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voievod · 11 days ago

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— in which Cătălina stumbles into the treacherous world of politics by accident and fights to secure a better future for what remains of her family.

word count: 7,197 words

warnings: mentions of violence; mentions of murder; political intrigue and conflict; mentions of family trauma and loss

a/n: Here we gooo! Chapter 4 from When Paths Cross is here, and I am so excited to finally post this little thing of mine. ❤️ Cătălina is an absolute force in this one, so I hope you will enjoy this chapter to the fullest. Thank you for all the love and support you have bestowed upon my project so far! 🥰

➨ also available on AO3

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VIRAGO (n.) — a woman who demonstrates abundant masculine virtues; historically, this was often positive and reflected heroism and exemplary qualities of masculinity, however, it could also be pejorative, indicating a woman who is masculine to the exclusion of traditional feminine virtues

* * * * *

February 1450, Curtea Domnească, Suceava, Moldavia

Dumitru has always known this moment would come.

He has expected it ever since the young Drăculea appeared at his uncle’s doorstep. He was merciful enough to delay it for a while, masking his intent behind friendly conversations and brotherly camaraderie, but these moments of easy companionship merely postponed what was coming. In fact, Dumitru has expected it since that very day over two years ago, since the blood on the stones, since the silence where Mircea’s voice had once existed.

Escape was an illusion. He knew the dragon would someday sink in his claws to claim what he believed was rightfully his.

Now, he has come to collect his due.

The brush moves under Dumitru’s hand. Back, forth. He finds the rhythm of old habit in the sound of bristles against the horse’s coat, a whisper in the hush of the stable. The horse exhales and shifts, the warmth of his breath a tether to a simplicity untouched by all that came before.

But then straw rustles under unhurried steps. He is a shadow, there but not there. Not careful enough. His presence drips into the silence, saturates it until silence is no longer silence but a pressing weight. Dumitru feels it first between his shoulder blades, a heat that prickles against the cold air — Vlad’s gaze is sharp and dissecting.

“It’s been two years since my brother was murdered, and yet, here you are. Still tending to the horse, just as you did in Târgoviște.”

Dumitru does not turn. There is nothing to see that he does not already know. The measured cadence, the deliberate choice of words — the distance laced with precision, a statement that is not a question but still demands an answer. Mircea’s way of speaking. A familiar ghost in an unfamiliar voice.

“Some things don’t seem to change,” he adds as an afterthought.

Dumitru’s hand stills, just for a moment, the grip on the brush tightening.

“And some things do,” he replies, refusing to look back. “Târgoviște is far behind me.”

“Is it?”

Stillness folds itself around them again. He brushes, back, forth, the movement steady, though his pulse betrays him. The beat is too quick, the rhythm too sharp. He does not see the almost imperceptible tilt of Vlad’s head, but he feels the scrutiny. The green eyes slice through the darkness like twin serpents, moving left to right, right to left, mapping his every movement.

Vlad takes a step forward, his voice closer now as he implores, “Tell me something. Did you leave Wallachia because you no longer cared for it? Or because it became too dangerous to stay?”

He should laugh. He should say something easy and unremarkable, let the words slip through his fingers like grain through a mill, ground into nothing. The accusation cuts too deep, and he takes the bait like a starving dog snapping at a bone.

“Does it matter?” he says, instantly despising the sharpened edge in his voice.

“It does.” Vlad stands beside him, close enough that Dumitru catches the scent of leather and spices. “Danger never truly leaves men like us. We don’t outrun it. How long do you think before the wars around us shift again?”

“Yet here you are, chasing ghosts.”

“Not ghosts. Strength.”

A sigh escapes from Vlad’s lips — short, sharp, a brief inconvenience, the sound of a man unused to patience but having to taste it all the same. “I will return to Wallachia. Whether it takes a year or ten, I will. And when I do, those who stood beside me from the beginning will be remembered.”

So that is what he tells himself at night, curled against the bones of his exile. That his name will outlast the cold. That the waiting is only a pause, not an ending.

Dumitru studies him, the sharp lines of a face that has not yet learned the patience of rulers. He has misjudged him; he is not like his brother. Mircea had that patience, the steady breath of a man who knew how to make the world lean in his direction. But this youth — Mircea’s brother, Mircea’s heir in all the ways that will get him killed — has too much eagerness in his step. A warrior of the Drăculești, but not yet the statesman. And still, his eyes burn with the same hunger.

Dumitru’s gaze shifts, his lips lifting just slightly. “Let’s not circle the matter further. You’re here to ask for something.”

“Not to ask. To offer.”

“Do you have much to offer?”

