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I regret not remembering why I’m here.

The room is dark, only it also isn’t. Tall candelabras illuminate an enormous parlor, revealing several rows of chairs, but there’s no other light. More disconcerting is the fact the seats are all filled. Maskless PNZ fraternity brothers sit straight-backed in each, as if they’ve been waiting. These are young men, I can tell by the set of their shoulders and jaws. Some probably thought they’d be chosen tonight, yet here they are: observers.

Coming from the rowdy celebration of the ballroom to this dark, muted eeriness startles me. The tension creeps in like ice running through my veins, but before I can break the silence to ask what’s happening, the men bend, placing me smoothly on my feet.

I hug my middle, feeling chilled in the hush of the room. “What–what now?”

“Now,” one of the two PNZ members, young enough to have pimples scattered across his exposed forehead, says, “you take off your panties.”

I jolt, stepping away from them. “Iwhat?!”

“For the throne,” Ashby says, standing back to gesture to the front of the room.

It’s only now that I see it. The throne is enormous. There are flowers carved into the wood–delicate but stately roses–but also real ones, draped all around it. White roses are arranged around the arms and back, filling the room with wafts of sickly floral sweetness. The throne is gilded, the gold bearing an aged patina. Not knowing what that has to do with taking off my fucking panties, I begin, “But why do I–”

And then I see something rising from the seat of the throne.

It’s blatantly phallic, about five inches tall, and gleaming in the candlelight.

I snap my gaze around, finally landing on Lex, who’s perfectly expressionless as he explains, “It’s to break your hymen.”

Casually, Pace adds, “So none of us have to compete. For thehonor.” The word is said with such derision that it makes me wince.

One of the PNZ members who carried me in gives the seat an excited pat. “This throne has broken in every Princess since the very first. Sitting on it is a privilege almost no one gets.”

I give a slow, dazed nod. “A privilege.”

Crazy.

This is fucking crazy.

I’ve been keeping my virginity intact for a Royal since the day I learned it existed, so it’s not the fact of it that makes my stomach turn.

It’s the coldness of it.

A Duke would never let some horrifying, antique, golden dildo ‘break in’ his Duchess. He’d fight for it. He’d touch her. He might not make love to her, but he’d damn surefeelher.

He’dwinher.

“Princess,” Ashby says in his lilting voice. “By walking through our gates tonight, you agreed to follow our traditions.” The tone suggests his patience is already wearing thin, and I gulp, looking around me. There must be well over forty men here–not a woman in sight–and they’re all at least twice my size. I could try to run, but would they let me go?

And do I want to?

The answer is obvious enough. As much fun as it’d been to be hoisted into the air and celebrated for a couple minutes, the last thing I want to do is give myself up to the likes of Ashby and his wayward sons. Whitaker has tried to assault me, Pace is a perverted creep who already fucking has, and Lex? I don’t even want to know.

Princes are supposed to be sweet and doting, handsome and charismatic, indulgent and adoring. When I agreed to this, that’s what I pictured. A Princess and her devoted Princes. Not three of the worst men in Forsyth.

But even then, it was a lie I made to myself.

Because I’m not here to become a Princess. I never was.

I’m here to become a Monarch.

Clenching my jaw, I gather up my skirts, fishing through the crinoline and silk to find the bare skin of my thighs. My hand lands in a wet spot, but there’s no time to recoil. Working upward, I grab the edge of my panties and drag them down, face heating at the feel of eyes on me, watching, waiting. When I’ve stepped out of them, I clutch the panties in a tight fist, body already trembling with adrenaline.

“This way,” Lex says, his voice lacking any of the charming politeness I’d heard earlier on the dance floor. This version of him is strung taut, his cold hands like manacles as he leads me to the throne, ordering, “Sit.”

He and Pace stand on each side of the throne, while a hard-faced Whitaker stands behind it, not meeting my worried gaze.