I was the ninety-ninth bride offered to the serpent-haired king, Kaius, by the human kingdom. Everyone believed I would die on our wedding night, just like the ninety-eight sacrifices before me. But I survived. Five years later, I bore him three black-gold serpent eggs. Kaius secretly made me his queen, guarded me and our children with his own hands, and even planned to announce my status publicly on the day the eggs hatched—and, in the name of the royal heirs' birth, grant humanity three hundred years of peace.
But on the very day the hatchlings were about to break free, the Sun Saint Oriana—sent to the palace for a political marriage by the temple—broke into the forbidden chambers. She refused to believe I was the queen, or that my children were royal heirs. She shattered the protective pendant Kaius had made for me from his heart-scale, crushed my wrist, and, before my very eyes, used Sun Sacred Flame to burn the three soon-to-hatch serpent eggs.
By the time Kaius arrived with the divine envoys, the human royals, and the serpent elders, Oriana was still holding up the charred eggshells, taking credit for having "cleansed" him of the "defilement." Only then did everyone realize that what she had burned was not just three children—but three hundred years of peace. Kaius flew into a rage. The human royals knelt and begged for mercy, and the temple swiftly abandoned Oriana. When I finally awoke, I made only one request: that she not be allowed to die too easily.
