When Rivian began nearly a thousand years ago, shaped naturally from the world's doings and happenings, Gudgeon Docks was one of the first landmarks to be established by the founders. Most of what they caught from the water was small, meatless fish, and they named the docks affectionately so.

No one thought to change it after the Void Queen, Wyetta Terravale, took the throne and reshaped the land with her Luminary abilities, molding Rivian into a perfect circle, its capital rimmed by a monster-infested river to protect the royal and rich. Gudgeon Docks remained the same except for the bountiful harvest of new fish species coming to the land once their ocean—an underwater home—was reshaped.

Settlers, mostly fishermen, constructed what is now Gudgeon village, a mess of buildings and storefronts planted next to the docks in hopes of looking like home. Before that, we didn't have a name. We're not considered a large enough city to be worth anything, but our six-day travel from the capital makes Gudgeon Docks and the cluster of homes next to it highly prone to attack.

Everyone here knows of everyone else. There isn't a face in the crowd I don't recognize and though their names may elude me, I know their businesses, their families, their laughs, and their take on Luminaries. Some keep so hushed that I wonder if they are one themselves, but the others that parade of magical death, swinging ankles from the gallows, are the threats I attempt to avoid.

For the past three years, I've kept my secret. The Raven Queen said it best the day she visited us to hunt down the obvious Luminaries in Gudgeon village. Magic is treason. Magic is dangerous. Magic will get you killed.

Surrender to me now and you face no consequence.

She didn't lie, technically, as death wasn't a consequence in the queen's eyes or that of the people. Some willingly stepped forward, and it wasn't until a large enough crowd formed that she ordered her sentinels, along with the strongest two of her four children, to execute them all.

The Void Queen clutches the army of the soulless. The Raven Queen adopts murderers.

I think of the tales of their separate uprisings on my way home from work. My ankles ache, the back of my knees weighs heavier than normal, and my neck strains after looking down at a table for hours on end. All the seasoned and flavored soaps in the world can graze my hands and the fish smell will cling on like a frightened child to its mother's breast.

Three blocks away, beyond the cottages for captains and foremen, guards and tradesmen, is one of my two homes. The one I despise the most. Not for the flower baskets hanging from the bottoms of the windows or the wooden bench out front, too close to the front door that I stub my toe on the metal leg every time I'm not paying enough attention.

The person on the inside makes my lip curl back from my fangs. His shadow passes by the front window and I stop, considering not opening the wooden door with the metal handle in the shape of a curved branch, but I have to stop by at some point. Three days is usually when he looks for me.

Rylan, my dear husband, is sitting on the sofa when I hang my satchel on the metal hook nailed to the back of the door. He frowns at me but attempts to remain stoic by giving me enough time to remove what is the worst-smelling part of my wardrobe. Another pair of leather boots—ruined.

My schedule revolves around his, not so we arrive home at the same time, but to give me a chance to miss his arrival or departure. Judging by the light armor still clinging to his underclothes, the silver chest plate covered in scratches and dents, Rylan hasn't been here for long. Otherwise, I would've found the chest plate and gauntlets on the floor where he believes they belong.

With no affection in his ice-blue eyes, dull as they've always been, Rylan says, "Hello, Marie." Even the sound of his voice makes me cringe. I tug my hair out of its loose braid, the strands having fallen around my face hours ago, and force a smile.

He catches my failure before I've stopped at the back of the empty sofa and draped my fingers over the brown cushion. "Rylan."

"Is that any way to address your beloved?"

Streams of sunlight break through the curtain, dust particles waking and floating in its beacon. On the table next to the sofa, also covered in a layer of dust, awaits his sword and collection of throwing knives. As if he's ever used them. Gudgeon Docks doesn't have a reputation for mindless assassins unable to be snared by an arrow.

"I can call you something else if you'd like," I respond, toeing the line. "After all, that is your name."

Rylan's hard face softens. I once loved that face, cherished every breath he took, but being in the same room takes all my energy. My power has never begged for anything more than to show him I am not someone to toy with. That's all he has done for the past three years now. Believe I'm lesser than he is.

"Come, Marie." He pats the empty sofa adjacent to his. I frown at his long, pale fingers. "Take a seat. There is something I wish to discuss with you."

I wish to blurt that he hates when I sit on the sofa without having bathed first. We are not the docks; our home shouldn't be seasoned with a fisherman's bounty. I'm not here enough to notice. Evident so by the dust and cold, quiet kitchen. My duties as Rylan's wife, according to Eligius.

Rylan watches me sit on the farthest cushion away from his own. The low table, with only a book about royalties, religion, and the pleasantries of money, is what I turn my eyes to. The auburn red cover swimming in black edging reminds me of a wanted poster for one of the Void Queen's soulless soldiers. He remained while the others left, but no one ever caught him. That was years ago.

"We've spent more and more time apart lately," he begins softly. The sofa creaks under his shifting weight, and I glance over to ensure he isn't attempting to move closer. We've gone through this, day after day. He isn't supposed to touch what doesn't belong to him. I'll scratch his eyes out before that happens and rip out his perfect, ashen blond hair. Longer on top and shorter on the sides, the wavy strands push back off his forehead and aim sideways, drooping down his skull to the pale, burnt skin of his neck. Rylan is handsome, always has been, but I see nothing other than betrayal in that face. "I believe it's time we come to a reconciliation."

"You do?" I nearly laugh outright. Reining myself back in, I humor him in our small, empty home. Never to see children like Rylan, and the rest of the world, desires. Nor a shared bed between a married couple or laughter with friends over spilled drinks. This is not home; this is a coffin. "What do you have in mind?"