“Not yet. But neither does the present voivode. Not truly.” Another pause follows. Vlad’s words coil between them. “The throne doesn’t belong to whoever sits on it. It belongs to the one strong enough to hold it.”

Hold it. Hold it.

Dumitru watches him, searching for any crack in the steel mask, any glimpse of the man behind the fire. These words are not new. He has heard them before — from lips now silent, from men now in their graves. He remains quiet, releasing only a slow breath. His fingers tap once against the brush, a brief, fleeting motion, then still.

“The boyars keep playing their games. They shuffle rulers like dice, wager on the one who will keep their coffers full. Such is the state of our land today. And like us, everyone else becomes another piece to be moved across the board.”

“The boyars hold the purse strings, the armies, the influence,” Dumitru leans forward, voice sharpening. “What do you hold?”

“A cause. A name that still commands loyalty in the right places. And a will that doesn’t break.”

Dumitru weighs him for a moment, contemplates. The game is an old one. Testing for weakness, for resolve. He does not say no. But he does not say yes.

And Vlad, damn him, smiles. “You think you left the game, but you didn’t. You merely stepped off the board. That doesn’t mean the game stopped moving around you.”

Dumitru’s fingers tense, a flicker of motion as the brush slips from his grasp, striking the rim of the wooden bucket with a dull sound. A tremor vanishes into stillness. He exhales through his nose, masking the shape of his thoughts beneath a practised veil of indifference. His hand betrays him, though. It drifts to his knee, pressing there, smoothing over fabric as if rubbing out a stain, as if the act alone could erase what has already passed through him — restraint, irritation, edges he does not care to name.

“And where do you see me on this board, Drăculea?”

“Not as a pawn. You never were one. But you also know that men like us don’t get the privilege of standing still. We choose a side, or the tide chooses for us.”

“Which tide dragged you here?”

Something fractures in his composure. The vibrant green of his eyes darkens, sharpens. When he opens his mouth to speak — low, steady — Dumitru hears a faint crack beneath the words, raw and wrenched from him against his will. “The one that murdered my family. And the one that will return me to my throne.”

“You speak as though it is already yours.”

“It used to be.” A breath, a heartbeat. “It will be again. The question is whether you will stand beside me when it happens, or watch from the sidelines while lesser men carve up what belongs to you.”

He does not want to react, does not want to let the words dig into him the way they are meant to. But Vlad presses forward, and the air shifts around him the moment he speaks again, “You were my brother’s closest friend. You fought beside him because you believed in the land he wanted to build. Did that belief die with him?”

“Belief doesn’t die,” he says warily. His eyes meet Vlad’s, unblinking, and for a moment, there is nothing between them but the knowledge of all they have lost. “But men do. And I’ve buried enough of them to know that belief alone isn’t enough.”

“But Mircea never doubted you, and neither will I.”

The sound of steps coming from the entrance is soft, barely more than the shift of breeze through leaves, but it stops him. Stops Vlad, too, mouth still open, words half-formed and dying on his tongue, a thought broken before it can land. They turn as one, heads snapping toward the movement, the quiet intrusion disrupting the conversation. Dumitru catches the fracture of light first — the long braid, dark but laced with copper where the sun reaches it and weaves itself through it as if fire sleeps within the strands. Cătălina stands at the threshold, her eyes flick between them, wide and unreadable. Her hand is pressed flat against the gate and searching the rough wood for meaning — a sign, a warning, an escape.

She hesitates. He does not.

Because of course, his little sister has come to care for him again. She always does. She does not know how to keep her comforts to herself, how to let warmth exist in her hands without offering a piece of it to him. She cannot bear to feast while he lingers in half-shadows and horse sweat, amid the steady rhythm of hooves and the rough scent of damp hay, tending to creatures that demand nothing but patience. She refuses to acknowledge that he prefers it this way. Odd, he thinks to himself, for she too finds solace in the quiet existence of a lone soul who keeps their hands busy so their mind does not wander.

His smile is slow, meant to undo the moment before it can settle into unease. He moves his hand in a small, wordless invitation, and Cătălina steps forward. As she passes with a basket held lightly against her hip, she lowers her eyes, her voice barely more than a murmur as she greets Vlad. She places the basket down on a wooden plank and begins to unwrap its offerings with gentle, practised hands. The cloth pulls away, releasing the scent of warm bread, of onions so sharp he can already taste them, of telemea fresh enough that he can already taste the briny cheese on his tongue.

The air is thick with it. His stomach growls in agreement. His hands slide over his coat in an impatient, eager gesture as he steps forward—

“When others turned away, he looked to you for counsel.”

The words do not fall. They land. They strike. Dumitru stills, a breath held but not yet exhaled.

