The cadence of the conversation in the room changed, a susurrus brushing through the assembled people as Dain and I took our positions in front of our seats. The last the High Court had really seen of us had been our dramatic show at the revel, after which we'd vanished from public sight. Now, here we were, standing hand-in-hand, wearing aggressively coordinated outfits and coronets rather than the slender circlets we usually wore to open court. Probably a lot of people were going to assume we'd hit our balance at long last, and that it was solidly affectionate.

Time to find out if Susan was right, and it would become open season on Leah—and if the allies Kamharida had assured me of would help keep me safe.

The Queen walked in from the other side of the dais. She looked towards us for one long moment, as if assessing, then took her seat without a word.

Open court went as it always did, despite my nervousness. The Queen asked our opinions no more and no less than usual, and nobody suddenly started shooting arrows at us from the gallery. The only difference was the warmth of Dain's hand soaking into my skin and his strong fingers laced through mine.

Once we'd completed the business of the day, it was heading towards three in the afternoon, and I was more than ready for lunch. We stood, and the Queen stood, and then together the three of us left through the back entrance to the throne room, and into the private room where favored courtiers could be invited to discuss the cases of the day with the royals, and present their own private petitions. The doors closed behind us, leaving Dain and I alone with his mother.

She turned to us as she sank down onto a chaise lounge, draping herself in an elegant sprawl with the apricot crushed silk of her gown falling all around her. "To the casual eye, the two of you appear like balanced soulmates," the Queen said with an amused lilt to her voice. "Yet were that true, I would have expected an announcement."

"We aren't balanced yet," Dain said in a calm voice. With one wing-hand, he tucked a loose tendril of hair behind my ear, his talon snagging on my skin from the almost-invisible tremor that ran through him at that simple act of defiance. "I wouldn't hide such a thing."

Her silver eyes watched him shift, an intensity in her gaze that I liked not at all. Then she smiled, a silken expression, and changed the angle of her head so that her long black hair cascaded down like a waterfall of oil. "Lady Aravaris is attending luncheon today, and you give her hysteria, my son," she said in a bored tone. "Leave your soulmate here and take yourself off to deal with the army business you've been neglecting this past week. I desire her company."