By the time I finished meeting with Dearsley and the regional heads from throughout the island, hours more had passed. Naturally every village and region regarded their problems as the most pressing—and just as naturally, they wanted more aid and support than they’d already been given. Calanthe was fortunate in Her prosperity—even after feeding Anure’s insatiable hunger all these years—but even the largesse of my realm only went so far.
Still, by dint of rational problem solving and even more meticulous diplomacy, we had them all sorted by evening. At least the headache of it all had kept me from dwelling—overmuch—on all the things that could go wrong with Con’s strategy. It was a slightly better plan than it had been, though that did little to comfort me. I supposed I had to accept that Con would always rely on improvising in the moment—which admittedly had kept him alive so far—and that I wouldn’t be able to change him.
There was also no sense in dwelling on everything else in our future that I couldn’t control or change.
“Lia!” Con called to me from the end of the hall I’d turned into. I paused, expecting him to catch up with me, but he beckoned to me. A number of courtiers loitering in the hall began whispering to one another at the sight of the queen being summoned—and pulling out paper to take notes in case of another dramatic fight in the halls—but I found I didn’t much care. Con would soon be gone, perhaps never to return, and I was happy to see him. So I turned my feet and walked his way—albeit with regal poise, to make clear I chose to go to him.
He had Vesno with him, and he carried a basket. I raised a brow. “What’s this?” Stroking Vesno’s silky head, I received an impression of exciting smells and a lot of the shipyard, nothing helpful.
Con grinned, all mischievous boy. He took my hand, tucked it in the crook of his elbow, and started walking in the opposite direction. “A surprise. This way.”
“I’m to attend a formal dinner for the regional heads,” I informed him, digging in my heels.
“Not anymore. Ibolya is arranging for it to be moved to tomorrow night. At my behest,” he added in a posh tone, spoiling it by slanting me a wicked smile.
“Conrí. You cannot simply rearrange My schedule and—”
“But I can.” He steered me out through the gardens and toward a path that led over the ridge to the next bay. “It’s amazing. I give orders and they obey. I should’ve tried this out long ago.”
“See what you missed by pacing My gardens and sulking?” I slid him a narrow look. “I, however, do not simply obey.”
“You did in the Night Court,” he reminded me in a sultry growl—which had me immediately blushing.
I cleared my throat. “If that’s what you have in mind, then you’re going the wrong direction.”
He shook his head. “Tempting, but not tonight. There’s something else I want to do with you. And I’m asking, Lia.” He slowed, giving me a hopeful look, golden-brown eyes wide. “It could be my last night alive, after all.”
“Oh, you did not attempt to leverage Me with that threat,” I gasped.
“I blame Sondra,” he hastened to say. “She said guilt would pry you out of your responsibilities if nothing else did.”
I would have words with Sondra.
“It’ll be fun,” he coaxed, then stopped, turning me to face him. Vesno circled back to us, concerned at the lack of progress. “I only want to spend this time with you, Lia. We’ve had so little of it when we haven’t been pretending with each other. But if you are certain this dinner is critical to have tonight, then I’ll go put on fancy clothes and we can do that together instead.”
Critical. No, it wasn’t critical to have it that night. I’d been reacting out of habit, hating to have my schedule changed for me. Was he asking so much? No, of course not. I gestured to my gown and heels. “Am I appropriately garbed?”
He grinned, victorious and delighted in one, the dimple showing in his left cheek as it did only when he smiled with genuine happiness. Just as it had been captured in the portrait of the royal family of Oriel, when he’d been only a mischievous boy with a wild streak, his skin and heart unscarred. “It won’t matter,” he declared mysteriously, “though you might be happier going barefoot. It’s a bit of a walk.”
Curiouser and curiouser. I slipped off my heels, and Orvyki appeared to take them from me. I handed them to her, not terribly surprised to find that she’d been surreptitiously keeping an eye on me. My ladies had all received the message that I no longer cared to have an extensive entourage at all times, and they seemed to have worked out a system where at least one stayed nearby in case I needed anything. I wasn’t sure I loved that system, but we would see. We had yet to settle into a new normal.
“I’ll be out for the evening,” I told her. Considering, I unpinned my crown and gave her that, too. I supposed having them around could be useful. “Please pass the word that I’ll be with Conrí and you all may spend the evening as you wish. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Orvyki curtsied, then carried off my things with subdued reverence. I watched her go, a delirious sense of playing hooky on my responsibilities lightening me.
“Have you worked things out with your ladies?” Con asked as we resumed walking.
