Regina''s sister had once told Regina that when a person died, their life supposedly flashed before their eyes.


    Regina had no desire to see that flash before she hit old age. Unfortunately, her life was running on full repeat in front of her as her mother kept speaking, oblivious to her daughter''s nearly stopped heart.


    "Of course your engagement party to the Crown Prince will cost a fortune," her mother sighed, "which means I am going to have to enter a lot of horse races from now until it happens."


    "You say as though you do not look forward to spending yet more time on the track," Regina''s father muttered, looking sour as he rubbed his forehead above his oversized glasses.


    "Still," Regina''s mother continued, though she shot a cold look back at her husband, "an extravagant engagement will be well worth whatever gold we must spend. We cannot look like beggars or, even worse, commoners when we are about to make our daughter a queen."


    Regina''s mother said that last word with even more satisfaction than she had while counting the winnings from a bet and a new terrible thought took root in Regina''s mind.


    "How did our family garner this engagement to the Alpin royal family?" Regina asked, mind still whirling with how improbable this scenario was. "We are not one of the three great ducal families –"


    "You mean the Nevilles, Burens, and Kuzeys," Regina''s father interrupted, a wry smile on his lips. "Trust me when I say that there is a reason the Alpins have not married into those families for years."


    Regina did not know what her father meant, but even if the Alpin monarchs had reasons for avoiding a marriage contract with the three most powerful noble houses of Carcosa…


    "But why," Regina asked, "would the Alpin royal family marry into our family? We are a marquessate family and technically we are but one rank below the duchies. However, we have only held a marquessate for a single generation. We… we only stopped being powerless commoners just a few decades ago, when we first manifested our magic. So how…"


    Regina stopped, staring at her parents to see whether either were upset with her honesty.


    Unfortunately, they both looked amused, which was more terrifying than if they had been upset. In fact, her mother looked almost approving, with a smile that Regina knew was going to feature in her nightmares.


    "So why," Regina bravely asked, "did the Alpins decide to pick a bride from our family?"


    Both her parents smiled widely in unison, causing Regina to flinch in spite of herself.


    "The Alpins chose us," Regina''s mother said, "because they are always looking for new knowledge and we are excellent brokers of… information."


    "Besides," her father dryly added, "even if the bloody Alpins do not always understand our information, they understand money… and we will spend whatever we must to make them overlook your deficits."


    Stung, Regina sat still in her chair.


    For a moment, she wondered if she should continue to protest, if there was anything she could do to let her avoid meeting, let alone marrying, the Crown Prince of Carcosa.


    Even if her dream of being condemned at her engagement party to that prince had just been a hallucination brought about by a bad dinner, she did not want to deal with a crown prince.


    All she wanted, all she had ever wanted, was to be safe and maybe even… peacefully content.


    Those goals did not fit with a life spent publicly parading around the royal court as the future Queen.


    With a flash of desperation, Regina thought about asking her parents why one of her unmarried female cousins could not take her role as the Crown Prince''s bride-to-be instead. Anne was prettier, Elizabeth was wittier, and Henrietta had arms even brawnier than Regina''s, which would be useful if the queen-to-be ever had to personally beat Carcosa''s enemies to death.


    All of them would make for far better queens than Regina, especially given how much effort Regina put into being as forgettable as the location of a pair of missing stockings. Surely it would be easy enough to persuade her ruthlessly efficient parents that someone else would be a more useful choice for the Sheridans?


    "What if," Regina began to say, "instead of me, you chose –"


    Then she took a long look at her parents'' faces and stopped speaking as she realized a much larger, more horrifying problem.


    After all, her father had already spoken about Regina''s deficits…


    …so what would become of her if she reminded them that she was useless for the one thing her parents had ever expected her to do for them?


    Instead, Regina took up her fork and began to mindlessly chew whatever they were serving for breakfast, even as her parents continued.


    "Do not worry about others sneering at you as their future queen," Regina''s mother said, looking almost maternal for a moment. "We Sheridans may have only become nobles in the last few decades but I like to think that makes us… potent."


    "Absolutely," Regina''s father said, slamming his hand on the table while Regina tried not to choke. "We are not like those decadent Nevilles or Burens or Kuzeys. We have had to fight for every scrap of power we have ever received, for every gold coin we have ever made! We used every ounce of cunning we had to make sure we went from being commoners to being recognized as nobles… and not just breeding stock used by other noble families!"


