“Indeed. Alliances by marriage usually only hold strong through the first generation of children, but they are still an excellent method to assure peace.” He pauses. “Your Great Aunt Larimi caught the eye of the northern prince. It was an unexpected windfall for us, and not one we can expect to occur again.”
A kind way of observing I’m unlikely to have foreign princes falling desperately in love with me. I don’t particularly mind, though. I would much prefer to marry someone who has as little interest in politics as me and just wants to live quietly on their lands.
“So,” my tutor continues, “how else might we strengthen our political alliances with them to assure they do not take it into their heads to invade us?”
I look down at the map and work through the possibilities with him: what we have to offer in trade, in support of them, and how we might also make ourselves look like too much trouble to bother with. Whatever was happening in the hallway appears to have died down, and I dismiss the incident as over until I hear the woman speak again.
“Bring them forward.” Her voice is loud and carrying and clear, and I finally place it as Lady Emmanika’s.
Oh no. My mind flashes to the memory of Valka facing Emmanika yesterday. I don’t want to know—and perhaps I’m wrong. What are the chances that this trouble with the servants has anything to do with Valka? But what if it does?
Valka does love her pranks, her malicious little methods to mete out vengeance. And she was very angry with Emmanika for correcting her.
I don’t want to know Valka’s secrets, I remind myself as my tutor goes on about the intricacies of our trade relations. I can just stay here, and—and I will still find out anyhow. And then, whatever injustice it is that has come to pass, it will be too late for me to do anything, just as it is with the hostlers, and Edlyna. And I will still have my family’s contempt, and regrets I don’t know what to do with.
I take a deep breath. I could just step outside. I don’t know what’s happening, but perhaps I can—I don’t know what I can do. But at least I should be there.
“Excuse me,” I say, sliding out of my seat and interrupting my tutor mid-sentence.
“Your Highness!”
I wince. “There is something wrong outside. I will just be a moment,” I say apologetically. I swing the door open to find the hallway crowded with nobles as well as nearly half my mother’s warriors.
I stand on my tiptoes and spy Maralinde’s father—a tall, thin man with a sparse beard and gaunt cheeks—standing halfway down the corridor. Most likely beside his wife. I thread my way through the onlookers, arriving at the center of the commotion just as the people at the other end of the hall press back, allowing through a contingent of guards and four very frightened-looking servants: three girls and a wide-eyed page. The girls wear aprons over their dull-colored dresses, the page a tunic and sagging leggings, probably handed down to him from a larger boy.
I cut sideways through the crowd and come up behind Maralinde, standing beside her mother and father.
“What’s happened?” I whisper.
Maralinde glances at me, and it’s the first time I have seen her looking truly angry, her brown eyes dark and her features pale. “Someone stole—”
“This morning,” Lady Emmanika says with such cutting, cold precision that everyone falls silent, “something was taken from my rooms. A brooch that has been in my family for generations.”
A brooch. My gaze flicks from the servants to the onlookers, searching out a face, and there, standing to the side, is Valka, with my brother beside her. He appears faintly entertained, she amused. Was it a brooch she was holding this morning?
Surely not.
“I understand that only the servants have been through this hallway during our absence. So I ask each of you, who has it? Return it to me, and you’ll escape with a flogging. If you do not, I shall have everyone searched, and all your belongings, and whoever is found guilty shall be executed. That is the law, and I shall have no compunction in seeing to it.”
The servants shake their heads. “Please, my lady,” the eldest says. “I don’t know how it’s happened. Perhaps we can help look for it? None of us would have taken anything.”
“There is nowhere to look,” Emmanika snaps. “It was taken from my jewelry box, which I set aside this morning in preparation for our departure. The box was left open, no less, and the brooch is nowhere around it. The work of a foolish, thoughtless thief.”
Or an arrogant, uncaring one, who wished to cause trouble. When I look toward Valka again, she is whispering something to my brother, their heads bowed together. What did she intend? Just to cause a disruption? If she has the brooch, no amount of searching will turn it up. But surely she won’t keep it? She likes creating a scene, and she should be well-pleased with this one. No doubt she’ll slip the brooch back into its place later today, and Emmanika will have to admit it was found—a humiliating admission for her to make after all of this, but she has enough dignity and self-respect to know it must be done.
Valka steps forward and gives a small curtsy. “I think I might be able to help, my lady.”
“Indeed, child?”
“I was passing through earlier and saw a girl coming out of your room.” She lifts a finger and points to the youngest of the servants, a girl no older than I am, with limp brown hair pulled back in a braid. I’ve seen her before, darting between tables at dinner, trying to avoid attention even as she sets out the meal. “Perhaps you