“And even when our enemies were sharpening their knives, even when he saw what was coming, he never thought you’d be among the ones to leave.”

The air grows heavy as the past closes in. Vlad has done what he meant to do. He dug his fingers into the wound, found the raw place where remembrances and present times blur. Something lingers at the edges of memory, pressing against the surface, waiting to be named. History reaches out with its skeletal hands and drags him back, back to the day the tide turned red, back to the screams, the fire, the bodies sprawled across the cold stone like broken puppets.

Shame seeps in, slow and deep, winding through his chest like venom. He cannot look at Vlad. Not at first. The weight of it presses against his ribs. Only after a moment does he turn his head slightly, voice rough. “Mircea was wrong about many things.”

“No, Dumitru. He never was.”

His hands tighten into fists against his thighs, knuckles whitening.

Dumitru buried more than a past.

He buried bodies, countless corpses of those he once called comrades. The weight of them, the warmth fading, the smell of iron thick in his throat. He buried the sound of their voices, their oaths — words once solid, now dust sifting through his fingers. He buried names and carved them deep inside himself where no one could see, where they could not be touched, where they could not be used. Let them rest in peace.

And his family — he buried them too, both in earth and in silence, in the empty space where they once stood. He buried his sister’s sobs and shame in the hollow of his ribs, buried the suffering in her eyes when they tore everything from them, buried the knowledge that his name had been the blade at her throat. Prestige, honour. Hollow things, poisoned things. He cut them from himself like rot, walked away before they could finish the work of unmaking him.

And now Vlad stands before him, hands empty but heavy with something worse than steel. A call to dig, to unearth what he swore he would leave buried, to press his hands into the dirt once more. Dumitru does not dig up graves lightly.

His jaw tenses, the muscle jumping, but then he laughs, short and bitter, the sound torn from his throat like something rusted and broken. “You think it’s so simple, don’t you?” his voice is edged now, cutting at the quiet. “That a man can step back into a life he buried, into wars he barely survived. That there is always a choice.”

“Then let the past stay buried if you need it to be. I ask you to decide if you will have a hand in shaping the future.”

“And what happens to men who throw their lot in with a future that never comes?” her voice cuts through the silence, unexpected in its calmness.

No…

Dumitru stiffens. He closes his eyes briefly, inhaling through his nose, steadying himself, contain it, contain it — but it does nothing to cool the irritation creeping up his spine. She should not be speaking. Not like this. Not to him. This is not her war, not her burden to carry, and yet here she is, stepping into it as if it were nothing more than a conversation over supper. He looks at her, but she is unreadable, her expression composed, as if the words she just spoke were the simplest thing in the world.

And then— Vlad.

Dumitru watches him shift, watches the flicker of amusement curve the corner of his mouth, the slow, purposeful way his gaze settles on her. Not dismissing. Not indulging. Considering. He studies her like one might study the sky before a storm, intrigued by the shape of the clouds, the weight of the air. A quiet kind of assessment. A careful sort of interest. And when he finally speaks, Dumitru already knows — this conversation will not go the way he wants it to.

“I suppose that depends on the man.”

Before the moment collapses in on itself, before the air turns too sharp, Dumitru sighs and lifts his hand — a silent truce, an apology without words — before his fingers close around her arm, firmer than intended. He pulls and steps aside, placing a purposeful distance between her and Vlad. Not even a shadow of discomfort crosses her stony face. She does not even give him the grace of a breath before she turns on him, does not hesitate before she strikes.

“A wise man doesn’t gamble with his life twice,” she does not raise her voice, but it hisses through the air with precision, loud enough for Vlad to hear.

“Cătălina, this is not a conversation for you.”

“No, but I can’t bear to see you fight a battle you don’t need to.” The dark eyes pierce through him, searching, unrelenting in how she stands her ground. Her voice stays calm even when her breath does not. “Don’t let duty bind you to a cause before you’ve measured its cost.”

“But that isn’t your choice to make.” His grip softens, the tension easing into something gentler. And then, he lowers his voice, almost a breath against the charged air between them, “Don’t make it your struggle.”

Something flickers in her eyes, but before she can press—

Laughter.

A sudden break in the tension. Shocking, effortless, infuriating.

The sound of it twists through Dumitru’s ribs — something he does not know how to name. He turns his head just in time to see Vlad lift his hands, palms up, surrendering to the moment as if it has all unfolded to his liking. It should make him pull back, harden him against whatever still ties them together, but instead, he feels relief. A breath he did not realise he was holding slips from his lungs before he can stop it.

Because for all his resistance, for all his caution, there is something terrifyingly easy about being in the Drăculești’s orbit again.

