70

If I had learned one thing from the stories, it was that work begat work, and tasks begat more tasks.

I had traveled the world, seen a witch removed from her throne, and rescued my father; but Potomac was not saved yet.

Yu and Dr. Gold were occupied those first few days with stabilizing my father—getting him well enough to travel, so he could receive more advanced treatment elsewhere.

I slept and paced at his bedside. Torden brought me my meals, so I didn’t have to leave.

The night Daddy woke up, he asked to be taken to his bedroom balcony. I’d sat with him there as I had so, so many times as a child.

We had lost Momma. But we had one addition now.

I held Victoria, marveling at her pink toes, her funny little mouth that stretched and pinched like a rubber band. She had a full head of hair, soft and black as Alessandra’s.

The first night I’d arrived, I had stood over her crib, afraid even to look at her. Afraid I would hate her, as her mother had hated me. What if Alessandra had been right to fear me? What if sending me away was the safest course for her daughter?

But I shouldn’t have been afraid. I loved Victoria at once.

I’d looked at my sister down in her crib, clinging to a soft toy sheep, just three months old. And I knew that if anyone tried to hurt her, I would protect her. I would be a wolf so she could be a lamb.

My heart had swelled almost painfully in my chest as she burbled at me curiously, her green eyes so like mine and my father’s. I’d slept that night on the floor in front of her crib.

She was a squishy bundle in the crook of my arm now, grabbing at the ends of my hair and sticking them in her mouth. I indulged her.

“We’ve got an owl back here in the woods we might hear in a minute,” Daddy said, thumbing Victoria’s little fingers. “Nest of robins on the edge of the tree line. Family of foxes a few hundred yards out. I know we need to flush them out, but those little kits are just too sweet to watch.”

Yu thought, though nothing was certain, that Daddy would recover fully. Already, my father seemed less burdened, more engaged.

If I had gotten nothing else I wanted, I would still have called it a happy ending. Him and Victoria and me, here on the balcony. A family, whole and enough, despite it all.

“They hunted foxes in England,” I said after a moment. “I know they go after sheep and chickens, but I didn’t like it much.”

“I wouldn’t have, either.” Daddy shifted on his chaise, nudging me with his thin shoulder. His eyes were tired, but clear, and curious as I hadn’t seen them in a long time. “Tell me how it went, baby girl.” His brows arched. “You didn’t come back alone, I noticed.”

“Torden.” I smoothed Victoria’s hair again, my ring sparkling. “He’s Prins Torden. From Norge.”

“Was he the first one you met?”

“No,” I said slowly. “Bear was the first. But I should start at the beginning.”

Daddy took a bite of soup. It was pumpkin, made from the autumn’s harvest. Winter would be well upon us soon, and we needed to be ready.

But for now—before Daddy left, for heaven knew how long—I wanted to tell him my story.

I told him about the four courts I had visited. The boys I’d courted. The kings and tyrants I’d faced.

The Imperiya I’d helped topple, and the idea I had for Potomac’s future.

When I was done, Daddy squeezed my shoulder.

“I’m glad you’re home, Selah. I’m sorry I didn’t see sooner what she was doing.” He swallowed and took one of my sister’s tiny hands. “I was so wrong to let you go. I was afraid you’d hold it against Victoria, if I was fortunate enough to get you back.”

“Never.” I squeezed Victoria closer, as if to banish the idea. “She’s my family. And I’m glad to hear you say all that.” I paused. “But I’m also glad I went.”

“You are?” Daddy raised an eyebrow, surprised.

“I met and learned from people different from me. I fell in love, and I got to see a great wrong righted. And now I have a goal for our future.” I shook my head. “And—I saw the world, Daddy. I wouldn’t have missed any of it.”

Especially because you’re still here, I couldn’t say aloud. Everything is all right because you’re still here.

The owls began to hoot from the edge of the woods.

“Now,” Daddy said, shifting again. “Tell me about this idea of yours.”

Yu took Daddy to New York the next day. I went to Mass every single morning in his absence, lit every votive in the bank of candles in the church, prayed on my knees at Godmother Althea’s side.

