“Be careful,” murmured Vittiore, touching Dinah’s side gently, her small hand just below Dinah’s breast. “You’re still healing.”
Dinah looked at her reflection as Vittiore stood next to her, fussing over her rib. Vittiore was wearing a simple, pale-pink dress, and yet she radiated light. It was like standing next to a doll, next to something unreal and holy. Next to her, Dinah felt like a living wound, compressed into one compact form. Still, she allowed a smile to stretch across her face. She had earned these scars, and she was queen after all of it.
I would choose victory over beauty any day.
She sat still as Vittiore applied rouge to her face and drew a tiny heart underneath her right eye—a symbol of her loyalty to the Cards.
“Draw another one,” Dinah ordered, pointing to her other eye. “Put the Spade symbol here.”
“Are you sure, Your Majesty?”
“Yes. I will show the people that Starey Belft did not die in vain.”
Vittiore cupped her tiny hand under Dinah’s chin, lifting it ever so slightly. Her fingers trembling, she drew the tiny Spade symbol with a black charcoal pencil. Her blue eyes, the color of an early morning sea, looked with genuine care upon Dinah’s face. Loving Vittiore as a sister might be easier than Dinah had originally thought. Vittiore dashed bright red lipstick across Dinah’s heart mouth.
“All right, we’re done. Let’s get your dress on.”
With a gasp, Vittiore lifted Dinah’s coronation gown out of its purple linen wrap and laid it on the bed. Fifty seamstresses, with a fair wage from the queen’s new discretionary fund, had stitched this dress together in three days. Dinah refused to wear the gown that had adorned Vittiore, and so a new coronation dress had been designed by Cheshire, a man of seemingly endless talents. The bottom of the dress was bone white, decorated with thousands of tiny red hearts. The tip of each red heart collided with the top of another, and so the gown resembled a spider web of red hearts, each dotted with a single tiny ruby. The top of the gown was bloodred, and made to cinch perfectly to Dinah’s figure. The signs of the Cards—Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs, and Spades—ran across the bustline before it arched up over Dinah’s shoulders. The back of the bodice was made of just the red heart webbing, showing a scandalous amount of Dinah’s shoulders and lower back. The base of the skirt was dusted in a shimmering white, so that when Dinah walked up the aisle, the fabric would sparkle and dance. She would look as if she were walking on air.
Dinah stepped delicately into the dress as Vittiore raised it up over her shoulders. Dinah felt all the air in the room get sucked away as Vittiore began binding the corset that pressed hard against Dinah’s broken rib. She bit down on her lip.
“I’m so sorry, Your Majesty,” whispered Vittiore. “I can loosen it if you desire.”
“No.”
Vittiore’s speech faded into hazy mumbling as Dinah stared at herself in the mirror, encouraged by what she saw. For a moment, Dinah looked just like her mother.
“We must go, Your Majesty. Your escort is ready and the walk is quite long.”
Dinah let a deep breath of air fill her chest, which pressed painfully into her corset. She winced. The dress was so heavy that she was having a hard time standing in it. Vittiore laid her hand gently on Dinah’s side and tucked a stray lock of Dinah’s hair back into place.
“Breathe, but not too deeply. Don’t injure your rib further.”
Dinah gave a nod and turned away from her. “I’m ready.”
“You look like a queen,” the girl said softly.
Dinah walked alone through the hallway, turned the corner, and gasped.
At the end of the long corridor, which shimmered with the light of hundreds of pink torches, Sir Gorrann waited, dressed in his finest Spade uniform, all polished and clean. He was almost unrecognizable. The Spade bowed deeply when she approached. The new commander of the Cards took Dinah’s free arm.
“I barely recognize you, sir.”
He gave a deep laugh. “And yeh as well. That dress probably weighs more than yeh do. It’s honestly a bit ridiculous.”
Dinah gave his arm a squeeze. “I like it. I look like my mother.”
The Spade kept his eyes trained straight ahead as they walked through the stone corridors of the palace, the filtered red light of the heart windows beaming over their bright faces.
“Dinah, sometimes I forget how young yeh are still. Yeh always thought yeh would share the throne with yer father, at least until yeh were married. Yeh were never supposed to rule alone.”
“Ruling alone is better than ruling beside a tyrant.”
“True, but being a queen is much more complicated than yeh know. Hopefully, yeh’ll do a better job than the King of Hearts did.”
“I will,” whispered Dinah, though a pang of doubt twisted through her. The King of Hearts might not be her actual father, but deep inside, she still felt the rage that had driven him. It scared her. She had grown up in its presence, and now it had infected her like a virus.
Dinah and Sir Gorrann were in the Hallway of the Golden Birds now, each metal fowl gazing down at her accusingly as their living kin fluttered around the rafters and skipped across the floor.
“This is where I leave you.” Sir Gorrann bowed and kissed her hand. “I have not seen a day this beautiful since I held my girls in my arms.” He stood up and winked. “Don’t sneeze in that dress, or yeh’ll be showing everyone what’s special about the Queen of Hearts.”
Dinah snickered and hit his arm. “Go.”
With a deep breath, she turned, knowing who waited for her.
Standing in front of a stuffed peacock, Wardley waited patiently for his queen. Dinah felt a stone rise up in her throat at the sight of him, so handsome in his new Knave of Hearts uniform, several new seals pressed across his cloak. Wardley looked over at her, gazed at his friend with misty eyes full of pride. Dinah squeezed his hand. There was so much she wanted to tell him, so much she wished he would say, but they were on opposite sides of a chasm so great it would swallow them whole. Dinah let out a long breath.
“Are you ready?” she whispered, but what she had meant to say was, Could you try to love me? Just a little.
With a kind smile, Wardley moved her hand and took her arm.
His face was so proud, the jagged scar on his cheek still dark and angry. Like Dinah’s body, half of his face was shadowed with healing bruises. Dinah stifled a laugh.
“What could you possibly be laughing at right now?” Wardley whispered to her.
“At what a motley bunch we are. Bruised and bloody, and about to enter the Great Hall.”
“It does seem strange that just four days ago we were knee deep in blood. So many dead.”
They paused, brutal memories ripping through them both. Finally, Wardley took a step forward, pulling Dinah with him, overtly changing the subject.
“I must tell you that your dress is utterly ridiculous. It’s the size of a house!”
“Really?” Dinah did a playful twirl. “I have to admit, I think I quite like it.”