61 He Found Us

Lyra couldn't sleep at all that night, filled with bothersome thoughts.  Everything about her engagement to Duke Kleo, which would be held in a month.  It's too soon, locking her in a new prison, though not a prison for the dead.

  'Even today he's starting to be mean to me,' she thought.  'I don't know if I should be happy or not.  I want to make him sick of me so that he soon lets me go.  But it turns out he ensnared me to make me suffer.'

  It was late, the moon did not appear that night, making the atmosphere seem pitch black.  Candles shimmered in the corners of the room, illuminating Lyra's figure lying on the bed.

  Her mind sank, thinking of various options for escape, again.  But she was too tired for that, exhausted to try and then fail.  Even though she had only tried to run away once, it felt like she had done so many times.