SERENDIPITY
PROLOGUE
Delacourt Lylieve would do anything for his wife. Yes, he adored Celeste, loved her with every fibre of his being. She was a pretty young thing; golden hair and shimmering grey eyes, a fair countenance. She was truly lovely.
Celeste did not love Delacourt. She was wed to him when she was young, but fifteen summers. Her family needed the money, and he was a wealthy baron. He showered her with gifts and gold - fancy silk dresses, pearl combs, bejeweled barrettes, lacy shawls. She would smile half-heartedly, accept his chaste kiss, and return to her sulking. She only ever left her room on the uppermost floor of the house at mealtimes and to sit in her garden.
Celeste longed for more. She read and read, and dreamed desperately of leaving Summer's Garde and moving to Skyrim, or Valenwood, or even Elsewyr. Yet she was stuck, like the princess in the tower, gazing out at the world from her mullioned window.
Delacourt knew naught of his wife's wishes; in fact, Delacourt knew nothing about anything. He was a right fool, with his head in the clouds, ever the optimist. He did not know that in the streets of Summer's Garde a woman named Marina held a fierce passion for him. He did not know that Marina's love slowly turned her mad, knowing that Delacourt worshipped a woman who held no regard for him, when Marina loved him so vigourously. He did not know that Marina had called upon the unholy matron of the Dark Brotherhood and prayed desperately that he would suffer as she suffered, and thus they would fall deep, deeply in love.
And her prayers were heard, and delivered unto an assassin by the name of Lucien Lachance. Lucien arrived in Summer's Garde on a sparkling, dewey morning. Celeste Lylieve was gone by twilight.