She held out an arm and he fell into it, hugging her about the waist. It was one of the innumerable habits linking little boys to their mothers. They walked to his bed together, into the light cast by a solitary hanging lamp. His new nurse, Emansi, had snuffed all the others.

The lantern’s flame was a point that blistered to look at, that could not be touched, that threw all the shadows outward, away from the burnished ring of illuminated things. The crimson embroidery—ducks with interlocking wings—gleamed along the folds of his half-drawn covers. The mosaic of dancing bears stretched in a floriated are into the darkness of the ceiling.

She pulled aside the covers and guided him into the folds with a gentle hand—yet one more thing he cherished with the ferocity of tears. Then she crawled in after him, cupped his small body in the warm palm of hers. She told herself, he knew, that she came here for his sake, that the loss of a brother was trauma enough, let alone the loss of a twin. Think of how intense their bond had been in infancy!

This was what she told herself, he knew.

He closed his eyes, followed the inner drift to the hazy outskirts of sleep. Her love seemed to encase him, to hold him hot and dry and safe. There was a nothingness in her arms, an oblivion indistinguishable from bliss. All cares fell away and with them, the cold-pocketed world that was their foundation. There was only here. There was only now. Another point of lantern-light, though no longer blistering, because he was the illumination.

Let others burn their fingers. Let them turn aside their eyes.

He rolled and snuggle-wriggled so that he could face her on the pillow. They stared into each other’s eyes, mother and son, for several long moments. The immediacy of her was so vivid, so close, that nothing else could ever be as real. She was the only thing.

He ran a fingertip along the embroidered lip of the top blanket, a small proof of texture. He bent his face into the semblance of petulant concentration.

“I miss Sammi …” he lied.

She swallowed and blinked. “Me too, sweetling. Me too.”

A part of him, the snake-sneaky part, laughed. Poor Samarmas. Poorpoor Samarmas.

“I didn’t get to see Father.”

Her eyes hardened beneath a film of tears.

“I’m sorry, Kel. We’re at war. Your father, he … he has to make sacrifices. We all have to make sacrifices. Even darling little boys like you …”

She fell silent and remote, but he could see her thoughts clear enough. He does not mourn him. My husband does not mourn our son.

“Uncle Maithanet,” the little Prince began, “he …”

A kind of wariness crept into her expression. Her eyes blinked away the fog of self-pity and suddenly became alert. “What about your uncle?”

“Nothing.”

“Kel. What about your uncle?”

“He … watches you funny.”

“What do you mean watches? How?”