelain pattern from the book’s illustrations: white porcelain with a thin black rim, imported from the eastern archipelago. She did not touch the cup. The original Catherine had adored sweetened tea, but Melanie had no idea whether Catherine drank hers with sugar or milk. A simple choice could reveal the change more easily than a bold declaration.

Seraphine noticed her hesitation.

“You are not drinking.”

“I am still feeling unwell.”

“Lucien tells me you remember very little of yesterday.”

“He may have misunderstood me.”

“Lucien misunderstands very few things.”

Catherine lifted the cup and took the smallest sip. The tea was bitter with cloves. She set it down.

Seraphine watched the movement.

“You have become quiet.”

“I have always been quiet.”

“Not with Lucien.”

The remark was gentle, almost idle.

Catherine folded her hands in her lap. “My brother is kind to me.”

“Kindness is a fragile thing.”

Seraphine turned toward the window. Beyond the glass, the palace gardens spread across the eastern slope, their hedges shaped into crowns and roses. Snow still clung to the shaded paths even though spring had begun in the lower provinces.

“People often mistake dependence for affection,” the Queen Mother continued. “They think that if someone gives them protection, they owe that person their loyalty forever.”

Catherine’s fingers tightened against one another.

In the original story, Seraphine had said almost the same words. Catherine had misunderstood them as a warning against trusting Adrian. Later, readers learned that the Queen Mother had been speaking about Lucien and Catherine’s relationship from the beginning.

The problem was that Seraphine never said anything directly.

She planted fears and allowed other people to water them.

“Do you believe I am dependent on Lucien?” Catherine asked.

Seraphine turned back to her.

For a moment, silence filled the room.

Then the Queen Mother smiled.

“I believe you are my daughter, and that a daughter should understand the dangers surrounding her family.”

Catherine decided not to point out that Seraphine had never called her daughter without adding a warning afterward.

“What dangers?”

“Adrian Vale has returned to court.”

There it was.

Catherine kept her expression composed, though her pulse quickened.

“His family is loyal to the throne,” she said.

“His family is loyal to whoever will grant them influence.”

“Then why do you want me to receive him?”

Seraphine picked up her tea. “Because your brother requires allies.”

The answer was too direct. Catherine looked down at the crystal hanging from her necklace.

“Does he?”

“Lucien will be named heir if the Council of Houses confirms his appointment. Several councilors remain uncertain. The Verdin family has refused to offer its support, and the Vale family has not yet committed itself.”

Catherine’s mind moved quickly.

In the novel, Lucien’s appointment seemed inevitable. The emperor had favored him publicly, and Catherine’s presence at his side had reassured the court that the imperial family stood united. But if the council was uncertain, then Lucien’s position was more fragile than Melanie remembered.

The Verdin family had refused to support him.

That mattered.

Gabriel Verdin was the duke’s son, though the court treated him as a distant heir with no interest in politics. He rarely attended banquets. He avoided the central palace whenever possible. In the book, he had been introduced as a cold, irritated man who disliked Catherine because she constantly appeared at gatherings with Adrian and mocked Gabriel’s discomfort around women.

Most readers had considered Gabriel a minor character until the final third of the novel, when his bloodline was revealed.

He was Seraphines son by a man outside the imperial marriage.

That made him Lucien’s half-brother.

More importantly, Gabriel was the only person who had never joined the conspiracy against Catherine.

He had disliked her, but he had not hated her.

Catherine raised her eyes. “What do you expect me to do?”

“Receive Adrian graciously.”

“That is all?”

“Do not embarrass him. Do not encourage gossip. If he offers you a gift, accept it.”

The last sentence made the tracking charm at Catherine’s throat feel heavier.

Seraphine smiled. “You are a princess of Aurelion. You know how to behave.”

Yes, Catherine thought. She knew how to behave so well that everyone had mistaken her silence for consent.

“I understand.”

“I am pleased.”

The tea continued for another quarter of an hour. Seraphine asked about Catherine’s health, her music lessons, and whether she had any interest in visiting the southern estates. None of the questions mattered. Each was a hand testing the surface of a locked door.

When Catherine finally rose to leave, Seraphine said, “One more thing.”

Catherine turned.

“Do not become attached to Gabriel Verdin.”

The room seemed to cool.

Catherine kept her face blank. “I have hardly spoken to him.”

“Then it should be easy to remain that way.”

“Why?”

Seraphine’s eyes were pale and unreadable.

“Because men who hate the court often hate the people who belong to it. Gabriel’s resentment makes him unpredictable.”

That was not the reason.

Seraphine was afraid of Gabriel.

Catherine did not yet know whether Seraphine feared his military position, his bloodline, or both. But the warning confirmed something important: Gabriel was already a threat to the Queen Mother, even before he realized it himself.

Catherine curtsied. “I will remember your advice.”

“Good.”

She left the room without looking back.

The moment she entered the corridor, she exhaled.

Her maid, a young woman named Elara, followed several steps behind. Catherine remembered her from the novel. Elara had been present at Catherine’s execution and had wept so loudly that a guard struck her. The scene had lasted only two paragraphs, but Melanie had never forgotten it.

“Princess,” Elara said carefully, “shall we return to your chambers?”

“Yes.”

They walked in silence.

Catherine’s mind raced through everything she knew about Gabriel Verdin. He was twenty-eight, three years older than Catherine. He had inherited his mother’s black hair and his father’s gray eyes. He had served in the northern army and returned with a scar along his left shoulder. He disliked crowded rooms, unexpected touch, and the scent of jasmine.

He also had a phobia of women.

The novel had treated that detail as an amusing inconvenience. Noble women would approach him at banquets, and Gabriel would retreat until his back hit a wall. Catherine, following Lucien’s instructions, had once laughed at him in front of the entire court. Gabriel had looked at her with such cold contempt that readers were meant to understand why he later supported her execution.

Melanie remembered the scene differently now.

A man who could fight on a battlefield but could not endure a crowded room full of women was not amusing. He was suffering.

And if he was the only person who could protect her, she needed to approach him carefully.

Not with flirtation.

Not with the false sweetness Catherine had used in the book.

She needed to offer him something he valued: distance, honesty, and a reason to believe that she would not use his fear against him.

When Catherine returned to her chambers, she dismissed Elara and locked the door. She pulled a sheet of paper from the writing desk and began making a list.

First: remove the tracking charm.

Second: identify which servants belonged to Lucien and which belonged to Seraphine.

Third: find the missing imperial records.

Fourth: meet Gabriel Verdin before Adrian Vale could become attached to her.

She paused over the fourth point.

The original novel’s first public banquet was scheduled for that evening.

Gabriel would attend because his father had ordered him to appear. Adrian would arrive in triumph after several years in the north. Lucien would seat Catherine between them, pretending that the arrangement was a coincidence.

By the end of the night, Adrian would offer Catherine the silver-rose necklace in front of half the court.

Catherine touched the crystal at her throat.

She had already changed that part of the story, but perhaps not enough.

A knock sounded.

Elara entered carrying a fresh gown and a message sealed with black wax.

“Princess, this was delivered by a palace courier.”

Catherine broke the seal.

The message contained only one sentence.

Your presence is requested at the Winter Banquet. Do not disappoint me.

There was no signature.

There did not need to be one.

Catherine recognized Lucien’s handwriting.

She folded the message carefully and placed it beside her list.

Six weeks until death.

One evening until Gabriel Verdin.

Catherine looked toward the mirror, where the Doll Princess stared back at her with beautiful, frightened eyes.

“Let us see,” she whispered, “whether the man who hated you can become the man who saves you.”