Stardust.
That is the gift Beatriz’s mother has sent her, hidden away in the false bottom of a small bejeweled music box along with a note:
Your time has come. Hide it on Lord Savelle. When he is discovered with it, Cesare’s council will urge him to show mercy and send Savelle back to Temarin in order to avoid war. I trust you’ll be able to convince him otherwise. Act quickly, I would hate for you to be caught with it instead, my dove.
Beatriz can’t bring herself to be surprised, really. In the two days that have followed the gift’s arrival, she has realized this was, in many ways, inevitable. The empress wouldn’t have told Beatriz to get close to Lord Savelle without a reason, and there is no surer way to start a war than by executing a country’s ambassador.
Still, for two days Beatriz has skipped her routine of taking morning walks in the sea garden with Lord Savelle, knowing that every moment the stardust remains in her possession, her own life is at risk. Her mother threatened as much—and Beatriz has no illusions that the final line of her mother’s letter is anything but a threat. She tells herself she is hesitating so that she can think up a plan, that she is waiting for the right moment, but that isn’t the whole truth of it.
Today, though, Beatriz forces herself up with the sun. She makes her way out to the sea garden and finds it deserted, apart from one lone figure standing out amid the brightly colored water plants, his back to her and his hands buried in his pockets.
Beatriz approaches Lord Savelle, each step feeling heavier than the last. When she reaches the wet sand, she takes her shoes off, holding them in her hand as she walks the rest of the way.
“Ah, Princess,” Lord Savelle says, turning toward her and looking mildly surprised. “I thought you’d grown bored with me.”
“I could never,” Beatriz says with a smile. “But I’ve had trouble sleeping the last few nights and was in no mood for company this early.” It’s not entirely a lie. Since she read her mother’s letter two days ago, her thoughts have been keeping her up, though she hasn’t felt that strange restlessness again since the night before she was summoned by the king.
“I confess I’m glad. I was beginning to worry about you,” Lord Savelle tells her.
That makes Beatriz uncomfortable, though she can’t quite say why. She isn’t sure anyone has ever worried about her before. Her sisters, perhaps, but no more than she worries about them. She doubts her mother has worried about her, personally.
Lord Savelle turns his gaze to the horizon where the sun is just beginning to crest. “Many parts of Cellaria have lost their charm for me, you know—this alone never has.”
Beatriz stands beside him as they watch the sun rise in silence, casting the sky and sea in shades of oranges and pinks.
“I used to bring Fidelia out with me to watch the sunrise,” he tells her after a moment. Beatriz glances at him, frowning slightly. He’s mentioned Fidelia quite a bit on these walks, but he’s never told her that. “It was our ritual. She had trouble sleeping too,” he adds, looking at Beatriz. “Usually after this, she would manage to sleep—sometimes until noon, but I never had the heart to force her up earlier.”
“You were a good father,” Beatriz tells him. She might not have any experience with fathers, but she certainly can’t imagine going to her mother when she couldn’t sleep—Empress Margaraux prizes her eight hours of sleep above most things, her daughters included.
“I was, I suppose…until I wasn’t,” he says, his smile turning sad. “It’s a difficult thing, Princess, for a parent to be unable to protect their child.”
Beatriz is aware of the vial of stardust in her pocket. She knows what she needs to do—pretend to lose her footing and then, when he reaches out to steady her, drop the vial into his pocket. It can be done in a matter of seconds. But she is frozen in place.
“I don’t remember my father,” she tells him instead. “He died when I was only a few days old. Rumor has it that he never even held me, or my sisters, because he was so disappointed we weren’t sons.”
Lord Savelle looks at her, surprised. Beatriz is surprised at herself as well—those three sentences might just be more than she’s ever said about her father before.
“I don’t believe your daughter’s death was your fault,” she continues, glancing away and back toward the sun. “If there had been a way for you to protect her, I’m sure you would have found it.”
