Shock. Pain. Misery. Agony. 

Jovine was assaulted by a torrent of piercing emotions as she stood watching her husband betray her. 

The look of concern and hunger on his face as he looked upon the mysterious woman with the haunting voice and the bleeding finger repulsed her. She could feel the fury churning in the pit of her stomach and the excruciating ache of her shattered heart as she looked at him caressing the woman’s hand. 

“Are you okay?” His gruff voice sounded throughout the room.

The woman looked up from beneath her lashes, a harsh blush that matched the color of her hair spreading across her cheeks. “Yes,” she answered in a breathy voice. 

He reached out a hand to sweep across her flushed face. 

“Maximus,” Richard barked, never taking his eyes off the woman before him. 

The Royal Secretary rushed over, looking agitated. “Your Majesty, there are several eyes watching, and the Empress —” 

“Silence! Summon the Royal Physician,” he snapped. 

Lord Maximus hesitated, looking as if he wanted to say something more, but from one fuming glare from the Emperor, he hurried away to fetch the Physician. 

The woman looked at the Emperor with wide eyes, awed by his presence. 

“Tell me your name,” he demanded. 

“Emilia,” she answered eagerly. “Emilia Syrene.” 

Richard smiled. “Emilia Syrene,” he repeated, savoring the taste of her name on his lips. 

Jovine wanted to die. 

Seeing her own husband offer someone else a smile he used to save for her broke her. She couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t fathom what was happening before her eyes. 

Whispers of scandal surrounded her but the embarrassment of it all was nothing compared to the pure torture of the scene playing out before her. 

Richard extended a hand out, and the memory of the way she used to be one he always reached out to flashed before her eyes. But it wasn’t her he was holding onto this time. It was her. Another woman.

As Emilia stood, she leaned into Richard, who looked down at her with intense, burning eyes, and it felt as if the world around them was intruding in this moment between the two. As if Jovine herself was the outsider who didn’t belong. 

No. Get away from him. 

A burst of rage tore through her with a vengeance. She wanted to claw the woman away from her husband. Wanted to watch her bleed. 

Out of pure instinct, Jovine moved to tear the treacherous woman away, but a firm hand stopped her. 

She flicked her head to the side to find an older reflection of herself staring back at her with resolve. Marchioness Elizabeth Rainer, Jovine’s mother who had remained in the distance through the whole ordeal, held her daughter back. 

Jovine trembled with the fury she was unable to unleash as her mother gave a minute shake of her head, and she could hear the unsaid words. 

You are an Empress now. You will remain composed. You will not break here. 

This was the prison she had never expected. She was both the most powerful and the most helpless woman in the world. She could do everything and nothing, and the weight of her crown was a chain she knew she couldn’t escape now. 

As if her mother could hear her resentful thoughts, she tugged at her with disguised force, walking her through a crowd of leering nobles and willing her to leave behind the Emperor and his new object of desire, who was now being treated by the Royal Physician. 

With her surroundings blurring and her mind running with terrible, horrid thoughts, Jovine was blindly led to the newly decorated Western Palace for the Empress. Entering the cold drawing room, she heard her mother dismiss her ladies, who had been eagerly waiting for her return.

As soon as they were left alone in the dimly lit space, her mother spoke. 

“Endure.” 

One word. But, it shattered her. 

Jovine fell to the floor, uncaring of the way her knees cracked painfully on the marble. Clutching her stomach, she bent over from the pain as an agonizing sob ripped through her. 

In the blink of an eye, she had gone from hope to despair. She went from dancing in his arms to watching another woman falling into his. For months, she had held onto him, not knowing when he’d come back to her, but knowing, for sure, one day he would. 

Now, she couldn’t help but feel it was too late. 

Even as her tears ran out, Jovine couldn’t stop the whimpers. She loved him too much. And, it hurt to love him. 

Their story had started with so much promise. He had cared for her and adored her. Even when he returned as a stranger, she believed she still held a part of him. 

But, now there was only darkness ahead. And, she wanted nothing to do with it. 

Jovine’s cries suddenly stopped. She placed her forehead to the cool marble of the ground, which was flooded with droplets of her shed tears. 

Then, like a possessed maniac, she struck her head on the floor. Over and over again. 

She wanted to numb the pain and feel the burn of her skull smashing against the floor instead. 

Crack. Crack. Crack.

“Jovine!” Her mother knelt down beside her in panic, attempting to stop her foolish actions. 

Jovine looked up at her mother with hollow eyes. “Leave me be, Mother. Let me hurt.” 

Her mother clenched her jaw. “Your love for him will destroy you. Forget it all, and move forward.”

She squeezed her eyes shut, shaking her head. “You don’t understand. You never do,” she whispered into the floor. 

Jovine was always the invisible child who only held worth if she was able to ascend the throne. Now, she was the Empress, and it still wasn’t enough to feel the warmth of her mother’s love. 

“He is the Emperor, Jovine. He is entitled to have any woman in this Empire, and your duty is to be a faithful servant. Expecting any more from a man like him—” 

“Get out."

Jovine was done. She refused to hear anymore from her callous mother.

Elizabeth Rainer stared at her daughter in shock, her mouth parting open in dismay. Then, with a cold look composing her features, she abruptly stood to leave. “For your own sake, Jovine, do not let this ruin you. Be reasonable, and endure," she spat out with a look of distaste. Walking to the door, she slammed it close on her way out.

The word rang through Jovine's mind for long moments. 

Endure. Endure. Endure. 

The look in her husband’s eyes as he looked at Emilia Syrene flashed through her mind again. She felt a maddening whirl of witless thoughts overcoming her from the memory. 

Perhaps this is all a temporary mishap. Maybe this is only an impulsive venture of infatuation that will run out in the end. 

Maybe I can bring him back to me. 

She needed hope to cling onto, and as pathetic as it was, this was all she could muster.

I will bring him back to me, she weakly thought. To whatever end, I will claim his heart again. 

----

Jovine de Tristaine, unaware of how much time she had left, filled her head with senseless excuses for her unfaithful husband. 

Two years. 

That’s all she had left until she would die.

Two years.

Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.