A grand but quiet vicarage home on the edge of London. Late evening. A storm brews gently outside. The girl sits alone by a dark window, dressed in a plain gown but eyes full of fire.
Margaret sat by the tall window, one hand clutching the thick curtain as she stared at the rain-smeared glass. Her candle flickered with each sigh from the wind, but she didn't move to shield it. She liked the dark. It felt honest.
Behind her, the house echoed with silence. Her father's sermons filled the walls by day, her sister's dreams of noble courtship by night — both equally tiring.
"Do you think the prince will attend the ball?" her sister had asked just hours ago, cheeks flushed and voice giddy.
Margaret had only smirked. The prince. The very idea.
Love, to her, was a fairy tale women told themselves when they were afraid of dying alone. It was stitched into every corset, baked into every polite smile, and locked in every cage disguised as marriage.
She wanted no part of it.
What she wanted was fire — noise — freedom.
And that's why her boots were already laced beneath her hem.
She rose, slipping a flask into her cloak's deep pocket. Her heart beat faster as she crept past her father's study, where scripture sat heavy on every shelf like judgment. But she didn't flinch.
Tonight, she would go to the back-alley tavern near Covent Garden. The one where no one asked questions. Where she could drink. Laugh. Forget.
She would not think of love.
Not of princes.
And certainly not of kissing anyone.
Fate, of course, had other plans.