For a moment, Lord Savelle doesn’t say anything. Finally, he lets out a long breath. “Thank you, Princess.”
“I told you, call me Beatriz,” she says with a soft smile.
He smiles back but doesn’t acknowledge her words. “I received a letter from King Leopold last night,” he says. “Your sister is safe, but there was a riot in the city. The royal family was attacked by a mob of angry peasants.”
Beatriz looks at him in alarm. “But Sophronia is safe?” she repeats, echoing his words.
“She was struck in the back of the head with a stone, apparently. Here, such an injury could have been serious, but I’m told the royal empyrea used stardust to heal her quickly. She’s fine.”
“Thank the stars,” Beatriz murmurs.
“Tell me, Princess—” Lord Savelle begins.
“Beatriz,” she reminds him, but he only smiles before continuing.
“Do your sisters have difficulty sleeping at night as well?” he asks.
Beatriz blinks. “Sorry?” she asks.
“You said you had difficulty sleeping at night,” he reminds her. “I was wondering if your sisters were the same.”
“No,” Beatriz says after a moment. “Well, sometimes Sophronia, but she always says it’s because her mind feels too busy, even when she’s exhausted to her core. For me, it’s different. Night falls and I don’t feel tired at all, but sometimes I feel I could sleep an entire day away.”
“More often lately?” he presses.
Beatriz considers it. “I suppose so,” she says, forcing a laugh. “My body hasn’t quite adjusted to Cellaria yet—it’s bright out longer here, you know. There’s less night to sleep through.”
Lord Savelle makes a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat. “As I said, my daughter had similar troubles,” he says. “Will you come see me if it gets worse?”
Beatriz frowns. “Worse?” she asks.
“I used to have an herbal blend of tea made for Fidelia—perhaps it will help you as well,” he says with a shrug.
Beatriz’s frown deepens. “Why?” she asks before she can stop herself.
“Because I’d have hoped someone would have done it for her,” he says simply. “And because I believe your father would want someone to look after you.”
From everything Beatriz has heard about her father, she doesn’t believe that, but she can’t bring herself to correct him.
The palace’s clock tower begins to chime.
“Ah, I should be getting back,” Lord Savelle says. “I have a breakfast meeting with the king’s council to update them about Temarin’s affairs.”
He turns to start walking back to the castle, and Beatriz feels her chance slipping away.
“Wait!” she says.
He turns back toward her, eyebrows raised. He’s close enough that she can still do it, just as she planned—just a little stumble. He’ll catch her. She’ll slip the vial of stardust into his pocket. It should be easy.
But it isn’t. Suddenly, it feels like an impossible task.
“Thank you,” she says instead.
Lord Savelle gives her a quick nod before heading back toward the palace.
Beatriz tries to put Lord Savelle and his discomfiting concern for her well-being out of her thoughts. She’ll go back down to the sea garden tomorrow morning, she tells herself, and this time she’ll do what she must. Every time she tells herself this, though, she believes it a little bit less. Especially because, as dusk begins to fall, she finds herself getting that familiar tingling in her body, that alertness that tells her she won’t be sleeping again tonight.
If that’s going to be the case, she’s determined that she won’t be bored, and that she’ll keep others up with her as long as possible. Which is why she invites Pasquale, Ambrose, Gisella, and Nicolo to an impromptu dinner on the beach. It turns into a lavish affair, for an outdoor meal, with a silk blanket laid out over the sand, big enough to fit thrice as many people comfortably. The palace chefs have prepared a basket of roasted pheasant, rolls of bread, carrots and parsnips, and tiny pies that fit in the palm of a hand, each stuffed with berries. And, of course, Gisella has managed to secure plenty of wine.
Dinner is consumed quickly enough, the five of them devouring the offerings, but the wine lasts a bit longer. When the moon is high in the sky, Beatriz can feel the energy of the party waning, and Pasquale begins fidgeting beside her. She knows it’s only a matter of time before he suggests turning in.
