Hanna was frowning. She had a formidable frown that still made Merecot wonder if she’d finished her homework. “Queen Merecot, as official ambassador to Semo, I should accompany you. I believe I may be able to aid . . .”
Merecot smiled merrily, hoping it wasn’t obvious that she was delighted to soon be free of her old headmistress. “Oh, you’ve done quite enough. Why not rest here while I pay a visit on my dear old friend? We can chat again after I return.”
Indeed, there was a lovely secondary benefit to leaving them here, under the protection of Merecot’s guards: they’d be assurances against Daleina’s good behavior. After all, Daleina’s and my last meeting was . . . dramatic. Having her beloved headmistress as well as one of her brave champions—not to mention the potential assassins and the palace guards who’d accompanied Hanna—would make nice leverage if Merecot needed it. At the very least, it will ensure Daleina plays nice.
Both the champion and ambassador began to protest, but Merecot cut them off. “You’d only slow me down. If I fly fast enough, I can reach Mittriel before nightfall. I do love to make a dramatic entrance.” She paused, reaching with her mind to touch the gold eagle spirit. “And a dramatic exit.”
The enormous eagle with a man’s head dove from the chandelier, and she leapt from the throne onto its back and flew out the window. Tapestries fluttered in her wake, and she reveled in the feeling of near-victory.
While the queen of Semo flew south, Daleina rehearsed her welcome speech for her former-friend Queen Merecot in the mirror. She had two options: the let-us-have-peace speech and the you-are-irredeemably-evil speech.
Lounging on a couch behind her, Garnah said, “I like the second one.”
Daleina didn’t turn around. “Your opinion on this is not required.”
“Remind me again why Mother is here,” Hamon said. “There’s been no word from the north that Queen Merecot even received your message, much less accepted your invitation.”
Squaring her shoulders, Daleina studied her own face in the reflection. She’d dusted pale powder under her eyes but it only made her look ghoulish, not less tired. She rubbed her cheeks hard until they pinkened. There, I look a little more alive now. “She’s already coming. She’ll be here shortly.”
Behind her, she heard Hamon jump to his feet, knocking over a small table. A vase crashed onto the floor. He was scooping up shards of pottery when she turned around. “You should have told us,” he said. “The guards . . .”
“I’ll need you to leave, Hamon.”
He stopped.
“You can’t be here when she comes,” Daleina said as gently as she could.
“I’m not leaving you alone with that woman,” Hamon sputtered. “She had you poisoned!”
“Your mother will watch for that.” Reaching out with her mind, Daleina felt the spirits only a few miles outside Mittriel react as the other queen flew through the trees. Through their eyes, she saw Merecot as a golden blur.
“You can’t trust her either,” Hamon said.
“Hamon!” Garnah said in feigned shock.
Ignoring his mother, Hamon crossed to Daleina and took her hands. His hands felt dry and soft in hers. “You know I would give my life to keep you safe.” Earnest, devoted Hamon. She nearly smiled, but she didn’t want him to think she was mocking him. He meant every word, and she treasured that—he was one of the few people in the palace who she knew had no ulterior motive. She knew how rare and lucky it was for a queen to have someone she could trust so absolutely.
“I know, and we must assume Merecot knows this too, which is why I need you elsewhere, ready with antidotes if I need them.” She didn’t want to tell Hamon that while she trusted him with her own life, she didn’t trust him with Merecot’s. He’d made his opinion on the poisoning abundantly clear, and she didn’t want him to do anything rash in the name of defending his queen. Just because I know he loves me, it doesn’t mean I know he’ll behave the way I need him to. “Trust me, Hamon. Please leave.”
He wasn’t happy with her. She hadn’t expected him to be.
Leaning forward, she kissed him. “Please, Hamon.” Placing her hands on either side of his face, she gazed at him, trying to put all her love and trust into her eyes. You are my safety, she thought. The one rock that won’t move, the one tree that won’t fall, the river that will carry me and never drown me. “Leave. For me.”
He left, still unhappy, and Garnah chuckled. “You know my son’s weaknesses. You. You give him exactly the kind of love and trust a boy like Hamon needs.” Shuffling over to a side table, Garnah poured herself a crystal goblet full of spiced pear juice. She popped a chocolate into her mouth. Daleina didn’t know how she could eat at a time like this. She felt jittery inside and out.
“Do you know what he was like as a child?” Garnah didn’t wait for Daleina to answer. She talked as if she were conversing only with herself. “Pleasant. You’ve never had children, so you don’t know how unusual that is. Children can be charming or intelligent or imaginative or destructive balls of chaotic fury. But they’re rarely ‘pleasant.’ Our neighbors would coo over him and tell me how lucky I was to have such a well-behaved son. And Hamon would go on pleasing them, being unfailingly polite and kind. For many years, I assumed he was deliberately manipulating all those fools.”
Daleina pictured Hamon as a child, bright-eyed and eager to please—and how impossible it must have been for someone as empathetic as he was to have a mother who casually murdered people, including her own husband, Hamon’s father. It’s a wonder that Hamon came out of his childhood whole.
“It wasn’t until long after he left me that I realized the silly boy was sincere. He has a towering need to love and be loved. He truly cared about the well-being of all those ridiculous people. The only one he never found room in his heart for was me. Do you know how it feels to have your own child deny you?”
Daleina was saved from having to reply by the shriek of a tree spirit.
She’s here.
Striding across the room to the balcony, Daleina called to the spirits in Mittriel, felt their agitation, drew them closer to the blur of gold that crossed into the city. She asked the spirits to flank the queen, like an escort—they already wanted to watch her, so it was easy to coax them into the trees and the air. At Daleina’s direction, the spirits of Aratay funneled the queen of Semo toward the palace, where Daleina waited, her heart pounding in her throat.
Garnah joined her on the balcony. “I admit, I am looking forward to meeting her.”
“Wait within,” Daleina ordered. “I greet her alone.”
A massive golden eagle with a human face burst through the branches. It shook the trees, and red leaves swirled in its wake, falling in spirals. Daleina heard Garnah retreat behind her, for once not making any witty comment or arguing. With her eyes glued on the eagle spirit, she kept her mind open to the spirits of Aratay. She wouldn’t put it past Merecot to try to seize control of them, or attack them, or . . .
I don’t know what to expect from Merecot, which is the problem.
So she waited.