'Yes,' Po said. 'I came here for a vacation. It's been lovely.'
Bitterblue smiled. 'When is Katsa coming?'
'She doesn't know. No doubt she'll come flying in just when we've given her up. She's managed Estill, Sunder, and Wester practically on her own, you know, while the rest of us were in Nander. I long for a few days of quiet with her before we overthrow the next monarch.'
'You're not doing it again!'
'Well,' he said, closing his eyes, leaning back against the wall. 'It was a joke, I think.'
'You think?'
'Nothing is certain,' said Po with maddening vagueness, then opened his eyes and squinted at her. 'Have you been having any problems?'
Bitterblue snorted. 'Could you be any less specific?'
'I mean, things like challenges to your sovereignty.'
'Po! Your next revolution isn't going to be here!'
'Of course not! How can you even ask that?'
'Do you realize how opaque you're being?'
'Well, what about unexplained attacks?' he said. 'Have there been any of those?'
'Po,' she said firmly, fighting against the memory of Teddy so that Po would not see it; crossing her arms, as if that would help her defend her thoughts. 'Either tell me what on earth you're talking about, or get out of the range of my thinking.'
'I'm sorry,' he said, raising a hand in apology. 'I'm tired and I'm mucking things up. We've got two separate worries on your account, see. One is that news of the recent events in Nander has been stirring up a lot of discontent everywhere, but especially in kingdoms with a history of tyrannous kings. And so we worry that you're perhaps at greater risk than you were before of one of your own people, maybe someone injured by Leck, trying to hurt you. The other is that the kings of Wester, Sunder, and Estill hate the Council. For all our secrecy, they know who its ringleaders are, Cousin. They'd love to strike us a blow—which they could do in any number of ways, including hurting our friends.'
'I see,' Bitterblue said, suddenly uncomfortable, and trying to remember the details of the attack on Teddy without linking them to Po in her mind. Was there any chance that the knife that had stabbed Teddy had been meant for her? She couldn't remember the particulars clearly enough to know. It would mean, of course, that someone in the city knew who she was. It seemed unlikely.
'No one has hurt me,' she said.
'I'm relieved,' he said, a bit doubtfully, then paused. 'Is something wrong?'
Bitterblue let out a breath. 'A number of things have seemed wrong in the past two weeks,' she admitted. 'Mostly small things, like a bit of confusion over some of the castle records. No doubt it's nothing.'
'Let me know if I can help you,' he said, 'in any way.'
'Thank you, Po. It's lovely to see you, you know.'
He stood, gold flashing. Such a beautiful man, with those eyes that glowed with his Grace, and with the feeling in his face that he was never good at hiding. Coming to her, he took her hand, bowed his dark head over it, and kissed it. 'I've missed you, Beetle.'
'My advisers think we should marry,' said Bitterblue wickedly.
Po shouted a laugh. 'I shall enjoy explaining that one to Katsa.'
'Po,' she said. 'Please don't tell Helda I was gone.'
'Bitterblue,' he said, still holding her hand, tugging on it. 'Should I be worried?'
'You've got the wrong idea about that Graceling. Forget it, Po. Get some sleep.'
Po gazed, or seemed to gaze, into her hand for a moment, sighing. Then he kissed it again and said, 'I won't tell her about it
'Po—'
'Don't ask me to lie to you, Bitterblue. Just now, this is all I can promise.'
'ARE YOU HAPPY that your cousin has arrived, Lady Queen?' asked Helda that morning, peering at Bitterblue, who'd just entered the sitting room bathed and dressed for the day.
'Yes,' Bitterblue said, blinking through bloodshot eyes. 'Of course.'
'So am I,' said Helda smartly, in a way that made Bitterblue obscurely uneasy about her late-night secrets. It also took away her courage to ask for any breakfast, seeing as she was supposed to have already eaten.
'The queen will have no fluffy morning bread,' she muttered, sighing.
When she entered the lower offices, through which she had to pass to get to her tower, dozens of men milled around or scribbled at desks, poring over long, tiresome-looking documents, their faces blank and bored. Four of her Graceling guards, sitting against the wall, lifted unmatching eyes to her. The Queen's Guard, who numbered eight, had been Leck's guard too. All were Graced with hand-fighting or swordplay, strength, or some other skill befitting the protector of a queen, and it was their job to guard the offices and tower. Holt, one of the four on duty just now, studied her expectantly. Bitterblue made a mental note not to seem annoyed with anyone.
Her adviser Rood was also present, happily recovered, at last, from his nervous episode. 'Good morning, Lady Queen,' he said timidly. 'Can I do anything for you, Lady Queen?'
Rood looked not like his elder brother Runnemood but like Runnemood's shadow, faded and old, as if, were he poked with something sharp, he would pop, and vanish. 'Yes, Rood,' she said. 'I'd love some bacon. Could someone arrange for some bacon and eggs and sausages? How are you?'
'A shipment of silver being transported from the silver docks to the royal treasury at seven o'clock this morning was pilfered, Lady Queen,' said Rood. 'The loss was only a pittance, but it seems to have disappeared while the cart was in transit, and of course, we are both mystified and concerned.'
'Inexplicable,' Bitterblue said dryly. She had parted ways with Sapphire well before seven that morning, but she hadn't expected that he'd be out thieving with Teddy's condition so serious. 'Had that particular silver ever been stolen before?'
'Forgive me, Lady Queen, but I don't follow. What are you asking?'
'To be honest, I couldn't say.'
'Lady Queen!' said Darby, appearing before her out of nowhere. 'Lord Danzhol is waiting above. Thiel will attend the meeting with you.'
Danzhol. The one with the marriage proposal and the objections to the town charter in central Monsea. 'Bacon,' Bitterblue muttered. 'Bacon!' she repeated, then carefully made her way up the spiral stairs.
GRANTING CHARTERS OF independence to towns like Danzhol's had been the idea of Bitterblue's advisers, and King Ror had agreed. During Leck's time, more than a few lords and ladies of Monsea had behaved badly. It was hard to know which had acted under Leck's influence, and which had acted out of pure clear-headedness, seeing how much they stood to gain from calculated exploitation while the rest of the kingdom was distracted. But it was apparent, when King Ror visited a few nearby estates, that there were lords and ladies who had set themselves up as kings, taxing and legislating their people unwisely, often cruelly.
How forward-thinking, then, to reward every victimized town with freedom and self-governance? Of course, an application for independence required motivation and organization on the part of a town's residents—not to mention literacy—and lords and ladies were allowed to object. They hardly ever did, though. Not many people seemed keen on the court poking too hard at past behavior.
Lord Danzhol was a man in his forties with a wide-mouthed face and clothing that sat strangely on his form, too big in the shoulders, so that his neck seemed to be emerging from a cave; too tight around the middle. He had one silver eye and the other pale green.
'Your citizens claim that you starved them with your taxes during Leck's reign,' Bitterblue said, pointing to the relevant passages in the charter, 'absconding with their property if they couldn't pay. Their books, the products of their trade, ink, paper, even farm animals. It's hinted here that you had, and still have, a gambling problem.'
'I don't see how my personal habits come into it,' Danzhol said pleasantly, arms hanging awkwardly from the broad shoulders of his coat, as if they were new arms and he hadn't gotten used to them yet. 'Believe me, Lady Queen, I know the people who've drawn up this charter and the ones who've been elected to serve on the town council. They won't be able to keep order.'
'Perhaps not,' Bitterblue said, 'but they're allowed a trial period to prove otherwise. I see here that since