Which is how Beatriz finds herself explaining the rules of a Bessemian drinking game, Confessions and Bluffs. She played it often over the last couple of years at balls and parties, though she’s never been able to play it with her sisters—it’s a terribly uninteresting game to play with people you know inside and out, after all. But she doesn’t know these people, except perhaps Pasquale, and sometimes she thinks even he seems more mystery than not.
She tells herself that she suggests it for fun, to get to know her new friends better, but she knows that isn’t the entire truth. Her mother didn’t raise her to do things for fun, and she certainly didn’t raise her to make friends. Confessions and Bluffs is a good way to gather information.
“It goes like this,” she tells them, sitting cross-legged on the blanket, her veridian skirt spread around her in a circle of frothy silk. The wine bottle she holds in her hands is half empty, but there are several more to go. “I’ll go first and confess something—it has to be something interesting, no boring facts about what desserts you prefer or the names of your childhood pets—and you lot will decide if the confession is the truth or if I’m bluffing. For each person who gets it right, I take a drink, but if you get it wrong, you drink. Simple, no?”
“Deceptively simple,” Nicolo says from where he sits to her left, his long legs stretched out in front of him and his hands behind him so that his face is tilted up toward the sky. Beatriz tries not to notice how close his leg is to hers, but she’d have an easier time ignoring a flame held to the palm of her hand.
“Dangerously simple,” Gisella adds, her voice a low purr in the night. She hugs her legs to her chest, her chin resting on top of her knees. Her blond hair is unbound from its usual style and hangs in loose waves around her shoulders.
Beatriz winks at her. “Aren’t all the best drinking games dangerously simple?” she asks. “I’ll go first so you can see how it’s done. Once, at a ball in Bessemia, I ran through the gardens in my chemise on a dare.”
The four of them exchange looks, but Pasquale is the first one to speak.
“Truth,” he says. “I don’t think you’re one to turn down a dare.”
After a second of contemplation, Gisella and Ambrose agree with Pasquale, but Nicolo frowns.
“Bluff,” he says finally.
Beatriz purses her lips, and after a second she lifts the bottle to her lips for one drink before passing it to Pas, who looks surprised.
“The three of you lose,” she says, nodding at Gisella and Ambrose as well.
Pasquale laughs, but he takes a drink before passing it to Ambrose. “I thought for sure that sounded like something you would do,” he says.
Beatriz shrugs, leaning back on her hands. “It almost was,” she says. “But the actual dare was to run through the gardens in my corset. My sister didn’t think I’d go through with it, but as you said, I never turn down a dare.”
“How did you know she was bluffing?” Pas asks Nicolo, shaking his head.
Nicolo shrugs. “Just lucky, I guess.”
“And now it’s your turn,” Beatriz tells him. “What will your confession be?”
Nicolo holds her gaze as he takes the bottle of wine from his sister, and she realizes that the words sounded more flirtatious than they should have. Not that anyone else seems to have heard it, but then again, that’s how Beatriz talks to everyone.
“You know the court treasurer?” Nicolo asks, leaning forward and tearing his gaze away from Beatriz to look at the others. “Lord Nodreno?”
“Vile man,” Gisella says, wrinkling her nose. “I caught him trying to accost a serving girl once. He stopped when he saw me, but I doubt it was the first or the last time.”
“That’s the one,” Nicolo says. “He was opposing a motion my father was trying to get before the king, so I…slipped some herbs into his midday glass of wine. It didn’t do anything serious, but it did render him unable to get more than a foot from the privy for the next few hours, and he missed the council meeting.”
Gisella gives a very loud, unladylike snort. “I don’t know if that’s true, but I hope it is, so I’m going to believe you.”
Pasquale considers it for a moment, and Beatriz can practically see the gears turning in his mind, no doubt weighing the morality of the move as well as the believability of it. “What herbs?” he asks after a second.
