This wasn’t my first time in the palace, but it was the first time I had been there since Magrit had taken power. And even though she had been in mourning, she had somehow found time to completely redecorate. The last time I was there, it had been decorated in pastels and ornate brocade. Now the Black Glass I had seen in the square was everywhere. Giant friezes of it carved with flowers and figures were replacing former Queen Meena’s pretty wallpaper. Workmen were fortifying the palace from the inside out.
The Queen’s lady-in-waiting appeared. She wore a full black mourning dress in honor of the dead Queen. She was plump with a round face, which lit up after she studied Hecate for a quick beat. Over the years, Hecate had presented herself to the palace wearing dozens of different faces, but all she had to do was whisper the word “Entente” and she was brought to the Crown.
In the past, some royals had disagreed with the Entente, while others had followed their advice to the letter. But they always accepted the Entente into their drawing rooms, and they always listened. Today should not have been any different, but I could not help but think about Galatea’s and Iolanta’s warnings.
Hecate smiled and curtsied. We were required to act like nobility when we were at the palace, so that our visits to the Queen and our influence on her could remain our secret, save for a few trusted insiders. Still, Hecate was the most powerful being I had ever known, and despite being told it was custom, it was odd seeing her bow down to anyone.
To the people, the Entente were a rumor, a bedtime story. But for those close to the royals, they were real and revered.
“I am glad you are here. Princess . . . Queen Magrit is not well. Perhaps she never has been.” The lady’s words came in a rushed whisper, and she looked behind her as if she were worried that someone might be listening.
This was not what Hecate wanted to hear, but she smiled nonetheless. “Lady Sadie, it is indeed a difficult time. But even in the most difficult times, there is still opportunity for good.”
“I see you brought another. I can take her to the kitchen and get her some sweets,” Sadie offered.
“Thank you, but she stays with me,” Hecate said.
I felt a wave of pride. I wasn’t a human child. I was Entente.
Suddenly Hecate whirled around and pulled out her wand. I felt her tense beside me, and then the flash of movement as she stabbed her wand into the air in front of her just as a line of soldiers came charging around the corner. The men froze in place in response to Hecate’s wand.
Hecate could stop time, but it wasn’t something she did lightly. Were they a threat? Were the soldiers attacking us? I could hear my heart beating in my ears.
Next to her, the lady-in-waiting gasped and fanned herself as she marveled at Hecate’s magic. “Oh my. That’s incredible! You really are Entente . . . But it isn’t necessary,” she exclaimed.
I studied Hecate’s handiwork. The soldiers were completely still. But upon closer examination, I noticed something strange . . . They were carrying wooden swords.
“They’re playing with the prince,” Lady Sadie said.
Hecate closed her eyes like she did when she caught a glimpse of the Future to confirm.
“Hide-and-seek,” Lady Sadie explained. “Prince Mather makes the staff play with him. The Queen doesn’t allow him to have friends.”
Hecate’s power, like the powers of all the sisters, had to be focused on a few people at a time. If Hecate looked at too many Futures at once, she would end up in a dark room like Iolanta. It was possible for her to miss something—like the intent of the advancing soldiers. Hecate, Galatea, and Iolanta called them glimpses for a reason. Images and feelings flooded all their senses, and sometimes they didn’t have enough or they had too much information about what had, could, or would happen. Just now, I had witnessed Hecate get a glimpse wrong. She smiled down at me as if she knew what it meant for me to see that even a Fate could make a mistake.
A little boy who looked to be my age ran behind me. He had dark-brown hair, wild brown eyes, and a smile that spread from ear to ear. I recognized him from the funeral—Prince Mather.
To my surprise, he stopped in his tracks.
“Whoa!” He was mesmerized by the frozen soldiers. “Magic.”
He reached out and touched the arm of one of the soldiers. The soldier did not move. “Are you Entente?” the prince asked, looking squarely at me.
I glanced up at Hecate for permission.
She nodded.
“Can you play?” he asked, forgetting about the soldiers and focusing on me.
“I’m sorry. The Entente don’t play,” I said reflexively, and at the same time ardently wishing it weren’t true.
The prince looked up at Hecate in disbelief. He had probably never met another child who didn’t play before.
“We have to see the Queen. Perhaps some other time,” she said.
The prince’s face fell, but then he brightened.
“If I say you have to play, then you have to play. Everything and everyone here is mine,” he said matter-of-factly.
“No one owns anyone,” I snapped as the goodwill I felt for him a second before began to fade away. “You certainly don’t own the Entente.”
Lady Sadie gasped. There were protocols for dealing with royals and I had clearly broken one of them.
“That is not the way we speak to His Highness,” Lady Sadie said sternly.
“That’s not the way he should speak to the Entente,” I retorted, putting my hands on my hips.
Hecate cleared her throat beside me. I looked up at her, expecting admonishment. Instead, she bent down and addressed the prince.
“I know that you are mourning your grandmother, but this is no way to behave. The people are not your playthings, and neither are the Entente. You should consider it your honor to one day be king . . . not the other way around.”
Prince Mather’s bottom lip quivered. The arrogance and the smile were gone. All that remained was a sad little boy. I felt a pang of sympathy for him. It had not occurred to me that the prince’s behavior could be tied to missing his grandmother.