“I don’t ask you to swear yourself to me today. I ask only this — think,” Vlad says at last and turns away, stepping toward the gate and into the cold morning air curling around him. He reaches the threshold but pauses, casting one last glance over his shoulder. The smirk is there again, that insufferable curve of knowing. “Though I have a feeling you won’t need much time for that.”

And then he is gone, swallowed by the light, leaving only the echoes of his words behind.

Dumitru watches the space where he has now stood, where his presence still lingers like an afterimage. Watches, but does not move. Beside him, Cătălina does the same.

She is the first to turn away. Her braid slides off her shoulder, and the motion speaks more insistently than any words could. That is her dismissal, a quiet conclusion to a conversation she has already decided is over.

Not a word falls from Cătălina’s lips. Not a flicker of agitation mars her face. He discerns no trace of the tension that has thickened the air between them. She moves with quiet certainty, and he watches her return to the makeshift table and reach into the basket. The knife glints in the dull light as she sets to work — slicing bread, dividing cheese. Even, precise. Every movement is measured, as if she were cutting away the moment along with the crust.

And then nothing. She does not take a single bite.

She prepares it all for him.

As Dumitru scrutinises the serenity with which she places the simple meal before him, that old unease slithers back, a thing without shape, without name, but felt deep in his bones. It takes hold whenever he looks at her now, whenever he remembers the girl she used to be and cannot reconcile her with the woman before him. Because she was always there. There, in the earliest days he can remember, her presence as inevitable as breath, as certain as the ground beneath him. He does not know what life without her at his side even looked like in the beginning — cannot imagine a world where she was not reaching for him, laughing at him, pulling him into whatever mischievous notion had sparked in her mind. And yet, here she stands, familiar but foreign, a presence that should be steady but is not. Time has stolen her from him and returned someone he does not recognise.

Because how is it possible? How is it possible that one moment, she is all soft hesitations, downcast lashes — and the next, she is this? Ice. Hard. Distant. Beyond reach, like a wall where there should be a door. She can shed emotion as easily as a snake sheds its skin — she steps out of it, untouched, unsentimental. He has always known her to be strong-willed, but this is different. This is new. Maturity has uncovered something else in her, steel-boned and sharp-edged, a kind of certainty that does not yield even in the quietest moments. A will that bends for no one.

Their father would have known how to curb it. Their father always knew how to temper her and guide her without breaking her. But he is not their father. And the more he tries to shield her, to soften the world before it can wound her, the more she pulls away, like protection itself is a shackle she refuses to bear. That stirs something bitter in him, tangled and raw. Because if she will not be protected, then what is left for him to do?

Love and resentment knot together in his ribs, indistinguishable and inseparable, as he steps forward and takes the food she has laid before him, fingers closing over the bread and cheese in a gesture that feels too much like resignation.

“That was not your place,” he mutters, voice thick with food, indignation dulled by the weight of it in his mouth.

She does not look at him. Instead, her eyes bind themselves to her hands as she peels the skin from an onion.

“And yet, you were about to pledge yourself to a man with no army, no land, no crown.” When she finally lifts her gaze, she tilts her head, lips pursed in contemplation. Her countenance makes his grip tighten. “What exactly were you agreeing to?”

“A future.”

“A future built on… what?” she scoffs. “His word? You should have made him offer something real.”

“He has nothing to give yet, Cătălina.”

“Exactly. And if he fails, what happens to you? We already gave everything to his family once!”

That is when she finally cracks — though he cannot decide if he is grateful or wary of it. Her eyes flash with anger, her hand slicing through the air as if she could carve out the truth with her fingernail. As if the force of her voice alone could draw blood.

“And his family showed us great generosity in return,” he reminds her, voice tight. “You’d do well to remember that.”

Her nostrils flare. And he understands.

Because they can both still hear their father’s voice, steady and loving even when the riders came to summon him. See their brothers standing tall, backs straight, eyes burning bright with faith in the cause. They all went willingly. None returned alive to them. Not one.

And no amount of loyalty, no promise of futures, no lands or titles could ever bring them back.

“If I ask for something now, he will see me as another self-seeker,” Dumitru props himself against the plank, then adds more softly, almost to himself, “I need to earn his trust first.”

“And what if he never earns yours?”

The words strike between them like a knife driven into the wood of the table. Dumitru does not answer. He does not shift, does not lift his gaze, does not let even a flicker of doubt betray him. Something stirs within him, in places he dares not examine even in his own mind.

And then he shakes his head. Dismissal. Refusal. He reaches for the peeled onion. The cool, wet surface presses against his palm. He turns and walks away. Each step pulls him further from the look in her eyes and the lingering thread of words dangerously close to understanding.