Nicolo glances at Beatriz. “Are questions allowed?” he asks her.
She inclines her head. “Any good bluffer knows how to defend their lies. I’ll allow it.”
Nicolo turns his attention back to Pasquale. “Bichterwood leaves and helve.”
Pasquale frowns. “Bluff,” he says.
Ambrose leans forward. “Pas knows his herbs,” he says. “I’m with him on this one. Beatriz?”
Beatriz chews on her bottom lip and regards Nicolo thoughtfully. “Truth,” she says after a moment.
Nicolo smiles before taking two quick drinks from the bottle and passing it across the blanket to Pasquale.
“No,” Pasquale says, but he takes the bottle. “Bichterwood and helve wouldn’t cause that.”
“They wouldn’t—they were to mask the flavor of the sylxen root,” Nicolo says.
“But you didn’t say—”
“He didn’t have to,” Beatriz says, impressed despite herself. “He wasn’t obligated to tell you the whole truth in the follow-up questions.”
Pasquale groans and takes his drink before passing it to Ambrose, who frowns at Nicolo and Beatriz before taking his drink. “You two are far too good at this. It isn’t fair,” he says, wiping the red stain from his lips.
“It’s a drinking game—it’s not meant to be fair, it’s meant to make you drink,” Gisella says, taking the bottle from his hands. “My turn now. I’ve never kissed anyone.”
Beatriz has to smother a laugh, having seen firsthand that Gisella is telling a bald-faced lie. But she holds her tongue, letting the others answer first so as not to ruin the game. The others pronounce Gisella a liar immediately and she grins, taking four drinks.
“Fine,” she says with a loud sigh. “I suppose that one was a bit easy. Pas? Ambrose?” she asks, holding the bottle toward them.
Ambrose takes it first, his fingertips tapping at the glass while he thinks about his confession. Even before he speaks, though, Beatriz knows whatever he says will be the truth. She doesn’t think Ambrose is capable of lying about anything. The realization makes her vaguely uneasy. After all, she knows what to expect from liars, but earnestness is another matter entirely.
“I don’t know how to swim,” he says finally.
For a second, Beatriz is tempted to tell him it’s not a scandalous-enough confession. But as she looks at Ambrose, she feels her heart soften slightly. He is not someone made for scandals, so perhaps not being able to swim is enough.
“Truth,” she says.
“Is it in the rules that we can toss him in the ocean to test?” Gisella asks her.
Everyone laughs except for Ambrose, whose eyes widen before he realizes she’s only joking.
“Never mind,” Gisella says, waving a dismissive hand. “That gave me my answer. Truth.”
After a second of thought, Pasquale and Nicolo vote truth as well, and with a strained smile, Ambrose takes four quick drinks from the bottle of wine.
“I’m not good at this, I’m afraid,” he says, passing it to Pasquale.
“Depends on the objective,” Pasquale says with a grin. “You and Gigi are tied for having the most to drink—some might say you’re winning.”
It’s hard to tell in the moonlight, but Beatriz could swear a light flush works over Ambrose’s skin.
Pasquale holds the bottle of wine in one hand, leaning back on the other elbow and staring up at the sky for a second before shaking his head.
“I don’t want to be king,” he says finally.
A beat of silence follows his words before Gisella laughs.
“Everyone wants to be king,” she says. “Bluff.”
Ambrose and Nicolo agree with her assessment, both casting their votes for bluff, but Beatriz hesitates. He’s never said those exact words to her, but she feels certain he’s spoken around them, leaving the outline of a truth. Pasquale doesn’t want to be king—he doesn’t even want to be a prince.
“Truth,” she says softly.
Pasquale meets her gaze over the smoldering fire and she sees his surprise there, and an instant of vulnerability before he seals it away behind a grin and shakes his head. “Of course it’s a bluff. Like Gigi said—who doesn’t want to be king?”
