“We don’t know there was a murder, Elena,” Willo said. “Not for sure.” She turned to Averill. “Did they find anything else?” she asked. “Anything else that would help us?”

Averill shook his head.

“Let’s think about this,” Raisa said, her voice low and wooden. “What if someone pushed my mother off her terrace? And what if she reached out and grabbed the chain around the killer’s neck, trying to save herself? And when she fell, it broke.”

“That’s plausible,” Averill said. “I must admit, that’s what I thought too.”

“But it’s not enough, that it’s plausible,” Willo said. “We still have no proof that—”

“It was the Bayars and their allies,” Elena said. “You know it was. Who else stood to gain from the queen’s death? Nightwalker is ready to go to war, and I don’t blame him. The Demonai will not continue to stand by and see the Nǽming violated without retaliating.”

Raisa fought down the voice in her head, the Demonai voice that said, Yes! Go to war against my mother’s murderers. Shed their blood as they shed hers.

“You need better proof if you launch a war in the Fells,” she said wearily. “The Bayars are guilty of plenty, but we don’t know that they had a hand in this. I will maintain a rule of law, even if it’s inconvenient.”

“It’s the rule of law that has brought us here,” Elena said, fingering her braids. “It seems that those who follow the law become victims.”

“And those who do not follow the law become tyrants,” Raisa said. “No one has more reason to demand revenge than me. But it’s the Queen’s Guard’s responsibility to bring my mother’s killer to justice. If there is a killer.”

“Where was the Guard when Queen Marianna was murdered?” Elena said. “Captain Byrne was dying in Marisa Pines Pass, and Corporal Byrne was in the flatlands. Who was in charge of keeping the queen safe?”

There was dead silence for a long moment. Amon sat up straighter, fixing his gray eyes on Elena, the fingers of his right hand beating a tattoo on his thigh. Raisa knew that he was furious, but doubted that anyone could tell who didn’t know him as well as she did.

These are the people I am going to have to manage, Raisa thought, if I am to succeed as queen.

“Elena Cennestre,” she said. “That’s enough. I would ask you to remember that ten members of my guard gave their lives in Marisa Pines Pass for my sake.” At least anger and frustration were potent distracters from the grief that threatened to overwhelm her.