“Politics are not meant for women, little one. Don’t meddle in such matters.”

later that day

The torchlight spits and flickers in the sconces, the flames carving restless shapes against the stone. Vlad waits. Back against the wall, one boot pressed to the cold stone, arms loose at his sides in a feigned ease that does nothing to settle the storm in his chest. Shadows coil at his feet and stretch long across the corridor. He is patient. He has always known how to will himself into patience, unnatural though that virtue may be for him. But tonight, it grates against him. He does not like this feeling — this not knowing, this subtle uncertainty that lodges beneath his skin and refuses to dislodge.

She has been avoiding him. Deliberately. He has seen it in the flicker of her eyes, the way they skim past him without landing, in the ease with which she folds herself into the noise of others, grasping at any conversation, no matter how tedious, so long as it offers her an escape. An escape from him. It is calculated.

He should not be here. Damn his curiosity. He should not care. This is about strategy — nothing more. She is a question that needs answering — nothing more. He needs a cause to press, an argument to dismantle, something sharp-edged and logical so he can rip it apart with reason and leave it at his feet. Because if he does not — if he allows himself to think beyond the question, beyond the hesitation in her gaze, beyond the sharpness of her mouth when she speaks — he might have to admit something to himself. And he is not ready for that, not yet.

It is easier to think of duty. To remind himself that her family’s service has always been at the Drăculești’s side. Were it not for my family’s goodwill, what would be of yours today? The thought rises, and he is quick to swallow it down and crush it before it takes form. It is a petty thing, a hideous thing, the kind of reasoning he despises in others. And he is no extortionist. He does not wish to drag capable men into loyalty with chains; he wants them to choose to stand beside him. That is what separates him from the others, from those who think gold can buy loyalty, who think swords can be wielded without a cause to sharpen them.

And yet, she resists. She defies. And he wants to know.

That is all this is. That is all this is.

He hears the doors open, the shift of weight against stone, the soft rustle of fabric and laughter filling the corridor. He straightens, pulse steady, breath measured.

This time, she will not escape him.

“You spoke well today. You might have convinced a lesser man.”

His voice cuts through the corridor’s warmth. She is still smiling, her arm linked through Maria’s, but the change is instant. He sees it, the way the light in her eyes does not fade but withdraws, like a door closing just before he can cross the threshold. A shift so subtle, another man might mistake it for nothing at all.

She draws the line. Don’t you dare.

She does not say it. She does not need to.

He pushes himself off the wall and watches, drinks in the slight tension in her fingers, the way she holds Maria’s sleeve tighter than necessary. Her gaze slides away from him. To look would be to acknowledge, and to acknowledge would be to engage. A mistake. She should have known he would catch it, how her eyes drop to her feet, her throat works around a swallow she does not take.

He moves, not enough to block her path. Just enough to slow her. Just enough to remind her that escape is an illusion. Maria is the first to stop. The careful, curious flicker of her gaze misses little. She does not ask anything.

His smile is easy when he bends to take Maria’s hand, bringing it to his lips. “Lady Maria, you look lovely as always.”

“Careful, jupân Vlad. I might start expecting compliments every time we meet.”

“Then I shall make sure never to disappoint you.”

She laughs, cheeks pink with warmth. But it is not Maria that his eyes seek. It is the one beside her, the one who has not spoken and stands poised but coiled, a bird prepared for flight. “Would you permit me to borrow your guardian angel for a moment?”

Maria hesitates, just long enough to decide whether or not to press for answers. “By all means,” she says at last, and then adds as she gently untangles her arm from Cătălina’s, “But if she returns with scandalous tales, I’ll hold you responsible.”

The corner of his mouth lifts. “Her virtue is safer than mine, I assure you.”

He feels Maria’s eyes linger a moment too long, as though she is waiting for something to unfold before her. Then she only inclines her head, stepping away with the measured grace of someone who chooses not to pry.

And just like that, Cătălina is alone with him.

She does not move, does not speak, only watches him with wide, wary eyes. A fleeting moment passes where it seems she might refuse outright or find some excuse to leave before he can say what he means to say. But he is already moving and gesturing toward the garden, toward the dark and the cold and the silence that will not protect her.

“Shall we?”

She hesitates — only for a breath — before stepping past him, through the doors, into the crisp night air. The ground is hard beneath their feet, frostbitten and brittle, the scent of winter clinging to the breath they inhale. The rose bushes stand bare, like skeletal fingers reaching for nothing, their beauty gutted by the season.

