But she and Ayla had been keeping the same secret.

“Green feather,” Ayla said now. “Storme gave me a green feather. I know that means something to you.”

The queen was silent. She didn’t need a mask to be unreadable.

“This will disappoint you,” she said finally. “My adviser is not here in Thalen. He left two days ago for the northern border, and he’s not due to return for another fortnight.”

Ayla sagged. A fortnight.

Without taking her eyes off Ayla’s face, the queen said, “Handmaiden Rupa.”

One of the two handmaidens, a tall, thick human girl, stepped forward. “Yes, your majesty?”

“Take this girl to the guest wing,” said the queen. “Provide her with a bedchamber, any food or clothing she desires. If she desires a bedfellow, provide that as well.” She smiled, thin and bloodred, at the shock on Ayla’s face. “This is how we show hospitality in my country, handmaiden Ayla. Welcome to Varn.”

2

Crier stood in the center of her bedchamber, a dozen house servants and handmaidens scurrying all around her, and tried not to feel like a piece of driftwood in the middle of a storm at sea.

There were two handmaidens twisting her hair into a crown of braids, another darkening her eyes and painting her lips a deep Automa-blood violet, and countless others flitting in and out of the room with velvet-lined boxes of jewelry, hair ribbons, thick heartstone paste and gold body paint that during the ceremony would be used to draw the symbols of the Makers on her skin.

Four hours from now, Crier would be married.

Presently, she was staring at her reflection, motionless in the large full-length mirror, as the human servants transformed her into a bride. Handmaiden Malwin was at her back, hands working quickly to lace up the bodice of Crier’s wedding gown, pulling it tight around her rib cage, so tight that if Crier had needed to breathe as often as humans did, she would have been suffocating. She was reminded, with a dull throb of pain, of the last time she’d stood like this while someone laced her into a dress. The last time she’d felt someone’s fingers brushing her bare shoulder blades, the nape of her neck, someone’s touch warming her even through layers of linen and silk.

The dress she’d worn then had been pale silver, bell-shaped. This dress was dark red velvet, cut closer to the shape of Crier’s body, the bottom of the skirt pooling on the flagstones at Crier’s feet. There were no sleeves, and she would wear no robe or silks—nothing that would get in the way of the ceremonial markings on her arms, her forehead, her chest above the neckline of the gown. On her head, a delicate golden tiara.

She met her own dark eyes in the mirror. She thought maybe her face looked different than usual, not just because of the makeup. Crier’s expression was usually neutral, controlled, her emotions and reactions purposefully tamped down. Today, she didn’t just look blank. She looked empty. Dead.