“My dear, I don’t know how you do it.” Her father stirred cream into his tea. “Court politics overwhelm me. It’s why I live so far from the city.”
“And how do the farmers feel about the newly enforced rations?” she asked, clenching her jaw in anticipation of more terrible news.
“Oh, they’re absolutely spitting with anger,” her father said blithely. “They grow the food, and so think they should not have to bend to the whims of the crown. But all of them have clandestine crops they don’t pay taxes on, so they don’t really have a leg to stand on when it comes to ethics.”
“I don’t think you’re meant to tell me that,” Elodie said, trying not to laugh.
Her father considered this. “I never know what I should and shouldn’t say. I can barely balance a grain ledger, let alone political machinations. It always surprised me how your mother managed to be so many places at once—somehow, she was able to prioritize her allegiances, build relationships abroad, rule, strategize, and raise you all.”
Elodie snorted. While her mother had been an excellent monarch, she had been a terrible mother.
“Well, she kept up the illusion of maternal instinct at any rate,” her father said, shrugging. “You likely got more of her time than any of your siblings, if I had to guess.”
That was certainly true. Tera Warnou had been very particular about imbuing her first daughter with her knowledge. “I’ve wondered about that. Mother knew so much, not only about being queen, but also what it took to be the queen’s right hand. She had me training to be an adviser my whole life, even though, were it not for her untimely death, Brianne would not have taken the throne until she was of age.”
“That isn’t so surprising, is it?” Her father reached for a sponge cake. “Tera was a third daughter, which put her third in line for the throne. An advisory role was the closest to the crown she ever thought she’d get. A set of strange, dark circumstances is the only reason that your mother ever ruled. I suppose she wanted her daughters to be prepared in case of something equally sinister.”
Elodie put her teacup delicately down on its saucer. She did not want her shaking hands to give away exactly how desperate she was for the information that lay behind the door her father had just unlocked.
“What happened to my aunts?”
Tera Warnou had been notoriously tight-lipped about her two elder sisters. Elodie had learned from a very young age not to mention them, as her mother would close herself off in her study, leaving Elodie out in the corridor, alone. The one time she had pressed Bale, the elderly steward, for information about the deceased queens, he had gone pale as a ghost and promptly fled. That night, Elodie had received a swift, precise slap from her mother, the pain making it explicitly clear that Elodie’s loyalty belonged to the living Warnou women, not the dead ones.
Her father sighed, putting down a half-eaten jelly roll. “I wasn’t here then, so what I’ve heard is secondhand. I had taken a position as a tutor on an estate in Upper Tyne, instructing some ghastly relative thirteen degrees removed from the throne. While your mother and I corresponded frequently, I knew only what she told me: that they were gone within a month of each other. One took her own life; the other drowned. It was terrible, both for the country and for your mother. But she rallied, best she could. Took that grief and channeled it into something productive: securing Velle’s future as the geopolitical backbone of the continent. No thanks to her sisters, mind you.”
Elodie frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Aurielle and Ursula were not the most civically minded. They traded away bushels of vegetables to ensure that the finest silks were imported faster. They put a moratorium on education, let the Church have its way so long as the tithes were paid. Your mother spent half her reign trying to undo their work.”
Elodie took a bite of cake to give herself a moment to spin up a segue. “Strange, isn’t it, that mother didn’t have an adviser?”
Her father squinted at her. “Is it?”
“This was a poor attempt at a leading question,” Elodie admitted. “I found something of hers recently. A stack of letters. Trouble is, I can’t for the life of me figure out who she was writing to.” She pulled the missives from their hiding place beneath the table. “You knew her for so long and spent so much of your lives entwined, I just assumed, if anyone would know, it would be you.”
“And here I thought you missed your precious father.” He chuckled, reaching into his pocket to retrieve his spectacles. “Let me see.” His eyes swept across the page. The longer he read, the harder he frowned.
“What?” He held up a hand, eyes scanning the page. “What?” Elodie repeated. Her father was very quiet, refusing to meet her eyes. “Father?”
“Elodie.” But the humor in his voice wavered. Finally, he returned her gaze. “She wouldn’t want me to tell you.”
Triumph sparked in her chest even as she outwardly pouted. “Why not?” Her instincts had been correct. Her father knew the truth. Now she simply needed to coax it out of him.
“She made me promise never to tell her children. It feels wrong to break that promise, even now.” He looked very sorry indeed. Still, his clear conscience would do his daughter no good.
“My mother died an untimely death,” Elodie said flatly, “and I am tasked with upholding her legacy, which she loved more than any of her children.” Her father pursed his lips, considering. “But I am failing. My mother is not here to tell me what to do, and while she prepared me to advise, she did not prepare me to rule.”
Elodie looked at her father with mournful eyes. “I’m slipping. My people are starving because a petulant boy cannot accept that I will not marry him. The Republics have banded together, their alliance forming an army three times the size of my own. I need someone strategic to help me navigate these decisions. Lady above, Dad, I need an adult. Someone who understands what my mother would have done and how she would have prevailed. Who understands how tenuous and terrible this responsibility truly is.”
Elodie slid from the settee onto the floor at her father’s feet. The Queen of Velle was not too proud to plead, especially with someone historically powerless in the face of her vulnerability. A single tear ran down her cheek. “Please.”
That did it. “Very well,” her father said quickly, waving Elodie away with his handkerchief. “You’re right. Your mother is gone, and she took many secrets with her. This one can be a gift for you.” He chuckled darkly. “Nicely done, by the way, appealing to my tender sensibilities.” His humor faded as he cleared his throat, looking uncomfortable. “Your mother had a third sister.”
Elodie sat, stunned. She had envisioned an ally one continent over. Perhaps an admiral who provided intel from the sea. What she had not expected was a secret sister.
“Rowan was younger than your mother,” her father continued. “They were thick as thieves, like you and Cleo. Did everything together. When Tera took the crown, she assumed that Rowan would stay by her side. Instead, the fourth sister fled. Tera didn’t know where she’d gone. Hence the unsent letters.” He gestured to the pile. “Something happened between them. Your mother never told me, and when I pressed, she urged me to stop asking. To swear I’d never speak of her again.” He sighed. “There are far too many mysteries buried beneath the Warnou family tree.”
But Elodie could not empathize with her father’s remorse. Instead, she radiated with excitement. Somewhere in the world existed a person who had known her mother from birth, knew her intimately as only a sister could. Someone who could read her mother’s words and understand the intent behind them. Someone who would be able to offer Elodie the guidance she so desperately needed.
“Thank you,” she told her father. “Truly. My mother would thank you, too, if she could.”
“I don’t know where Rowan is, mind you,” he said, still frowning. “Or if she’s even still alive. And I cannot guarantee that you’ll like what you learn if you do find her.”
But Elodie would not let this potential discomfort keep her from the truth. Whatever had wedged a divide between Rowan and Tera was surely worth uncovering.
Elodie was visited by her own younger sister only moments after the duke had departed. Cleo barged into the queen’s chambers without so much as a knock.
“What did you do?” the middle Warnou demanded, intercepting her sister, who had risen to draw herself a well-deserved bath. “Why would you banish Sabine?”
“You heard,” Elodie said dully.
“Yes I heard,” Cleo said incredulously. “The whole castle has heard. The only thing I can’t figure out is why?”
“I take it you did not hear about her attack on Tal?”
Cleo frowned. “I just assumed he had it coming.”
