“Why are you asking this, Amilia?” Modina looked from her to Nimbus and back again. “What do you know?”
Amilia hesitated for only a moment, then spoke. “There is a Seret Knight standing guard in the north tower.”
“I’m not familiar with your palace. Is that unusual?” Arista asked.
“There’s nothing to guard there,” Amilia explained. “It’s a prison tower, but none of the cells hold prisoners. Yet last night I watched two fourth-floor guards deliver a pot of soup there.”
“To the guard?”
“No,” Amilia said, “they delivered the soup to the tower. Less than five minutes later, I arrived. The soup was gone, pot and all.”
Arista stood. “They were feeding a prisoner, but you say there are no occupied cells in the tower? Are you sure?”
“Positive. Every door was open, and every cell vacant. It looked to have been that way for some time.”
“I need to get in that tower,” Arista declared. “I could burn a hair in one of the empty cells. If he’s nearby, that could really tell us something.”
“There is no way you are getting in that tower,” Amilia told her. “You’d have to walk right past the knight. While the chief imperial secretary to the empress might get away with such a thing, I highly doubt the fugitive Witch of Melengar will.”
“I bet Saldur could walk in and out of there without question, couldn’t he?”
“Of course, but you aren’t him.”
Arista smiled.
She turned to the tutor. “Nimbus, I have a letter for Hilfred and another for my brother. I wrote them in the event something happened to me. I want to give them to you now, just in case. Don’t deliver them unless you know I’m not coming back.”
“Of course.” He bowed.
Amilia rolled her eyes.
Arista handed the letters to Nimbus and, for no particular reason, gave him a kiss on the cheek.
“Just make certain when you are caught that you don’t drag Modina into it,” Amilia said, leaving with Nimbus.
“What are you planning to do?” Modina asked.
“Something I’ve never tried before, something I’m not even certain I can do. Modina, I don’t know what will happen. I might do some strange things. Please ignore them and don’t interfere, okay?”
Modina nodded.
Arista knelt and spread her gown out around her. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and tilted her head back. She took another deep breath, then sat still. She did not move for a long time. She sat breathing very slowly, very rhythmically. Her hands opened. Her arms lifted, as if floating on their own—pulled by invisible strings or rising on currents of air. She began to sway gently from side to side, her hair flowing back and forth. Soon she began to hum. The humming took on a melody, and the melody produced words Modina did not understand.
Then Arista began to glow. The light grew brighter with each word. Her dress turned pure white, her skin luminous. It soon hurt Modina’s eyes to look at her, so she turned away.
The light went out.
“Did it work?” Modina asked. She turned back to face Arista and gasped.
When Arista opened the door, the guard stared at her, stunned. “Your Grace! I didn’t see you come in.”
“You should be more watchful, then,” Arista said, frightened by the sound of her own voice—so familiar and yet so different.
The guard bowed. “Yes, Your Grace. I will. Thank you, Your Grace.”
Arista hurried down the stairs, self-conscious and fearful as she clutched three strands of hair in her left hand and a chunk of chalk in her right. She felt exposed, walking openly in the hallways after hiding for so long. She did not feel any different. Only by looking at her hands and clothing could she see evidence that the spell had worked. She was wearing imperial robes and her hands were those of an old man, with thick gaudy rings. Each servant or guard she passed nodded respectfully, saying softly, “Good afternoon, Your Grace.”
Growing up with Saldur practically as her uncle had one advantage—she knew every line of his face, his mannerisms, and his voice. She was certain she could not perform a similar illusion with Modina, Amilia, or Nimbus, even if she had them in front of her for reference. This took more—she knew Saldur.