Chapter 42

15 days left

A s dawn brightened the sky, Aria paced in her room, stepping over a collection of reading materials spread across her floor and occasionally stopping to jot notes in the journal on her desk. These were not the books on Casting she'd sought in the past; they were records of royalty. Family journals, a history of laws passed within the kingdom, records of trials and executions, peace treaties, trade negotiations, coronation transcripts. She circled at the heart of her family's legacy.

Weariness set into her bones along with the advent of day, and she paused only long enough to drink a cup of Baron's birthday wine before resuming her study.

Jenny entered with a quiet knock, and Aria shot the girl a quick smile before bending over her desk to record a line of thought. During the night, Jenny had helped her find the records she needed and carry everything to her room, but as dawn approached, she'd left to be ready for her duties.

"Welcome back, Jenny."

Rather than replying, the girl sniffled.

Aria straightened, bumping her desk and scattering a collection of loose parchment. She hopped over the mess. "What's wrong? What's happened?"

Jenny's face was drawn and pale. She wore her hair in the same two wispy, fraying braids as she had all night, though she usually replaited them each morning. Unshed tears shimmered in her brown eyes. Her voice emerged as a quiet rasp. "Some of the other servants ... have noticed me falling asleep during duties. There's been rumors ... daughters of the king and then a servant ..." She swallowed hard, and a tear slipped free, followed by another. "His Majesty ordered I leave. So I wanted ... to say goodbye."

Aria clenched her jaw at her father's continued rampage. "Tell him you can't leave yet, that you need time to find a new arrangement. One day. I need one more day."

"Highness, I—"

Aria grabbed her hands, squeezing tightly. " Aria . Just Aria. And I will not accept your goodbye. I will not lose another sister."

Jenny's eyes widened. She glanced at the door, as if guards would burst in at the very mention of her illegitimate heritage. Then she looked down at their joined hands. When she gave a small sob, Aria pulled her into a hug, and they held each other as the morning light grew brighter through the window slats.

When Jenny pulled free, she wiped her eyes and looked down at the carpet of disheveled parchment. "Do you need more help?"

Aria's laugh held a touch of panic. "Desperately. Here, this wine is from Baron. It'll keep you awake."

She thought Jenny might protest the magic, but she didn't, and they got to work. Jenny obediently moved books and stacks of parchment wherever Aria asked, and she listened as Aria read sections from her in-progress peace agreement. The girl's solemn, observant insights saved Aria a good deal of embarrassment.

A servant from the kitchen brought a breakfast tray, relayed by a guard through the door. Cook had made Aria's favorite breakfast rolls, baked with apples and maple. Aria ate two, insisted Jenny have the rest, and returned to work renewed.

"I'm missing something," she murmured, snatching up her grandmother's journal again. Queen Theresa's handwriting, cramped and shaky, made it difficult to read. More difficult still were her wandering thoughts, weighing down the page with random and inconsequential things.

"Dorothy Ames." Aria tapped the page, looking up. "The Affiliate."

Jenny paused, maple roll halfway to her mouth. "She was ... executed."

"Almost forty years ago, when my father was a child. My grandmother sentenced her according to the law against shapeshifters, then made restitution to her family. But this entry is from the day my parents got married. Right in the middle of talking about marriage and alliances, my grandmother starts talking about Dorothy."

"Perhaps she felt bad? Dorothy was young. I never thought about that, since she was ... a shapeshifter."

Aria's eyes widened. "Jenny, you're brilliant."

She searched through laws to find the ones concerning shapeshifters, then returned to her grandmother's journal, then to her own notes. The morning dwindled quickly, much too quickly for all Aria had to accomplish in a single day.

When lunch arrived, she'd returned to drafting the new peace agreement. Rather than setting her quill aside, she ate pear slices and dates while continuing to write. After her fifth draft went in the fire, she stood up to pace, drinking another cup of Baron's wine to stay alert during the day.

"It's getting better," said Jenny, turning the logs over to cover the ashes of Aria's failed attempts.

Aria smiled. She twisted her loose hair up, pinned it with Corvin's comb, and sat down to draft a sixth.

When a servant came to retrieve the lunch tray halfway through the afternoon, it was not anyone Aria had expected—it was Cook herself. Apparently the guards couldn't hold back the fierce woman, who no doubt threatened them with a wooden spoon until they allowed her to stand at the door.

"New challenger at the castle," Cook said. "Familiar sort, missing two brothers. Seems very determined. King won't be able to meet with him for another half hour."

"He'll be killed," Aria whispered in horror. With the way her father had responded to Silas's disappearance the previous day ...

"Daft lad needs some help." Cook gave a pointed look.

Aria couldn't leave her room, and even if she could, her presence would not help her father's mood. In fact, if he saw her with Baron, he would no doubt think the entire thing somehow a trap.

The pit within her stomach grew, and she clutched the door. She wished he would have written, wished she could have spoken to him before he'd announced his intentions at the gate. When she'd told him she was going to Northglen, she'd not intended to endanger him by dragging him along, not when his first priority should be caring for his brothers. If she got him killed—

Cook grunted. "I've got dough proofing. It can't wait all day."

Whether the comment was meant to be veiled instruction or not, Aria took it as such. Baron would soon meet with the king whether she did anything or not.

"Of course. Just a moment, though—I've remembered I kept a plate from breakfast."

"Hurry it up, then."

Aria closed the door, then rushed to her writing materials. Her note to Baron was hasty and smudged, and she hoped it would be enough. She slid it beneath her plate on the tray.

Then she handed the tray to Cook and watched the woman disappear down the hallway.