And I worked from sunup to sundown to ensure that when he returned, healthy and whole, Potomac would be, too. Our coffers were empty, our government in chaos, our people uncertain. I began the slow job of rebuilding what had crumbled and decayed while Alessandra manipulated us.

I read into the wee hours of the night. Not only my fairy-tale book, but law books Bear and Yu sent me from England and Zhōng Guó—as well as a few about looking after babies. Victoria had two nannies, but I moved her nursery across the hall from my room and spent my nights walking her across the floor as I studied.

And when the morning came and the sun rose, I wrote letters until my hands ached, to my mother’s relatives in Savannah and to our neighbors, the Rappahannock tribe, to the zŏngtŏng and to England’s king, and to the Shield of the North and to the new government of Yotunkheym. I refreshed relationships with our friends and neighbors. I gathered as much wisdom as I could.

We held elections. Proper elections, with public debates and town meetings, where the people asked questions and received answers. Secretary Gidcumb was the only member of the old Council innocent of corruption and collusion with Alessandra; he became our new secretary of state, on our new Council, which did actual work. There were to be no more hangers-on in government.

We seeded every public field. I oversaw it myself.

I met with Alessandra only once, the day our new state barrister interrogated her in advance of her trial. She charged my stepmother to explain her deeds from their beginning. Alessandra admitted to recklessness with Potomac’s finances and to poisoning my father after blackmailing and manipulating Pugh (as she had Perrault).

“What about Peter?” I asked her suddenly, as Madam Turner, the barrister, finished her questions.

“What about him?” Alessandra’s voice was tinged with the same disbelief that had colored it the day I’d confronted her, as if she couldn’t truly believe she’d be met with consequences for what she’d done.

“Did you force him to decline my proposal?” I wasn’t sure why I asked; I had no reason to believe she’d give me a truthful answer.

Alessandra tipped her head back as if to think, exhaling through her nose. “I told the Janesleys I would audit their business if he accepted, and that something would be found. Does it matter?”

“Absolutely,” muttered Madam Turner, retrieving her ledger to make an additional note. I fought off an unexpected laugh.

“No,” I said. “Not really, it doesn’t.” I rose to go.

Alessandra clasped her hands, abruptly nervous. “Will you let me see Victoria?”

I frowned. “I love my sister. We won’t keep her from you. You’ll see her as often as the judge permits.” Alessandra met my eyes. Her own were troubled.

She didn’t trust me, or understand how I could love Victoria.

But her fear wasn’t my problem.

I didn’t see my stepmother again after that. I delivered my testimony in writing for her trial, and returned to work as they debated. I didn’t want to sway the outcome with my presence, and I had a life to get on with living. Alessandra had claimed enough of it already.

The morning the trial began, I sat at my writing desk, staring at the piles of correspondence and legal texts and baby books.

It was overwhelming.

I had come so far. I was so grateful to my friends, to my godmother, to Gidcumb—who I had learned was responsible for smuggling in my radio.

But I wanted—hoped—to do so much more.

I plunked my pen down, dipped my little finger in my pot of ink, and wrote my hopes down my left arm.

Happily

ever

after

We were so close to putting the past behind us, to the bright future that lay beyond all the fairy-tale endings.

A knock came at my door. “Come in,” I called idly.

I didn’t even have to turn. I knew his footsteps.

“Hi, sweetheart.” I wiped the ink from my finger.

Torden tried to squeeze onto my chair beside me, then stole my seat and lifted me onto his lap when he didn’t fit. “Art project, elskede?”

“Wishful thinking.” I gave a rueful laugh, a little of the old doubt creeping in. “I’m excited about my plan, but our funds are still low. Are people going to say I’m overspending, like Alessandra did?”

“Selah.” Torden turned my chin to face him. “You’ve done all you set out to do, and more. And this plan is going to take time. But it’s a good plan, and it is nothing like Alessandra’s wastefulness. Your Council approved it. After all you saw in the Imperiya, they see how important this is.”

He kissed me, and my very bones seemed to still, to steady.

How I loved this boy.

As he had done in Norge so many months before, Torden dipped his finger in the ink on the desk. In his own more angular writing, he wrote on my right arm the words I hadn’t been able to write myself.

And

they

all

lived

And we had.