He takes three drinks before passing the bottle to Beatriz so that she can take her drink as well.
For a second, she considers calling him out on the confession. She knows liars, after all, and the lie Pasquale just told was so palpable, so glaringly obvious, that she’s surprised no one else caught it. But perhaps they don’t want to see it. Nothing good will come of her pushing the matter, so she forces a smile and takes her drink without complaint.
“You were doing so well, Triz,” Gisella says, shaking her head. “But I suppose Nico won that round, didn’t he?”
“I didn’t realize there were winners or losers,” Nicolo says. “And like Pas said—I don’t feel like much of a winner, being the most sober one here. Pass the bottle, would you, Triz?”
She does, and for a second their fingers brush and he lingers, or maybe she lingers. She isn’t sure, but she knows it goes on a heartbeat longer than it should before the contact is broken. She knows that she regrets the loss of it when it is.
Ambrose is the first to call it a night, just after the clock tower strikes midnight, citing the need to be up early the next day. Gisella follows half an hour after that, saying she needs her beauty sleep. Pasquale makes it until nearly two in the morning before he begins drifting off on the beach and Beatriz has to insist he goes to bed, promising to join him soon.
Then it is only Beatriz and Nicolo, passing the last bottle of wine between them until they run out of things to talk about and just sit together in silence.
“It is late,” Beatriz says finally. “Will you walk me back to my rooms?”
Nicolo nods and gets to his feet, holding a hand out to help her stand. She’s unsteady on her feet—after all the wine it’s hardly surprising—but Nicolo keeps his hand around hers. Even when she finds her footing, he doesn’t let go for another few seconds, and when he does, Beatriz wishes he’d held on longer.
They start back toward the palace, walking side by side.
“I’m sure Pas is missing you,” Nicolo says when silence stretches out between them.
Beatriz gives a snort of laughter before she catches herself and offers him a sheepish smile. “I’ll admit, it’s nice to have a few hours apart,” she says, shaking her head. “No one tells you that when you get married, you never have a moment alone. I thought being a triplet was one thing, but at least I slept in my own room, my own bed.”
She realizes how bitter she sounds and quickly amends her remarks before he can see the truth of her marriage. “I love Pasquale, truly, but it’s nice to have a moment with just my thoughts.”
“I’m sure they’re fascinating,” Nicolo tells her with a small smile.
Beatriz hesitates, eyeing him in the moonlight, the way his face is cast in high relief. He is all sharp angles and dark eyes and full lips. Handsome.
Sophronia always liked to say Beatriz made poor decisions in the presence of handsome faces. If she were here, she might tell Beatriz to let him walk away, because he is a dangerous sort of handsome.
But Sophronia is not here to talk sense. Silence falls over them as they make their way back into the now-quiet palace—even the servants seem to be asleep, and not another soul is around. It’s almost eerie, given the life and energy usually flooding the palace halls, but it’s also peaceful.
“Are you still missing them? Your sisters?” Nicolo asks, jerking her out of her thoughts.
“Wouldn’t you miss Gigi?” she asks.
“Sometimes, I’m sure,” he says. “But also, sometimes I probably wouldn’t.”
Beatriz bites her lip. “I used to crave a little distance, you know,” she admits. “When we were growing up, I would get so annoyed. They were always so close. Sometimes it felt like they were smothering me. I couldn’t wait until I was old enough to leave and come here and see all manner of new and exciting things.”
“And now?” he asks.
She considers the question carefully, aware that even if she likes Nico, she can’t trust him. He is a social-climbing boy, determined to win the king’s favor. She suspects he would sell her out if he had the chance, and even though she respects him for that, she certainly isn’t about to be that chance.
“I miss them—of course I do—but Cellaria is a heady daydream of a place. It’s everything I imagined growing up. I always wanted to see more of the world.”
