SHE TOOK HER SISTER’S PLACE AT THE ALTAR—BUT THE MONSTER ALREADY KNEW HER NAME

The choosing bell tolled midnight, its heavy iron clang reverberating through the damp wooden walls of the Briar Glen chapel.

Outside, fog rolled off Hollowspire Mountain like smoke from a dying forge. Inside, every unmarried woman between sixteen and thirty stood in rigid silence. The village elders moved along the center aisle, their ceremonial silver bowl gleaming beneath the dim flicker of tallow candles.

Evelyn Vale stood near the front pillar, her arm linked tightly around her nineteen-year-old sister, Clara. Clara was trembling so violently that her breath came in ragged, terrified hitches.

"It’s alright," Evelyn whispered, leaning down. "It’s just a ritual. The odds are hundreds to one."

"They say he devours them, Evie," Clara whimpered, her wide blue eyes wet with tears. "They say Lord Alaric turns them into stone to adorn his garden."

"They're fairy tales to keep us obedient," Evelyn said firmly, though her own heart hammered against her ribs.

To their left, their mother clutched her wooden prayer beads so tightly her knuckles shone white. Beside her, their father stared blankly at the floorboards, his jaw set in a hard, unreadable line. He hadn't said a word all evening.

The village priest stepped up to the altar. He plunged his gnarled hand into the deep silver bowl, stirred the slips of parchment, and drew out a single folded page.

The silence in the chapel grew so absolute that the crackle of candle wax sounded like snapping bones.

The priest unfolded the paper. He cleared his throat once, his eyes widening slightly.

"Clara Vale."

A collective gasp echoed through the room.

Clara’s knees instantly buckled. Evelyn caught her sister before she hit the cold floor, hauling her upright. Across the aisle, their mother let out a strangled cry—yet she made no move toward her youngest daughter. She simply dropped her eyes.

Their father slowly closed his eyes, exhaling a long, shuddering breath. It wasn't the reaction of a man struck by sudden grief. It was the posture of someone who had been waiting eighteen long years for an inevitable bill to come due.

"No," Evelyn spoke up, her voice ringing clear above the murmurings of the crowd.

The priest frowned, looking over his spectacles. "The choice is sacred, Evelyn. The contract with Hollowspire Castle cannot be broken."

"She is a child!" Evelyn stepped in front of Clara, shielding her sister with her own body. "Look at her! She’s barely an adult!"

"And you are twenty-six," her father's voice cut through the air, quiet, cold, and entirely devoid of warmth. He stepped forward, refusing to meet Evelyn's gaze directly. "Old enough to understand that one life cannot be placed above an entire village. If we refuse, the monster descends and takes every firstborn daughter. Would you condemn every family here?"

Evelyn stared at her father as if seeing him for the first time.

All her life, Evelyn had sacrificed for them. When her father’s apothecary shop went into debt, Evelyn worked sixteen-hour days blending remedies until her fingers bled. When suitors came calling for her in her early twenties, her parents turned every single one away, insisting they needed her at home to run the family estate. She had surrendered her youth, her freedom, and her own happiness without complaint.

And now, her father was asking for Clara.

"I won't let you give her up," Evelyn hissed.

Before dawn, back in their quiet home, Evelyn brewed a pot of lavender tea. While her mother wept silently in the corner and her father sat in his study staring into the fireplace, Evelyn slipped three heavy drops of powdered nightshade extract into Clara’s cup.

Clara drank it innocently. Within ten minutes, her eyelids fluttered shut, and she sank deep into an unarousable sleep.

Evelyn carried her sister to bed, tucked her under the heavy quilts, and then walked into the parlor where the black silk wedding dress—delivered by the village elders an hour prior—lay draped across the table.

She pulled the heavy black silk over her head. She pinned the obsidian lace veil across her hair, obscuring her face completely.

When Evelyn stepped out onto the porch, the riderless carriage pulled by four jet-black horses was already waiting in the mist.

Her father stayed inside the house.

Her mother stepped out onto the porch, reaching out a trembling hand to kiss Evelyn’s forehead through the dark veil.

"Forgive us, Evelyn," her mother whispered, her voice choking. But as Evelyn searched her mother’s pale face, she didn't see the crushing agony of a grieving parent.

She saw relief.