Not princess for long, she knows, and a pang of dread hits with that reminder.
She steals out of Dekala’s room, exhausted and sick with tension, but stops short when she sees Kalere sitting at the table in the main hall of Dekala’s quarters. “I sent Kimya to bed,” Kalere says calmly. “I told her you would be out late tonight.”
Ruti swallows. “I didn’t—this isn’t—” she stammers, and she wraps her arms around herself, afraid of what she’s exposed of Dekala and of herself.
Kalere tilts her head. “We are Princess Dekala’s attendants,” she says, her voice gentle. “We will be discreet. Now and for any other nights that you might.…”
“No,” Ruti says hastily, and her heart aches at that impossibility. “No, Dekala is … she is bonding with Prince Torhvin,” she says dully, and the truth of that has never settled into her heart before as it does now.
Ruti walks toward her room, conscious of Kalere’s eyes on her back. She swallows, feeling very close to sobs as she takes step after step toward her door.
She pushes the door open, changes mechanically into a nightgown, and climbs into bed. Whatever happens next, she won’t regret tonight. She can’t, no matter how much it might hurt in the coming days as the rest of Dekala’s plans unfold. She stretches her legs across the bed and closes her eyes.
They snap open a moment later. Her arms are flung across the bed to the window, but they haven’t touched the curled-up girl she is accustomed to sharing her bed with. “Kimya?” Ruti whispers as she squints into the dark, her heart thumping. Kalere said she’d sent Kimya to bed. But Kimya isn’t.…
Kimya isn’t in the room, not in Ruti’s bed or the other one. “Kimya?” Ruti repeats, her voice harsh with fear, but there is no response, no movements in the dark or signs that might be Kimya teasing her for her late arrival. “Kimya,” Ruti says insistently.
Nothing.
Unbidden, Torhvin’s cool threat from earlier in the night returns to her. I will take everything from you for that, he had said, the promise of a man who knows what there is to take, and Ruti’s blood runs cold.
Byale is beautiful, full of ornate buildings that rise above the royal carriages in shades of gold and pearly white. The roads are paved and clean, even in the Merchants’ Circle, where shopkeepers aren’t permitted to bring their wares out into stands in the road. Ruti sees no sign of poverty in Byale as they ride through it. Only the farmland on the outskirts of the city is less than picturesque, with withered plants and brown grass that hint at Byale’s recent lack of rainfall.
The lack of crops has no apparent impact on the rest of the city. The palace is enormous, adorned in gold and steel with towers that rise high above the buildings of Byale. There are statues everywhere of King Jaquil, Prince Torhvin knelt beside him, and the sign of King Jaquil—a trident with the pattern of ashto and majimm superimposed upon it—dots almost every building, both public and residential. Ruti notices, though, that the houses and private buildings they pass are far less elaborate than the public property of the city.
She doesn’t notice much else, distracted as she is by Kimya’s disappearance. No one has given her answers. Kalere was adamant that Kimya had gone to her room and there were no intruders. “She’s young and curious,” Mikuyi had said gently. “She might have gone out wandering. I’m sure she’ll be back.”
But there had been something about Torhvin’s face as he led Dekala into his carriage that Ruti hadn’t trusted. Torhvin has Kimya, and he knows Ruti knows it. He’d had the audacity to invite her into his carriage as well, his eyes glittering with amusement, and Dekala had been the one to say pointedly, “There is a carriage for my attendants.”
Torhvin’s face had shone with victory. Dekala had leaned against his arm and said nothing more, her eyes burning into Ruti.
As expected, they will not be talking about that night again. They hadn’t known about Kimya then. Her disappearance hadn’t been a factor. Ruti’s skin prickles when she thinks about it, and she is seized on occasion by the compulsion to cry at the thought of the little they’d discussed. She doesn’t know if it’s for Kimya or for Dekala, for the Markless who suffer under Torhvin’s rule or for what she has to do now.
She will pretend, with Dekala beside her, in this unfamiliar city of strangers.
