The guards from Torla’s Neck who might have served as witnesses against Benni had fled. The young woman who’d brought Bitterblue her food in the attic had escaped to Kamassar in the Tima airship. Linta Massera was dead. The Kamassarians who’d scuttled the Seashell were gone, and anyway, there was no hard evidence that the sinking of the Seashell had been anything but an accident. The Magistry wasn’t considering it a crime.

Even Katu seemed content to think Ferla was his abductor. He knew from experience that Ferla could be ruthless, while Benni was a nice guy. And the Devret guards had reported that Ferla, not Benni, had gone out one night, bribing them to keep quiet. A Graceling named Trina, Graced with finding things, had come forward, claiming that Ferla had tried to hire her to locate human remains in the rubble of the burnt Cavenda house.

Bitterblue was gazing through the starmaker at the fire in her grate when Giddon snuck in.

“Hi,” he said, closing the door with a quiet click.

“Hi,” she said gloomily, swinging the starmaker to the lamp in his hands. Bitterblue loved the starmaker. It gave one part of her mind something nice to do while another part tried to solve problems.

Giddon set the lamp down and climbed under the covers. “What is it?” he said, pulling her against him and holding her in that way that always made her feel treasured, the same way using his gift, the starmaker, made her feel treasured.

“I don’t want Lovisa to have to testify in court against her own father,” she said. “I don’t want that entire burden to fall to her. But she’s the only reliable witness, even though we all know he’s guilty. I know things the fox told me that it kills me I can’t share.”

He breathed evenly against her hair for a while, thinking about it. “Are you considering exposing the fox?”

“No! Of course not. I can’t do that.”

“Are you considering . . . something else?”

Now Bitterblue took a moment. “If I pretended to have heard or seen something while I was in their attic,” she said, “I don’t think anyone would doubt me.”

Giddon’s voice was unhappy. “I don’t think so either.”

Bitterblue was obscurely ashamed of her next question. “Giddon? How terrible would it be to use one’s power as a queen to make up evidence in a foreign court? Evidence that everyone would believe?”

“Evidence of a crime that’s punishable by death?”

“Yes. To spare a sixteen-year-old girl having to testify against her father?”

Giddon scooched down, brushed the stray hairs away from her forehead, and studied her expression. She knew he was going to advise her against it.

“Maybe my method for deciding if something is terrible is different from other people’s,” he said. “But as a rule, if you’re doing something, it can’t be terrible.”