    For once, Regina was in complete agreement with her parents… at least in terms of how the Sheridans had outmaneuvered the noble families of Carcosa. Regina shuddered, picturing what could have happened to her family if they had not already been wealthy and cunning, despite being commoners, when the family magic manifested.


    As much as she hated her family''s elders, she had to credit them for her family''s independence. Though the Sheridans had been merely commoner merchants just a few decades ago, albeit as powerful and wealthy as commoners could be, they suddenly developed magical powers seemingly overnight. Unfortunately for all the noble families who had attempted to discover the Sheridan secrets, the reason for those magical powers remained a mystery.


    Yet while most commoners with magic were forcefully "adopted" or "married" into existing noble families to breed more magical children, the Sheridan elders had hidden their family''s abilities long enough to buy and blackmail their way into becoming nobles who could not be subjected to such force. Thus, unlike other magical commoners, the Sheridans had escaped the pitiful fate of being all-but-kidnapped into existing noble families.


    Regina would have applauded her elders'' cunning if the elders had not then decided that the best way to keep their family in power as nobles was to marry out their magicless children to other nobles, marry their powerful magical children to one another, and kill off any children with weak magic powers.


    What was more, the elders did all this while keeping the younger Sheridans blind as to what magic they were supposed to be manifesting!


    To this day, Regina had no idea what her family''s power was. Regina''s sister had once speculated that it might be some form of luck that made every business deal the Sheridans were involved with go well.


    If so, Regina certainly did not inherit that power given that she had never, ever, ever been lucky.


    Then again, Regina was grateful for the fact that she had not inherited her family''s secret magic. Her older sister had inherited that magic. However, once her sister''s magic was deemed to be ''useless'' by her family…


    Regina''s eyes drifted to the empty seat that her sister had once used, back when her parents still breakfasted regularly with their children in what Regina had once thought was a clumsy but sincere attempt at family bonding.


    "Thank you," Regina said to her parents, eyes still fixed on her sister''s empty seat. "I… appreciate the troubles you two have gone through on my behalf. It will be just… lovely to be married."


    Granted, it would have been lovelier if Regina could have married a dull nobleman with a country estate where Regina''s greatest challenges would have involved angry geese and aromatic cheese.


    After all, even Regina, an inbred shut-in whose greatest strength lay in becoming the human equivalent of wallpaper paste when danger was near, knew that the royal family was terrifying and prone to ''testing'' their heirs…


    The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    … which meant that even Regina knew that any knives out for the Crown Prince would be out for his wife as well.


    However, as Regina mindlessly placed something in her mouth that might have been food or the remnants of her dignity, she resigned herself to her future.


    It was useless to ask her parents to give up on their family''s long-held dream of becoming a ducal power as strong as the Nevilles, Burens, and Alpins. The Sheridans were already the only family of power in the West, but it would take royal support to move their rank beyond that of a marquessate.


    What could she even tell her parents that would make them give up on such an important connection to the royal Alpins? What could she say that would outweigh stopping other nobles from sneering at the Sheridans for being upstart merchants… with the insinuation that all that their rank as a marquessate family could be removed just as easily as they received it?


    Only a ducal title was nearly impossible to remove… which Regina assumed was why the northern Kuzeys, notorious for their lack of interest in politics, still claimed their rank. Thus, it was no wonder her family yearned to be a ducal family as well.


    So Regina sat at the breakfast table, treating each bite as if it was a brick in the wall of her future while her mother and father continued speaking. Through the dull drone in her ears, Regina assumed they were either criticizing her or trying to arm her for the future. She honestly could not tell.


    She was finally forced to pay attention when her father said that given the size of her dowry, the Alpins would be satisfied just by her having the right number of eyes, arms, and ears and Regina briefly wondered what those numbers were. Did the Alpins want their brides to have extra eyes with which to observe their many gold ornaments?


    Before Regina could contemplate the Alpin approved number of arms, her mother added, "And if they are not satisfied with you having a body, remember that you can probably trick the Alpins into impaling each other with those little metal stakes they love to make."


    "Thank you for the advice," Regina said, absently stabbing her plate with the force of a metal-wielding Alpin against a rival. "Perhaps I can try it during the engagement party."


