of you below? That might’ve been our new guests themselves, for all you knew.”
The prince tore free, rolling her head to stretch out the dull bruises her mother’s fingers left behind. She clasped her hands into fists behind her back. “I don’t want to get married.”
“Your wants are not my immediate concern, Calepia. Not compared to the needs of this kingdom.”
Hal grimaced. “Then go, leave me, or I’ll go. I only thought to … never mind.” She tore off her cloak and made for the door, balling the tattered old thing against her stomach.
“Hal,” snapped the queen. “Stop. Talk to me.”
Back turned to her mother, Hal did stop. She hugged her cloak. Her mouth was tacky, her head throbbing. She needed water and food. Or more wine. “Will you … have breakfast with me?”
A sigh of exasperation was the answer. “I’ve eaten, Hal, and you are hungover. There’s red in your eyes from lack of sleep, and you stink of river moss and sour wine. How dare you come to me like this?”
But it was not anger in the queen’s voice: it was disappointment.
“I wanted to speak as we used to speak,” Hal said softly. A thousand years ago, when Hal was a little girl, before her mother’s exile. Or even that brief time last year when it seemed Hal could do this.
The queen stepped nearer. “I did not hear you.”
The prince turned. She tossed her disastrous dark hair away from her face with a sharp shake of her head. “Let me bring Banna Mora home. That will bolster my reputation.”
Celeda’s lashes flickered in her only show of startlement. “You haven’t brought that up in months.”
“I miss her.”
“Do you think she misses you? My information suggests she is making a home for herself on Innis Lear, as well she should. Better that she remain.”
“But it should be her choice—it makes you look weak to force her away,” Hal said, then clenched her jaw as if expecting to be hit.
“You make me look weak,” the queen said, simply and with little expression.
Hal paused to swallow the blow. Carefully, she asked, “Hasn’t Mora been punished enough?”
Celeda sighed and moved to one of the gilded chairs along the paneled wall. She sat, hands in her lap, and leaned her head back, closed her eyes. “Were I to send you, it would confirm that we need her. If you would only put yourself together, be good, Hal, then you could have her back—as a friend. As a vassal. But you cannot reach out to Banna Mora from a lesser state.” Suddenly Celeda’s eyes opened. “I’ll put the March under your name.”
“No!” Horror had Hal leaping forward. She knelt and grabbed her mother’s hands. “You can’t. It’s hers—I remember what it was like when Rovassos took Bolinbroke from me, from you! It was like my heart was torn out.”
“She has already suffered that pain,” Celedrix said, and a subtle shift of her hand brought Hal’s attention to the Blood and the Sea. “And the March would do you good. Get you out of the slums of Lionis, and force you to lead. The March is more engaging than Bolinbroke.”
“I can’t leave Lionis,” Hal protested.
“True, not until Charm arrives. But it would be a good honeymoon.”
Hal’s guts knotted, full of sharp bubbles of air. “No, I—Mother, I—” She stood and turned to flee.
“Heading back to further debase yourself,” the queen asked, “in some brothel or cheap tavern? To cry with Ianta Oldcastle? You used to have better friends.”
“Ianta never did anything to earn your censure,” Hal said, struggling to remain calm. “She taught us so much.”
Celeda said, “Ianta Oldcastle taught you excess and a lazy way. She filled your head with magic and stories for children, jokes and riddles and rot. Just like Rovassos. They were the same ilk.”
“You know she taught us more than that.”
“Yes, she made you into fine warriors. But at what price? You were children, and she encouraged you to embrace degradation.”
“I embraced none but Hotspur,” Hal snapped.
The queen lifted a hand, palm out for peace. “If Ianta’s influence was so impeccable, come home and leave her in the squalor she’s made for herself. Show me, and everyone, that you can rise to your destiny.”
“Being a prince was never my destiny—until you murdered the king!” The moment she said the words, Hal regretted them. She saw it again, again, again: the arc of blood, the blade sawing against Rovassos’s neck.
Hal’s accusation spilled across her mother’s face, flaring Celeda’s nostrils, tightening her lips,