Messages carried by the Helat moved much faster than the couriers Clarencio 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 relay network 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 Carinal for the winter.

  The Autumnlight Festival left the Jewel of the Delta abuzz with gossip. A shimmering, exotic new beauty accompanied the Lord of Siu Carinal on the High Stand. Every wagging tongue from the whoring houses to the palace spoke of radiant skin inscribed centuries before by Eketra with runes stolen from Teikru, runes that enhanced the beauty’s abilities enough to drive even Josean mad with lust.

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

  The Lord of Siu Carinal had fought a battle to gain her otherworldly attentions, setting aside his wife for the favor of entertaining Seleketra in his bed, and slaying his own son in a fit of rage when the young man had attempted to touch the demigoddess.

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

  As always, Athalia was right. Overnight, Seleketra’s became the most sought-after hand in the city. 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 palace 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 was provisionally dubbed Reuel by his mother. The name he would eventually carry to the throne would be decided upon later, when the crown prince made it back from the northern front.

  Pasiona’s interest 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 black 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 later, 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 musicians 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 Clarencio included—was fastened to the beautiful young woman seated at the left hand of the mad queen.

  Princess Kelena.

  The girl was a softer combination of her sire’s arresting House Khinet features and her mother’s striking beauty, as pale as porcelain, with dark eyes so deep they could swallow a man whole. Her long black hair curled naturally into ringlets like the mad queen’s, but hers was noticeably cleaner and devoid of the bone beads her mother favored.

  Kelena laughed 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, complemented by a pair of dimples piercing her flawless cheeks.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  If Clarencio hadn’t remembered those wide eyes so clearly, he would have thought that the real princess had died and been replaced 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, Clarencio 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, favoring 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 dance with you, you silly goose,” one hissed behind her hand, looking pointedly at Clarencio’s walking stick.

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

  Kelena beamed. “Of course! I was such a child when we visited Blazing Prairie, but your residence was gorgeous, Lord Clarencio. 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,” Clarencio said. “Would you mind if I sat with you for a while?”

  The other girls giggled again, but with a playfully irritated look, Kelena sent them scampering back to their mothers.

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

  Clarencio sat and rested 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 center of all this fabulous beauty, but unfortunately, I couldn’t spare the time. My instruction was rather intensive.”

  “I recall.”

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

  “Crying 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 exciting than I expected.”

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

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

  “I was raised hardly ever seeing one,” he said. “It can 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 watching her and laughed gayly.

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

  Clarencio shook his head. “I wasn’t thinking about marriage at all, in fact. Forgive 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 dancing, 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 clasped her hands in her lap. 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.” Clarencio felt strangely compelled to soothe her concern. 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 musicians began the final song, the signal for the revelers that the feast was over. The princess looked in the direction 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 Clarencio. 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.” Clarencio 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 queen left the feast, down the darkened corridor that led to Mistfen’s residences.

  Clarencio 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 anywhere these days. They would be gone long before he managed to 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 accomplished what she’d been sent to do.

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