He laughs. “It’s funny—I have as well, but nothing seems more exotic than Bessemia. To me, Cellaria is boring. Give me mild weather and dry air and glittering white palaces. It sounds like a fairy tale.”
“It is,” she says, smiling softly before shaking her head. “There are so many places I’d like to see if I could—Friv and Temarin and the eastern isles, not to mention all of the places beyond that, places we don’t even have names for.”
He doesn’t say anything for a moment, and she worries that she’s said too much, been too open, that she’s frightened him somehow.
“Sometimes,” he says finally, “I feel like I’m so hungry for the world that I would swallow it up whole if I could.”
Beatriz’s mouth stretches into a grin. “You’d have to share it with me,” she says. “Half and half.”
He glances sideways at her, a wide smile tugging at his lips as well. And in that look, Beatriz feels like he sees her entirely, every inch of her inside and out. They’re walking through the royal wing now, both nodding at the guards posted outside the entrance, though even those guards seem half asleep and barely spare them a second look.
“Half and half,” he agrees.
They come to a stop outside the door to the rooms she shares with Pasquale, but neither of them makes a move to leave. On the opposite wall, the large windows have been left open so the moon and stars cast the hall in an ethereal glow.
She wants him to kiss her—she wishes for it so badly that she thinks she might sacrifice just about anything for the feel of his lips against hers.
“I wish you would kiss me.”
She doesn’t realize she’s spoken the words out loud until she sees the surprise play over his face. But then he takes a step closer to her and reaches his hand up to her cheek, the tips of his fingers so light against her skin that she barely feels them.
“I hoped you would say that,” he says, the words more breath than voice.
“We shouldn’t,” she tells him, though even as she says it, she’s tilting her face toward his.
“We shouldn’t,” he agrees. “But I hoped and you wished and here we are.”
The kiss is inevitable. As soon as his lips brush over hers, she realizes there was never any avoiding it. They’ve been careening toward this moment since he kissed her hand at her wedding. Trying to pretend otherwise was a fool’s game, and now that it’s happening, now that his arms are around her waist and her hands are in his hair and the kiss has no end in sight, she can’t remember why she tried to resist it.
The courtesan Sabine’s words whisper through her mind. If you can become what they want you to be, they’ll burn the world down in your name.
But in this moment, Nicolo just seems to want her. She doesn’t have to become anyone, just to be herself. And that feels like a whole different kind of power. One she would drown in if she could.
When they break apart, though, and her eyes meet his, a realization shudders through her. He wants her, yes, but she wants him as well. Just as much. And her mother and the courtesans never told her how to navigate that.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have…” Nico trails off, and Beatriz gets the feeling he wants to kiss her again. This time, though, his sense wins out and he turns away from her, hurrying back down the hall and leaving her alone.
She turns to go into her rooms, but when her hand is on the doorknob, she catches sight of something glittering on the stone floor beneath her feet. She crouches down, reaching out to touch it, and the pads of her fingers come away glittering as well. Her stomach plummets.
What was it she said? I wish you would kiss me. Simple-enough words, a common-enough phrase. No real power in it.
But in the light of the stars, she wished and it came true, and now there is stardust on the floor where she stood and a sharp pain already beginning in the space between her eyes, like a postdrinking headache, but so much worse. Like the morning Pasquale shook her awake to tell her that the king wanted to speak with her because stardust had been found on her windowsill. On a night just like this one, when she couldn’t sleep.
Beatriz goes toward one of the narrow windows that line the hallway, peering out at the night sky. There is the Dancing Bear, making its way across the sky. There is the Thorned Rose. And there are the Lovers’ Hands, clasped directly overhead, but something about them is not quite right. It takes her a moment to find it, but when she does, the world shifts beneath her feet: a star is missing from the thumb of one of the hands.
She stumbles back from the window, a dozen excuses rising to her mind. Someone else could have pulled the star down, couldn’t they have? And whoever left the stardust on her windowsill before might have left it outside her bedroom door now, another ploy to frame her. The headache coming on could just be a headache, caused by too much wine. There are a dozen excuses, but she knows she is lying to herself.