    "Oh, please do not," Regina''s father replied, frowning. "We are paying thousands of coins for the gaudy gold-cloth that the Alpins insist on adding to all their events. If you are going to incite bloodshed, do it outside. It is much easier to remove blood from bushes."


    With that generous piece of parental guidance, both Regina''s mother and father left the breakfast table.


    Regina stared at the plate in front of her until whatever indistinguishable lump she was eating started to look like a multi-eyed, multi-armed version of herself.


    Quietly, she rose gracefully from the table, gracefully exited the dining room, gracefully entered the manor garden, and gracefully raised her head to the heavens to scream soundlessly at the universe that hated her.


    ~???~


    Regina was not entirely sure what she did after entering the garden.


    She suspected at one point she might have pretended to be a bush in a desperate attempt to see if she could will herself into becoming foliage.


    Either way, by the time the pleasant fog in her mind cleared, it was evening and she was once again in her bedroom.


    Completely exhausted and seriously contemplating whether setting the manor on fire would cause enough confusion for her to pretend to be dead and run away to be the Amazing Human Wallpaper in a traveling show, Regina collapsed in bed.


    "I know," she said while glaring at her ceiling, "that I have always wanted to leave my family as a bride rather than a corpse, but why did my family take that as a challenge? Did my parents have to engage me to the bloody Crown Prince of Carcosa?! Were there not any potato men available? Could they not have found a quiet, spudlike baron for me?!"


    Pinching the bridge of her nose, Regina felt a headache emerging as she thought about her future. "In fact, I would take an actual potato over the Crown Prince. If I were married to a potato, at least people might not care enough to frame me for being a wicked villainess!"


    Sensing that seriously contemplating the possibilities of marriage to a vegetable was not a good sign for her mental state, Regina forced herself to take a deep breath.


    "Serene," she told herself sternly. "I will be serene. Perhaps this engagement will not be as bad as I fear. After all, it would be bad politics for the prince or his family to let me be killed. What other noble family would marry their daughters into the Alpin line if the Alpins show how little they respect their prospective brides? Who would waste their dowries if it meant losing both their child and their family''s reputation?"


    After another deep breath, Regina closed her eyes. "It was only a terrible dream… and I have always had terrible dreams. Just because I dream about being dissolved in a puddle of poison, does not mean that I need to fear going out in the rain! After all, only Cousin Alric was killed by dissolving his flesh and it smelled so terrible the elders never tried it again!"


    Thus fortified with common sense, Regina tucked herself in bed, feeling much more confident about her future. "I just need to get a good night''s sleep and make new plans tomorrow. If I have outlasted my family''s deadly dinners and poisonous puddles, I will not let a mere engagement kill me! The universe does not care enough about someone like me to spend energy making my life, in particular, miserable."


    So, filled with equal parts determination and exhaustion, Regina drifted to sleep.


    Unfortunately, the universe did in fact enjoy making Regina Sheridan, in particular, miserable.


    ~???~


    Henrietta Sheridan, Regina’s favorite cousin, had both brawny arms and a formidable information network.


    She also had the bad habit of asking questions Regina either could not or did not wish to answer.


    Regina had hoped to hide from her after seeing Henrietta’s searching gaze at breakfast, but Henrietta had cornered Regina in the hallway.


    “Who died?” said Henrietta, arms crossed, as she blocked Regina’s only corridor of exit.


    “No one and nothing,” Regina muttered, “unless you count my last piece of faith in humanity and the universe.”


    “We all lost that quite a while back,” Henrietta responded briskly. “Even so, you look especially terrible. If it was not because of someone’s murder… Were you harmed?”


    Seeing Henrietta making a threatening movement towards a large vase, potentially with the intention to merge it with a Sheridan elder, Regina hastily waved her hand.


    “No. No! No one has harmed me.”


    Regina hoped that was sufficient to keep her cousin from a suicide mission against the powerful family members who kept them all in check, but Henrietta still stared at Regina with concern.


    Finally, Henrietta cocked her head, still watching Regina’s face. “Were you not able to sleep?”


    It was as if some tiny, thin thread holding Regina together finally snapped.


    “Well, would you be able to sleep with a frolicking blond everywhere you looked?!? On top of the crates? A frolicking blond! Hanging from the windowsill outside the cafe? A frolicking blond! Dancing by himself while my terrifying dreams are potentially confirmed to be real? A frolicking blond!!”


