Ultimately, she decided to marry the king, but not for power or riches, and certainly not for love.

Clara married Caspian simply because she had the option, and the alternative would be to continue living her life always wondering what would have happened if she had said yes. Plus, what did she have to lose? She had no children, a job which was more stress than it was worth, and an unshakeable feeling that she was predestined for something more than a life as a wallflower.

Prior to meeting Caspian in a chance encounter on the day of his coronation, Clara's life had been frustratingly ordinary. Most people would have been satisfied with her life, she lived comfortably in most senses of the word. However, there had always existed in Clara a loneliness so profound that it encroached upon her heart as a steady ache in every moment of attempted relaxation.

So when this doting yet awkward monarch walked into her life and latched onto her like she were the answer to all of his prayers, she did not think to dwell on whether she could ever reciprocate his feelings. Nor did she consider that he was a newly crowned ruler of a nation on the brink of war.