Within minutes, Mirabella finds herself standing in the Black Council chamber. She was placed at the end of the long table, and her hands are clasped before her like a prisoner brought up from the cells to hear her sentence read. Even the faces of those she would call allies—Luca, Bree, to some extent Rho Murtra—are unreadable as stone.
At the head of the table, Katharine crosses her arms. “I do not need to ask where the lines are drawn.” She gestures to the High Priestess, Rho Murtra, and Bree. “You three will be for allowing Mirabella to stay. You others”—she waves a hand to indicate the rest—“will be against her. The only question is who of those against her are willing to see if she can help.”
“Help,” Lucian Arron scoffs. “What was this bargain that brought her to us in the first place? It was not disclosed to us, and though it seems that they know”—he points to Luca, Rho, and Bree—“we cannot wring it out of them.”
“Oh, what does it matter?” Bree interjects. “Once the people know that Mirabella has joined with the crown it will only strengthen the queen’s position.” She looks to Katharine. “When will you make the announcement? Indrid Down should see you both, side by side.”
“They should not see her,” Antonin Arron hisses. “She should have been dropped by a poisoned arrow the moment she set foot in the city.”
The lamps in the room flare, but not from Mirabella, and she casts a look of warning at Bree. Her fire has always gotten the better of her.
“No,” says Katharine. “I invited my sister here under a banner of peace. And I will keep my word so long as she meets her end of the bargain.”
“What bargain?” Lucian Arron asks again. He and the other Arrons are becoming more and more frustrated. Mirabella would find their wild-eyed expressions amusing were they not currently deciding whether or not to let her live.
“You were not at the battle, Lucian. You did not see her at Innisfuil fighting back the mist. She is the only weapon that we have against it, and until we find a better one, give me real reasons why I should not keep her close. Real reasons,” Katharine adds when Antonin opens his mouth.
“On top of her . . . skill with the mist,” Luca says slowly, “her presence assures us the allegiance of Rolanth in our growing civil war. Indrid Down and Prynn cannot stand alone against everyone else.” She looks at Mirabella and nods, and Mirabella shifts her weight. It will be difficult to be so near Luca again. Difficult to keep her guard up when all she wants is to forget that Luca sided with the Arrons and ordered her execution.
Antonin and Lucian Arron look at each other. They seem miserable. Old. Exhausted. “It goes against tradition,” Antonin says.
“That is not enough of a reason,” says Katharine.
“And are we just supposed to take her at her word?” Genevieve asks. “That she is to be trusted?”
Katharine’s eyes flicker to Mirabella’s as Genevieve goes on.
“And you, my queen, have seen her fight the mist. But not all of us have. Who is to say she can do it again?”
That, at least, seems to get Katharine’s attention. “What are you suggesting, Genevieve?”
“Test her gift. Send her out into the mist and see if she can banish it.”
“And if she cannot?”
Genevieve cocks her head. “Then the mist will take her, and our argument will be solved. And we will really be no worse off than we are now.”
“You cannot be serious,” Bree says when Katharine appears to consider it. “Using her as defense against the mist is one thing, but to send her into it—”
“We ought to send other elementals along with her.” Rho’s deep voice cuts through the space and every head turns toward her in surprise. Especially Luca’s. “Who is to say that one elemental gift is better than another? Why not test several? Perhaps we have not needed her from the start.”
Katharine drums her fingers on the tabletop. “I feel we are being very rude. Sending my sister out as a sheep to slaughter. Surely, we ought to ask for her consent to this test.”
“I consent,” Mirabella says.
“Good.” Katharine knocks twice on the wood and rises. “Renata, send summons for the five strongest elementals from Rolanth, gifted in wind and storms. And when they arrive, sister”—she smiles—“you will face the mist.”
The meeting over, the guards return Mirabella to the king-consort’s apartment, with assurances they will stay posted directly outside for her “protection.”
Mirabella closes her eyes, and the face she sees is Katharine’s. But not the cold, pale-cheeked queen who sat across from her all night. Instead she sees the beautiful little girl who rarely frowned and loved to have her hair brushed.
When she opens her eyes, she sees the mist, still settled over the sea. The same mist she watched creep over the land at Innisfuil and overcome the queensguard soldiers, tearing them apart like strips of cloth.
“Arsinoe,” she whispers, and wishes more than anything to be back in Sunpool, where she was no longer a queen but a sister and friend. “It should be you here with your cleverness. I do not know if I can do this.”
After the Black Council has disbanded, Katharine lingers in the halls before the chamber. She will never get to sleep tonight. With Mirabella in the capital, her blood is up, and the dead queens are swirling through it like a school of rotting fish. She is so distracted by the sensation, and by her own thoughts, that she does not notice she is not alone until Genevieve says her name.
“Katharine.”
Katharine glances at her, annoyed. “Genevieve. What are you doing here?”
“It is late. I thought I might spend the night here rather than taking the carriage back to Greavesdrake.” She joins Katharine near the wall. “Will you walk with me a little? You are not the only one left unsettled.”
“I am not unsettled.” Katharine raises an eyebrow and starts walking. “I am apprehensive. I am undecided.”
“Two very unsettling feelings.” Genevieve throws a cloak around Katharine’s shoulders. “Come. Let us take some air.”
They walk out of the castle and into the night, alone except for the constant shadow of queensguard soldiers. At a look from Genevieve, the queensguard fans out and secures the entrances, effectively giving them their privacy.
“I know you wish Natalia was here,” Genevieve says. “That even Pietyr was here, rather than me.”
“Do not sound so pitiable. Why would I wish for you? Of all the Arrons . . . I like you the least.”
To Katharine’s surprise, Genevieve does not pout. Instead, she smiles.
“Why should you like me at all?” she asks. “When I was cruel. When I was ashamed of you, and resented you, as the weak queen we were left with. From the moment you set foot inside Greavesdrake, I knew you would be nothing but an embarrassment. But I was wrong.
“You are a good queen, Kat. All those times I thought you were cowering, you were actually listening. Learning. I was wrong about you, and I am sorry.”
Katharine stops. She studies Genevieve suspiciously in the dark, the courtyard lit only by small lamps and the torches of the queensguard. “I half expect that now you will throw a bag of angry snakes at me.”