IT WAS STRANGE HOW sound carried, or sometimes didn’t, within the inner walls of the Temple of Kyria.
Cassia heard the hoofbeats in the outer court as clearly as she could hear her spade scraping the soil,
but she couldn’t make out the voice of whoever had arrived.
Her aches distracted her. The preceding winter months had left her gardening muscles out of
practice and wrought calluses on her hands more suited to accommodate a shuttle than a spade. In a
moment she might have to give in and straighten to rest her arms and rub her back. But her body had
no cause to complain. It had been in its own bed for the past three nights, all night long. Never mind
that she had slept poorly, thinking of what she had not done.
Curse Deukalion for keeping her awake with thoughts of how close they had come to disaster.
Curse him for inviting her out to the Font. The king’s own mage had nearly caught them together! She
had felt Amachos brandishing his magic as she escaped.
Cassia hurled aside the stone she had pried out of the soil. She was wiser than the idealistic,
overconfident Hesperine. She knew when risk outweighed the answers she would never get.
She would not venture into such dangerous territory again.
“Lady Cassia.”
At the sound of her name, Cassia finally straightened, rising up on her knees and allowing her body
to stretch.
Deutera stood at the end of the row. She wore her veil, and a line between her brows suggested
worry. Or perhaps regret. “A messenger has come for you. He awaits you in the outer court.”
The pain in Cassia’s limbs worsened from sudden tension. She got to her feet. Knight moved
restlessly at the edge of the garden but did not disobey her command to stay out of the bed. As soon as
she made it to the end of the row, he twined around her legs, eager to offer comfort.
“We won’t completely clean up,” she told him. “We’ll be back after we’ve heard what the
messenger has to say.” She paused only to set aside her tools. This could not be a summons.
She and Knight followed Deutera around the inner wheel of the temple, through the walls that
divided it like spokes and the gardens nestled in between. Cassia was coming to understand the
purpose of the different segments and the ways of the soil in each. Most remained chill and hard in the
grasp of winter, while others turned into lakes of mud as they thawed, but come spring, all would
become home to the seedlings now tended so carefully indoors.
Tendrils of Kyrian magery brushed Cassia’s arms as Deutera led her past women who nurtured the
dirt with tools and spells. A group of apprentices stood laughing at a well, trying to wash mud from
their dark blue robes. Splashes echoed off the walls, and sounds played tricks on Cassia’s ears again.
Although the infirmary was in the outer temple, she heard a child moan.
The cacophony faded as she and Deutera emerged from the nest of walls and fertile soil. They
halted in the outer court, where the messenger in royal livery confronted Cassia. She knotted her
hands in her apron and waited for the man to speak.
He had a hard face that showed no expression. “His Majesty requires your presence.”
That meant immediately. That meant the king was, for the first time, calling Cassia back from the
temple in the middle of the day for all to see. What it meant beyond that she could not imagine, if she
were to reach the palace on her feet.
Trying to ignore the twisting pangs in her stomach, Cassia glanced down at herself and gestured to
indicate the smears of soil on her apron. “I will take a moment to make myself fit to appear before
him.”
She must hurry. It would take too long to retrieve her tools. She must leave them and wash up at the
nearest well.
She turned to find one of the apprentices already standing near with the basket of tools in hand.
Another young mage offered a damp cloth. Cassia breathed a grateful thank-you to both girls and
tidied herself, then took off her soiled apron and made to fold it with the clean side facing outward.
The result was a haphazard, wrinkled pile she stashed on top of her tools. She gripped the basket to
her, made a courteous apology to Deutera that she forgot as soon as she said it, and turned back to the
messenger.
He was holding his horse for her. Waiting to pack her onto the animal and deliver her to the king.
She wasted an extra instant rubbing away the moisture between her palms. Then she marched to the
horse, and the messenger hoisted her into the saddle. He took the reins in hand and led her out of the
temple.
Knight paced beside her the whole way, now on one side, then on the other. He could not stand
still, as if he wished to attack something, but could not spot it. Cassia focused her gaze on the
countryside so the motion of the horse did not worsen what was going on in her belly.
The ride felt interminable, and she wished it had lasted forever. The messenger deposited her in
the main courtyard of the palace and informed her, “His Majesty awaits you in the solar.”
The walk through the palace seemed too fast, although she walked slowly, swallowing at every
step. Suddenly she found herself in the king’s wing. The corridor was full of sunny afternoon light
falling upon her from the windows far, far above her head. The double doors that led to the king’s
rooms stood open.
The antechamber was full of guards. As she passed between their ranks, they chatted with each
other as if she were not there.
The solar door was closed. Would they make her ask for admittance? Would they make her open it
herself?
The door popped open, and Cassia jumped. Red-gold robes, oiled dark hair and an unremarkable
face met her in the doorway.
Amachos smiled at Cassia and held out his arm to invite her inside.
No, no. He couldn’t know. He hadn’t told the king.
Let it not be true that Amachos had seen her with Deukalion.
“Lady Cassia.” The mage’s voice seemed to resound around her. “How very interesting to see you
again.”
The sunbeams swam in her vision, and the sight of the mage blurred before her. She could only
hear his clear, deep voice. She stood there as if his words tethered her to the spot.
No reprieve. No recourse. No escape.
“Won’t you join us inside?” he commanded.
Cassia feared the guards might have to push her over the threshold. If they did, what passed within
would be infinitely worse. She forced herself to step inside. She made herself walk past Amachos,
although her every instinct screamed that she mustn’t put her back to the enemy.
