Daphne

"Are we boring you, my dove?"

Daphne straightens, blinking around the council chamber, at her mother sitting at the head of the large oak table. Despite the casual tone of her voice and the term of endearment tacked onto the end, the empress's dark brown eyes feel like a knife's tip pressed to her skin. The others at the table look at her too—Madame Renoir, General Urden, the Duke of Allevue, and Mother Ippoline—the last of whose gaze is particularly loaded.

Daphne spent the bulk of last night with her at the Sororia again, this time borrowing some of Cliona's clothes and sneaking out alone through a servants' entrance, leaving Bairre and Cliona to cover for her if the need arose. Daphne was surprised to get the summons from Mother Ippoline after supper, assuming they would wait for Beatriz before planning further, but Mother Ippoline greeted her with a thick stack of ledgers that Blanche, the courtesan Madame Renoir regularly employed, had managed to take from her office.

It led to a long night of reading through the numbers and running her own calculations with help from Mother Ippoline before Daphne understood exactly what she was looking at—the Duke of Allevue had been right to be upset about the cut to his allowance. From what Daphne could tell, that was the least of the issues Madame Renoir had obscured with clever accounting and unchecked power.

But now Daphne, who's accrued no more than six hours' sleep over the last two days, is struggling not to nod off during the council meeting her mother invited her to sit in on—one she should be paying close attention to.

"Not at all," Daphne says, cutting her mother an embarrassed smile. "I'm afraid my injury is still affecting me."

"Really?" her mother asks, brows rising. "My physician assured me you were the very picture of health."

"Yes, I've tried to inform my body of that diagnosis, but I'm afraid it has a mind of its own," Daphne says, realizing only when General Urden fails to hide his burst of laughter with a cough and earns a glare from the empress that her tone was more wry than she intended.

Her mother looks at her, red lacquered mouth pursed in bemusement. "Perhaps you are in need of a nap, my dove," she says, her voice coated in concern that rings fake. "You sound far more like your sister than yourself, and you know how many times I had to eject her from council meetings for her behavior. I'd hate to have to do the same to you."

Her mother isn't wrong, Daphne thinks. Beatriz was the only one who ever talked back to their mother, while Daphne and Sophronia were always careful to mind their words and tones. Sophronia because she feared the snap of the empress's temper, Daphne because she feared her disappointment.

Now, though, the empress isn't disappointed in Daphne, she's suspicious, which is far worse, so Daphne forces her exhaustion to the back of her mind and reaches for the cup of coffee a servant brought at the start of the meeting, though the half cup left has since cooled. She sips it anyway.

"I'm fine," she assures her mother. "And it is important for me to be here, isn't it? If I'm to run a country of my own one day?"

It's a challenge only her mother hears. While the empress promised Daphne she would inherit the Bessemian throne, she hasn't gone so far as to name her heir publicly. She won't, Daphne knows, the promise she made worth less than dust, but they are still dancing their dance, trying not to trip over the lies they've told each other.

"Of course it is," the empress replies smoothly. "But your health is of paramount importance. You won't be able to run a country if you're dead."

The words are casual enough, sounding to everyone else at the table like a figure of speech. Only Daphne—and perhaps Mother Ippoline—hears the threat.

"We'll have detailed notes sent to your rooms," the empress adds. "It will be like you were here the entire time. Rest, my dove," she says, reaching across the table to take hold of Daphne's hand, squeezing it. Daphne stares at her mother's hand around hers, the elegant fingers with their manicured nails, the gold rings that decorate them, a fraction warmer than her mother's skin. She wants to recoil from the touch, but there is a part of her still lurking deep, deep within that wants to lean into it, to revel in the small show of affection, no matter how much of a performance it might be.

She gives herself a mental shake and gently withdraws her hand from her mother's grip, getting to her feet. "Yes, thank you, Mama. I believe I should get some rest."

Daphne steps into her rooms, leaving the guards to stand outside the door, exhaustion shrouding her thoughts and weighing down her movements. She should go to sleep early tonight, she thinks, even if it means missing dinner. The world won't fall apart in the next few hours at least. She reaches up to cover a yawn as she walks toward the door to her bedroom, walking past Beatriz perched on the sofa with a teacup balanced on her knee. Daphne mumbles a hello, her hand on the doorknob, and freezes.

Ever since she returned to Hapantoile, she's seen her sisters everywhere. Their ghosts haunt these rooms in particular, where they spent the bulk of their lives together. Of course her tired mind has summoned Beatriz now—so real she even catches that inexplicable scent of ambergris that always clung to Beatriz even before she bought her first bottle of perfume.

She'll just be disappointed if she turns around, she thinks. When all she sees is an empty sofa. She shouldn't even look, just step into her room and fall asleep and hope that in her dreams, she finds Beatriz and Sophronia.

"Daphne."

Daphne's breath hitches, and in the space of a single blink, she turns, flinging herself blindly toward the sofa and the very solid, very real Beatriz sitting there, not caring when she knocks the cup Beatriz is holding to the floor, spilling brown tea on the white rug.

Beatriz's arms come around her, holding her tight, and she presses her face to Daphne's neck, tears damp against Daphne's skin, but then Daphne is crying too.

"You shouldn't be here," she whispers, conscious of the guards so close, just outside the door. "Foolish, impulsive, idiotic," she chides, even as she hugs Beatriz tighter with each word.

"I missed you, too," Beatriz whispers back. "I couldn't stand to be away a moment longer. And I'm not afraid of her."

Daphne pulls back just enough to see her sister's face—so different from the last time she saw her, stepping into a Cellarian carriage in the Nemaria Woods, dressed in that dramatic red Cellarian gown, face laden with cosmetics. She looks as tired as Daphne feels, and in need of a good long bath. Her red hair is in a simple braid down her back, coming loose from the ribbon holding it, and her simple wool dress is fraying in places. But she's here, Daphne thinks. She's alive.

"You've never been afraid of her," Daphne says. "Which is foolish."

One corner of Beatriz's mouth lifts in a smile, and she presses her palm to Daphne's cheek. "Fine, then," she says. "I'll be brave and foolish; you be cautious and conniving. She won't stand a chance against the two of us."

Something between a laugh and a sob saws out of Daphne's chest. "I have so much to tell you," she says.

"And I you," Beatriz replies. "I sent your husband to find mine at the Crimson Petal and said I would bring you along as soon as you got back."

Daphne shakes her head. "Mama is having me watched," she says. "I believe I got away without being followed yesterday, but I'm not sure enough of that to risk your life, Triz."

"Let her have you followed," Beatriz says, shrugging. "We have an army hiding in the woods outside Hapantoile, awaiting our orders. The time for hiding and sneaking and subterfuge is done. It's time to show her exactly who she raised us to be."

Daphne looks at her sister, searching the face that is as familiar to her as her own even after months apart. Who she raised us to be. The words burrow into her chest, igniting something. She nods once.

"And make her regret it," Daphne adds.