will make her seem pure,” The Lady said grimly. “The emperor loves girls like that.”
“Then you’re making the wish today?” Woo In asked. The Lady nodded, and to my shock, she cupped Woo In’s face just as she had cupped mine. He leaned into the touch, kissing her palm. I was jealous immediately.
She said, “I know you’ll keep her safe.”
He scanned her features with hunger, a moth before a candle. “I believe in this cause,” he said.
She fondled his hair. “And I believe in you.”
“Why are we going to Oluwan?” I demanded. “Mother, are you coming too?”
“No, Made-of-Me.” The Lady reclined on one of our hall’s broad window seats. The sun backlit her frame in a halo. “I will come for you when the time is right.” She patted her lap, nodding at me.
For the rest of my life, I wished the universe had given me a sign then. A warning of what was about to happen. But no—the air was warm and serene, and honeybirds sang in the distance as I scrambled, eagerly, into my mother’s arms.
She stroked my back for a moment, gazing at the hazy Swanian sky. “How frightened you must be,” she told someone I could not see. “You caged me like a bird, but you could not make me sing.” Then she told Kathleen, “Give her the portrait.”
A gilded oval frame was placed in my hands. A boy stared back at me, with tightly curled hair and the brightest smile I’d ever seen. Naive brown eyes shone from a dark, broad-featured face.
“Why is he happy?” I asked.
The Lady raised an eyebrow. “Aren’t you curious who he is?” I shrugged, and so she answered my question. “He is happy because he has everything you want. Power. Wealth. Legacy. His father stole those things from you, and gave them to him.”
“Be careful, Lady,” Kathleen muttered. “Remember: She must fall in love with him.”
My brow creased with confusion. I couldn’t remember ever wanting power or wealth. And why did I have to love him? But The Lady’s pressing arms and the scent of jasmine jumbled my thoughts. I snuggled against her, forgetting the boy with his stolen happiness. I would trade all the wealth in Aritsar to be held. To be touched without fear. To never be called dangerous.
“Are you listening, Made-of-Me?” The Lady whispered. I closed my eyes and nodded, resting my cheek on her breast. Her heart raced like a hummingbird. Her next words were halting, cautious. “When you meet this boy in the portrait …”
Something that had slept for years rose in my belly, searing my skin, like the cuff on Melu’s arm had done. I opened my eyes. For a moment, in my reflection on the portrait’s surface, my pupils glowed like emeralds.
“When you love him the most, and when he anoints you as his own …” The Lady touched the boy’s face, blotting out his dazzling smile. “I command you to kill him.”
I RETCHED INTO THE BOWL BETWEEN MY LEGS, stomach lurching with the jostle of the mule-and-box.
“I told you traveling by lodestone was a bad idea,” Kathleen snapped at Woo In as she emptied my sick bowl out the window. “We should have taken camels. Lodestones are nasty powerful. She’s never been exposed to magic before.”
“She was raised in an invisible manor house,” Woo In pointed out dryly. “She’ll be fine. Besides, from the looks of it, the kid would have been sick however we traveled.”
It was my first time in a mule-and-box—in anything with wheels. After leaving Bhekina House, we had crossed two realms in two weeks. By mule, camel, or river barge, the trip would have taken months. But we had traveled by lodestone: a powerful, hazardous magic that dissolved bodies and reformed them leagues away. Ports were scattered throughout Aritsar, guarded by imperial soldiers. Whenever we passed through them, Kathleen had forced my face beneath a hood.
“Stay down,” she had grunted. “You’re The Lady’s spitting image.”
I didn’t understand why resembling my mother was dangerous. In fact—in the thrill of adventure—I often forgot all about The Lady’s wish. Her lethal words grew hazy as I witnessed marvels from my books and scrolls. Town. Market. Mountain. Lake. Forest. In a world so big, what were the chances of meeting that boy in the portrait?
After the first lodestone crossing, I had vomited my breakfast onto Kathleen’s boots. The Imperial Guard warriors had warned against traveling by lodestone more than once a month, but Woo In had insisted on two crossings a week.