“It’s all right, miss, really. It can’t be helped,” the Magistry officers kept responding, never quite noticing that their disinterest in challenging her was coming from the power her Grace had to slide their attention away from her.

The Magistry officers stayed for lunch. When they left, Hava did too, clunking out of the dining room and down the corridor on her crutches with small gasps. She wasn’t supposed to be relying so much on her crutches. It created a strain on her broken rib. But it was impossible to force Hava to keep still, impossible to impose any will upon her beside her own, so Bitterblue bit down on the words she wanted to say.

“Care to bet what Hava’s been up to?” she said quietly to Giddon.

“I’m hoping we’re about to find out,” he said, spreading butter and honey onto a slice of bread with the focus and precision of an artist. Giddon did things like that when he was pondering something else. He did it with his touch too, when they were together, rubbing Bitterblue’s shoulders or her neck unconsciously, but carefully, finding her tight, aching spots, while they talked or planned. It was definitely in her top ten favorite habits of his.

A few minutes later, they heard Hava’s crutches approaching again. She entered the dining room, lowered herself back into her chair with a small grunt of pain. Reached into her shirt and pulled out a thick pile of papers, which she handed to the queen.

Wordlessly, Bitterblue flipped through the pages. They were written in Hava’s handwriting, composed of diagrams and symbols Bitterblue didn’t understand, interspersed with stretches of Keepish.

“I copied them exactly,” Hava said. “Every picture, every page.”

Bitterblue cleared her throat. “And then,” she said, “you set the hotel on fire?”

“Hardly,” said Hava. “Just the rug.”

“You have a broken ankle and a broken rib. You stayed in that room, inhaling smoke, risking falling down—”

“You came when I knew you would.”

“Hava! You could have told us the plan.”

“I’m telling you now,” said Hava. Then she pushed herself up again and left the room.

Bitterblue sighed, then gathered the papers together, rolling them into a tube. She didn’t want them in her hands. They felt like a menace that might explode in her face. But they were hers now, and she was going to have to guard them, and decide what to do.

“Will I ever stop worrying about her?” she said, wishing that in addition to her criticisms of Hava, she’d remembered to say “Thank you.”

“Unlikely,” said Giddon, licking butter from his thumb.