Maram stood from her chair as silent as a ghost and walked to me. The hems of her skirts brushed over my knees.

“Is there a problem?” she asked softly. “Or are all your words hollow?”

I drew in a shuddering breath and closed my eyes.

“No, Your Highness,” I said. “I am capable of fulfilling my duty.”

Her hand came beneath my chin, the hold gentle, as if she were cradling a child. As if the look in her eye—that she might take my head at any moment—was not there.

“Understand, Amani,” she said softly, “I would do anything just to spite you.”

And then her hand was gone, and she swept out of the room, an orchestra of fluttering skirts and the chime of jewelry following in her wake.

2

The weeks passed in a blur of fittings and preparation. I had taken in some crucial part of Maram in our time of knowing each other, so falling back into her mannerisms and speech felt like slipping into an old gown. The day of the wedding dawned like any other—I was in the center of the world, but I was not its center. No one cared that my world was about to collapse. No one cared that I was about to go through an unimaginably cruel thing in the name of a sovereign nation that had colonized mine.

I sat in a stone tub, its surface covered in flowers. Tala stood in the entryway, hands folded in front of her, an eyebrow raised. Serving girls waited quietly in the dressing chamber just beyond the entryway.

“Daydreaming?” she asked, voice mild.

“No,” I said softly. “Just … preparing for the inevitable.”

“Come, Your Highness,” she said. “We have much to do today, and not very much time to do it.”

I climbed out of the bath and into the towel waiting for me and dried off efficiently.