Chapter One: The Bargain

The papers on the table looked plain. Mira Voss stared at the papers, she looked like she thought they would bite her.

"Sign it," her stepmother said. She did not look up from her tea. "You have done nothing for this family for three years. This is the least you can do."

"He is in a wheelchair," Mira said. "His face is ruined. People at the club say his own father cannot look at him."

"Then he will be an easy husband." Her stepmother looked up. "He will be thankful for any attention you give him. Thankful men obey and this is a gift, Mira."

Mira's hand shook over the pen. She thought about her life: her mother died young, her father married again fast and her stepsisters got tutors and dresses and trips but she got chores and silence.

By seventeen she knew she was just a guest in that house. Now she was twenty-two, and she had to pay.

"What if I don't sign?” Mira asked.

Her stepmother gave a stiff cold smile. "Then you will leave with nothing. With no name,no home, and not even money. Let's see how far your pride takes you in this city."

Mira had no other option than sign it.

The car came for her three days later. The driver said nothing to her. She watched the streets change. The glass towers turned into old stone buildings with iron gates and stone lions.

The Ashfeld house looked like a fortress dressed up as a home.

A woman in a gray suit met her at the door on arrival . "Miss Voss, I am Helena. I run the household staff and Mr. Ashfeld is waiting in the east study."

"Which one is Mr. Ashfeld?" Mira asked. Her voice came out small, and she hated that.

Helena's face changed for a second. It looked like pity, or maybe amusement. "You will see."

The east study had tall windows. A fire was already burning, even though the night was warm.

A man sat near it in a wheelchair. His back was to her, a blanket covered his knees, and his shoulders were broad but they did not match the weak man she had been told about.

"Mr. Ashfeld," Helena said, "your bride is here."

The chair did not turn right away. When it did, Mira forgot how to breathe.

He was not disfigured but his face looked like it belonged on a magazine cover. Sharp lines, quiet, dark eyes that studied her like he already knew her secrets. A faint scar ran along his jaw. It did not look ugly but somewhat interesting.

"You look surprised," he said. His voice was low and sure of itself.

"I was told" Mira stopped. "I mean, everyone said."

"Everyone says many things." He rolled the chair closer. His hands did not shake. Nothing about him looked sick except the chair. "Sit down, Miss Voss, we have a business."

She sat across from him. Her spine was straight, her chin was up and she would not let him see how scared she was.

"You will live here," he said. "You will go to events with me when I ask. You will not ask about my work, my schedule, or my family. In return you get everything money can buy; Clothes, freedom, protection… Name it."

"Protection from what?” Mira asked.

Something flashed behind his eyes. It was gone fast. "From people who would hurt you to reach me." Mr Ashfeld answered.

"Why would anyone want to hurt a man in a wheelchair?" Mira asked.

His mouth curved. "Be careful, little bird. Do not underestimate me. That will be the most dangerous thing you do in this house."

"Am I your prisoner, then?" Mira asked quietly.

"You are my wife." He rolled closer. She could see gold flecks in his dark eyes. She could smell cedar, and something wild under it, something she could not name. "Whether that makes you a prisoner depends on how well you behave."

She should have been afraid. Part of her was but a louder part of her, the part that had spent five years feeling invisible in her own home, felt something sharper than fear, curiosity and defiance.

She felt certain this man was not what the world thought he was and now she knew a secret no one else in the city knew.

"What if I don't want to behave?" Mira asked.

For the first time, he laughed. It was low and quiet, like it surprised even him. "Then you will finally give me a reason to get out of this chair."

The words hit her strangely. They felt too sharp like a joke only he understood.

Before she could ask what he meant, the study door burst open. Helena stood there, pale and out of breath.

"Sir," she said. Her voice shook. "They found her, your sister. She is not answering and there is blood on the balcony."

His whole body went stiff. Then, faster than any hurt man should move, he pushed up out of the wheelchair. He stood at his full height.

He towered over Mira. His shadow stretched long across the firelit floor.

Mira's mouth fell open.

He was not disabled at all. His eyes met hers. Gold flashed where brown had been a second before and Mira understood, with a cold and sinking feeling, that she had just married something that was not fully a man.