Madrid had been restless, but now—weeks after Harrow’s disappearance into the bowels of the Alcázar—the city exhaled like a man waking from a nightmare. The paranoia in the streets softened, though it never fully vanished. Spies still whispered, men still disappeared, but the sharp edge of fear dulled. A foreign spider had been caught, and with it, the city believed, the worst of the web had been burned away.
Lancelot knew better.
He stood in the courtyard of the safehouse in La Latina, sharpening a dagger on whetstone, listening to the scrape of steel over stone. Every report from London confirmed his suspicion: another would come. Yet a new certainty had begun to form in his chest, one that weighed as heavily as any blade. The war in shadows would never truly end. If he wished to preserve Spain, to secure her future, his struggle could not remain in taverns and cellars forever.
It had to move into the realm of kings.
For years, Lancelot had worn the guise of a shadow operative: a Spaniard without title, a leader of whispered resistance, a ghost to counter Britannia’s own. But his blood carried a weight greater than secrecy. He was not merely Lancelot the spy. He was Lancelot of Aragon, heir to a fractured crown. The fact was no longer avoidable. The Aragonese nobles whispered his name in court, testing it on their tongues like a wine too strong to drink.
Colonel Valdés himself had alluded to it one evening when they shared a rare glass of brandy.
"You play the shadows well," Valdés had said, "but shadows cannot rule. Spain is not secured by daggers in alleys, but by dynasties at altars. Your blood demands more than conspiracies, Señor."
The words stung because they were true.
The fall of Harrow had bought Spain breathing room, yes, but Britannia would not sleep. France still watched hungrily across the Pyrenees. And Castile itself, though bound to Aragon, seethed with factions. If Lancelot were to lead Spain into a future free of foreign domination, he would need more than steel and whispers. He would need alliances. He would need heirs.
He would need a wife.
The thought lingered with him long into the nights, when candlelight flickered against his maps. A wife. The word felt both alien and inevitable. In shadows, he trusted no one; in marriage, he would be asked to trust entirely. Yet kingship demanded it. His enemies would not rest, and the people would not rally to a bachelor prince forever.
Isandro noticed the change in him. One evening, as Lancelot studied reports of English activity in Lisbon, Isandro spoke bluntly.
"You stare at papers as if they will breed armies. Armies are bred from families, my lord. You need one."
Lancelot looked up sharply. "You call me lord now?"
Isandro shrugged. "It is what you are becoming. We fight with knives now, yes. But tomorrow? Tomorrow you will need banners, oaths, bloodlines. That requires a woman beside you."
The truth could no longer be dodged.
Whispers already circled among Spain’s nobles. Three names appeared most often.
Doña Isabella of Navarre, a distant cousin to Navarre’s king. Bright, learned, fluent in Latin and French. Such a match could strengthen ties in the north, creating a bulwark against French encroachment.
Lady Beatriz of Castile, daughter of a powerful Castilian duke. Fierce-tempered, rumored to ride and hunt as well as any man. Her dowry would be immense, and marriage to her might bind Castile’s fractious nobles tighter to Aragon.
Infanta Maria of Portugal, younger sister to Portugal’s heir. A union here could secure Spain’s western flank and perhaps even lay the foundations of an Iberian union.
Each was desirable in her way. Each carried risks.
Navarre was small, Portugal proud, Castile unstable. And each choice would shift the board not only in Spain but across Europe. Britannia, France, and the Empire would all watch closely.
Lancelot summoned his most trusted circle—Isandro, Father Alonso the Jesuit, and two Aragonese nobles who had aided him quietly during the struggle against Harrow. They met in the candlelit cellar, the same place false reports once had been forged to snare Britannia’s agents.
"This is no longer a question of daggers," Lancelot told them. "It is a question of crowns. The Englishman is broken. But to secure what we have gained, I must wed."
The Jesuit nodded gravely. "God blesses kingdoms through holy unions. Without heirs, without legitimacy, your enemies will wait you out. Better a wedding than a war."
Isandro grunted. "Sometimes they are the same."
