To Marry A Monster (by Brey Mitchell) novel Chapter 203

The North was beautiful in its own way, but it would never be the South.

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“That is what I keep thinking,” Celeste said, as if she had plucked the thought straight out of my head. We sat on a wooden bench at the edge of the park, boots half–buried in snow. “It is beautiful here, Sister, truly. But the South is different.”

I watched my breath cloud in the air as she spoke.

“The South is warm and loud,” she went on, eyes drifting over the grounds. “Children screaming in the streets, vendors shouting over one another, mothers scolding from doorways. Even the parks feel alive. You remember the one near the river? Flowers in every corner, that old gardener who always yelled when we stepped on his grass.”

Here, the only color came from dark stone and distant banners.

The park spread out around us in curves of white. The hedges had long since disappeared beneath the snow, shaped into rounded mounds that almost looked intentional. Some of the soldiers had taken to stacking and carving them into rough figures whenever they had an hour to spare.

It was the opposite of the South.

No beds of wildflowers, no bees. No dirt–stained skirts from running on sun–baked ground. Just the crunch of snow, the faint creak of branches, and the distant echo of steel from the training grounds.

“Do you remember when we ran into the forest near the Beta’s estate?” Celeste asked suddenly. Her voice softened in a way that would have made my chest ache once. “You told me you knew a secret path, and we got lost for hours.”

A small sound escaped me before I could stop it.

“I remember,” I said. “You tripped over a root and rolled down that little hill. You scraped your arm and started screaming like something had bitten your leg off.”

Celeste laughed, the sound sharp but lighter. “You picked me up and tried to carry me back,” she said. “You were shaking so hard I thought you would drop me. You kept saying it was your fault, that Father would be angry, that he would punish you for taking me outside the path.”

“He did,” I said, a corner of my mouth lifting. “He shouted. I think he forgot you were the one who insisted we leave the road.”

Celeste tilted her head, feigning innocence. “I was the younger one,” she said. “It was your job to say no,”

I looked at the snow wolf by the tree instead of at her face.

Back then, I had never imagined that Celeste would one day stand on the other side of a noose with the rope in her hands. I had not thought about promises or bargains or what it meant to be expendable. When we were younger, she had clung to my skirts, to my sleeves, to my wrist, and I had let her, believing that loving her

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Chapter 203

meant carrying whatever weight she gave me.

I used to think that was enough.

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I had loved her the way an older sister was supposed to. I had taken the blame, smoothed her mistakes, pushed extra food onto her plate when Father watched too closely. There had been nights when she crawled into my bed, shaking from nightmares, and I had held her until she fell asleep again.

I had never thought she would…. I swallowed and tried my best to divert my attention elsewhere. What was the point of thinking about the past?

“Sometimes,” Celeste said, breaking into my thoughts. “I almost forget you are the same sister who used to drag me home by the hand.”

“Do you?” I asked, keeping my tone mild.

She hummed, noncommittal, and shifted on the bench so she could look around the park again. Grace stood a little behind us, close enough to reach me in a heartbeat, far enough to pretend she was simply giving us privacy. Two guards watched from the path, their attention loose but present.

For the past hour, Celeste had pointed at everything with careful interest.

She asked about the training fields, about the watchtowers, about the barracks. She asked if the soldiers slept here or rotated with the outposts. She asked about the infirmary, the supply routes, the rest days. She asked about the northern families, about who held influence. She wrapped it all in soft words about “wanting to understand my new home.”

Each question was another finger pushing at the edges of my life, checking where the walls were thin.

“It is still hard to imagine you here,” she said now. “But you always loved the infirmaries, even in the south.”

“That has not changed,” I answered. “Although… the smell is worse here. More blood, more burns, less perfume.”

She laughed again, then turned fully toward me, skirts brushing the snow–dusted bench. “So,” she said. “The infirmary is where you stay most of the time?”

I nodded, slow enough that it did not look like a reflex. “Most days, yes,” I said. “If I am not there, I am with the patrol reports or in meetings. When there are wounded, it is the easiest place to find me.”

“And you like it?” Celeste asked. There was no real curiosity in her eyes, only calculation hiding behind it. “Healing them, I mean. Spending your days with injuries and pain and… all that.”

Her nose wrinkled slightly, as if the idea truly bothered her.

“I do,” I said. “It is better to see them stand up again than to watch them carried out.”

Celeste studied my face for a heartbeat, then exhaled slowly, as if she had reached the point she had been circling since we left the mansion.

“If you can heal them,” she began, voice soft and careful. “Then perhaps you could heal Father as well.”

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Chapter 203

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There it is, I thought. I have been waiting for this moment and even practiced this inside my head.

She watched me closely, searching for any flicker she could use. I kept my features smooth and let the question hang in the air for a moment, as if I was weighing it, as if the idea was new and not something I had anticipated the moment she saw the scout on that cot.

“Celeste,” I said at last, pushing my hands against the bench as I stood. “It is already getting late. Cassian asked me to return to the infirmary before sunset. There will be more men coming in from the eastern patrols. They will need me.”

Her face pinched around the eyes for a second, the sweetness slipping. The line of her mouth thinned, the way it always did when she did not get the answer she wanted. Then, just as quickly, she smoothed it over and rose to her feet as well.

“Of course,” she said, forcing warmth back into her tone. “I should have known you would be needed. I only wanted to ask. For Father’s sake. I worry about him, you know.”

“I know,” I said. “We can talk about it another time.”

She nodded as if she believed me.

Soon enough, we started walking back toward the main path, our boots leaving twin lines in the snow. Grace fell into step a few paces behind, the guards shifting their position to bracket us without drawing attention.

The sky had begun to darken, the light flattening across the courtyard. A handful of soldiers crossed the far end of the park, bundled in heavy cloaks. A few children from the civilian quarters chased each other near the barracks door, under the watchful eye of an older woman.

It almost felt normal.

We had taken only a dozen steps when movement flashed at the edge of my vision.

A man stumbled out from behind one of the snow figures near the path, hands pressed to his stomach as if he were injured. His cloak hung crooked on his shoulders. His hat had slipped low over his brow. For a heartbeat, he looked like any other worker who had had too much to drink or taken a hit in training.

“Help,” he gasped, voice hoarse. “Please, my lady-”

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