And Eirhan wanted me to pretend I was considering this man.
The banquet was followed by a reception, during which it seemed I had to dance with or greet every single person in the room. I found myself dancing with Sigis twice, though dancing was hardly the right way to describe it. Mostly he pushed me from place to place, occasionally lifting me to twirl me around. He spoke loud and long of his fondness for Kylma, of the ways he would modernize it, of the great trading benefits that the Avythera agreement would bring us—especially if we changed the agreement entirely to suit him. When he finally let me go, it was to face a sea of delegates that I couldn’t remember anymore. Fatigue threatened to drag me under, and no amount of cloudflower juice could keep me awake.
At long last, Aino rescued me. “Coffee?” I mumbled hopefully.
“Bed,” Aino said firmly. Eirhan opened his mouth to object, but she held up a hand. “Her Grace had an early morning and has a trial to win tomorrow.”
“You’re my favorite.” I sighed as she hustled me out of the reception hall.
“Don’t say that quite yet. You haven’t heard what’s in store for you tomorrow.” Aino let me lean on her as I limped up the ice stairs toward the royal wing, followed by Viljo and the other guard.
“I do know what’s in store for me,” I said without much hope. “Sleep. I’m going to sleep for days.”
“You’re not,” Aino said. “I’ll bring you breakfast at five. As you eat, Eirhan will recount the rest of the night’s happenings, summarize correspondence, and make appointments. At eight, you’ll meet with your cabinet, at nine with the clerics, and from ten until lunch you’ll meet ministers in order of their current support for you.”
“And then at lunch I can sleep for days,” I suggested.
“Sigis has requested that you lunch with him. No, there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“This schedule stinks of Eirhan,” I complained.
Aino didn’t even blush. She would have made a great politician. “I had to step in after your outburst with the foreign girl, and that meant making concessions. Eirhan was ready to defect after your little stunt and overthrow you for some kind of a parliament.”
“Where is the ‘foreign girl’?” I asked. Aino had whisked me from the crowd so efficiently that I hadn’t had the chance to think up a good way to offend Inkar. Maybe leaving without her would do.
Aino shrugged. “She’s not my problem.”
We entered the royal wing. It was quieter than I’d ever heard it, a combination of the late hour and the near-death state of my family. The silence was strangely peaceful. After the hubbub of the rest of the day, I could pretend that the whole world had stopped, that I had it to myself for a little while.
Well, to myself and Aino. And Viljo and the other guard.
Aino unlocked the door to my rooms and ushered me in. “Help me with my coat,” I begged as she shut the door. “I’m wasting precious seconds.”
She tugged me out of my coat and began to loosen the elaborate dresswork that kept me standing. I was tired down to my bones. It hurt to move, it hurt to stand still—it hurt. “Maybe Farhod will have the curse figured out tomorrow,” I said, sending a short, mental prayer to whatever god might be listening.
“There’s not much use in thinking like that,” Aino warned me.
“I know. Get me my nightgown, won’t you?”
As Aino went into my bedchamber, I staggered over to the chair before the fire and collapsed into it, kicking off my shoes. The cold air prickled the bare skin of my calves, but I didn’t care enough to fetch the blanket that lay over my desk chair. My eyes slid closed.
The door unlatched. I tilted my head back as far as it could go and spoke. “If you’ve come to assassinate me, now’s actually a really great time.”
“I would rather wait,” Inkar said.
My eyes flew open. She leaned over me, close enough that I could see the unevenness of the kohl around her eyes. I jerked up and narrowly avoided colliding foreheads. “What are you doing here?” My heart pattered. I wasn’t used to other people in my rooms. Not since Nari had grown old enough to coat the inside of my sleeves with glass.
Inkar’s not dangerous. But I looked at the curve of her mouth, and I knew I was wrong.
“I am the grand consort now.” Inkar came around the chair so that I could see her properly. “Are these not my chambers as well?”
I brought my knees up to my chest, tugging my shift over them. “There are special rooms for the consort.” Mother’s rooms.
“I will not stay in the rooms provided for me. They are too cold.”
Aino appeared at the door to my bedchamber. She held my nightgown up like a shield.
“We’ll have a servant build you a fire,” I said.
“They are not grand consort rooms.” Inkar folded her arms. Her biceps and triceps twitched. “People will look at me, and they will say, that is the girl who is not allowed to be grand consort. She is stuck in a side room while Sigis takes the largest suite. While Sigis competes in the coronation trials and flirts with the grand duke.”
The door to my rooms opened again. Three servants entered, carrying a chest and a few miscellaneous items. “What’s this?” I asked.
“My belongings. I travel light.” Inkar nodded to the servants as they set her things down, then pulled a pair of clippers from her belt and clipped three pieces of an armband from her arm. She dropped the metal into their hands, and the servants bowed low, then retreated without saying a word.
“What—you—” Outrage blossomed in my chest. “You can’t stroll in here like it’s your rooms. You can’t bribe my servants!”
Inkar waved a hand. “I am not bribing them. I am thanking them for their service.” Her mouth twitched in a bemused smile. “My wife, in my country, married people spend their nights together.”
“Yes, yes,” I said impatiently. “Biological imperatives and so on. But we…” I stopped, and a blush crept over me. Biological imperatives were the last thing I needed to think about right now.
“If I am so horrible, you can cancel the trial,” Inkar pointed out.
“No,” I said, too quickly, and a sly smile spread across her lips. My face was so hot it was cooking all intelligence out of my brain. “I… don’t want to jump into, um, things. All at once.”
Inkar’s expression softened a little. “I do not wish to sleep with you—I mean, that is all I wish.”
We were silent as I contemplated the best way to hide under my chair without looking like a complete fool.
Behind Inkar, Aino briefly covered her face with the nightgown. “Your Grace, may we speak in private?”
“I will leave you a moment.” Inkar picked up her chest as if it weighed nothing and squeezed past Aino into the bedroom.
Aino’s nostrils flared, but she stepped into my antechamber and shut the door. Switching to Kylmian, she said, “We should move you to different lodgings.”
“No.” I’d slept in this suite every night for sixteen years. My notes were here. Farhod’s dissection illustrations. My portfolio for the university.