“All right.” Biting back a sigh, I followed Director Chen inside, through the lobby, and down the hall toward the Mages Guild offices. I hated Chen’s office with a passion—her visitors’ chairs were incredibly uncomfortable—but I would endure them rather than chance someone overhearing us. Especially if she did want to say something nasty about my relationship with Iannis.

However, we walked straight past Chen’s office and entered a lounge two doors down, commonly used by senior Guild employees for receiving visitors. The room was decorated in Canalo’s blue and gold—dark blue wallpaper with a repeating pattern of the state emblem, gold couches and chairs, dark blue rugs with golden embellishments, heavy wood tables, and parquet flooring. To the left of the seating area was an unlit fireplace of white gold-veined marble, which served as a sort of accent and relieved the colorful space.

“I hope you like green tea,” Chen said as we sat on the couches. She lifted a small red clay teapot with Garaian symbols painted on the sides from the silver tea tray that had been left on the coffee table, and began to pour steaming, pale yellow liquid into matching red cups. “I confess it’s a favorite of mine.”

“Green tea is fine,” I said. I preferred my tea cold rather than hot, especially in summer, but it would have to do.

“Excellent.” Chen handed me the cup, and I held it gingerly—there were no handles, so I had to endure the hot ceramic directly.

“So what’s this about?” I asked, blowing on my tea as I waited for it to cool.

“Well, before I get into anything else, I would like to offer my apologies,” Chen said. She picked up her cup of tea and blew gently over the top before taking a dainty sip. “I misread the situation between you and Lord Iannis. It is quite clear to me now that he is fonder of you than I realized.”

“I believe the word you’re looking for is ‘love’, not ‘fondness’,” I said evenly. I wasn’t going to let her trivialize what Iannis and I had.

An uncomfortable expression crossed Chen’s face, but she nodded. “Yes, of course. In any case, I hope there are no hard feelings.”

“I can move past it if you can.” I took a sip from my tea. Yowch. Still too hot. How the hell did Director Chen manage to sip hers so calmly, when it had to be scalding her lips off? Drinking hot tea had to be classified as some kind of torture, I was sure of it.

“Excellent.” Chen gave me a brief smile, then her expression grew serious. “I brought you here because it’s time to discuss public-relations strategies. Specifically, we need to carefully handle the media regarding your engagement.”

“What?” I stared at her, baffled.