Aria continued her work, but dark undercurrents swirled in her mind, rethinking every word of her instruction to Baron, imagining all the unpleasant ways her father might surprise her. Jenny had fallen silent, tending the fireplace to keep the room warm and comfortable.

A sharp caw came from outside the window, followed by another. Aria glanced at Jenny; the girl had gone white, but then she nodded, and Aria opened the shutters, spilling in a cloud of winter air along with a black-feathered crow.

Corvin perched on her bedpost, but then he spotted Jenny and froze.

Aria latched the window and gave him an encouraging smile. Even so, it was a minute before black mist began wafting from his feathers.

Jenny turned her eyes to the fireplace, stoking the logs with renewed vigor.

In a burst, Corvin was himself, standing behind the bedpost as if it could shield him. He eyed the poker in Jenny's hands. "I'm sorry I scared you," he said unsteadily. "Last time and ... now."

For her part, Jenny seemed to be fighting a heart attack, clutching her free hand to her chest, knotting the fabric of her white shirt as she stole glances at the boy who'd moments before been a bird.

"He's harmless," Aria said. "Unless you're his twin."

"Hey!" Corvin squawked, lifting his shoulders like ruffling feathers. "Leon always starts it."

Aria smiled.

Jenny opened her mouth and closed it, apparently choking on air. After a few more struggles, she whispered, "I'm sorry. For the guards."

" Oh , that." He gave a half smile. "Thanks. Anyone else would still be calling them, so that makes you braver than most."

The girl's face colored, and she returned to stabbing logs.

"Baron?" Aria prodded at last.

Corvin grimaced. "I saw him get through the gate, but obviously I couldn't fly into the palace, except here. I know he wants me to go home, but I thought maybe I could wait here, and after you meet with the king, you could just ... tell me it worked out. Feels silly now to say it."

"Unfortunately, the king has confined me to my room. Baron must meet with him alone."

A very dark part of her wanted to ask Corvin to turn His Majesty into a bird and make the problem fly away. If it wouldn't have risked the boy's life, she would have.

Corvin's eyes widened. " My father sent me to my room all the time, but I never thought anyone could do that to a princess."

Aria gave a short, breathy laugh. "In this, we're no different. Except my father has royal guards to enforce it."

"Then what about Baron—"

"I've sent him a note with strategies. I have full confidence in his abilities after that."

She did, but it didn't quash the fear that her father would find some new way to be irrational.

"The throne room has windows, doesn't it? I could go see what's happening."

"I know it's tempting"—Aria had considered sneaking out to eavesdrop as well—"but the best thing we can do for Baron is not distract him or do anything that risks my father's ire."

When the boy glanced at the window, Aria reached forward to grip his arm.

"If anyone in the kingdom can manage this," she said, "it's Baron."

Corvin nodded, though he still looked restless, ready to fly. Normally, she would have urged him to go home, but she did not harbor any delusions that he could fly in a straight line that didn't include following Baron. Safer, then, to keep him occupied.

She steered him into a chair, where he perched on the cushioned arm rather than the seat. He tilted his head, peering around her, then quirked a smile. "You like the comb."

Aria touched her hair. "I told you I did."

"Anyone could say it and not mean it. I gave my mom an Artifact once, but I never saw it again. I think she was embarrassed by me."

"I hope that wasn't the case." Aria thought of her own father and looked away. "But no matter the reasons, sometimes people we love do things that hurt."

"Baron says she's in Northglen."

Aria looked back with wide eyes. "Your mother?"

"She sent a letter. Baron can tell you. I don't really want to talk about it." He focused on Jenny. "When you visited the estate, you said you were from Harper's Glade, but I never got to ask about the Halloways. Did they really tear down that massive barn?"

Aria raised an eyebrow in Jenny's direction, expecting the girl to shrink away.

Instead, she took up conversation with Corvin. Though timid at first, Jenny began telling stories Aria had never heard, stories of her hometown, her childhood, her mother. She and Corvin both spoke animatedly about a lake which apparently grew overrun with frogs each summer.

Pulling a second chair beside Corvin's, Aria shepherded her half sister into it. Jenny barely seemed to notice, busy answering questions with more words than Aria had known she possessed, and Aria recognized something in the flush of Jenny's cheeks, perhaps even in Corvin's smile.

She grinned to herself, and without thinking, she turned, expecting to find someone at her shoulder, someone who would giggle with her and gladly tease Jenny every morning after.

But Eliza was still gone.

Aria closed her eyes, breathing until her heart remembered how to beat in proper rhythm. Then her gaze fixed on the door.

All her life, she'd felt isolated—that was the nature of royalty. She did not have friends in court the way others did. She did not attend a school or share tutors with other students her age. But she'd never felt alone . She'd had Eliza. She'd had her father.

Until Eliza abandoned her. It was the unkindest way to think of it, and Aria felt guilty for entertaining it, but the feeling remained, like a snake curled beneath a bush, hissing to make itself known each time wind disturbed the leaves.

Her father had abandoned her more directly, cut her off in everything except an official disownment, and even then, Aria felt bitterly certain he only maintained her inheritance because he still planned to marry her to some suitor of his choosing.

The venom of that pulsed deeply in her veins, stinging with every single heartbeat.

Yet in a time when everyone had turned away from her—

Baron came marching in the castle door.

She hated the danger he faced, hated that she couldn't face it with him, but even so, he would never know how much it meant to her that he faced it for her sake, that he stood by her instead of turning away.

She closed her eyes, wishing she could send another message to him along with her note, but she couldn't even manage the proper words. Thank you didn't cover it, and neither did don't you dare lose.

In the end, the best she could manage was, Whatever happens, I'll meet you at nightfall. Just be there.