The wind catches her instantly, lifts the edge of her skirts and slips its claws into the gaps between fabric and skin. Before she can pretend she does not feel it, he slides his coat from his shoulders and wraps it around her, heavy with warmth and the scent of him. The fur collar brushes against her cheek and hides her face from the bite of the evening, but not from him.

He extends his arm and watches the hesitation in her hand. Because some part of her still clings to formality and pretence, she rests her fingers against his sleeve, light as breath, as though she can place a boundary where there is none.

He does not let her. His words are hardly formal.

“I expected defiance,” his voice is low, edged with something unreadable. “I didn’t expect you to make it so public.”

Her fingers tense against his arm. A heartbeat, a breath, a war fought in silence.

This time, she does not look away. “Would you have listened if I had kept it private?”

“Do you assume I listen better when challenged in front of others?”

“I assume you’re a man who weighs options differently, depending on when and where they’re given.”

“And still, you spoke against me.”

“I spoke for my brother.”

The rush of emotion spilling from her lips catches him off guard, discordant against the stillness of her face. He stops. The motion is sudden, and she feels it before she reacts. The tug of his arm shifts her forward slightly. Her fingers slip from his sleeve, the heat of him dissipating quickly, and then her fingers ghost over the embroidery on his coat before retreating to herself. It is a gesture so measured, so deliberately serene, that it irritates him. He watches, and she knows he watches because the scrutiny in his gaze is relentless, not just at her hand but at the shape of her silence, the way she holds herself together as if careful not to let anything spill.

His voice is quiet and unnatural in its restraint when he finally says, “I offer him a future. Why do you wish to see him refuse it?”

She exhales slowly, the night swallowing the small cloud of her breath. She folds her hands in front of her like a person composing themselves before stepping into a fire. “With all respect, my lord—”

“Which is none—”

“—futures are built on foundations. Some of us have seen what happens when those foundations crumble.”

Not enough. She sees it in the way his brow shifts, the subtle lift, the unspoken command that he does not even need to voice. Say more. Say all of it. She yields to it, though not with obedience.

“Dumitru and I did not come here for ambition. We came because it was necessary. He built a life here, earned his place. He may not hold a noble title, but his work is honest and his position steady. I have my own place at court. We didn’t take anything. We earned it. For that reason, I wish to see him consider the weight of what he is being asked to take on.”

It is not open defiance. Not exactly. She does not say no. But she does not say yes. It is not the blunt force of refusal, nor the pliance of submission — she walks the fine edge between them, gives him nothing to strike against, nothing to dismantle. It is a skill he recognises, admires even, because it is one he does not possess.

“Ah, so this is your answer. Security over loyalty,” he says.

“No. Pragmatism over promises.”

The words that leave her mouth are straightforward, stripped of excess. He is surprised — not by emotion, but by the immediate lack of it. There is a clarity to her reasoning, sharp as winter frost. Her voice holds not a whisper of hesitation, and that, more than anything else, unsettles him.

She does not move. Does not blink. He exhales sharply — a sound caught between a scoff and an amused laugh — and there is an edge beneath it. “You’re still careful with your words, Cătălina. You don’t refuse outright. You don’t tell me to leave him be.” A pause, the faintest narrowing of his eyes. “So what is it you want?”

A flicker of something close to amusement stirs at the corner of her mouth, too measured to be mistaken for warmth and so slight, it barely lingers before vanishing altogether. It does not reach her eyes. “Why do you assume I want something, my lord?”

“All people want something.”

“Perhaps. But wanting and taking are not the same.”

He watches her unrelentingly. The way she holds herself, the way she does not fidget, does not break her silence except on her own terms. But silence, even wielded with skill, has weight. It presses and demands, and after a moment, Cătălina sighs.

“Would you prefer my honesty? Or shall I maintain decorum?”

Vlad’s answer is immediate. “Honesty, of course.”

“I have lost too many to your family.” There is no softness in her words, no embellishment, only the cold, hard weight of fact. “They fought for yours, they died for yours. Father massacred in Giurgiu, one brother killed in Varna, another butchered in front of my eyes by Albu’s men—”

“Albu? Cel Mare?” His voice is different now — not disbelief, but something close to it.

Dumitru has never spoken of this.

“After Vlad Vodă was murdered, many of the Drăculești’s allies met the same fate. They tried to dispose of everyone. Entire families vanished.” She shakes her head, and something flashes in her eyes. Not grief. Rage. The raw edge of a wound that has never closed. “It was no coincidence that Albu suddenly amassed greater wealth and estates all over the country. The rumours reached even the Moldavian court.”

“I need proof, not rumours.”

