“I hope we haven’t kept you waiting, Your Majesty,” Zoya apologized, playful and coy. She glided in to take the empty seat beside his.
“I’m sorry, but I have the strangest feeling that we’ve met before.” Prince Kance was staring at me with a puzzled smile. The blue-eyed girl had reestablished her hold on his arm, ignoring Zoya.
“Why, Your Majesty,” one of the asha declared, fluttering her eyelashes at him, “what a thing to say! Here we are, and yet you barely spare the rest of us a glance or even a word of greeting!”
“I mean no disrespect, Yonca, but I don’t think I’ve met her at any of the cha-khana here before, which makes her familiarity even more puzzling.”
“One asha is the same as all the others,” said the blue-eyed girl with the death grip on his hand, her obvious disinterest a visible fog that clung to her shoulders. “Why even bother with learning their names, Kance? There’ll be a new set next week with the same faces and dresses!”
The smiles of the other asha broadened. Zoya’s even managed to look pitying. “To understand asha is a mark of one’s understanding of foreign affairs.” The sincerity and gentleness in her voice nearly fooled me. “I would be happy to help you improve your education on such matters if you’d like, Princess Maeve.”
The girl scowled. Prince Kance snapped his fingers. “I remember! Weren’t you in Kneave last spring with Lady Mykaela, during our heartsglass ceremony? Tea, isn’t it? I’m quite sure of it.”
He remembered my name!
“You’re welcome, Your Majesty,” Zoya said demurely. At his puzzled expression, she continued, “I heard that the newest recruit of the Valerian was from Odalia, and since you are friends with Lady Mykaela, I thought it would be nice for you to see a familiar face from home while you are staying in Kion.”
“Why, you’re the little bone witch!” Princess Maeve exclaimed, suddenly gleeful. “Tea? An odd name surely. You look nothing like they say at all—just a little thing in black weeds and dirty shoes! There’s nothing scones and crumpets about you.” The other girls giggled. Emboldened, the pretty girl continued. “Maybe it’s true. You’re younger than my mother said you should be. You’re Mykaela’s get, I suppose? Bone witches oughtn’t breed. Rats have better reasons to.”
“Your manners, Maeve,” one of her companions remonstrated, a pretty, doe-eyed girl.
The yellow-haired princess laughed. “Why should I, Lia? Nasty gits, bone witches. The older one is who they call Mykaela, isn’t she? You look too young to be anything, though I suppose even witches were young once.”
“Lady Tea was a new apprentice when she left Kneave. I may not know much about the Willows, but I know not even your finest asha could have risen through the ranks so quickly.” The prince gestured at me to sit, and I did so with relief, afraid that my shaking knees might give me away. My headache had only increased since stepping into the room. “Tell me the truth, Lady Tea. Are these girls playing a trick on you?”
I tried to work through the logic in my head. I could appeal to the prince for help, but that would put me in more trouble in the long run. The last thing I wanted was punishment worse than cleaning the outhouses.
“My sisters were kind enough to make an exception for me for this one night, as a favor to Your Majesty,” I said, hoping I sounded meek enough for Zoya’s satisfaction. The room tilted, and I shut my eyes briefly. Lady Shadi was slimmer than I was, and her hua must have been tighter than I had thought.
A snort sounded from one end of the room. Prince Kance’s lone male companion didn’t bother to rise from his seat to greet us when the prince did. He was a year or so older than him, was dressed in a somber black from head to toe, and still gave off the impression of wearing chain mail despite being garbed in expensive silk. His brown eyes regarded me with suspicion. “Knowing what I know about Lady Zoya, I think that unlikely.”
Zoya lifted a hand to her chest, pretending a show of dismay. “Oh, Lord Kalen! I’m distraught by your low opinion of me. But as you and Prince Kance seek our companionship whenever you stay in Ankyo, perhaps you do not dislike me too much?”
The man snorted again. “Prince Kance makes the arrangements. I’m only along to keep an eye on him.” He made no protest, however, when the other asha crowded around him, laughing, and he accepted a glass filled with an amber-colored drink that one of the girls poured.
Prince Kance smiled at me. “I hope they haven’t been teasing you. They’re nice girls, for the most part.”
“They’ve been teaching me a lot about what it’s like to be an asha,” I said softly, because that was true enough. “What brings Your Highness to Ankyo?”
“Politics, for the most part. My father is visiting Empress Alyx for a few weeks, to bolster a new trade agreement between Odalia and Kion.”
Another snort from the other boy. “That’s an odd way to describe your impending engagement with Alyx’s daughter, Kance.”
“Do not joke so, Kalen,” Princess Maeve said tartly. “My mother would have known of any such arrangements. And why would anyone be affianced to that Kion strumpet?”
“Princess,” Prince Kance chided.
I felt deflated. Arranged marriages are common among royalty, but I hadn’t thought that applied to Prince Kance for some reason. “But you’re not that much older than I am!”
“Kance isn’t engaged,” the boy in black drawled. “But they do marry Odalian princes young. All the easier to indoctrinate.”
“This is my cousin, Kalen,” Prince Kance told me. “You’ll have to forgive him. We’ve been visiting cha-khana since we were eight years old, but he’s never been one for good manners.”
I could barely concentrate on what he was saying. I kept my gaze on my lap, trying to focus. This felt wrong. I had never felt so lightheaded before. Had Zoya or one of her friends done something to me?
“I don’t see the importance of good manners the way asha seem to,” Kalen said. “People respond to a show of force, not to etiquette. You asha are powerful in your own right. I don’t see why you have to wrap it up in pretty clothes and dancing. People don’t kowtow to me because I know what type of spoon to use with my stew.”
“You’re a man, Kalen,” Zoya laughed. “Or, rather, you are the type of man who has little patience for intrigue, and so you dismiss it and think others should do the same. We women prefer to have more subtlety. No one should ever need to feel offended just because we’re getting what we want—less of a mess on the furniture, for instance.”
“You’re right about one thing,” Kalen said. “I have no stomach for schemes. Tell me what you think of me to my face so we can have it out once and for all; that’s my kind of etiquette.”