The nobles followed the emperor’s lead where I was concerned. The novelty of the new sovereign Auraseer was fleeting. I was reduced to the new female trailing the emperor to meeting after meeting, meal after meal, sitting in a corner and struggling not to fall asleep. Valko’s apathy leaked into me like a disease, and the fatigue of it all made my footsteps heavy. I did not even have the mystery of him to stimulate me anymore. If he was anyone other than the eldest son of Emperor Izia, he hid the clues with a master’s precision.
In the wake of the dowager empress’s death, I searched for any valid threats from the nobles, not just the dark grumblings I felt when the men lost too many rubles in a game of quadrille, or when the young wives of the dukes tossed the emperor secret glances, only to have Valko stare back at them impassively. The duchesses’ eyes would slit like cats’ or droop like puppies’, their auras half tempting me to inwardly scream or heave a sigh. None of it was enough to make me think anyone was capable of causing Valko harm. If they were, surely I’d feel it on impulse. I’d scream or do something more than feel the drudgery of my existence. Nothing seemed capable of moving me. Valko’s energy, indifferent though it was, held the power to rein mine. And late at night, when I couldn’t sleep or bear the torture of touching Feya’s statue, I found other ways to sustain my misery.
I took to walking the palace corridors after midnight, as I had done in the convent when Yuliya was sick and I had no one to keep me company. During my days here in Torchev, at least the emperor’s apathy could keep me distracted from my guilt over the deaths at the convent. But at night, in my solitude, I was left to the full throes of my remorse. If I was honest with myself, perhaps my exhaustion and gloom was just as unbreakable as the emperor’s. Maybe his energy combined with mine to form an iron fence no other auras in the palace could penetrate. At least it stopped me from wanting to curl up in a ball every time I dined with the assembly of nobles in the great hall. As for the dreaded prospect of being forced to eat meat again, that excruciating experience had yet to repeat itself.
My quarter hour at breakfast with Pia helped me wake up every morning, helped me finally fall asleep, knowing I would see her the following day. She was sunlight. Clean air. Unbridled joy. I soon discovered why: she was in love.
Her eyes followed a palace guard with flaxen hair—a guard often assigned to me. Sometimes he was stationed outside my rooms when it was time to escort me to the emperor. Whenever he so much as smiled at Pia, she glided across my floor as if skating across a frozen pond, her giddiness making me me twirl along with her. The day I made her confess her feelings for him out loud, she laughed. “I was wondering when you’d guess! I thought you’d sense it in me the first day we met.”
“I knew you were elated.” I smiled. “I just didn’t know his name was Yuri.”
A pretty flush rose to her cheeks, and she held up a bandaged finger. “Whenever he speaks to me, I end up burning my hands in the kitchens.”
“Does he come to you there?”
“Oh, no, he would never! Cook would rake him over the coals. I just get so muddle-headed, recalling every word of our conversations, every look he ever gives me.”
I threw a pillow at her. “You’re hopeless.”
She giggled and clutched the pillow to her breast. “At least I admit to my madness. You won’t even talk to me about Anton.”
I rolled my eyes. She was still fixated on the idea that there was something between the prince and me, when the truth was we weren’t even on speaking terms. Whenever I rounded a corner and happened upon him—even if he was at the far end of a spacious room—he stiffened and found some excuse to leave promptly. It didn’t matter. I’d have done the same if he hadn’t beaten me to it. I ignored the way my stomach tightened with anxiety upon our fleeting encounters. The sensation couldn’t possibly be coming from him. How could I make him nervous when he scarcely even noticed me?
The worst was when Valko required his brother’s presence. I’d learned Anton held the office of viceroy over Perkov. The southwest province bordered the Bayacs, the mountain range separating Riaznin from Estengarde. Although Anton was viceroy, the title was stripped of any ruling power. He served as more of a councilor for that small but important area. I’d guessed Valko had bequeathed him the position as a public show of goodwill, for I never sensed any true sentiment within the emperor for Anton.
Sometimes the brothers had to meet and discuss the border wars, disturbances with the peasants, or concerns over the long famine and what could be done to help the people. I would sit with them, coiled tight like a spring ready to burst from faulty clockwork. The tension was palpable, though I could never determine its origin—if the discord I felt was between them or between me and Anton. Every time our shoulders brushed, he’d flinch. My body flushed with heat until Anton cleared his throat, breathed deeply, and scooted his chair another inch away. Twice his hand wandered to the left pocket of his kaftan, as if he guarded something valuable from me.