and a dusting of gold powder on her lids lent a hint of the usual sparkle to her eyes. Salves had been applied to her cheeks and lips to simulate healthy color. It had taken all Tobin’s and Camigwen’s combined skills to create the semblance of her normal face to which the makeup had then been applied. They had done her hair in a mass of thin braids that twisted around her head and looped down her neck like plaited fire. She supposed she was beautiful.
“Where did Walvis get to with the jewels?” Camigwen fretted as Tobin lowered the gown’s skirt over Sioned’s hair and pulled it into place around her waist.
“You’d think my idiot brother would be dressed to his own satisfaction by now, and have the decency to remember Sioned’s emeralds.”
Sioned finished tying the skirt’s laces and stared bemused at her image. The dress was everything she had hoped when she’d first seen the heavy silk in the merchant’s booth. Was this what a princess looked like?
“Perfect,” Cami announced, standing back from her.
“I think so, too,” Rohan said softly.
Sioned turned. Resplendent himself in a solid black outfit like the one he’d worn at Stronghold, he had added a sleeveless black silk tunic slit in front from the waist to the knee-length hem, belted in silver. He and Sioned stared at each other until Tobin broke the spell with laughter.
“Put your eyes back in your heads!”
“Is that my Sioned under all that?” Rohan teased.
“Want proof?” She held up the hand wearing his emerald.
“Oh, something a little more substantial than that,” Cami suggested, laughing.
Sioned cast her a sidelong glance, then went to Rohan and kissed his lips. The Fire blazed up between them. She didn’t dare put her arms around him, knowing he held back for the same reason. They knew each other’s bodies now, understood the reality of ecstasy. When she stepped away from him, they were both trembling.
“Oh, it’s you, all right,” he murmured, eyes dazed. Then he shook himself and reached into a pocket. “Tobin, you put these on her. I’d drop them.”
Within moments Sioned saw herself alight with green fire. She could see nothing but the emeralds that pulsed with a life of their own. A black shadow crowned with golden hair moved to stand behind her, and as he placed his hands lightly on her shoulders their eyes met in the mirror.
“Only one thing missing,” Tobin said, coming forward with two thin circlets of silver that twisted open at the back. She gave them both to Rohan, who blinked in surprise before he smiled and kissed her cheek.
“Two things,” he corrected. “But one, in the end,” he added cryptically. Sioned smiled.
“Now, don’t either of you leave here until Chay and I can join you,” Tobin warned. “And where is he, anyway?”
“Dressed and waiting for you,” Rohan said absently, fingering the circlets. “Sioned, are you well? Truly?”
“Truly,” she answered. “But let’s make it an early night, shall we?” She winked at him in the mirror, and he grinned.
“Now I’m positive it’s you!”
Careful of the elaborate braids, he placed one of the circlets across her brow. Then, with a shy smile, he handed her the second one. Sioned bit her lip; this was her vision come to life at last. She gave him the mark of royalty, pulling strands of golden hair into place so the circlet gleamed visible only across his forehead. Princess in every fact but the actual ceremony, she looked into her prince’s eyes for a long, silent time without doubts or strivings, at peace.
Andrade left Urival to deal with Pandsala and the infant, secure in the knowledge that the former could not escape and the latter now had a wet nurse. Urival’s dismay had been almost funny; Andrade pitied him the impossible evening, left alone with a frantic princess, a newborn, and a girl chosen not for her brains but her breasts. But there was no one else she could trust to keep Pandsala in line. The girl had twice tried to run, getting as far as the outer row of Rohan’s tents before the faradh’im had caught up with her, the regular guards being wary of placing rough hands on a daughter of the High Prince. Urival had no such scruples. Andrade hoped he would spend the evening making a few realities clear to her. The girl was not inherently vicious, she thought—unlike Ianthe, who was so twisted it was a wonder her own guts didn’t strangle her.