“Yes and no,” I replied, musing on how much attention Con paid to the trivial matters of my personal life. “They all wish to continue serving Me—and they are doing so with perfect etiquette, as you observed—but there is a coolness between us now.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Lia. I know how much you rely on their company.”
I shook my head a little, realizing that it felt good to be free of the crown’s weight, slight as it was. “It could be that the distance was always there and I simply didn’t realize it.” I squeezed his arm and smiled at him, feeling a bit shy and exposed. “I have a new understanding of what it’s like to be truly intimate with someone.”
He covered my hand with his. “Me too.” After a moment, he added, in a low, gruff voice, “I never imagined I could have this, with you, so thank you.”
I burst out laughing. “It’s not a gift to thank Me for.”
He didn’t laugh, or even smile, simply gave me a very serious look. “Your heart is a gift, and I should be grateful for it. No matter what happens, Lia, I want you to know this has been the best part of my life. I know that’s not saying much, but it’s been … everything. I’m not good with words, but if I don’t survive Yekpehr, I—”
“Don’t even speak it,” I said, cutting him off, feeling superstitious and not caring a whit. “Those words are more than enough.”
We walked on quietly, passing out of the outer gardens and following the path that led eventually to the harbor.
“I’m trying to be smart about this,” Con said after a while. “Coolheaded and calculating, like you are.”
I slid him a side-eyed glance, but didn’t comment.
“I know Anure will try to manipulate me, so I’m thinking through the possibilities. Contingencies for contingencies.”
“That’s all I ask,” I said, restraining a sigh of resignation. I could not control this, so I’d let it go. As best I could. We’d turned away from the harbor path and followed a narrow foot trail through a grove of flowering trees. The setting sun filtered through the delicate, trailing bracts of the scarlet blossoms, giving them an otherworldly glow. In the quiet, the nearby surf rolled in steady rhythm, and a few nocturnal songbirds trilled their first calls. “Where on blessed Ejarat are we going?”
“You don’t know?” Con teased. “I thought you knew everything about Calanthe.”
“I know where I am, but I can’t imagine what your destination might be. This path doesn’t go anywhere but to the next cove, which is only a…” I trailed off in realization.
“A swimming beach!” Con finished triumphantly.
“You’re going swimming?” I replied faintly, trying to form a real response.
“We both are. Ibolya says you’ve never been, as far as she knows.”
“My life has not been one that lends itself to swimming. I don’t know how.”
“There’s not much to know. We won’t go deeper than you can stand with your head above water anyway. I taught myself, when I was a kid. There was this lake—so perfectly still it mirrored the sky—and I would sneak off to it and swim all day.”
“Eluding your tutors.”
“Exactly.” He grinned unrepentantly. “They never could find me there. No one could. I was free to do as I pleased.”
“You were the crown prince of Oriel,” I pointed out. “Do you really think they’d let you disappear for an entire day with no knowledge of where you’d gone?”
His smile faded, and I felt bad for saying something, but then he shook his head in astonishment, a light of affection in his golden eyes. “You’re absolutely right—and that never occurred to me. My parents let me do that, didn’t they?”
“It seems likely,” I offered tentatively. “It wouldn’t have been difficult to have you watched from a distance.”
“I remember being scolded,” he said in a musing tone, “but never punished. They let me go do that,” he repeated with some wonder. “Probably my other escapes, too.”
“They loved you,” I said, shrugging. “Children need to be able to play and stretch their wings.”
“You never did,” he pointed out, and it was true.
“I want to say that I was never a child,” I said slowly, “but of course I was—just not the normal sort.”
“What is normal?” he mused quietly. “Neither of us have had anything like a peaceful life, but we have this.” We had emerged from the winding trail onto the dunes, following Vesno as he blazed across a set of wooden bridges and onto the soft sand, and Con waved a hand as if he’d created it. The beach was entirely empty, with no one in sight, not even a boat on the water. “Paradise,” he said, dimple flashing in delight. “And all to ourselves.”
“More of your doing?” I asked.
“Yes. I spotted this beach on the map in the tower. It will be romantic. We’re going to swim naked, and have a picnic on the beach, just you and me.”
“And Vesno,” I noted as the wolfhound barreled gleefully into the gentle surf.
“He never gossips,” Con replied in a confiding tone. “There’s no currency for it in the world of wolfhounds.”
I giggled at that image, surprised to hear that sound emerge from me.
Con’s grin widened. “Race you to the water?”
