Messages carried by the Het moved much faster than the couriers cio was used to. He could send a missive and have a reply in weeks rather than the months it had taken Saint Daven to make the journey. He wondered whether the Children of Day had set up a secret rey work within the kingdom.

  As promised, their messengers never failed to find him, even though, as autumn passed, Hazerial moved the court from Siu Rial to the warmer Siu al for the winter.

  The Autumnlight Festival left the Jewel of the Delta abuzz with gossip. A shimmeriiew beauty apahe Lord of Siu al on the High Stand. Every wagging tongue from the wh houses to the pace spoke of radiant skin inscribed turies before by Eketra with ruolen from Teikru, ruhat enhahe beauty’s abilities enough to drive even Josean mad with lust.

  This was the demigoddess Seleketra returo the earth. Anyone who doubted it only had to look into her eyes ahe light of the ghost city still shining in their depths.

  The Lord of Siu al had fought a battle to gaiherworldly attentions, setting aside his wife for the favor of eaining Seleketra in his bed, and sying his own son in a fit e when the young man had attempted to touch the demigoddess.

  “Wasn’t none of your fault, that,” Athalia said softly, f the horrified Pretty after the young man had died at her feet, hacked apart by his own father. “They do because of them, not you. I know it’s hard tet all that suffering now, but trust me, child, it’ll only add to Seleketra’s desirability.”

  As always, Athalia was right. ht, Seleketra’s became the most sought-after hand iy. Athalia’s guards became Seleketra’s guards. Dresses and jewels and flowers and gifts came for the demigoddess by the score. Athalia curated the beaus who were allowed to pursue her, and narrowed the number allowed to be seen with her to only the most powerful and advantageous.

  On the cusp of winter, however, the pace gossips’ talk of Seleketra gave way to a new arrival. The heir to the Kingdom of Night had been born in Mistfen.

  The boy breathed his first breath under Josean’s blessing, like his father, and rovisionally dubbed Reuel by his mother. The name he would eventually carry to the throne would be decided upon ter, when the prince made it back from the northern front.

  Pasiona’s i in hidden passages carried over to Mistfen only long enough for her son to be born. Upon the infant’s arrival, she lost all curiosity for the lives of others. Her world narrowed to the soft round face, feathery bck hair, and tiny ragged nails. Every trembling sigh was a new adventure. Every blink of his dark eyes wrung her heart.

  She couldn’t bear to let the nurses hold him, and when she was forced to present the newborn to King Hazerial and the mad queen, Pasion shivered inwardly, waking terrors assaulting her until she was able to escape back to the nursery with him.

  A week ter, a feast was held in celebration of the babe’s dedication to the strong gods, though he only attended for a brief few minutes. He was startled by the sudden noise of the musis starting up a rioting martial Josean anthem in his honor, and his mother whisked him away to safety once more.

  The guest of honor’s absence was hardly remarked upon, however. The attention of every nobleman and woman in attendance—Lord cio included—was fasteo the beautiful young womaed at the left hand of the mad queen.

  Princess Kelena.

  The girl was a softer bination of her sire’s arresting House Khi features and her mother’s strikiy, as pale as por, with dark eyes so deep they could swallow a man whole. Her long bck hair curled naturally intlets like the mad queen’s, but hers was noticeably er and devoid of the bone beads her mother favored.

  Kelena ughed and flirted with the young dandies, flowing gracefully through the steps of the dances as if she’d spent her life learning them. She gossiped with the noblewomen and their daughters and fawned over dresses and jewels and hair. Her smile never faltered, plemented by a pair of dimples pierg her fwless cheeks.

  If cio hadn’t remembered those wide eyes so clearly, he would have thought that the real princess had died and been repced by a bubbly young look-alike under everyone’s noses.

  Late in the day, when the younger revelers began to disappear together and the elderly nodded over their goblets, cio finally approached the miraculously returned princess.

  She sat with a pair of young noblewomen alongside the dance floor, tittering away and rubbing her ankles in exaggerated exhaustion.

  “Your lordship,” she said, fav him with a brilliant smile. “I’m afraid I’m forced to sit out this dance. I’m not used to this much exertion.”

