“But your grandmother knows you are coming,” Phebe said. “And after Leo’s meeting with Rahel, there will be no doubt she will hear of your arrival. You must get to Ithilia as quickly as you can. Her protection may be the only thing that can save you. If the Triumvirate finds out who you are, I don’t know what they’ll do. Holding the heir of Culinnon hostage certainly seems like an excellent bargaining chip.”

Agnes felt her throat go dry. The heir. She’d never imagined the word applying to her. Nor could she have conceived of the danger that accompanied it. Would these three queens really use her as leverage against her grandmother?

“I wish I had known all this before,” she said. “I wish my mother had been alive to tell me.”

Sera gave her a sympathetic look as Phebe said, “Oh, child, I’m sure your mother would have wanted to be there for you more than anything. Life does not always turn out the way we expect.”

Agnes reached into her pocket, ignoring the letter from Ambrosine and instead drawing out the photograph of Alethea.

“This is the only picture I have of her,” she said quietly. “The only one.”

Phebe took it as if it were more delicate than a moth’s wing. “I had forgotten,” she whispered. “How radiant her spirit was.” She turned it over and read Alethea’s inscription on the back.

Taken by X, March 12. Runcible Cottage, the Edge of the World.

“Do you know what that means?” Agnes asked without much hope.

“I do not,” Phebe said.

“What was she like?” Sera asked, leaning over Agnes’s shoulder to study the photograph. “She looks very brave.”

Agnes translated and Phebe smiled.

“Brave, indeed. She had a wild spirit. And the parties she threw in Ithilia were legendary. She was creative but short tempered, gracious yet stubborn. Very stubborn. Eneas used to say there were mules with more sense than her.” Phebe chuckled softly. “But he loved her all the more for it. And she knew how to cause a commotion. The day it was announced in the Ithilia Star that Alethea Byrne had married a man from Kaolin, you’d have thought the oceans had risen up and swallowed Whitehall. The whole country was in a frenzy.”

Agnes felt tears well in her eyes and blinked them back. Her mother had never seemed quite so real to her as she did in this moment.

“What’s Whitehall?” Leo asked.

“The sacred shrine of Talmanism,” Phebe explained. “An outcrop of land just off the coast of Ithilia, connected by a narrow bridge to the great Palace of Banrissa, from where the Triumvirate rules.”

“And not a place we are wishing to be visiting,” Vada said. “Not if the Triumvirate is seeking to retaliate against Byrnes.”

“No,” Phebe agreed. “I wish Rahel had not seen you, Leo. It would be best to avoid Ithilia altogether.”