“Naked first. I’m not ruining a second gown in one day.”
“Like you don’t have thousands more.”
I snorted at him, pulling off my gown and laying it on the blanket he spread on the sand, then removing the rest of my jewelry. It felt strange to be naked out on this open beach—odd, since I was well accustomed to nakedness, especially with Con—but also wonderful. Freeing, as he’d said.
He took more time than I had, wrestling off his boots, shedding his weapons, then his other clothing—so I took off running. Ignoring Con’s shout of protest, I ran to the water with a glorious whoop! Vesno, radiating delight, dashed up to circle me and plunge into the surf also.
The first wave took me by surprise, tumbling me over and filling my mouth with sand and salt. Calanthe’s sea filled my heart and mind also, the water carrying to me the myriad thoughts and sensations of all the ocean denizens—and their memories. It was the dreamthink magnified, and I wondered why I’d never tried this before.
Con seized me, catching me up in his strong arms. “Cheater!” he accused, acting horrified and astonished.
“It’s not cheating when you win,” I informed him. “I like to win.”
“Do you know what happens to cheaters?” he growled. Before I could answer, he launched me into the air, sending me flying and then plummeting into the sea. I came up sputtering and spitting water, and he pointed at me and laughed.
“You’ll pay for that!” I shrieked and threw myself at him.
We played like that, like kids yelling and splashing in the surf. And then not like children at all, as our touches grew hot and hungry, the teasing kisses lasting longer, going deeper and welling with both newfound tenderness and the anticipation of goodbye.
We made love on the blanket in the sand, the warm tropical night enfolding us, an exhausted Vesno sleeping in the sand nearby. And then we ate the picnic by the light of a candle, drinking wine and watching the glitter of stars on the water.
It was romantic, fun, and carefree in a way so few things in my life had been. And when Con whispered to me that I’d given him as many reasons as the stars to want to live, I only hoped that I wouldn’t be the weakness Anure would use to strike him down.
We returned to the palace in the early hours before dawn, Con and I parting to prepare for the day. Since Ibolya was off preparing for her own journey, my other ladies assisted my bath. None of them commented on the sand they washed out of my hair. Ibolya would have, and I already missed her gentle amusement and steadfast presence.
I selected my gown carefully. So many times my courtiers had traded analyses of my gowns, how they reflected my mood—and predicted which direction their petitions would go. While I had little desire to return to the elaborate scaffolding of my previous wardrobe, I also felt this occasion required a sense of ceremony. My brave adventurers deserved a send-off from their queen worthy of the risk they took. If I must stay behind on my island while they sailed away, I’d remain in style.
Nahua and Zariah laced me into the corset the gown required, along with the curving panniers that would support the heavy skirts. The bodice sported high epaulets that stood up on their own, and the metallic gold frontispiece molded over my breasts in a sunburst. Sculpted gold plates over my hips gave way to a fall of golden silk, shimmering and flowing, while a panel of patterned pieces draped down the center of my skirts.
Overall, the gown gave the impression of a golden statue of a warrior queen come to life—and once upon a time, I would have donned a gold wig and painted my skin with metallic gold paint. As it was, I had my ladies pile my own wild hair of vines and blossoms into an intricate coronet of braids, my new crown of diamonds and gold nestled in them.
Some touches of gold glitter to my lighter makeup palette completed the look. I examined myself in the full-length mirror. Ejarat gilded by Sawehl’s sun. It would do—and it would help make up for the fact that my own personal sun would soon sail away.
I walked down to meet them at the docks just before sunrise, my ladies with me, but no one else. Though I’d continued to make sure no birds had flown to Yekpehr with messages to betray our plans, it still seemed wiser to keep as much secrecy as possible.
Ambrose appeared along the way, walking easily, his staff barely touching the ground, Merle riding on the faceted emerald topping it. He gave me a nod of greeting with a raised brow, and my ladies fell back at my gesture to give us privacy.
“So, wizard,” I said, “is all going according to your master plan?”
He slid me a canny look, the ancient forest in his gaze. “Your Highness is presuming both that there is a master plan and that I am the originator of it.”
“Yes, and?”
Laughing, he shook his head. “I told You before, like You, I am a passenger on this ship captained by Conrí. Will he sail us to our longed-for destination or run us aground on the rocks? It remains to be seen.”
Ambrose had spoken of Con that way before, back at Cradysica, before the battle. Conrí has the courage and determination to set sail, the willingness to take the chances that You and I flinch from, because we can see all too well how difficult the journey will be. Not at all a reassurance that Con would succeed.