She tenses. He sees the tightening of her jaw, a shudder in her breath that she tries to smother. The crack of her teeth grinding is small, but it is there. “Well, I wouldn’t be surprised if you found one of Albu’s men walking around Dâmbovița with teeth markings on his hand.”

“What in the devil does that mean?”

For a moment, her composure falters. The flicker of hesitation, the way her throat moves as she swallows words she has already let escape. He recognises it, this betrayal of the body, this split-second war between what should be hidden and what has already been revealed. A private thing, half-buried, dragged too close to the light.

But then, Cătălina sighs, long and slow, pressing it all back down, forcing herself into something steadier. “And now you come, asking my brother to throw himself back to it. For what? A hope? A future that may never come?”

She is watching him, waiting for a reaction. He gives her none and lets her continue instead.

“If he gives himself to you, he gives himself to the same fate as those before him. But honour doesn’t fill an empty chair at the table. It doesn’t comfort the mothers or sisters left behind.”

“Do you think me careless with the lives of my men? With the lives of their families?” his voice lands between them, and she accepts them as if they were placed in her hands.

“No. You understand loss too well to dismiss it so easily. But you are asking for something I cannot replace.” Her fingers move without thought, folding, unfolding, as if memory lived in their joints, in the creases of her skin. “My father and brothers gave their lives for your family. I only ask that my brother’s life be given the value they never lived to see. And if you expect men to follow you, my lord, you would do well to give them something worth following.”

Vlad exhales, and something unsettled lingers at the base of his throat. There is an urge to answer and crush the words into convenience, but he does not. He lets the silence stretch as they walk through the darkness, watching as the torchlights at the doors flicker restlessly against the stone. He turns his head slightly, enough to catch the edge of Cătălina’s profile in the dim light. Shadows coil at the edges of her figure, shifting as she moves, as though the darkness itself cannot decide how to hold her.

He draws breath, lets it settle. “You are bold, for a woman who wants to avoid battles.”

“I don’t avoid battles. I only choose the ones worth fighting.”

“Except you misunderstand one important thing, warrior lady.”

She tilts her head, barely, waiting. “And what would it be?”

“You think men align themselves with a ruler only when the throne is already beneath him. But that’s not how power is gained.”

Something shifts in her stillness, a current beneath frozen waters, as she absorbs his words.

“By the time a man has everything to offer, he no longer needs to offer anything at all. The seats have been taken. The favours given. Those who waited for certainty will find themselves with nothing.” His voice softens then, the harsh edge melting away. “Your brother is a practical man. And practical men know that to reap a reward, they must first take the risk.”

“But how many have risked and gained nothing? He will stake his life on a cause that may never bear fruit.”

His fingers twitch at his sides, restless, an impulse half-formed before he tamps it down. He exhales sharply, his breath cutting short, and when he speaks again, his voice is threaded with the frustration he no longer bothers to conceal.

“And what is the alternative? To let him sit and wait until the choice is no longer his to make?” Sudden, unguarded, restraint slipping through his grasp before he can catch it, Vlad moves, just close enough that she has no choice but to hold his gaze and meet the force of his words head-on. “Do you truly think Moldavia will shelter him forever? That war will never touch these lands? That his future — your future — will not be dictated by others if he doesn’t act first?”

He is watching her too closely now, waiting — not just for her words, but for the shift in her breath, a flicker in her gaze, any sign that she understands. And he knows that she does, because she, of all people, must understand what it means when others decide one’s fate before one does. The wind stirs again, a restless thing, curling around them like an impatient witness.

“Your brother hesitates because he fears losing what little security he has. But I tell you this, as one who shares your position,” his voice drops lower, softer, but the weight remains. “There is no security in exile. Only borrowed time.”

There is no gentleness in her. Only thought, calculation, the slow turning of the wheels behind those dark eyes. She has heard him. He can see it in the way her fingers trail absently along the sleeve of his coat, steadying herself against the truth he has laid bare.

“But you already know that, don’t you?”

She does not answer immediately, and so he watches her turn her head slightly, notices the moment the truth settles in her bones. He sees it in the way she does not argue, in the way she retreats into the quiet chambers of her mind where truths are examined, dissected, accepted. He has pressed where it matters, touched something that was already there long before he gave it shape in words. She cannot unhear what she has always known.

“You speak well. I imagine it is why men follow you,” she says at last, and her eyes lift to his, unreadable. “But words do not shield men from the sword.”

Something about the way she says it makes him tilt his head, intrigued. “No. But they guide the hand that wields it.”

Her breath hitches, and then she tilts her chin, looking up to the darkened sky, as if the stars might offer an answer he has not already given. She finds none. When her gaze returns to him, he knows that she has already lost this argument. He turns and begins to guide her back toward the doors, toward the promise of warmth and away from the tension that knots itself between them.