“You can’t tell me you believe that Kimya would just disappear,” she hisses to Dekala in a hall emblazoned with King Jaquil’s sign. They had left for Byale just after sunrise, taking a direct route that brought them to the city by midafternoon. Winda has been assigned to their personal security in Byale, and Orrin trails beside her, alternating between glowering at her and looking at Dekala with puppy-sad eyes. Dekala must have spoken to him before they left, because he no longer lingers as though he expects her to change her mind. Instead, he only looks stricken. For a moment Ruti wonders if he, too, is pretending. But no. Orrin has only gotten the bare bones of what will happen next.
Ruti, for better or worse, has gotten the entire feast.
Right now Orrin and Winda are at the end of the hall, keeping a careful distance from Ruti and Dekala as they argue. Other Ruranans scamper down the hall and slow when they pass them, eavesdropping easily on their whispered argument. Dekala’s eyes flicker to them and Ruti raises her voice, adds an outrage that isn’t hard to find right now. “She loves the palace. She loves you. Don’t you care about her at all?”
Dekala lifts her chin, resolute. “Kimya is a sweet child and she deserves better than you using her like this to try to disrupt my soulbinding.”
Ruti sputters loud enough for their eavesdroppers to hear. “I’m not—I’m trying to save you. You can’t possibly want to marry Torhvin.”
“I find,” Dekala says, her eyes icy, “that I tire of being told what it is that I want.”
“This is a mistake,” Ruti says, and she modulates her voice to sound worn and exhausted at this battle, at trying again and again to save Dekala from herself. Sometimes it is so easy to be genuine when she puts on this act. “This isn’t you.”
Dekala scoffs. “Because you believe you know me,” she says. The people around them must see the chasm between them, impassable and filled with ice. “So does Orrin. So does my uncle. I am whatever you need me to be, regardless of what it is that I want to be.”
That stings more than it should. “And what you want to be is queen,” she says dully.
Dekala doesn’t answer, but a wind caresses Ruti’s face, an acknowledgement she doesn’t need. Ruti stares at Dekala, eyes burning as she clenches her fists and refuses to look at the Ruranans who pass by.
They’re interrupted by a man who makes a mad dash around the corner, breathing a loud sigh of relief when he catches sight of them. “Princess Dekala!” he says, pressing his hands together. “I don’t know how we were separated again!” Kieran is their guide through the Ruranan palace, a hapless man who is easily lost when they need him to be.
Dekala straightens, turning away from Ruti. “No worries,” she says calmly, a picture of grace and elegance now. There is no sign that she’d been arguing moments before, except for the entourage casting worried glances their way. “My guards kept up with me. I know my stride can be a bit much.”
“Oh, certainly not,” Kieran says fervently. “It is my own fault for falling behind.” He blinks down the hall, bobbing his head with relief when he catches sight of Winda. “You’ve been well protected while I’ve been searching for you?”
Winda inclines her head. “It is under control.”
Kieran swallows, beaming up at Dekala. “Well then, let’s get on with it,” he says, clapping his hands together. “There is an exquisite tapestry in this hall.” He gestures to a woven cloth that covers nearly the entire wall behind Orrin and Winda. “It is a gift from the court weavers to our great King Jaquil, who slumbers still in a room just down this way.”
“Fascinating,” Dekala says, sounding genuinely interested. Ruti gives her a dark look that doesn’t go unnoticed by Kieran. “It must have taken a very long time to create.”
“Oh, yes,” Kieran says, bobbing his head. “We have been bereft of our king for so long. Torhvin leads handily, of course, but Rurana’s soul yearns for Jaquil.” A servant hurries to him, motioning at King Jaquil’s room and speaking in a hushed voice. Kieran’s brow furrows as he listens, and Ruti arranges her face into another glare at Dekala, shifting away from her so she can listen.
The servant is only reporting a strange light spotted from the king’s window, and Ruti dismisses it. Kieran turns back to them, a wide smile on his face. “We don’t want to disturb his dreams,” he says. “Come, let me show you our grand gallery.”
Kimya would have happily stolen a dozen of the trophies Kieran shows them next, Ruti thinks as she fingers a priceless jewel that once sat on the crown of every Ruranan king of the Tabia dynasty. Kimya should be here.
None of them should be here, she reminds herself. She snatches her hand away, finding Winda’s eyes hard on hers. Dekala hisses audibly from beside her, “I am growing very tired of your provocations.”
Ruti’s eyes narrow. “You didn’t mind them a few nights ago.”
