Even with a murdered archduke, even with the country on the precipice of war, there is an order to the banquet. Tradition holds Vetris together when no other glue would. The older nobles watch the younger ones walk in, exalting over which of them is most suitable for marriage. The younger nobles do their best to look less nervous than they feel. The Steelrun and d’Goliev girls—Charm and Grace—who debuted with me at the Spring Welcoming, seem older now as I watch them walk in. I spot the Priseless twin boys, ever blond and ever snub-nosed. We lock eyes and, as if they share a skin, both of their faces go a startling shade of green at the same time. Their defeat at my hands in the duel still plagues them, I’m sure. I indulge them with a smile, and they scurry off without so much as another glance.

“And don’t come back.” I laugh, snatching a flute of wine from a passing tray, but the moment of joy lives short. I down the wine and it gives me courage enough to parse my eyes over the crowd, looking for a shock of familiar white hair, mouse-hair, midnight hair. Nothing. Fione isn’t here yet, and I’d know if the prince and Malachite were here.

The wine in turn gives the crowd the courage to whisper.

“Y’shennria’s niece, is she not? And His Highness’s favored.”

“—mysterious circumstances. She saw Gavik’s murder firsthand. Poor thing—”

“Lady Y’shennria isn’t here with her? How curious.”

“I’ve heard the Y’shennria manor does not stir of late—”

I hold my head high. Y’shennria’s gone—she told me she’d be heading for sanctuary outside of Vetris with the witches the moment I left for the Hunt. Coming back would be pointless; for all she knows, I’m either shattered and dead or reunited with Nightsinger. But if Y’shennria doesn’t show up to a noble function soon—and she won’t, because it’d be dangerous and illogical—she’ll garner more and more suspicion. Especially with news of Gavik’s “murder” going around. And that suspicion will shunt right to me, if it hasn’t already.

I’m on borrowed time. But I always have been in this city, have I not?