"Thank you, Mercedes," I said. "I hope I have not sounded unappreciative, because I am so grateful for everything you've done for me—for us."
She waved it off. "I have done nothing. However, if you do join us for dinner, I must give you a word of caution: You are safe here, in this house, because you are under my protection, but there remain those who may be swayed with the right incentive. Prince Stefan may have denied Lord Danton's proposal of marriage to you, but there are others who would be more than willing to hand you over to the Pontefracts for a prize."
My breath caught. "So it's true."
She nodded slowly.
I inhaled deeply, and my chest felt heavy. Stefan had denied the proposal…for me. Stefan, the acting regent of Gaia, whose primary duty was to protect his realm, had denied crucial help so that his sister could be happy. Stefan, my brother, who followed every single rule and custom, whether written or implied. I thought I should've felt joyous, but instead I felt…chastened. "Does…does everyone know?" I asked.
"If by everyone, you mean the entire world, no," she replied. "Lord Commodus Pontefract has conveniently informed the rulers of each territory; it is only a matter of time before his intentions bleed beyond the aristocracy. People love to gossip, you know. Being privy to restricted information gives some a faulty sense of self-importance, and those same people are usually eager to share that information so that they might be important in others' minds, too."
I sighed and looked up into her eyes. Her expression was inscrutable.
"Daria, I tell you this because the Pontefracts do not take rejection lightly. They have many supporters—some of whom will be in attendance this evening. I expect you'll want your Aegises to accompany you to dinner." She paused, and her eyes flickered over my face. "You must be careful, Daria. You will be watched. Every single thing you do will be watched and noted. Any apparent…partiality you may show will put you and the object of your partiality in great danger."
I held her heavy gaze, knowing she was referring to Alex. How did she know? Was it really that obvious?
I'd thought my love for Alex would be enough. I'd falsely believed that I really did have a choice in this world to be with him, and it had been easy to believe, hidden and isolated in the forest, always riding away from truth. But Myez Rader's words had jerked me right out of the world of dreams and hopes I'd built and thrust me into the bitter cold of reality. I could feel however I felt and want whatever I wanted, but it did not change the way this world worked. If anyone even so much as suspected feelings between a princess and her Aegis, it would completely undermine everything Stefan was fighting for. Anything I was fighting for. And Stefan had already sacrificed enough for me. Not to mention it would directly put Alex in danger.
Perhaps that was why he had withdrawn again. Perhaps Myez Rader's words had reminded him of reality, too.
I was wondering why Mercedes had chosen to warn me when I noted the great empathy in her gaze. She had experienced something of this kind, as well.
I swallowed, nodding slowly in understanding.
Once Mercedes was satisfied that I understood her meaning, she said, "I will fetch Ansha to prepare you for this evening." And then she took her leave, pausing only to glance at me over her shoulder, and then she was gone.
I sighed and sagged back against my headboard, closing my eyes. Things were getting very, very complicated.
Chapter 10
A Royal Bath
Ansha appeared before I could spend any time wallowing in self-pity.
"I weel take you to the baths, now, yes?" she asked.
A bath. Yes, that was just what I needed. I could let my worries drown in the water.
"That sounds wonderful, Ansha." I smiled at her and slid out of bed. I swayed on my feet and Ansha rushed to my side to catch me, but I held her off. "I'll be all right. Just a little dizzy, is all." I was probably dizzy from too much sleep.
Her eyes flickered over me and she frowned. Ansha grabbed a towel and some other article of clothing from the wardrobe near the glass doors and then held my bedroom door open, motioning for me to follow her. I slipped my feet into the sandals beside my bed and slowly and steadily followed her out the door and into an open corridor that boasted a view of the city.
Mosaque.
It was the dream of an artist, arid and elegantly constructed of white stone to blend into the white rocks of the cliffs. Greenery and flowers draped from rooftops and terraces; dozens of verandas opened to the sky. A blue sea glittered beyond, the smell of the ocean mixing with nearby lavender in a combination that soothed the soul. Natural springs filled small pools that were home to both lily pads and thirsty birds. Beautiful water fountains were the centerpieces in the maze of open walkways.
