Within a month, the child was motherless.

Ayla spent the morning lounging around, which was something she’d never done before. She even went back to sleep for an hour or so: a wild luxury. It was almost ten by the time she heard a knock at the door, the three handmaidens scurrying inside the moment she bid them enter.

“It’s time to get you ready for the feast,” Renne announced. “And thank the gods. If I have to polish one more spoon I’ll scream myself hoarse.”

“Wait. What?” said Ayla. “I’m not attending it, am I?”

“You’re a guest of the queen,” said Maris.

“Gods smite me down,” said Ayla.

She lingered in the bath they drew for her, soaking until the water began to grow cold. Maris washed and oiled her hair, twisting it into a knot at the nape of her neck. Then Ayla was herded over to the mirror, where Maris and Renne set about choosing an outfit for her, and Kiv produced a small box of—makeup? Tiny pots of black eyeliner and rouge, deep red pigment for the lips, shimmery gold dust that resembled what Lady Dear wore on her collarbone and temples.

Ayla was expecting to hate it, but a few minutes later, when Kiv moved aside so Ayla could see her reflection, she found . . . she didn’t. The black liner made her eyes look more intense, and the sheen of rouge and gold dust across her cheekbones was . . . pretty. Kiv hadn’t painted Ayla’s lips with red or purple, as was the trend; she’d just rubbed in a bit of tinted beeswax, the subtlest red. She’d pressed tiny flakes of gold leaf to Ayla’s temples, which winked in the light whenever Ayla turned her head.

Ayla had never really given much thought to her own appearance. She’d been a servant since she was eleven; her priorities revolved around keeping Benjy and herself alive, keeping her head down, fanning the flame of anger in her belly, and plotting her revenge on Sovereign Hesod. There were no mirrors in the servants’ quarters. Before she became Crier’s handmaiden, she hadn’t seen her own reflection in who knows how long. She knew what her face looked like, but it was like knowing what her hand looked like. It was there, it was a part of her body, end of story.

But now, gazing at herself—her features, heightened—she felt . . . something. The girl in the mirror looked like a girl in a tapestry or painting. Like the girls in illustrations of faerie stories. Like a princess or a noblewoman, sure, but also like a witch, or a trickster spirit, a creature that lured unwitting men to their deaths. Ayla felt—maybe the right word was powerful.

“Thank you,” she said to Kiv. Wrenching her eyes away from the mirror was difficult; she didn’t want to stop looking at herself. “You did a good job.”

Kiv grinned.

Maris and Renne helped Ayla into her outfit: gold silk trousers and a matching doublet embroidered with the symbols of the Makers. The only piece of jewelry she wore was the bracelet Queen Junn had gifted her, the blue jewel glittering at her wrist.