    “What –” was all Henrietta had time to say before Regina grabbed her by her shoulders and asked her a desperate question.


    “Hen,” Regina pleaded, “if someone sneezes at night in the dark of their locked room, you ask them the next morning how their cold is doing. Tell me, please, did you hear any news of an orphanage being sponsored by the Alpins in celebration of… of the crown prince’s possible engagement?”


    Even as Henrietta stared blankly at Regina, Regina mentally pleaded, ‘It was just a dream. I was so dazed yesterday that I ate the bouquet on the table instead of my food and thus had nightmares about a shiny gyrating blond man hopping around the town square in the middle of a ridiculous proclamation. The Alpins hate commoners and orphans and probably kick puppies in their time spent not impaling people with spikes. They would never sponsor an orphanage. The universe would never play such a cruel joke.”


    Unfortunately, Henrietta then spoke as the voice of a cruel, joke-playing universe. “How did you find out before me? Gina, how did you already know that the royal family has begun celebrating the crown prince’s probable engagement to you with a new orphanage? That is remarkable – I just read in this morning’s broadsheets that they plan an official announcement in the Capital square later this morning!”


    Defeated, Regina slumped against the wall of the manor, even as Henrietta continued to stare at her.


    “I thought you would be happy,” Henrietta pointed out, clearly confused. “I heard that you were about to marry into the royal family just a few days ago and you could do far worse for in-laws, considering our options.”


    The worst part, Regina realized in something close to despair, was that Henrietta was not wrong.


    If Regina was not having terrifying dreams, she probably would have been delighted to have been so thoroughly removed by marriage to a family the Sheridans could never touch. Henrietta must have used her uncanny information gathering abilities to find out about the engagement and been waiting for Regina to share her delight.


    It was unfortunate that Regina’s only thoughts were of mourning her lost country potato engagement.


    As it was, she barely heard Henrietta’s continued thoughts. “Though I suppose you shall need to start being a little more… hmm…”


    “Difficult to murder?” Regina tonelessly replied.


    “I was going to say ‘more social and talkative’,” Henrietta said dryly. “Even so, this sudden Alpin generosity has made headlines all over Carcosa. The royal family is hardly known for their charity work, so it is obvious that they are preparing to win over the commoners in support of the succession. Everyone knows this is all leading to an engagement for one of their princes… though only we know that you are their chosen bride-to-be.”


    Regina just sank further into her seat and groaned like a dying Sheridan cousin.


    “Please,” Henrietta said, as her eyebrow rose to incredible heights. “Try not to overwhelm me with your delight.”


    Seeing that Henrietta was starting to get truly offended by Regina’s behavior, Regina weakly pleaded a headache and fled for the relative safety of her room.


    Sitting at her desk, with a nice clean piece of paper in front of her, Regina tried to reassure herself that this meant nothing.


    “I need to calm down and think rationally,” Regina told herself, scribbling frantically with her quill. “Last night, I just had a silly dream about a very shiny man that I obviously invented, experiencing an event that I knew would happen because… well, after all, I have been hearing much news of the Alpins and their… their… their passion for public works!


    “Obviously,” Regina decided, “my mind has a hidden fixation for both blonds and for tracking what the Alpins are doing. I am just on a very unfortunate journey of discovery! Truly, if the Alpins looked more like potatoes, none of this would have happened. Once I stop mourning my quiet potato baron and our quiet country life, I will be perfectly fine!”


    Regina stared triumphantly down at the paper in front of her, convinced of her own ability to outplan her fate.


    A large potato marked with “Blond wig?” stared back at her.


    Regina calmly crumpled the paper and tossed it in the fireplace, her face serene and completely unbothered.


    Regina stared at her face in the mirror on the fireplace mantle. “My dreams do not mean anything in particular. I am obviously rattled by my upcoming engagement and need to get better sleep!”


    “In fact,” Regina added, “I am so unafraid of my dreams, that I am going to go to bed right now. When I wake up, I expect to be refreshed and to remember nothing of what happened while I was dreaming.”


    There was one thing Regina’s extended sleep proved when she woke the next morning.


    It seemed that Regina had needed fourteen hours of sleep…


    …in order to truly understand that the universe hated her.