“But you have seen aspects of this, in the prophecy,” I pressed. “You knew he’d need My hand.”
“Aspects, yes.” He turned the staff thoughtfully, Merle picking up one foot and then the next to remain facing us, listening with a cocked head. “The future is difficult to predict because it hasn’t happened yet,” he confided.
“This is exactly what I’ve always said,” I replied, though I’d have liked a different answer.
Ambrose shrugged cheerfully. “It’s like looking down a raging river and spotting a boulder that divides the current. The boulder might be more or less fixed, but a great deal else can change by the time you reach that location.”
“I keep feeling like there’s something more I need to do, more than donating a body part to the cause.”
“That’s hardly all You’ve contributed.” His very blandness sharpened my attention.
“So is My part in the tale over?” I pressed. A side note in the hero’s epic journey, the lonely witch queen left to the island she could never leave.
Ambrose didn’t say anything until we’d nearly reached the docks. Finally he shook his head, sliding me a rueful look. “The trouble with attempting to nudge the future in a particular direction,” he confided, “is that so much depends on the motivations of the people involved. I trust that You will follow your heart and do…” Merle cawed and Ambrose nodded. “Yes, whatever You think best.”
“People always make that sound like a simple decision,” I complained, “and it never is.”
“Nothing is ever as simple as ‘people’ make things sound,” Ambrose observed.
The Last Resort and the fishing vessel from Hertaq sat side by side at the end of the dock, the former outshining the latter like a jewel beside a rock. If I hadn’t been informed—by my own people, not just Kara—that the fishing ship was seaworthy enough to make it to Yekpehr, I’d have seriously doubted. As it was … it didn’t inspire confidence.
I didn’t see Con anywhere. Ambrose, Merle, and my ladies all wandered on down the pier, inspecting the ships and meeting up with some of the others. Kara, no doubt seeing my frown, leapt off the deck of the fishing boat and, landing on the dock before me, bowed deeply. “Don’t worry, Your Highness—it sails far better than it appears.”
“I know,” I replied, tearing my gaze from the ship, which seemed to list ever so slightly to one side. Should it do that? “I asked a few of My people to verify,” I added.
He smiled, a narrow and humorless slash in his dark face. “You still don’t trust me?”
“I believe in being thorough,” I replied. “Though I do trust you, if only because Con does. Can I charge you to do your utmost to make sure he survives this mission?”
Kara’s smile twisted into a grimace. “You can ask, and I can promise—but we both know Conrí follows his own path. I tried at Cradysica, you know. Or maybe You don’t.” He hesitated. “Conrí is a man possessed by a powerful idea.”
“I know that.” And I did—and it wasn’t something I could change. “I also realize it’s brought him this far.”
“It’s brought all of us this far,” Kara corrected gently. “Without Conrí … well, I don’t think we’d be in a position to attempt this at all.”
“There’s something to be said for being bullheaded,” I remarked with a rueful smile, an expression Kara reflected.
“Talking about me?” Con asked, catching me around the waist and speaking into my ear.
I managed not to jump, but just barely. For a big man, he could move as silently as a cat—and now that I’d seen his surprisingly playful side, I knew full well that he enjoyed sneaking up on me. “As a matter of fact, yes,” I said. “However did you guess?”
With his hands on my hips, he turned me to face him. “I seem to recall you were likened to the other bull in the small pen we occupy.”
“I never denied the metaphor,” I replied. “Brenda has a gift for them.”
I looked him over, seeing he wore the court clothes that I’d had made for him—the black with silver trim—though he’d forgone the crown and wore a sword instead of the rock hammer. “No crown is a good call,” I noted, as Anure wouldn’t appreciate the Slave King pretending to actual royalty, “but I’m surprised you gave up your rock hammer.”
He scowled in disgust. “Blame Sondra for that. She thinks the sword is more ‘impressive gentleman’ and not so ‘escaped-slave-from-Vurgmun.’”
“She has a point.”
“I left it in our rooms,” he confided. “So you can keep it for my return.”
I blinked back tears, moved by this small gesture that meant so much. Never mind the bitter voice that whispered he’d be more invested in returning for the rock hammer than for me. “I will.”
With the excitement of taking action, the sheer glee of going after his long-held goal sparkling in his eyes, Con looked taller, charismatically imposing, vividly and fully the man I loved. “I have a favor to ask,” I said. “Keep Vesno with you.”
He raised a brow. “You want me to bring a wolfhound into Anure’s throne room?”