"Gudgeon Docks becomes dryer the more days go on." How ironic, considering we're next to the ocean. "I believe it's time we...expand our horizons. Go on a journey, a trip to see the land and bathe in its glory. I can have the Raven Queen set something up for us; funds paid. After I caught that Luminary for her, she still owes me a favor."

The sound of the world Luminary leaving his lips tightens my frown. His job in the village isn't just to ensure peace remains between the fishermen and the locals, along with the close towns and settlements full of farmers and brash workers, but the Raven Queen gave him a special assignment all those years ago. Since Rylan knew the area and had impressed her in the past, he received a small piece of acknowledgment in the Panjandrum Corps. Though he works away from the capital and the Raven Queen's son, they meet twice a year to discuss reports and findings through the farm territory, a land not commonly known for possessing the magic-hoarding hiders.

An offer as captivating as the one Rylan proposes intrigues me. The thought of exploring the kingdom and the eight territories...no money spent. It's a dream only brought to life by royals. For a matter of weeks, I could live in a similar luxury as they do, only to return to a mundane life of cleaning fish and living with a husband from a marriage deriving on an exchange of goods.

For a brief moment, my mind slips off its focus and I allow myself to wonder what it'd be like to take that journey with him. That much time away, together and without interruption from family and friends, would give us a chance to patch the holes in our relationship. I look down at my hands. No amount of patchwork would fix that.

"Ask one of your lovers," I mumble to my lap.

Rylan hesitates. "Excuse me?"

I know he heard me. "You have lovers in the village. I'm certain they'd be more than happy to go with you."

His nostrils flare, a crease forming on the tip of his broad nose. These are only the beginning moments of Rylan's wrath that I awaken during every meeting we share. And to think, he courted me. Gave me flowers and wrote poems about how much he loved me and needed me in his life. Now I'm the woman sitting on the farthest cushion on a sofa that doesn't have a single dent other than the rise of dust. We hate each other. There's no mistaking it.

"You need to get over that," he warns. 'That happened in the past, and it is to my greatest displeasure—"

"Last I remember, you met with a woman last week." I stare at him sidelong. "That is not the past, Rylan. Nor are you so inconspicuous that I don't find out about these things."

The perfume sticking to his clothes, the drooping of his hooded eyes when he returns home after work, the slumping of his body against a bed he won't rise from until the next morning. He doesn't have to tell me when he meets one of his lovers. I know; as I've learned to notice these occurrences after the first.

He promised me I was better than her. That kissing her in our home was a mistake and it wouldn't happen again. I gave him a second chance, then a third, before the blame turned to me. I wasn't making him happy enough. I didn't smile when he came home or laugh at his jokes. Everything bleak turned on me and it swallowed me until even the loneliest corner of the room wasn't enough to keep my broken heart away from him.

"I try to make this work." Rylan's voice brings me back to the cold, lonely room. The empty fireplace. The worktable shoved against the wall after he threw it at the sofa months ago. The corner is still chipped, despite him promising to fix it. "I married you, not out of necessity, but because I loved you, Marie."

He scoots closer to me and I tense. I don't bother lying. "I loved you, too." We've been through this conversation, taken every different route in hopes of finding a peaceful, calm way out of it, but we end up screaming at each other with no end in sight until one of us storms out. My shoulders slump after a long day's work and all I wanted to do was crawl into bed and rest my eyes. "I cannot forgive you for what you've done and continue to do. I haven't loved you in years."

"Well, I still love you." I long to believe him, but that familiar crack in his voice puts a brick wall between us. The days he lied about visiting Eligius or having to work an extra shift; they caught up with him when I discovered the hidden meanings behind his truths and lies. A simple crack in the solid foundation inside his mind. A weakness that proves even he knows what is wrong. "And I don't want our marriage to only be about Castiel's potion. I long for happiness...a family."

That stings. Family. I lost my parents three years ago, had to pick up the pieces and ask a wizard for a potion to halt Castiel's pain, only to find the money to afford it was more than I could ever make. By that time, Rylan had already made his decision about how he wished our relationship to unfold. I gave him a simple offer. He could wed me as long as he paid for what I couldn't.

I brace my hands on my knees and stands. Rylan moves with me. His broad shoulders give way to clenched fists and a rigid abdomen.

My lips speak to his chest plate instead of his eyes. "This cottage is not big enough for a family," I say.

"We'll buy something bigger. With more rooms and a larger kitchen."

"You can buy a palace and that still won't be enough. If we wish to become a family, you'll fill the rooms with your lovers and leave no room for children."

I know the fault of my words before Rylan realizes how angry he is. He throws a hand in my direction, waving me off like a sodden dog, and slumps back down onto the sofa. Jabs about his decisions are nothing new, he dodges and avoids them with ease, but it's not his specialty.

Rylan drags a hand through his hair. "You're worthless," he sighs.

"I've been called—"

His fist slams onto the low table and I jump. "Worthless!"

The birds in the street silence, nearby laughter and conversation dies out. Receiving strange looks when I storm out of this cottage never fails to make my cheeks redden, but it's worth it. To know everyone in the village realizes that Rylan Aubenet is married to a woman that can't stand his guts is satisfying enough for me.

As Rylan continues to curse under his breath, complaining about how he never should've married me in the first place, I quietly sling my satchel over my body. Inside, Castiel's potion swirls around in a glass vile. I take one last look at my husband, fuming silently on the sofa, and slam the door as I walk out.