She made a wish and brought a star down from the sky. And it isn’t the first time. She thinks back to before, when she wished on a star in the Wanderer’s Wheel. Then, she wished to go home, and that didn’t come true. But wishes work in mysterious ways, don’t they? And it was soon after that wish that she met Lord Savelle, the key to her returning home.
Lord Savelle. He asked about her sleepless nights, seemed particularly interested in them because his daughter had suffered the same affliction. What was it he said? I believe in the deepest part of my soul that she was as innocent as you are. She’d taken that to mean that he’d thought them both innocent, but maybe he’d meant the opposite. That he knew his daughter was an empyrea and that Beatriz is as well.
And is she? It seems impossible, utterly unfathomable, but here she stands with the proof of it on her fingers and in the sky. One person in ten thousand has the potential to bring down the stars, only a fraction of them ever manage to control it, and yet here she is, somehow. Two things become very clear to Beatriz. First, she needs to get out of Cellaria as quickly as she can, before her power is discovered, and second, Lord Savelle’s knowledge makes him a threat.
She scoops the rest of the stardust off the floor and brings it into her apartments, trying to ignore her blossoming headache. Wishing for Nicolo to kiss her was a small wish—certainly no bigger than her wish to go home—so she suspects the effect on her will be the same. Already, she can feel a headache blossoming. She needs to act now. A low fire is burning in the bedroom, and she casts a glance at Pasquale, who is fast asleep, before throwing the stardust into the fire and watching it burn. Then she retrieves the vial her mother sent her from its place in her cosmetics kit, along with a few pots of pigments and creams. She sits down at her vanity and gets to work.
Beatriz never thought of herself as a coward, but as she sneaks into Lord Savelle’s rooms just after sunrise, while he is out in the sea garden, she realizes she just might be one. She knows she can’t plant the stardust on him in person—if she tries, she will lose her nerve like she did last time. Which led her to cake her face in enough creams and powders that she looks like a woman at least three times her age. In her plainest gray dress, she manages to pass for a maid, if no one looks too closely.
In her disguise—with a hunched-over walk to match, because Beatriz does nothing by halves—she gains entrance to Lord Savelle’s rooms with ease. There are fewer guards than outside the royal wing, she notices, and with servants beginning to tend to their chores, she blends in easily enough.
Perhaps it is cowardly, she thinks as she places the vial of stardust in one of Lord Savelle’s boots, but she would rather be a living coward than a dead hero.
She leaves his rooms as quickly as she came in and wanders the halls outside until she comes across a guard. She lets herself bump into him, as if by accident.
“Watch where you’re going,” he snaps at her.
“Oh!” she says, pretending to be flustered. “I’m so sorry, sir, I find myself distracted.”
The guard doesn’t take the bait, as Beatriz thinks he might have if she still looked like herself—he’s perfectly happy to ignore a woman past middle age.
“Sir, please,” she says before hesitating and biting her lip. “Do you know what stardust looks like?” she asks, dropping her voice to a whisper.
That gets his attention, and his eyes snap to her as if truly seeing her for the first time. “Why do you want to know?”
She pretends to hesitate again. “I think I might have seen some in the Lord Ambassador to Temarin’s rooms. There was a small vial of some kind of silver dust—”
“Where?” he interrupts, standing up straighter.
“Tucked away in one of his boots. In the wardrobe, a tall black pair.”
The words are barely out of Beatriz’s mouth before the guard is hurrying past her, toward the rooms she just came from.
When she gets back to her own rooms, Beatriz suddenly feels so exhausted, her head pounding and every muscle aching, that sleep claims her as soon as she climbs into bed beside Pasquale. She doesn’t wake again until dusk, and by the time she does, Lord Savelle’s arrest is all anyone is speaking of.