With half amusement and half challenge, she tilts her head as her fingers find his extended shoulder again. “Then let us hope, for your sake, that your hand never falters.”

He stays quiet for a beat, then laughs, short and surprised. A disbelieving shake of his head follows.

“You are an obstinate woman.”

“One of my virtues. Someone here has to think reasonably.”

“You’re bold to question me like this. Most would hold their tongue.”

She finally smiles, a slow, knowing thing. “Most don’t care enough to speak, my lord.”

He stops, considers her for a moment longer than he should. She is infuriating, this woman. Sharp-edged, unyielding, but there is something in the way she looks at him — challenging, unwavering, not with fear but with something far more dangerous. Understanding.

“Vlad,” he says, the space between them narrowing with the weight of his own insistence.

She freezes mid-motion while shrugging off the heavy coat, blinking with hesitation. “Pardon?”

“Now that you’ve chastised me like a child, you may as well address me by my name.”

He takes his coat from her hands with a smile, draping it over his forearm as her dark orbs probe his face for answers. He inclines his head in farewell and turns away, but the moment does not pass as cleanly as it should. Leaving her at the doors, he feels Cătălina’s eyes on his back, a presence that lingers even as he moves away. He does not turn back. He walks, because that is what is left to do. The imprint of her remains.

He misjudged her. Again. He feels it now, that irrevocable shift. This was not a misstep but a failure of sight, of understanding. He thought — assumed, in that quiet conceit he mistook for certainty — that she was a timid thing.

There is nothing timid about Cătălina. This woman is a fire personified, and God help the man who thinks he can hold her without scorching his hands.

Once again, thank you so much for reading this work! ❤️ These days have been particularly challenging, and finishing this chapter after quite a long time of sitting on it and letting dust settle over it has filled me with great joy. I hope it brings some of that joy to your day, too!

This chapter is very dear and important to me as it deepens Cătălina’s story and introduces a very formative part of her life that will be mentioned in the future as well. Dumitru also finally makes a more significant appearance, and it was pleasant to see the siblings come to life a bit more. Crafting this part of Cătălina’s character was also very important to me as I wanted to shed some light not only on the life of these great rulers but also on “ordinary” soldiers and people whose lives were affected by the politics of those days. It is not my intention to criticise these historical figures and historical standards, I simply wanted to consider the other side as well and see how it affected these men’s subjects as well. Cătălina’s family — like many other families of those times — was caught up in the violence of the place and times.

And now, let’s look at the facts and figures!

Dumitru is a purely fictional character crafted only for the purpose of Cătălina’s (but also my version of Vlad’s) story. The idea for his name came from a letter sent by Vlad Drăculea to Brașov on December 8, 1458, in which he mentions that, “our man Dumitru bought some steel, and he bought it fairly, but you did not let him bring the steel back with him”. We don’t really know who this Dumitru was (I believe it could have been a merchant or perhaps someone from Vlad’s delegation, given that the steel was supposed to be delivered to Vlad), I simply thought it would be nice to expand on this name and give him some solidity, a story to own. From this mention, Cătălina’s elder brother came into existence. His history might be quite obvious in this chapter, but fear not, more details shall follow in the upcoming works.

Telemea is a type of Romanian cheese traditionally made of sheep’s milk. It is a soft, crumbly, briny cheese similar to Greek feta or Bulgarian sirene.

Two armed conflicts play a very grim role in Cătălina’s family’s history: the Battle of Varna in November 1444, and the Battle of Giurgiu in September 1445. The Battle of Varna (1444) was a decisive clash between the Christian forces of the Hungarian-led Crusade of Varna and the Ottoman Empire. King Władysław III of Poland and Hungary, alongside John Hunyadi, led a campaign to push back Ottoman expansion but suffered a catastrophic defeat when Władysław was killed which left European countries vulnerable. Vlad Dracul (Vlad’s father) was essentially forced into participation by Hunyadi, and the Wallachian troops were eventually led by Mircea (Vlad’s elder brother), his eldest son and co-ruler. This almost led to the deaths of Vlad and Radu who were at that time held as hostages in the Ottoman Empire. The Battle of Giurgiu (1445) was part of the Christian counteroffensive comprised of Wallachian and Burgundian (and more or less Hungarian as well) troops during which Vlad Dracul and Mircea successfully captured the Danube fortress of Giurgiu from the Ottomans. As with every battle, this one took people’s lives as well.

#vlad dracula #vlad drăculea #vlad tepes #vlad țepeș #vlad the impaler #cătălina costescu #dumitru costescu #historical fiction

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