: Chapter 62

There’s a queen in my bedroom, and a king down the lane, but somehow Nora is snoring away, little Sinna asleep at her side. Honestly, I’m glad they’re asleep. The men have been searching bodies and stockpiling weapons all day, but now they’ve moved on to dragging corpses farther down the lane. My little sister doesn’t need to see that. The princess definitely doesn’t.

I’m down in the bakery, wiping counters that don’t need to be wiped and setting dough to rise for bread I’m going to feed to the royal family. I feel like I’ll never sleep again. Maybe I’ll be hung for treason tomorrow, and I really won’t ever sleep again.

I heard what the king said to Jax, but he didn’t say it to me.

And Jax wasn’t the one who invited Lord Alek right into her bedroom.

I swallow and glance at the front window. Those scravers left hours ago, but I won’t be able to erase what I saw them do. I won’t be able to forget how the queen used magic to save my sister.

Or maybe …

I stop my thoughts in their tracks. I hold a hand to Mother’s pendant, feeling its warmth press into my skin.

Alek said it was charmed against magic. But I remember having my hands on Nora’s chest, how she was able to breathe while we waited for help. I remember the stars in my vision before the queen even touched her, how those stars seemed to multiply when the scravers arrived. I remember how Tycho explained to the queen that their rings allowed magic to seep into their blood.

I thought I was lightheaded from the panic and worry, but maybe it was something else.

I pause in my scrubbing and reach for one of my knives. Before I can think about it too closely, I touch the blade to a fingertip, and a drop of blood almost immediately wells up.

I close my eyes, thinking of those sparks and stars, imagining them. My finger is stinging something fierce, and I feel foolish.

I sigh and open my eyes, then use my rag to swipe away the drop of blood.

No injury remains. I stare at my finger, breathless.

Magic.

No. It’s not possible.

I grab a new rag and start swiping the counters twice as fiercely. I need to worry about my sister. No matter what they do to me, there must be a way for me to protect Nora. Maybe Jax will look out for her. My shoulder aches from scrubbing so hard, but I move on to the bench in front of the window. I beat the dust out of the cushions, then set them aside to scrub the wood.

“Callyn?”

My breath catches, and I straighten. The queen has come down the stairs. She’s changed out of her stained attire into one of my loose linen dresses. Her bruised face is freshly scrubbed, her hair neatly braided in a plait that hangs down over one shoulder.

I curtsy hastily. “Your Majesty.”

She inhales to say whatever she came down to say, but I’m deathly afraid she’s going to take me away from my sister or chain me up in the barn, so I start babbling. “Are you hungry? I can make you anything you like. Would you care for a meat pie? Or an apple tart?” I sound addled, but I can’t seem to stop. “I believe Nora and Sinna finished the sweetcakes—”

“Callyn. Please—”

I recognize my error and flush. “Oh! Excuse me. Ah … I mean, Her Highness, Princess Sinna—”

“Please,” the queen says. “Stop.”

I stop.

But I can’t stop. I feel my face crumple, and I press my fingers to my eyes. I choke on my voice as I say, “Please don’t hurt my sister. Please—please, Your Majesty. She didn’t know. She wasn’t a part of this. Please—please—Nora is so kind, so good, so innocent—”

“Callyn,” she murmurs.

And then, to my absolute shock, the queen’s arms come around my shoulders, and she’s holding me. She’s so warm and reassuring, and I’m clutching at her in response, soaking my tears into her shoulder before I realize what I’m doing.

But she’s stroking my hair down my back the way I do for Nora when she’s had a nightmare. She’s holding me up when I feel like curling into a ball.

“Your sister,” she says quietly, with a bit of humor in her tone, “got my daughter to fall asleep in mere minutes, which means I owe her a great debt, and I may in fact hire her to be a royal bedtime adviser.”

It’s so startling and unexpected that I giggle through my tears.

“She read Sinna a story,” the queen continues. “She’s quite animated when she does the voices.”

I draw back and swipe at my eyes. “She loves the voices.”

The queen brushes the tear-damp hair back from my face. “She said you always do them when you read to her, so she wanted to do the same for little Sinna.”

I swallow a hard lump in my throat. “I do. Mother used to do it for me, and when she died—” My voice breaks, and I touch a hand to my pendant again.

Oh, Mother. I don’t know what to do with this.

The queen wraps me up in her arms again, and I almost can’t believe it’s happening.

“Forgive me,” I say tearfully. “I shouldn’t cry.” On the queen of all people.

“Oh no,” she says. “You should cry all you want. Big sisters rarely get the chance.”

Eventually, I stop and draw back. I have to swipe at my eyes, and I’m surprised to find that hers are red-rimmed, too.

“We have much to discuss,” she says to me. “Perhaps we should have a cup of tea?”

Yes. Good. Something to do. I nod quickly and dry my hands on my skirts, then move to set the kettle on the stove.

The queen sits on one of the stools beside my pastry table, the spot that Jax usually claims, and it’s bizarre to have her here in my bakery. But also … not.

She glances at the window, at the dimming sky. “The king does not think it would be prudent to return to the Crystal Palace until Prince Rhen’s forces arrive. We don’t know how many more members of the army and the Queen’s Guard may be disloyal. For all we know, they may have taken the palace. So for a few days, we will be staying here.”

My eyebrows go up. “There are far finer places in town, I promise you—”

“And far too many people,” she says. “Far too much risk. Grey will assess how many rebels may have escaped, but it is easier to keep a remote bakery secure than a boarding house in the middle of town.” She pauses, and a note of uncertainty enters her voice. “Especially as we have no idea how deeply this insurrection runs.”

An insurrection I was a part of. I swallow, twisting my fingers together.

Again, I think of little Nora.

I remember telling Alek that I’d hang beside Jax.

The queen notices my fretting, and she puts out a hand on the table between us. “I’m not going to harm your sister,” she says. “Nor you. But I am going to need you to tell me everything that has happened here in Briarlock. With Lord Alek and with Lady Karyl.” She pauses. “And with your friend Jax.”

I swallow and nod. “Yes, Your Majesty.” My voice is rough. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

But I rub my healed fingertip against my thumb. The tiny injury has disappeared so completely that I might have imagined it. I probably did imagine it.

I do tell the queen everything she asks.

But for now, I leave that part out.