choice than You did.”
“Nevertheless, I appreciated your … companionship.”
She gave me a crooked grin. “Is that what we’re calling it?”
“For lack of a better term.”
“Fair enough.” She swept a gallant bow. “It was an honor. But let’s not do it again, shall we?”
I had to laugh. “Agreed.”
“Your Highness?” Ibolya, makeup repaired and composure restored, glided in. “Your bath is ready.”
Sondra gave me a cheerful salute. “And I’m off to mine.”
“One moment,” I told Ibolya, and with a thought to Vesno, I took him to sit with Con, easing open the door to the bedchamber. Vesno, heeding my mental instructions, climbed gently onto the bed to lie next to Con, so he wouldn’t wake alone.
Finding Ibolya in my bathing chamber, I shed Con’s shirt, stepped into the steaming tub, and sank in, sighing at the bliss of hot water. It seemed so quiet, to bathe with only Ibolya there and no Morning Glory, none of my other ladies. Good thing I had no intention of donning my normal costume, as the two of us would never have been able to manage without more help.
“Does Your Highness have a preference in gowns today?” Ibolya asked, her thoughts clearly going in the same direction. “I have not yet sent for Lady Calla and the others, but I can.”
“No, don’t bother.” I rolled my neck on the edge of the tub, watching her bustle about. “I’ll be going to the temple as soon as possible.”
“You will—I mean, we will, Your Highness?”
“Yes.” To Calanthe’s center, the wellspring and the vortex of Her power and the rapidly collapsing ties that bound Her to the physical world. I sensed them keenly now, as if my time away—the brutal ripping of my roots and blood-fueled grafting of myself back into Her—had made me consciously aware of what I’d always taken for granted. Now that I knew myself as a person away from Calanthe, I recognized where I ended and She began. Though it wasn’t a clear demarcation, so perhaps grafting was the wrong analogy. An extension of the goddess. Our connection flowed in a circle, and I was both part of Calanthe and my own person.
“Yes,” I said again, recalling myself from riddles I might never fully resolve, “I must travel to the temple immediately.”
“Surely not today, Your Highness?”
“The sooner the better. I have to address the problems with Calanthe, and I can’t do it from here.”
“Will a night make that much difference, Your Highness? It will be sunset in another hour or so. And You’ve only just arisen from Your sickbed and a terrible trial. You look so much better, but … perhaps go a bit slowly?”
She had a point. “Tomorrow morning, then. Tonight I’ll show Myself to the court.” If Ibolya had been that distressed at thinking me dead, when she had better reason to hope than many, then I needed to reassure everyone. Calanthe’s thrashing wouldn’t be helped by the people’s panic.
“Conrí held court yesterday and let it be known that Your Highness had returned to the palace.”
“Ah.” That’s right—even in my near-death delirium I’d noticed his handsome clothing, wondering if he’d appeared formally. Would wonders never cease. “I’ll meet with Dearsley, too, do what I can to set things to rights. I’ll require a gown, but not underpinnings. Something unstructured—no corset or other padding. I shall go as Myself.”
“Of course, Your Highness,” Ibolya murmured. “The black wig?”
“Did you bring it from Cradysica?” I asked, startled by the thought.
“Yes, Your Highness. None of Your things were damaged.”
No, just me. Don’t think about it.
“No wig,” I declared. I intended to grow out my own hair—vines or flowers or sticks, or whatever it would be—and until then, I’d go bald proudly. If I were You, I’d just wear my crown on my bald head and let the critics go fuck themselves, Sondra had said. Unfortunately, I lacked a crown to put on my bald head, actually now quite fuzzy with soft green growth. I’d last seen the crown of Calanthe with my other jewels, tossed onto the heaps of treasure piled on the steps of Anure’s obscene throne, as if he were a dragon of old, hoarding every bit of glitter and keeping it from the world. “We’ll have to devise a crown.”
“I have ideas, Your Highness.”
“You always do.”
* * *
Ibolya seemed unsurprised when I refused the body makeup. The patterns of petals, leaves, bark, and thorns shimmered over my skin in subtle counterpoint to the dramatic crimson-black of the gown Ibolya brought out. Scarlet as fresh