She tried to ignore everything inside that room except the legs of the desk, where she pinned her
gaze as she knelt. But in her mind’s eye, she saw each stick of rich furniture that cluttered the
chamber. All fourteen of the swords on the walls. The arch of the great hearth, where a fire always
burned, as in the kingdom’s forges. Most of all, every line graven on the face of the man who sat
behind the desk. His hair and beard had gone white while he occupied that chair, but his blue eyes
were as keen and piercing as they had been since Cassia could remember.
“Well,” said Amachos behind her. “Out of all our daily afternoon meetings, Basileus, few have
been so revelatory. I will leave you to...settle your family matter.”
The door swung and landed shut with a quiet, final impact that sounded like a catapult. Cassia’s
whole body jerked. The startle gave way to the slow burn of humiliation. She had betrayed her
feelings.
“What do you have to say for yourself, daughter?”
Cassia swallowed again. He expected her to speak first?
“Forgive me.” She hated the words and how broken each syllable sounded. “The messenger did
not...that is, he had yet to tell me for what purpose you summoned me.”
“Do you not already know?”
Cassia clenched her teeth, willing her back not to tremble.
Did the king know?
She supposed others might have prayed in that moment, but all she could do was try to think. He
was baiting her. She knew this; that open-ended question was a classic threat, a trap. If he didn’t
know, she must not condemn herself.
She heard the king shift in his chair, a warning her silence had stretched on too long already.
“Forgive me,” she said again, pushing the words out of her tight throat. “I do not know.”
“Your wrongdoing does not weigh on your conscience at all? That offends me most deeply. Even
your mother had a greater sense of propriety.”
Cassia waited. The glare of the sun streaming in the windows behind the king made pain erupt in
her head, which felt as if it were much too near the ceiling. The promised rain hadn’t come yet.
Knight shifted his body closer to her, and right in front of the king, she leaned on her dog to steady
herself.
“Go ahead,” the king commanded. “Ask me what you have done.”
Cassia coaxed a breath into her nose and convinced it to form words. “What have I done? Your
Majesty?”
“You have done your brother a grave insult. He was angered to see you leave the feast in his honor
so early. For his own sister to be among the first to depart...what sort of message do you think that
sent to others in Our court?”
Cassia felt the mad urge to laugh. So this was to be it. A boy’s party, her undoing at last.
She had miscalculated. Over something so simple.
“What do you have to say for yourself?” the king asked.
“I saw Lady Hadrian leave, and I thought it acceptable to follow the example of one so esteemed.”
“Lady Hadrian is not my daughter, nor is she the prince’s last surviving sister.”
The hopeless laughter inside Cassia was gone. Something much more dire rose and raged, striving
to fight its way out of her.
She held it within herself with every ounce of will she had.
“I. Was ill.”
“Did you not feed a sample of every dish on your plate to the dog first, to ensure none of it would
make you ill?”
“Yes. It was not the food.” She cleared her throat. “I...I did not want to humiliate my brother by
fainting before his guests. I thought it better to return to my chambers and not display my weakness
before Your Majesty.”
“It disturbs me that you always seek to hide your shame. Is there anything else you wish to
confess?”
“N—no.”
“Is there anything else you ought to confess?”
Her heartbeat pounded in her ears, throbbing with the pain in her head.
Her life, as always, depended on her answer.
What could she possibly do to make him believe her?
She lifted her head, inch by inch. She tilted her eyes upward.
His blue gaze burned into hers.
“I have done nothing else that would offend Your Majesty or my beloved brother. Forgive me for
my failure on his day of honor. It was...a feminine weakness.” The most convenient lie she could
grasp at. She hadn’t used it yet this month. Had she? No. Time to contrive bloody rags for Perita to
launder so the ruse would remain convincing.
“So much time spent with the mages of Kyria, and yet their healing arts do nothing to assist you
with womanly complaints.”
“I shall consult with them...for a new remedy.”
“See that you do. It is a hardship for Us for you to be unreliable.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
He tapped blunt fingertips on the surface of the desk. “Go back to your rooms. Do not embarrass
Us in that way again.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
She struggled to get her legs under her. If not for Knight, she would never have made it to her feet.
She backed away, and the carpet seemed to clutch at her slippers. The knowledge that she stumbled in
front of the king made her skin burn from scalp to belly. She still faced those cold blue eyes. Only
when she got out the door and it shut on his gaze was she released.
She turned and fled.
No reprieve in her rooms. Perita sat by the fire at her mending. Cassia rushed past her without a
word and shut the door of her bedchamber.
She saw herself slamming it. Saw her hand reaching for her spade and throwing it against the wall
so she could listen to it clang and echo on the stone. She heard all that in her mind only, for every real
noise she made, whatever she did in this room, Perita would hear and report to the king.
Cassia took her basket of gardening tools in both hands and hurled them with all her might onto the
bed.
Her spade rolled impotently on the soft bedclothes, scattering bits of soil. Packets of seeds landed
all about and spilled their precious contents. Her apron fluttered over it all and landed with its
unstained side up.
Cassia made it to the basin on the floor by her bed just in time to avoid vomiting on herself. Knight
nudged his head under her elbow until she wrapped one arm around him. She clung to him while her
body heaved, pushing out and emptying everything from within her.
When it was over, she crouched there and rested her forehead against Knight. She cleared her
throat, then swallowed. Her voice was rough, but she managed a whisper for Knight’s ears to hear.
“Change of plans.”