The nobles argued, each pressing their preferred candidate. One favored Castile—"Without Castile, Aragon is a shadow." Another pressed Navarre—"We need northern strength against France." Only Father Alonso counseled Portugal, citing the possibility of an Iberian union under one banner.
Lancelot listened, silent, weighing each like a commander planning a campaign. It struck him then: he had fought Harrow in alleys and courtyards, but this battle—of marriage, alliance, dynasties—would prove no less perilous.
Even in his cell, Harrow’s presence haunted Lancelot. What would the Englishman think, knowing his enemy now debated brides instead of assassins? Perhaps Harrow would sneer that marriage was weakness, that the only true power came from shadows. But Harrow had fallen, precisely because he relied on shadows alone.
Lancelot muttered into the quiet: "A king cannot rule in secret forever."
Word spread swiftly, even before Lancelot spoke of it publicly. Madrid’s court buzzed with speculation. Poets composed verses, satirists whispered jokes, and painters dreamed of new portraits. Each noble family began to maneuver, sending gifts, letters, emissaries.
Lady Beatriz sent falcons and a saddle, hinting that she knew of Lancelot’s reputation as a horseman. Doña Isabella wrote a letter in flawless Latin, extolling the virtues of wisdom in rulers. Infanta Maria sent a gilded reliquary, a relic said to contain a saint’s bone, blessed by Lisbon’s archbishop.
Each gesture was a blade wrapped in silk. Content originally comes from Nov3lFɪre.ɴet
Colonel Valdés, ever watchful, counseled caution. "A wife can bind a kingdom—or divide it. Choose as you would choose your most trusted spy: carefully, knowing she may one day betray you."
For all his decisiveness in war, Lancelot found himself hesitant. Which mattered more—Castile’s power, Navarre’s safety, or Portugal’s union? He thought of Spain as a board, with each marriage a move that could either secure victory or invite defeat.
At night, he dreamed of Harrow’s mocking voice: Even spiders know where to weave their webs, Spaniard. Do you?
One dawn, sleepless and burdened, Lancelot walked through Madrid’s silent streets. He passed beggars, bakers, guards half-asleep at their posts. The city was fragile, like a patient barely recovering from fever. A wrong alliance could plunge it back into chaos. A right one could bind it into strength.
He stopped before a church, its bells tolling softly in the morning mist. A priest sweeping the steps looked up at him and said, without recognition: "The Lord does not always give us the choice we want. Only the one we need."
Lancelot bowed his head. Perhaps God spoke even through strangers.
By the time he returned to his safehouse, he had resolved himself. He would not delay. He would not wait for Britannia to send another Harrow, or for France to press another claim. Spain needed unity now.
He summoned Isandro. "Prepare messengers. We will open talks with Castile, Navarre, and Portugal—but not as a supplicant. As a prince. They must know: whoever weds me weds the future king of Aragon."
Isandro grinned. "At last, you wield a sharper blade than any dagger. Your blood."
As Madrid’s autumn gave way to the first breath of winter, preparations began. Envoys set out across mountains and rivers. Courts in Lisbon, Pamplona, and Toledo would soon hear the name of Lancelot spoken not as a shadow, but as a prince seeking alliance.
For the first time, the war of shadows faded. In its place loomed another kind of struggle—one fought in ballrooms, chapels, and bedchambers.
And as he sharpened his dagger one final time before setting it aside, Lancelot whispered:
"The next battle will not be in the dark. It will be under God’s light."
Madrid trembled once at the step of spies. Now it would tremble at the march of kings.
That night, as frost silvered the rooftops, Lancelot stood alone at his window, the city spread below him like a chessboard half-cleared of pieces. He felt the pull of two lives—the ghost in the alleys who had survived by daggers, and the prince whose future would be measured in crowns and heirs. He could not be both forever.
Somewhere beyond the mountains, in castles and courts he had yet to walk, women whispered his name, weighing its promise against its dangers. They saw not the shadow he had been, but the throne he would inherit. And in that unseen judgment, his fate was already forming.
Lancelot turned from the window, doused the lamp, and let darkness fall. The shadows had served him well, but now they were behind him. Ahead lay banners, vows, and the long, perilous road to kingship.