Imperial Staff POV – Elira, Chief Coordinator
There's something surreal about preparing a royal wedding in an Empire built on power, fear, and absolute obedience.
My name is Elira, and I serve as the Chief Coordinator of the Imperial Palace. I've planned coronations, executions, state dinners for five hundred, and the burial of a traitor's headless corpse with the same precision. But this—this wedding? It's unlike anything we've ever handled.
Because this isn't just a union. It's a message.
Chris Blackwood—Blackwood 01—is marrying Amara.
The same Amara who once stood in Skylar's shadow.
The same Amara who now stands over her.
The palace is buzzing, not with joy—but tension. Every staff member feels it. You can't walk ten feet without passing armed guards. There's a quiet whisper on every servant's tongue: Will Skylar be present?
No one knows. And no one dares ask.
The ballroom has been completely redone. Black marble floors imported from the Northern States. Crimson banners with the Blackwood insignia hang from gilded columns. Each one stitched with the phrase: "Power. Unity. Obedience."
Amara's dress arrived today.
White with an obsidian veil—symbolic. Pure on the outside, shadowed underneath. Fitting for a woman who rose from assistant to empress.
Behind closed doors, I hear whispers. The guards say Christiana has been sighted in border sectors. No one knows if it's true. But it hangs in the air like a pre-storm pressure.
And still, we prepare.
Golden goblets. Six-tiered cakes laced with edible gold. A symphony flown in from the Eastern provinces, all pledged to perform or die.
This isn't a wedding.
It's a declaration.
And I, Elira, am at the center of it.
I just hope we all survive it.
To be continued…