I had no idea where Ansha was taking us, even if I'd been paying attention. My focus was so diverted that she could've been leading me to the dungeons and I wouldn't have known. This city in the cliffs was so mesmerizing. A hummingbird fluttered past, wings a blur as its body floated before a honeysuckle. I wondered why on earth Vera would leave Gesh for a place like Valdon. Sure, Valdon was beautiful in its own right, but Gesh was positively ambrosial.
We passed men and women as we wound the labyrinth of walkways. The style of clothing here was similar to what Mercedes had worn, all loose and flowing. Men mostly walked bare-chested, and if they had any covering over their torso, it was a simple sash or a web of decorative tattoos. And all of the people were tanned and corded with muscle.
Curious eyes with lingering gazes followed me as I passed. Conversation would sometimes stop, inciting a deliberate scowl from Ansha, and then those onlookers would hurry off.
I was too weary to care much, though the fresh air was already breathing life back into my stiff joints. We eventually arrived at an entryway, which was a perfect rectangle cut out of stone, and the view beyond was blocked by another wall. We slighted right and I was engulfed in hot and humid air, and then we rounded the corner.
It was a bathhouse, and perhaps one of the most opulent places I had ever seen. It had been built against a cliff, waterfalls trailing down the natural rock wall and running into a pool of the most brilliant blue, as though the water were liquid sapphire. Golden sunlight streamed through an oculus in the domed rooftop. Vines and flowers covered the other walls like thick carpet, and the scents of eucalyptus and citrus saturated the heavy air. The pool was adorned in thousands of shiny, colorful pebbles like some giant mosaic, and all around little stone dragons stood, water spouting from their jaws, their tails, and their talons. A fine layer of steam rose from the water, and I found myself very eager to climb right in.
"You like eet?" Ansha stood at the top of a set of stairs, which disappeared into the water.
"It's beautiful," I said, walking to the edge and dipping my fingers into the water. It was the perfect temperature, too.
"Are you going to get in?" Ansha arched a brow.
"Yes…" It suddenly dawned on me that I needed to take off my clothes. "Um." Well, this was awkward. "Would you, uh, turn around?"
She looked a little incredulous but did as requested. I shimmied out of my shift and all but threw it at her as I jumped into the pool with an indelicate splash. I dipped down so that the water level was at my collarbone.
"May I turn beck around?" she asked.
Was that sarcasm? "Yes. Thanks."
She turned around, fixed me with a look that said, "You are pathetic," then set an ivory bar of soap on the edge of the pool beside me. "Use thet," she said then sat atop a stool in the corner of the room.
I grabbed the bar and set to scrubbing. I didn't remember being so filthy, but the more I scrubbed myself, the filthier I felt. Layers of mud had caked in the strangest places, and once I thought I'd effectively scrubbed away my top dermal layer, I set to my hair. When that didn't work so well, I shut my eyes and sank underwater, letting the water soak me until I couldn't hold my breath any longer. With a gasp I emerged, and my hair was less like thatch and more
like hair. Ansha sat comfortably on her stool reading a small book.
"What are you reading?" I asked.
She turned a page. "I am nit reading." She skimmed the page then flipped to the next page.
Since she obviously didn't want to talk about what she was "nit reading," I leaned my head back against the lip of the pool and shut my eyes. Water lapped against the edge of the pool, and the constant drone of the falls blotted out all other sound. The scent of eucalyptus was much stronger from in the water. I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt so relaxed. Here, in this bath, my mind drifted away so that it was no longer able to interfere with my spirit, and for the first time in a long time, my spirit felt peace. There was no realm. No politics or betrothals. No evil and death.