“Yes. It’s not so unusual that the guards will balk, as well-behaved as Vesno is. And I’ll be able to watch, perhaps.” The one advantage of being a witch queen: I might be confined to my island, but I had ways of looking beyond it.
He nodded, considering. “I’ll do my best to keep him with me. You look amazing,” he said in a lower voice. “Like a golden goddess.”
“Thank you.” I tried to think of something else to say, but all that came to mind were cautions and questions. Not how you sent off a hero who charted his own course through the raging seas of doubt and stacked odds.
He seemed to be searching for words, too, also coming up empty. “I love you, Lia,” he finally said, and I understood in that moment why people liked to say those words to each other. They held a wealth of other, unspoken and unspeakable thoughts and feelings. A kind of a gift, a token that symbolized so much more.
“I love you, Con,” I told him, infusing the simple words with all my hopes and wishes for good luck. He smiled, dimple winking into existence like the first star of evening.
Then his gaze lifted over my head, looking beyond me. “Everyone is assembled, ready for Your Highness to address them.” For once he employed the honorific with total sincerity.
I hadn’t meant to make this farewell that sort of event, but he was right—when I turned, they’d all gathered expectantly. Besides, I’d dressed for the part, hadn’t I? Naturally an address fell to me, queen of Calanthe. I’d come to think of myself as Lia among most of this group, people who’d become friends, who teased me about fighting with and loving Con.
I looked them over: Con, tall and itching with anticipation, the predawn breeze catching and whipping his long hair, Vesno, noble profile raised to sniff that breeze, sitting at his heel. Kara, dark-skinned and somber, leanly relaxed. Brenda beside him, square and silver-haired, solid determination in the set of her jaw. Agatha, wrapped in a shawl, thin face pale and eyes distant. Ibolya stood just behind her, black hair gathered into a braid, eyes on me with trust and loyalty. Sondra, off to the side, always a bit on her own, golden hair shorn brutally short, wearing a slave’s dull garb and twirling the walking stick she’d found in Yekpehr. Percy stood with Ambrose, both of them in glittering garb. Ambrose wore his court wizard of Calanthe robes and leaned on his tall staff, the emerald topping it a dull green under the pinkening sky. Merle, large and glossy as obsidian, sat on his shoulder, returning my gaze with a canny glimmer in his eye, a much larger being visible in the layers of alternate realities beyond him. As for Percy, he’d dressed as his version of a sea captain, in nautical colors, plenty of braid, long pleated skirts and a jaunty cap on his head.
I’d miss them all, I realized suddenly, and their departure would leave me more alone than I’d ever been in my life, because I’d never known before what it was to work with a team like this. I also, with sudden and acute regret, wished I could go with them.
I even considered, in the impulse of that terrible loneliness of being left behind, that I would go with them. What would Anure do if I knocked on his door with Con and faced him down?
Turn me over to his wizards, that’s what. And I’d be powerless, an orchid severed from the stem, wilted and dying by stages. A liability to them all.
Con tipped his head, studying me, and I realized I’d been silent too long.
“Farewell and calm seas,” I said, beginning where I’d meant to end. I gathered the frayed edges of my thoughts. “You all take with you our dearly held hopes. The world will celebrate your deeds, your bravery, and your selfless determination to right the many wrongs done. When you return, you may ask of Me anything you wish. If it’s within My power, I will give it to you.”
They stirred, a few whispering among themselves. Even Sondra, though she narrowed her eyes in habitual suspicion, looked interested.
“Farewell and calm seas,” I repeated, and the bookending sounded purposeful, like a poem.
They all saluted, bowed, curtsied, or nodded, according to their natures. Then the larger group boarded the slower fishing boat. In short order, they threw off the lines and pushed away. I helped them along with some gentle currents, while Percy and Con made the Last Resort ready.
Then Con, leaving Vesno aboard the yacht, came back down to the dock while my ladies wandered discreetly away some distance.
“Do I get a kiss goodbye this time?” he asked, with a wry half smile for the last time he’d asked, just before the Battle at Cradysica, when I’d refused him.
“I suspect it would be bad luck not to,” I conceded.
“Exactly,” he replied, gaze wandering over my face as if memorizing it.
Since he didn’t move, I stepped closer to him, sliding my hands behind his neck and tipping up my face. Though he put his hands around my waist, nearly able to span the width of it with his big hands, he still didn’t kiss me.