  “Mattius isn’t here to dah you, you silly goose,” one hissed behind her hand, looking pointedly at cio’s walking stick.

  “Perhaps on a slower tune,” cio said. “My iion was to see whether you remembered me.”

  Kelena beamed. “Of course! I was such a child when we visited Bzing Prairie, but your residence was geous, Lord cio. The chamber you put me up in was so luxurious. Those windows! The sun shone in all day. I wish I had thanked you at the time. I’m so sorry I didn’t.”

  “No matter,” cio said. “Would you mind if I sat with you for a while?”

  The irls giggled again, but with a pyfully irritated look, Kelehem scampering back to their mothers.

  “Please, your lordship.” She gestured to a vacated seat.

  cio sat aed his palms on top of his walking stick. “It’s a surprise to see you here, Princess. Where have you been all this time?”

  “Studying under my mother and the priests. I wish I could have been at the ter of all this fabulous beauty, but unfortunately, I couldn’t spare the time. My instru was rather intensive.”

  “I recall.”

  Kelena ughed. “You must have thought I was such a stupid baby, g like that over nothing.”

  “g over men’s lives is nothing to be ashamed of.”

  “Mother tells me you’ve been following court all this time. How do you find court life, your lordship?”

  The assassin sprang first to mind. “At times, more exg than I expected.”

  “You must miss Bzing Prairie terribly.” She sighed. “I remember the stars out my window and the dark sky overhead most of all. No ghost city.”

  cio’s ears perked up at the wistful note in her voice.

  “I was raised hardly ever seeing one,” he said. “It feel oppressive at times, having those things hanging overhead everywhere you turn.”

  “Like the strong gods are pressing down on you from above,” the princess whispered. “Pushing the breath out of you. Pushing the life out of you.”

  Kelena caught him watg her and ughed gayly.

  “Of course, it must help that Bzing Prairie isn’t full of silly geese honking at you to dah them,” she said with merry self-deprecation. “I do apologize. I’m so stupid. I don’t think. You must be seriously residering yreement to marry me about now.”

  cio shook his head. “I wasn’t thinking about marriage at all, in fact. Five me for saying this, Princess, but you seem like a very different girl from the one I met two years ago.”

  Kelena looked out at the few couples still dang, wonder in her soft features. The false cheer slid away.

  “I’ve had dreams like this. The colors. The people. It’s all so wonderful.” She csped her hands in her p. The delicate knuckles were white. “Of course, in the dreams when I say something stupid, it all falls apart. So this must be real. Thank you for not—for not going when I was an idiot.”

  “It was really nothing. I’ve heard much worse.” cio felt strangely pelled to soothe her . The longer he talked to her, the more she seemed… thin. Like a ghost his hand would pass through or a curl of smoke about to drift apart. “In any case, we all say foolish things from time to time.”

  The previous song ended, and the musis began the final song, the signal for the revelers that the feast was over. The princess looked in the dire of the king’s table, her dark eyes settling on her mother. The queen smiled, revealing sharp yellow teeth.

  Kelena stood. “Thank you for speaking with me, Lord cio. I’ll remember it when I return to my studies. I’ll remember every word.”

  “Princess, about your studies—”

  “Will you—will you take this? So you’ll remember me, too?” She pressed a dark purple ribbon into his hand. Her fingers were like ice, her dark eyes pleading, almost frantic.

  “I—yes.” cio folded the ribbon over his thumb. “But before you go—”

  “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

  She swept a deep curtsey, then hurried away to her mother. She and the queehe feast, down the darkened corridor that led to Mistfen’s residences.

  cio watched the girl go. It would have been indecorous for a lord to run after a princess half his age, and even if it weren’t, he wasn’t running ahese days. They would be gone long before he mao lever himself out of the chair.

  ***

  As she led Kelena up the corridor, Jadarah petted the girl’s hair. The little nothing trembled all over, but she had aplished what she’d beeo do.

  Hazerial could talk of webs, but Jadarah didn’t need Eketra’s Thousand Strands. One well-pced trap would do the mad queen as well as a world of puppet strings.