My hands and feet were nicely pruned by the time Ansha told me it was time to go. Out of both courtesy and annoyance, she turned around so that I could dress in the clean shift and robe she'd brought for me. Once I was clothed, she motioned for me to follow her. We walked back up the maze of walkways to my room. The sky had become a lurid canvas of brilliant oranges, yellows, and pinks as though someone had taken a great paintbrush and streaked the sky with neon. Ansha shut my glass doors and rummaged through my wardrobe again, this time retrieving something the color of an aquamarine. It shimmered like an aquamarine, too.
She shoved it at me. "Put thees on." She nodded to a dressing screen in the corner.
It took me a bit to make sense of the fabric. It was a simple but elegant gown of soft silk that came in two pieces: a panel of a top that covered my bust, like a thick bandeaux, and a long flowing skirt with high slits on both sides, leaving my stomach, shoulders, and arms bare. It would reveal more skin that I was comfortable with, but I doubted Ansha would let me have a say in the matter.
I carefully slipped out of my shift and flung it over the top of the screen. "Ansha?"
"Mm?"
"Your language…" I tied the skirt at my waist. The silk slipped softly against my legs. "What is it called?"
"Saqai." She said it like Suh-keye, with emphasis on the second syllable.
"Saqai," I repeated. I wrapped the top around my bust. It was like a fat ribbon, and there was a good five inches between the top of my skirt and the bottom of my top. Maybe she'd let me wear some kind of shawl. "Will you teach me how to say 'thank you' in Saqai?"
"Garati," she said.
I wasn't so good at rolling my "R"s, but I tried. She laughed at first, and with a little practice, I was doing it "goot enough."
I stepped out from behind the screen. Ansha's scrutiny was upon me at once, then she fussed a bit over the placement of my skirt, loosening the tie until the skirt rested low upon my hips, and then she lowered my top in an attempt to show a little bit of cleavage. Which I didn't have much of.
She stepped back and noticed this with a frown. "You hef no confidence."
I'd expected her "C" word of choice to be something else. "Confidence?"
"Yes. Stend up straight! Shoulders beck. Chin up. You are all turned into yourself like a turtle."
I laughed, and then stopped at her look. She dug her pointer finger between my shoulder blades, trying to force my posture, but I only wriggled away from her. "Ow!"
She grumbled irritably and told me to sit down so that she could try to fix my hair because it "looks like a weed-infested callaberry bush."
She applied wax to my brow—which, by the way, was more painful than any wound I'd ever incurred—and once she'd finished dusting my face with paints, curling my hair and securing half of it on top of my head in a delicately twisted pattern, she stepped back, admiring her handiwork. She wasn't frowning, but she wasn't smiling either. She rubbed scented oil on my inner wrists and at the base of my neck, cuffed my upper arms with gold bands, secured a few white flowers in my hair, and then pulled me in front of a mirror.
I didn't look like me anymore. She had effectively turned me into Aphrodite. I didn't know how, but she'd done it. The young woman who had been me was nowhere to be found. And the dress matched my eyes perfectly.
"Ah, one more thing," Ansha said, then grabbed a vial of ink and some kind of silvery feather from somewhere, and brushed the hair aside from my shoulder. Her eyes narrowed as she focused on my wound. "Holt steel." Her tongue stuck out a little, pinched between her lips as she dipped the quill in the ink and began to draw. Her touch was gentle and the tip of the quill tickled a bit on my skin, but when she was done, my scar had been elegantly hidden inside a tattoo of a dragon. She set the vial of ink down, lay the quill beside it, fanned her hand over her artwork, and then let my hair fall back in place.
"Now you look like a Mosaquian." She preened. "Ready, preen-ciss?"
I was about to say yes when I remembered something. "One moment," I said, and dug through my bag until I found my dagger. It was still sheathed behind the little obsidian rook. I thought I should probably find a new sheath because this one forced unwanted memories upon me, but I'd have to consider that another time. Quickly, I strapped the belt and sheath high around my thigh where no one could see it. I most likely wouldn't need it, but I felt better having it on me. Just in case.
Ansha noticed but said nothing.
"All right," I said. "I'm ready now. But please—just call me Daria."
