Ruti senses the Heir’s impatience growing with each day, and when she’s awakened in the middle of the night, she fears the worst. “You promised,” she gasps out before she even opens her eyes. “If you lay one finger on me, I’ll sing you to your death.”
“Calm down,” the Heir says disgustedly. She stands over Ruti, the light of the sun’s rise haloing her as she snatches her hand from Ruti’s shoulder. “I’m not here to kill you.” Her eyes narrow as Ruti sits up, squinting at her through the bright light. “I need your help. My uncle only just sent word. A new prince is arriving today.”
“I’m doing my best,” Ruti says, but dread suffuses her at the thought of trying to persuade the spirits with what she’s done so far. “There’s no way that I’ll be able to—”
“I know,” the Heir says abruptly. “But there is another option.” She raises her voice. “Kalere,” she calls, and Kalere hurries into Ruti’s room. “Can you do it?”
“Do what?” Ruti asks, but suddenly Kalere is running her hands over Ruti’s hair, cupping her face, eyeing her with calculating eyes.
“I think we can,” Kalere decides, and pulls Ruti unceremoniously from her bed and herds her toward the bathing room without another word.
“Wait, what?” Ruti says, keeping up with Kalere as the Heir gives her a cool once-over and slips out of her nightgown.
Ruti stares, averts her eyes, then stares again, her face very hot as her eyes flicker over the Heir’s smooth skin. The Heir, for her part, seems unbothered by her own nakedness, accustomed to being touched and bathed by the attendants around her.
The Heir steps into the bath and says, “The only option I see is that this new prince believes we are trying the bonding when we aren’t. You and I are about the same height, even if you’re too light-skinned,” she says, assessing Ruti. Ruti still feels heat passing through her as the Heir’s body disappears beneath the water. “I think with some styling and heavy makeup, we can make you look like I do in paintings.”
“You want me to pose as you?” Ruti repeats, the full import of what the Heir is asking finally settling in. “How am I supposed to—”
“I haven’t met Prince Kedron of Phecia,” the Heir says. “He won’t know the difference. And you’ve spent enough time with me to do a crude facsimile of me. It will be enough, at least until dinner with my uncle.”
Mikuyi urges Ruti into the bath, tugging the gown off her shoulders, and Ruti feels the Heir’s eyes lingering on her torso. Ruti flushes, self-conscious of what she knows is nowhere near the smooth perfection of the Heir’s skin. She is scarred from various fights and bad weather in the slums, and she’s always been a little too scrawny, even after weeks at the royal palace. Her ribs are visible, her figure uneven, and she wants to cover herself the moment the Heir sees her.
But she leaves her hands at her sides, stubborn and prideful in all the ways the Heir brings out in her. The Heir watches her, lower lip trapped for a moment in her teeth, and she looks away when she sees that Ruti has caught her. Ruti slides into the bath opposite her, their bare feet bumping together, and Ruti can’t stop a new flush at that.
She clears her throat. “I can certainly do a Princess Dekala,” she says, her voice slyly mocking. “All that involves is treating everyone around me as though they’re below me and I am forced to put up with them.” She heaves a long sigh and affects a cool expression. “It is my fate, as heir to this squalid kingdom.”
“Perfect,” Kalere says, grinning. The Heir glowers at them both.
Mikuyi applies a liberal amount of golden ochre onto Ruti’s face, enough to conceal the disparity in her skin color and the Heir’s from all but the most acute of eyes. Ruti’s hair is twisted tightly into a facsimile of the Heir’s customary coils. The Heir, for her part, has her hair teased out into soft curls much like Ruti’s, and she wears a simple red gown.
Ruti is dressed in white and gold and sent out into the hall for her first test. Orrin falls in place beside her without a second glance and says, “You look lovely today. Will we at last have a morning without that Markless urchin?”
“I wouldn’t count on it,” Ruti says brightly, and Orrin recoils. The door opens again, the Heir gliding out in Ruti’s clothing and a hood placed carefully to conceal her face. Orrin looks between them with faint horror.
They do not go about their daily routine, which is a relief for Ruti, who had been afraid she would have to attempt stick fighting with Tembo. Instead, they’re brought to the main courtyard by the Regent’s attendants, men who don’t look twice at Ruti or the Heir as Ruti stumbles in her long dress and the Heir slips an arm in her gloved one to keep her steady.
“Prince Kedron will arrive shortly,” the attendant, a man named Obasi, informs them. “Your uncle will be watching your meeting to guarantee your—”
Ruti draws herself up to her fullest height, frowning at Obasi. “I hope you aren’t implying that I would ever flout propriety,” she says, mimicking the cadences of the Heir’s voice. The Heir’s arm in hers shakes ever so slightly, a little ripple of thunder above them sounding like soft laughter.
Obasi stumbles over his words. “Of course not,” he says hastily. “I only meant—well, you have expressed a.…” He looks around wildly. “Your uncle is waiting,” he says, nodding toward the twin thrones at the end of the courtyard.
