Married to the Beast
Wilhelmina Ashcombe is the Marquess's illegitimate daughter, a servant in her father's house, and a widow twice over. Two husbands dead in three years. Black hair. Red eyes. No magic.....
Wilhelmina Ashcombe is the Marquess's illegitimate daughter, a servant in her father's house, and a widow twice over. Two husbands dead in three years. Black hair. Red eyes. No magic. All of Eldoria calls her cursed. Her stepmother is already selling her a third time. So she does the unthinkable. She walks up to the Duke of Northmere, the Beast of the North, and proposes. A marriage for protection. When he finds his mate, he lets her go. But her husbands were murdered. Someone built her curse to hide her. And the beast inside the Duke falls silent only when she is near. As a duchess, she can finally fight back: the ledgers, the tea tables, the Court of Reputation. But the seal that holds back the Hunger is failing, the monsters are moving south, and at the winter solstice the realm ends unless the Key and the Guardian renew it. She never planned to love him. She never knew she already belonged to him.