The Serpent Clan's Substitute Bride novel · Chapter 1 of 12
Chapter 1: The Stolen Potion
My potion was the third one on the judges' table, and it wasn't mine.
I knew it before anyone said a word.
I'd spent four months preparing the Dew of Shadow, a silvery-gray tonic that forced you to tell the truth for exactly one minute.
I'd bottled it in a smoked glass flask, with a green wax stopper and a label written in my handwriting.
Now, on the judges' table, the same flask bore a new label.
"Jacinta Navarrete."
My sister.
My adopted sister, who came to our house when she was five and whom I had taught to read.
She stood by the table, in a black silk dress with her hair braided high, smiling as if she'd never done anything wrong in her life.
She looked at me.
And raised an eyebrow.
It took me a moment to understand.
There were six hundred people in the Hall of Tournaments of Piedra Blanca.
All the herbalists in the kingdom.
The five clans in their boxes, with their banners.
And the judges: three elders of the Council and a man in a green cloak, with a serpent insignia embroidered on his chest.
The ambassador of the Serpent Clan.
"The winning potion," announced the elder on the left, "is the Dew of Shadow, by Miss Jacinta Navarrete."
The hall erupted in applause.
I stood frozen among the crowd, my hands stained with dye.
I didn't scream.
I didn't know how.
At the table, my sister brought a hand to her chest, feigning emotion.
"Miss Navarrete," said the ambassador, in a voice that carried to the back. "On behalf of the Serpent Clan, I hereby notify you of the marriage contract."
The hall fell silent at once.
"Contract?" asked Jacinta.
"Every ten years, the tournament chooses the author of the finest potion. That woman marries the clan's heir." The ambassador pulled out a rolled parchment. "Nazario Vidaurre, firstborn of the Serpents, awaits you in three days."
A murmur rippled through the hall.
"They say he's cruel," someone whispered.
"They say he's sterile."
"They say he killed his first fiancée."
Jacinta lost her color.
I looked at her and for the first time in my life I understood that she hadn't calculated that.
She didn't know.
She had taken my glory without knowing what it cost.
My fiancé emerged from the crowd.
Íñigo Valcárcel, heir of the Wolf Clan, blond, gray-eyed, in his family's white coat.
The man I was marrying in two months.
He took the platform steps two at a time and stood in front of Jacinta.
They looked at each other.
I saw something I didn't want to see.
"No way," he said in a low voice.
"Íñigo..."
"No way. I'm not letting you marry him."
He took her by the hand and led her out of the hall through the side door.
I followed them.
They crossed a hallway, entered a judges' antechamber, and closed the door.
Not all the way.
They left it ajar.
I looked through the crack.
Íñigo had her against the wall, his mouth on hers.
Jacinta had her arms around his neck.
He unbuttoned her dress in one pull.
She laughed.
"The pact," he whispered. "If I mark you, the Council can't give you to anyone else."
"And Ofelia?"
"Ofelia doesn't matter anymore."
He said it without looking back.
I stood in the hallway, my hand on the wall.
I listened to the sounds.
Her moans.
His grunts, the dull thud against the wood, the rustle of fabric.
When it was over, Íñigo turned around, his chest bare.
On his back, between his shoulder blades, a red mark in the shape of a wolf's paw glowed.
The mark of the pact.
Jacinta had the same one, on her shoulder.
They saw me.
Jacinta was the first to smile.
She adjusted her dress unhurriedly and stepped into the hallway.
"Dear sister."
"That potion is mine."
"Really?" She tilted her head. "Prove it."
"I will."
"Your fiancé is already mine, Ofelia. So what now?" She stepped closer. "In three days you turn twenty-five. If no one marries you, the Council declares you without custody. And the uncustodied are given to the wanderers. Old. Dirty. The ones no one wants."
Íñigo came out of the antechamber, buttoning his shirt.
He didn't look at me.
"I'm sorry," he said, staring at the floor.
"No, you're not."
I turned around and left the hall.
I crossed the squares with the icy wind in my face.
I reached my parents' house, in Ceniza Alta, as night was falling.
They were in the kitchen, my mother with a handkerchief in her hands, my father with his head in his hands.
They already knew.
Jacinta had sent a messenger.
"Daughter," my mother began.
"I know."
"We have to talk to the Council, ask for an exception, pay the bond..."
"No."
"Ofelia..."
"If she doesn't want to marry the Serpent heir," I said, my voice steady, "then I will."
My mother covered her mouth.
My father lifted his head.
"You don't know what you're saying."
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