This is their next test, and Ruti’s heart beats quickly. She is wearing the gold ochre in elaborate swirls marked by diamond blots across her face, specially shaped to conceal her identity from even the Regent, but one word from her mouth might be enough to expose her. She walks in tiny steps toward the Regent, who watches her with deep disapproval.
“You will spend the day with Prince Kedron,” he says curtly when she sits, the Heir and Orrin arranging themselves beside the throne. “He is the heir to Phecia, a suitable match for you and for Zidesh. I want you to try bonding with him within the day.”
Ruti watches him, keeping her eyes cool, and she is careful not to respond. “You saw the last prince as a humiliation,” the Regent says, his voice gentler. “I have ensured that this one is far more deserving of you.” His manipulations are as subtle as the note of kindness in his voice, and Ruti peeks at Dekala out of the corner of her eye. The Heir’s lip is curled, and Ruti does her best to mimic that expression.
The Regent makes a disgusted noise and turns away, the simulacrum of caring gone from his expression.
Prince Kedron arrives with an entourage: first, a crowd of Bonded guards, with faces and chests painted to mimic their Maned One patron, who create a show with lightning and fire and wind in the courtyard. Then a trio with power over form create grand, lifelike images in the air, telling stories of Phecia’s greatest triumphs through picture and dance, and Ruti watches with fascination as they move through the courtyard. They sing in a language like Zideshi but different, though Ruti can catch a few words here and there, and their song isn’t magic but it feels like it should be.
“And now,” calls one dancer in Zideshi as they tumble over each other, clearing the center of the courtyard. Together they raise their hands and form a great pathway across the courtyard, the earth rising like a bridge toward the Heir’s throne. “We present our prince.”
The doors to the courtyard open and Prince Kedron saunters forward, flanked by guards as he walks lazily up the bridge toward the throne. He has a narrow Phecian nose and a handsome shape to his face, Ruti supposes, though she is hardly one to note such things. There is a slyness to his smile that makes it nearly a smirk, and it’s this that makes her wary of him.
“Your Highness,” he says in lightly accented Zideshi, kneeling before her and raising his hand to hers.
Ruti stretches out her hand. Kalere used a lotion on her arms that is a slightly darker brown than her olive skin calls for, and Mikuyi gave her a carefully painted mark in anticipation of this. Once they touch palms, this farce will be over at last. But Prince Kedron only presses a kiss to the back of her hand. “Your uncle told me of your wish to delay soulbinding,” he says, his smile still lingering on his face. “Please, show me your grand palace.”
Ruti stands stiffly, her eyes flickering to the Heir’s. The Heir nods almost imperceptibly, and Ruti allows the prince to help her rise. Under the Regent’s eagle eyes, Ruti walks with Kedron down his earth bridge and toward the two-arched, gold-inlaid doors to the palace.
Once she’s put some distance between them, Ruti finally feels as though it’s safe to speak. “These are my companions,” she says, gesturing to Orrin and the Heir as they catch up with them. “Orrin, my lumbering bodyguard, and Ruti, who is the best of us all.”
The Heir’s eyes narrow. Prince Kedron laughs. “The stories of your comeliness have spread across the land,” he says, “but the tales have made little mention of your wit.”
“The tales would have me quiet,” Ruti says boldly. “A queen to be seen and marveled at with a king ruling over her. But I will be ruled by no one.” It is true of the Heir, who has proven to be a force to be reckoned with. Her uncle underestimates her, and even the people of Somanchi speak only of her beauty.
The Heir, walking beside her, gives her an odd look that Ruti can’t quite decipher. Prince Kedron extends his arm for Ruti to take. “A princess of your might should bow to no one,” he says easily.
His words are sweet and sly; Ruti feels her distrust grow. She shows him the palace as well as she knows it, the Heir silent beside her and Orrin glaring at them both, and the Prince is nothing but complimentary toward her and Zidesh. Still, his words reek of insincerity.
“When we are Bonded,” he says as they watch the guards do their exercises in the courtyard, “Zidesh and Phecia will be joined as well. Have you ever seen Phecia?”
The Heir speaks up before Ruti can answer. “Of course the Heir has journeyed to Phecia a number of times while you were away at war. A terrible shame you’ve never met before, as you two are becoming such close friends today.” Her eyes are narrowed.
Kedron looks taken aback at her hostility. “I suppose it is a shame,” he acknowledges. “I feel quite certain that you are my soulbond. They say that your uncle selected the most experienced scholars in the land to calculate who might be yours.” He looks at Ruti, who smiles thinly. The Heir stares daggers through them both, which seems very unfair to Ruti. She’s only doing what the Heir wants. “I understand that your kingdom will never accept an Unbonded woman as its queen,” he says gravely. “But our joined kingdom will be mightier than any other in the land.”