She studied me a moment. "But you are a preen-ciss. You weel always struggle if you do nit first accept who you are. A frostberry seed will only thrive in thee weenter soil, as Gaia intended, for Gaia created the frostberry with a certain purpose. If the frostberry refuses and tries to be any other seed and live here"—she gestured to the space around us—"in thees jungle, eet will die. The heat would scorch its roots and the birds would pluck its berries until all thet would be left is a skeleton. Eet was not created to survive here. Eet was created to survive in weenter, and in the weenter is where the frostberry will reach its zenith." She smiled, patting my arm. "Come. They are waiting for you."
Chapter 11
An Imperial Feast
If I'd found Mosaque breathtaking during the day, it was ensorcelling at night. The sweet smell of nectar clung to the air, lamps lined the walkways, and orbed lanterns hung like garland from porticos, casting everything in a soft golden hue. The night sky was filled with millions of bright stars, and once Ansha and I reached our designated terrace, I could no longer see the stars above, for the space had been occupied with dozens of floating lanterns. They looked like miniature golden hot-air balloons, suspended in midair, swaying only slightly with a warm summer breeze.
I turned back to say something to Ansha, but she had gone.
I was on my own, then.
I looked back out at the terrace. It was large and square, and the portion nearest me had been left as a dance floor. A few pairs had already begun dancing to the mellifluous melody that slipped through the night, emanating from instruments off to one side of the terrace. Bows weaved and strings plucked, and just like back at the castle, there was no one standing behind them.
Beyond the dancing pairs were tables. There was one very large table that could easily accommodate a party of twenty, and two smaller tables at its ends, only barely detached, so that the arrangement was loosely in the shape of "U". All were adorned in silvery cloth with crystal goblets and empty platters and glowing candles awaiting an aristocratic party.
A party I was supposed to influence somehow.
There was a handful of guards stationed about the terrace, keeping to the shadows. They weren't dressed for the occasion, in their studded leather armor with forearms and calves still exposed, and their faces were concealed behind masks, watching the crowd and challenging the smallest step out of line. With such an important guest list, I was surprised there weren't more of them.
Beyond the dining tables glittered a black sea, stretching endlessly into the night. I thought I could just see a ship far out on the water; a cluster of golden lights hovered on the horizon. And then I wondered what a Gaian ship looked like.
I missed home. I missed my
simple life. I missed the time before pain and grief.
As if sensing the sudden change in my mood, the instruments began a somber melody. Haunting and ethereal, drifting through space and time as though it might touch the stars above and tell them a story of heartache and loss. It slipped over the strings of my heart and plucked them ever so lightly. My chest tightened and I tried to focus on something else. The loss of my father was still too close.
A warm ocean breeze rustled through the light fabric of my gown and the lanterns overhead swayed.
I am with you, the wind seemed to say.
I took a deep breath. Where was Alex?
Remember Mercedes' warning.
I remembered her warning enough, but surely a princess of the realm could inquire over her Aegis without inciting suspicion. Alex's absence was like a vacuum, droning constantly, absorbing every other sight and sound.
Just then, a handful of tiny points of light buzzed around me. At first I thought they were fireflies, but then one hovered before my face. It was a…person. A tiny person, similar to the one I'd seen in the fiori. Her body pulsed with golden light as silvery wings fluttered behind her, and then she extended a tiny palm and blew into it. A cloud of golden glitter blew in my face and she giggled—a sound like bells. She flitted away, the rest of her firefly friends darting after her.
And I sneezed.
"There you are." It was Vera.
She looked…different. Her hair had been washed and curled back, and she wore a golden wrap that shimmered when she moved. An elegant tattoo of a flower marked her shoulder, with a stem that curled around the upper part of her arm. But even more than that, there was a certain softness to her face, like someone had taken a sponge of happiness and smudged away all her anger lines.
Well, this was a new development.
"Hey," I said, "did you—" I sneezed again. Loudly. The pressure was building behind my eyes fast.
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