“Yes, my lady,” she said, and scurried into the main building.

As long as Imeria had Laya under control, she could deal with the other loose ends later. According to Vikal, the Royal Maynaran Guard had yet to track down Eti. The girl’s disappearance was a nuisance, but Imeria needed to worry about the wedding first. To quell the riots in the city, she’d consumed more precioso than she’d anticipated. The drug left her with growing cravings, a lingering headache, and little energy to think of anything else. In the hours following each use, its absence grew harder to ignore. It didn’t help that the vial of precioso shifted along her necklace at the slightest movement. The tiny shards of crystal whispered in her ear like naughty spirits⁠—more, more, more.

Imeria banished the thought with a sharp exhale. She gazed past the bustle of servants in the courtyard, her eyes landing on the eastern wing. The alchemist was not hiding there, as she had hoped. She remembered the last time she had been inside that building, the same day the eastern wing went up in flames. The memory returned to her in a billow of smoke, crashing into Imeria before she could push it away.

She could still feel the weight of the air inside the guest chamber pressing up against her skin. Beyond the Untulu Sea loomed the threat of a hurricane. The midday sun had baked the tiles in the courtyard outside. The shell-paneled window screens did little to block the wet-season heat, and young Imeria had wanted to open them to filter out the thick, resinous incense the old queen liked to pump into the eastern wing, but they needed to keep the screens drawn for fear of being seen.

Despite the boiling heat, Imeria awoke curled up alongside Duja’s sleeping form, her cheek pressed against the princess’s bare shoulder. Duja was far softer than the earth she wielded. Imeria couldn’t help but nestle closer, even though the princess’s skin felt hot enough to burn.

Beside her, Duja stirred. “Imeria?” she called, her voice sluggish from sleep.

Imeria’s heart leaped at the sound of her name. “Yes?”

Duja yawned and stretched her arms over her head, arching into Imeria’s embrace. Slowly, she rolled onto her side. For a wild moment, Imeria feared what she would find on the princess’s face when she turned around⁠—apathy? Or worse, disgust? Instead, Duja gazed at her tenderly, her dark eyes free of their usual shields.

“That was foolish of us,” she said, smiling shyly.

Warmth crawled up Imeria’s neck and spread across her cheeks. “Do you regret it?” she asked.

“No,” Duja said. She sounded sure of herself for the first time. “Truly, I don’t.”

Imeria wanted nothing more than to accept Duja’s reassurance, but she couldn’t quell the doubt that continued to simmer deep within her gut. “What about the⁠—the others?”