“Your parents will be there,” said Benni.
“Please tell them I’m sorry too,” he said. When Lovisa scowled, his smile widened. “Don’t look so grouchy, Lovisa,” he said. “You get to meet the Monsean delegation tonight.”
“Ah, there you are, Lovisa,” said Benni, turning, leaning down to kiss her forehead. “Where’s your coat?”
“Is the Monsean delegation coming to dinner, Papa?” said Lovisa.
“Yes.”
“Including the Graceling?”
“They’re all invited,” said Benni. “We have no control over who comes. Go on, choose a coat. Such a smart boy, that Mari,” he added idly as Mari disappeared down the corridor.
Hearing the change in his tone, Lovisa instantly understood that her father had invited Mari to dinner because Lovisa had been caught with a house guard. Mari Devret—wealthy, well-mannered, from a good Industrialist family—was the sort of person Benni wanted to dangle before her.
It made her inexpressibly tired, to think that her parents might start trying to put her friends forward for that purpose.
She found a coat. “I’m ready,” she said.
* * *
—
“There’s some news, sweetheart,” Benni said as they walked through the city toward Flag Hill. “You should know it, in case you’re seated near a Varana at dinner.”
“Oh?” said Lovisa, intrigued. “Social news or political news?”
Benni flashed a quick smile that showed her something she hadn’t noticed before—the strain of exhaustion in his face—and yet, it was hard to keep up with him today. As he turned onto a staircase, she had to reach a hand out to slow him down.
“Criminal news,” he said.
“Criminal!” she said. “What happened?”
“Some engineering plans have disappeared from a safe in Minta Varana’s house.”
“You mean she was robbed?”
“Presumably, yes,” said Benni. “Someone stole a few chemical formulas, including one for the reaction that extracts the gases used in varane from the atmosphere.”
“Am I supposed to understand what that means?” said Lovisa dryly.
Benni grinned. “The mixture of gases that makes up varane is perfectly balanced. Without all the formulas for how to extract and combine all the parts, airships don’t float, and they’re also dangerous.”
“Dangerous how?”
“With the wrong combination? Among other things, fire,” said Benni. “The Kamassarians have been trying to duplicate airship technology for years, and I understand they’ve had a number of deadly fires. The Varanas too had a couple of dangerous explosions early on, while they were tinkering with the formula.”
This sounded familiar. “Didn’t a professor in the school of chemistry get fired for causing an explosion in one of the labs a few years ago?”
“Yes, but that was something to do with zilfium.”
“Zilfium explodes too?”
Benni waved a dismissive hand. “I don’t know anything about it, just that it was zilfium, not varane. Regardless, the Varanas figured out the right balance of gases for varane, and the solution is a big secret.”
“Do you think someone stole the formulas to sell them to Kamassar?”
“Or Borza, or Tevare, or Mantiper,” said Benni. “Everyone wants airships.”
“Did the thief who stole the formulas break Minta’s safe?”
“No. Apparently they opened it.”
“Really? Will Minta be at dinner?”
“No, but the prime minister will.”
“Are people blaming that Graceling who finds things?”
“Trina? There’s talk, of course,” said Benni. “But Minta has as many guards as anyone, and that woman has never once been invited into her home.”
Lovisa wondered if Minta’s guards were involved. Then, thinking of the valuable item her father was keeping protected in the attic room, she wondered if her father trusted his own guards. Maybe Benni was wise to be taking extra precautions. “Well,” she said, obscurely excited by the news. Wishing she could tell Katu. “I won’t provoke Sara Varana about it at dinner. Unless, of course, you want me to.”
“My girl,” he said, smiling absently. Then he pulled her close for a moment, kissing her on the top of the head, his lips touching her white streak, right there in the middle of the street.
* * *
—
Atop the Cavenda house, Lovisa saw Quona Varana’s airship docked alongside her parents’.
She inhaled, preparing to be patient. “You invited Quona too?” she asked. “Why?”
“We couldn’t invite the Monsean delegation without inviting their host, could we?”
“Want to bet how many times she mentions cats?”
Benni pursed his lips. “I’ll go with five.”
“Then I choose six.”
“What are the stakes?”
“Candy,” said Lovisa nonchalantly. “Anything but samklavi.”
“Ugh. The loser should have to eat samklavi,” said Benni, wrinkling his nose but giving no indication that samklavi had any recent significance to him. The guards opened the door and Lovisa stepped into a crowded, noisy party. Glancing up the stairs, she saw Vikti, Erita, and Viri tucked behind the banisters, peering down with interest. They spotted her immediately. Viri called out her name, then someone must have caught sight of them, because all at once they went wide-eyed and bolted upstairs.
In the meantime, her father had abandoned her, so Lovisa did what she did best: found a dark corner, made herself small, and watched.
* * *
—
At dinner, Lovisa sat near one end of the long table, next to her father and Mara Devret, Mari’s mother, mercifully removed from her own mother. The room was ablaze with silbercow oil lamps. Lovisa wondered how much this dinner cost, and which of the foxes darting around the room was her mother’s.
To her delight, two of the Monsean delegates were seated right across from her, including the Graceling, Hava, who, it turned out, was just a girl. Lovisa had been expecting someone grown-up, flashy. Not this pale, plain girl who never talked.
“Are you studying Lingian in the school of politics and government, Lovisa?” said Mara Devret in Keepish, an obvious attempt to draw the Monseans graciously into conversation.