The Cursed Vow

She came to his court in chains she couldn't see. She stayed by choice.
When a blood contract mark burns itself onto Alora's wrist the night her home is destroyed, she finds herself bound to the last person she'd choose, Kael Avreth, the cold and ruthless King of the Shadow Court. The proximity requirement keeps her caged within three hundred metres of a man who feels nothing. The contract will kill her if it goes unfulfilled. And the only way to survive is to figure out what the old magic actually wants from both of them.
The problem is, the king isn't what she expected.
He's precise where she's instinctive. Controlled where she's fierce. He builds walls out of silence and she walks through them like they aren't there. He keeps secrets to protect himself and she finds them anyway. And somewhere between the archive at midnight and the training hall at dawn and a roof where neither of them could sleep, something starts happening that neither of them has a contract clause for.
Alora doesn't bow to kings.
Kael doesn't let people in.
The old magic doesn't care about either of those things.