I waited for the burn of anger. The twist of guilt. I waited for shock, disgust, shame. I waited for it to creep over me, one small rivulet at a time. I waited for it to swallow me whole. I waited for a glimpse of anything big or small, any hint of feeling I could latch onto to carry me away.
But nothing came.
Summer appeared. Summer vanished.
Leaves turned. Apples in the orchards behind the palace grew plump. Frost breathed across our window, sealing it shut. Thaan didn’t send us on another mission, though we knew he watched us closely. Hooded Naiads shadowed every movement we made, from a visit to the kitchens to the edge of the palace cliffs, there was always at least one, though often there were more. I’m not sure if he didn’t trust us or if he was just biding time and watching us before the next assignment.
Selena led us through our daily activities. Breakfast at our table, lunch in the courtyard, moonbathing on our balcony. She resumed her record-keeping, filling her hours with her undying thirst for knowledge, saving only a little time before bed for the novels she used to devour. Some question would enter her mind in the morning, and she’d spend half of the day dredging up everything from ancient Naiad scrolls to modern Aalton texts to answer it.
“Your hyoid bone isn’t connected to any other bone,” she’d say while turning a cube of sugar in her tea. “It’s a floating bone in your throat shaped like a horseshoe. Do you think it’s lucky?”
Or later, while stirring her breath into hot soup, “The miners in Sylus developed a type of language without words. Ways to send the Cyprillic alphabet through long and short taps that they pulse along a wire.”
I wasn’t sure what she was searching for in her pages of archaeology and anatomy. If she was satisfying an itch or simply passing time. Maybe she was simply distracting herself from the quiet, since that’s all I could offer her.
Sometimes, late at night, I’d wake to find her staring at the ceiling.
On the nights it rained, I’d wake to find her gone. I’d push myself out of bed, wandering through our apartment to find her out the doors at our railing, standing in the downpour as though inviting the sky to wash through her skin.
I always sneaked back to bed, lying awake until she came to crawl into her sheets, soaked to the bone.
It’s not as though I didn’t take on my own strange intricacies. Food bored me. The moon became more pest than blessing. I lost interest in my plants. Realizing I hadn’t watered them in a month, I made to call moisture into their pots only to find the soil already damp. I wondered how long Selena had been taking care of them. Everything seemed less bright, less lustrous.
Except the sea.
And the islands beyond it.
I didn’t press. I knew Selena didn’t want to hear it. I let her tote me around. To the gardens, the solarium, the cliffside. Cakes, pastries, tea. Evenings wasted while we lay out in a blanket over the grass, breathing the chilled wind of autumn and listening to the tide, closing my eyes when spray happened to fly high enough to kiss my eyelids.
Once, in early winter, the Queen passed by us.
She stopped at our wrought iron bench, watching as a bundled-up Selena sorted the corners of a jigsaw puzzle under the icyCapriissun. Her sons were with her, Prince Hadrian and Prince Nikolaos. The captain of her royal guard raised a fist, stopping his men. The boys stuck close to their mother, though their noses and cheeks dusted with pink from the cold. They played chase, jumping in and out of each other’s snow-sung footprints in a way that reminded me of the skip-chalk game Selena and I had played as kids along the Cyprian docks.
Queen Cemre waited for our attention long enough to grow impatient. Then leaned over Selena, selecting a puzzle piece and fitting it into place. Selena gave a start when she finally noticed the young mother, jumping to her feet and bowing her head. “Your Majesty.”
“I didn’t see you at my solstice ball last night,” Cemre said, running her finger along the puzzle in search of a second piece. “But I suppose it only takes one bad night with him to convince you to stay away.”
She curved her elbow over her rounded belly as though it were an armrest. Like me, she’d lost weight this last year. The delicate skin under hereyes was a shade too dark, her lips a hue too pale. I watched the boys jump from print to print, the smaller one’s curls bouncing with every clumsy leap.
Selena tracked the Queen’s long, olive-skinned fingers as they shifted pieces around. “I think he plans to kill you.”
The Queen continued her search, finding a slice of the puzzle’s edge and snapping it into place. “He does.”
“You should leave,” Selena said softly. “Take your children and leave the palace.”
The older boy stopped to cough. His toddler brother paused, gazing up at him. Their mother did as well, firm focus in her golden eyes. Four small bruises hovered over her brow, a perfect patterned line.
“How far along are you?” Selena asked.
Prince Hadrian cleared his throat. Then frog-leapt over his brother. The motion seemed to wake the Queen from a small trance. She secured one last puzzle piece into place. “Come, boys,” she said, an arm still over her belly as she made her way across the courtyard. I watched the younger one toddle after her, curls springing with each step.
Nikolaos.
How small he was to be named in a prophecy. Marked for war. Subconsciously, my own hand settled over my stomach. Instinct whispered in my ear, the prickle of being watched. I glanced over to find Selena studying me in silence.
I stared at her. She stared at me. Neither of us spoke.
A winter sparrow flew to our feet, hopping to the dry patch of dead grass under the table.
