to argue with anyone. Niya wasn’t even sure the Princess Regent had noticed she was gone. Elyssa was a different sorrow from that she felt for the Fetch, but no less powerful. Elyssa was lost for good, but Niya could not accept it. She kept on feeling as though Elyssa, the real Elyssa, would suddenly appear.
And then there was the name, Kelsea. Many in the Keep whispered that there had been some influence in the birthing chamber, some overreach by the Guard, and who could blame them? Since her mother’s incapacitation, Elyssa had signed more than twenty death warrants for members of the Blue Horizon. Only Niya, Carroll, and Lazarus knew that in that last moment, the old Elyssa had been with them. Naming the baby had been Elyssa’s last act as a member of the Blue Horizon, and Niya thought that Gareth would have approved. The child in her arms was both Gareth and Elyssa, and she was all that remained of either of them.
Is that why you stay?
Niya didn’t know. The Princess who had placed the Crown storehouses under guard, who had ordered the Blue Horizon exterminated . . . that woman had betrayed them, and Niya could barely stand to be in the same room with her. But the Elyssa who had emerged since the birth was somehow worse: charming but vacant, as though the removal of the sapphire had somehow removed the last piece of her essential self as well.
Kelsea waved her tiny arms, batting Niya on the chin. She was an angry little thing, though she had odd periods of good temper that came and went. The sapphire had popped free of her swaddling clothes again; no matter how many times Niya tucked the jewel and chain in, they would not stay. But Carroll’s orders had been explicit: the chain was not to come off.
Niya finished pinning the nappy and picked up the Princess, smoothing her tiny nightdress. The wet nurse had begun humming behind them, an oddly merry tune that annoyed Niya as well. What was there to be merry about?
The door opened, making Niya jump. But it was only Elyssa. Behind her came Carroll and Elston. Their expressions were carefully, almost studiedly blank, but beneath the blankness, Niya sensed consternation. At the sight of Elyssa, the wet nurse dropped into a low curtsy, but Elyssa barely noticed her, her eyes roaming the room dreamily. As she saw the baby in Niya’s arms, an odd, empty smile appeared on Elyssa’s face.
“My little princess! How is she today?”
“Fine, Highness,” Niya replied, looking to Carroll and Elston for help. But they would not look at her . . . or even at each other. Mace was behind them, Niya noticed, peeking around the doorway. She tried to summon the anger she had felt toward him in the birthing chamber, but it was gone. His woman—a pro, or Niya was no judge, though she had gotten only one curious glimpse through the infirmary doorway—was dead, and even the Guard had been treading lightly around Mace lately, taking care with him. Mace probably wasn’t aware of it, for he didn’t know them as Niya did. But she had noted the contrast, and been moved, well past her anger. Mace noticed her looking at him and vanished from the doorway, back into the tiny antechamber that fronted the nursery.
“Would you like to hold her?” Niya asked, offering Kelsea toward Elyssa.
“No . . . no . . .” Elyssa replied. “I just came in to see that she was well. She eats enough?”
“Yes,” Niya replied, though in truth, she didn’t know. When Elyssa finally woke after the birth—a sleep of some eighteen hours, by Niya’s reckoning—she had announced that she would not breastfeed the baby and demanded a wet nurse. But Carroll had already dispatched a servant, who had returned with several wet nurses, and Kelsea seemed fine with all of them. Niya supposed she was well fed, though it was difficult to tell with a baby so small.
But the wet nurses were not there for cuddles . . . nor, Niya thought darkly, was Elyssa. It was Niya who changed Kelsea’s nappies, who quieted her when she cried. When the new princess had made clear her adamant refusal to go to sleep in her cot—or, truthfully, anywhere that she might safely lie down—it was Niya who dragged an enormous, comfortable armchair into the nursery and sat there with the baby every night, from dinner until dawn. Kelsea slept well