“The Queendom must move on,” he said. “We should all be happy for our new Queen.” The words sounded rehearsed, as if they were not his own.
“It’s okay to miss her,” I told him, just as Hecate had told me at Queen Meena’s funeral. “The Past is never gone. We carry it with us now and into the Future.”
“Farrow is right,” Hecate said. “When someone truly loves you, some part of them never leaves you.”
Prince Mather absorbed my words and Hecate’s with a sniffle. “Are you sure you can’t play? I’m asking, not ordering,” he added quickly.
“We have to go, Prince Mather,” Hecate said, her voice gentle now.
The prince’s face fell again, but this time without the petulance.
Hecate bent down and whispered something to him, and he smiled.
“She says we’ll meet again,” he told me.
I wondered if she meant that I would be his Entente. Until I made South wings, I’d thought that I would be lucky to be sent to one of the other Queendoms to use my magic to aid and advise another queen. But if I was capable of that, perhaps I was capable of being a Fate after all. The thought was chased immediately by guilt. Nothing good should come out of the bad thing I had done to South. I wish I had found out how powerful I could be some other way.
“I’ll take you to the Queen. But first we must make you presentable,” Lady Sadie said.
“But what about them?” Prince Mather asked, pointing at the still-frozen soldiers.
Hecate lifted her wand. “I’ll count to five and give you a bit of a head start.”
The little prince ran ahead of the soldiers with a squeal. He took a peek back at them and his eyes connected with mine just as Hecate reanimated the soldiers, who picked up exactly where they had left off.
“Now, to what do we owe the honor?” Queen Magrit was seated on a chaise in the center of the room. Her angular face did not hide her displeasure.
“Your Majesty, we just wanted to pay our respects. I fear we did not get off to the best start after the funeral. The Entente and the royals have a great history. And my sisters and I want only for the Present and Future to have the same fruitfulness.
“Last week I showed you that if you don’t change course, you will lose your life. And the lives of many of your subjects. And yet you do not believe me.”
“You told me to give up my crown. You might as well have asked me to give up my life,” the Queen said.
Hecate approached her with her wand. “May I?”
The Queen recoiled and then she reconsidered, leaning forward. Magrit couldn’t resist. She wanted to see. Hecate put her wand to her temple as Magrit closed her eyes. Queen Magrit shuddered at what she saw and her eyes flew open.
“Enough!” the Queen screamed, her eyes wild. “How can I believe what you say and what you show me when you won’t show your true face to me?” she said angrily.
“This is the way it has always been done. For your sake and for ours,” Hecate explained calmly.
“If you hadn’t noticed, things are different now. I am different from my predecessors. And the Future will be different from the one you magicked for me.”
Hecate raised her wand again. “I don’t make up the Future. I am merely a conduit.”
“You are more than that. You and your kind have meddled too much and for too long in human affairs. I believe it’s time for you to leave.”
I expected Hecate to keep fighting. To make her case. The way she had with me about South. But, instead, she crossed to me and took my hand.
“I pray you heed my advice, dear Queen. Or Hinter will pay for your folly.”
We slipped out into the square among the crowd. I glanced back at the palace.
“Don’t look back, Farrow. Don’t ever look back,” Hecate said with an urgency that frightened me. “Promise me that you will look to the Future no matter what happens.”
She touched her wand to my forehead; I closed my eyes, and I got a glimpse.
I could see the interior of the palace and my hand extended, holding a wand. Somehow I knew it was mine. It was different from the one that was in my pocket now. It was completely covered in carvings. The chime of a clock tower rang in my ears.
When Hecate removed the wand from my temple, I looked at her.
“I don’t understand,” I said, searching her face for meaning.
“One day you will. I wish we had more time, Farrow.”
She kissed me on the cheek then. I felt warmth wash over me, and I could see the faint glow of the kiss’s light emanating from my skin. I remembered the kiss that Galatea had given Hecate. A kiss of protection.
Then she did something that no one in the Entente had ever done before. She hugged me.
“We don’t do that,” I said as her arms came around me. We cannot do what we must for others if there is no light between us. If we love each other too much there will be no room for us to love all humanity. Hecate and the other sisters had told us that countless times. We were supposed to be sisters, but we were not supposed to be attached to one another. But right then she pulled me close. I put my arms around her awkwardly and inhaled the smell of her hair. She smelled like the lavender soapstone we all used.
“It’s time to go,” she said, straightening. She touched my face and dress again and then her own. I could feel us both transforming into the appearance of commoners. To my shock, she had chosen her own face.
I touched my face. I was wearing my own too. “We never show our real faces.”
Hecate abruptly let go of my hand.
The Queen was sweeping into the square with her guard twenty-deep behind her. At her side there was a boy about my age dressed in a guard’s uniform.
“That’s not the prince,” I said.
“Be quiet. Be still. You have to hide, until . . . ,” Hecate whispered, drifting off.
I protested, reaching for her hand, but she pushed me backward with a wave of her wand and suddenly I was beneath one of the carts in the square. I tried to move forward, but it was as if an invisible wall blocked me from moving. She had spelled me.
“Witch!” the Queen said, her eyes locked on Hecate.
Hecate stood her ground, but she did not raise her wand. She did not stop time. Hecate was not running.
“Witch,” Magrit repeated as she stepped still closer.
From my position under the cart, I could see the soldiers surround my mentor.
“Take her.”