“No matter what happens, Lia,” he said, softly enough that I couldn’t have heard him if we weren’t so close, “remember that you are the reason I want to live. For someone like me, that’s a miracle. And it’s truth.”
I parted my lips for a reply, but he stole the words and my breath, mouth moving over mine with devastating thoroughness, as if he tried to drink me in. The sun tipped over the horizon, spilling golden light through the tangle of his hair, and I trembled with need and emotion.
He wrenched away, giving me one last blazing look with his eyes so like the sun, steadied me on my feet, and walked away. Striding aboard the Last Resort, he pulled up the gangplank and threw down the final ropes before looking my way again, like he didn’t trust himself to see me until he’d forced their departure.
Con raised a hand and I returned the gesture. We stood there, our hands up in a frozen wave, a kind of salute to so many things between us. My remaining ladies gathered behind me, respectful in their quiet, and we all watched the yacht sail into the sunrise, my guiding currents beneath to send them on their way as far as I could reach.
They cleared the barrier reef before the sun rose high enough to heat me through. When they disappeared from sight, I finally lowered my hand, finding it had gone numb from being held aloft so long. The rest of me had gone numb, too, as if Con had taken my heart with him.
Which, I supposed, he had.
But I still had the rest of myself. Along with all that I had learned and grown into.
I turned to my four ladies, the formal distance between us bruising with its awkward edges. We were as private as we’d ever be. So, while the end of a lonely dock seemed like an odd place to have this conversation, it was also fitting in a way. New approaches to handling our changing world. Calanthe and I—and all my people—had been in stasis for so long. Living in our delicate bubble, one that depended on us not breaking it from the inside.
I studied their familiar faces, awaiting any indication of my wishes with alert eyes and carefully sweet smiles. I sighed mentally for the last. I’d like to tell them to only smile when they felt it sincerely, but that would be asking too much.
“I mentioned that I’d be asking more of you than I have before,” I said, noting the wariness creeping into their serene gazes. “You all are practiced at defending My person. I’d like you to expand your efforts to defending all of Calanthe.”
They gazed back at me, with varying levels of comprehension and confusion. Calla frowned slightly but took the initiative. “Using the same techniques, Your Highness?”
I smiled, pleased with her quickness. “Yes. If you envision Calanthe as a larger embodiment of Myself, then the magic should naturally follow.”
Orvyki’s face cleared, lighting with interest. “A violent attack on Calanthe can be reversed just as a violent attack on Your Highness would be.”
I nodded. “That’s My theory exactly.”
“Your Highness is expecting magical attacks by Anure’s wizards,” Nahua put in, not quite a question. “Ibolya told us everything.”
Good. Thank you, Ibolya. “Yes. They’ve been using various magics to test Calanthe’s wards—to Me they feel like needle jabs or splashes of hot water, other similar odd sensations—so I’d like you four to spend today attuning yourselves to that probing and being alert for escalation.”
“Do we know how to do that, Your Highness?” Zariah asked tentatively. “I want to do this, make no mistake, but…” She trailed off, her demurely interlaced fingers gripping one another tight. She clearly worried about being dismissed, but—by the way the other ladies threw her grateful glances—they all harbored the same concern.
“I’m asking you to try,” I said, trying to speak to them as the friends and companions I’d like them to be. My new team of warriors and confidants. “I’m trying new tools, too, magical techniques I’m not sure I know how to do, either. I’m hoping we can all learn together.”
They relaxed at that, smiling back at me with hesitation, then increasing warmth. Genuine smiles. They were all so young, I realized. All younger than I, except for Calla who was my same age. And look how much I’d grown in just a few weeks. We’d been frozen in time, in our seemingly eternal youth. Now it was time to grow up.
“It will be a challenge for us all,” I proclaimed. “I think we’ll be brilliant.”
“Do You intend to convene court today, Your Highness?” Calla asked, raising a brow. “If so, then I advise one of us should remain with You, while the other three practice this new task. We’ll take turns.”
“Then you’re all willing?” I asked, with some surprise.
They exchanged looks and nodded, breaking into excited smiles. “Ibolya is not the only one who’d like to do something more,” Nahua said staunchly. “But I agree with Calla: One of us should be with Your Highness at all times.”
“We won’t abandon You again,” Orvyki declared fervently.
“Besides,” Zariah added with a quirk of a smile, “it will be nice to do something besides sit by the throne all day. Taking turns sounds lovely.”
“Thank you,” I said, tremendously moved. “Let’s get started.”
Walking together, we returned to the palace, ready to begin a new way of life.