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The senile mask she wore before her family is gone. Curious.

“My godfather taught me to finish a fight,” I say. “Two hours of strategic instruction every day.”

“If only he had taken his own lessons. Then Darrow would be a memory instead of a ten-year plague.”

“My godfather is still the only man to ever best the Reaper in battle,” I say. “And I rather think it the habit of an indolent mind to indict a single man for a civiliz

ation’s failure.”

“True. Back and forth they go. But now a peace.”

“So they say.”

“What a thing it must be for you. Lorn for a grandfather. Octavia for a grandmother. Magnus, Aja, Moira, Atalantia…trapped between so many giants and having to watch the birth of two more.”

“Two?”

“Darrow and Virginia. I rather think it the habit of a boy’s mind to believe the man could exist without the woman.” She smiles.

I feel a sudden surge of enjoyment at the riposte.

I like this woman. She reminds me of Atalantia.

“All others here call him the Slave King, yet you do not?”

“That brat is flesh and bone. Why feed the legend?” She wheezes as her Obsidian helps her sit on the flame-maple bench. “Thank you, Goroth.” He turns from her to take a place at the window, and as he does I see a screaming skull has been tattooed to cover the back of his head in blue ink. “Don’t let the old blackeye frighten you,” Gaia says. “He’s as batty as I am.” Goroth shakes his head in disagreement as he reaches the window. “Oh, quiet, you.” She pats the bench beside her as she produces a thin white pipe from her robes, along with a match. “Sit here with me, Lysander. I will teach you.” She strikes the match on the calluses of her heel and holds the flame to the pipe bowl.

Glancing uneasily at the Obsidian, I sit down in the cloud of smoke at her side.

She pats the piano. “My husband gave this to me as a gift when I was twenty-nine. Do you want to guess how old I am now?”

“You hardly look older than sixty,” I say with a smile.

“Sixty!” She cackles. “What a rogue you are! That Bellona philanderer rubbed off on you, I see.” She scrutinizes me. “I hope you didn’t catch anything from him.”

“He was like a brother to me.”

“Well, that’s not saying much in the Core.”

“My home is Luna. Not the Core.”

“Pfah. It’s all the same to us.”

Why am I here? In accepting the invitation, I’ve walked into some scheme. Is this a test of some sort? Just because I’m grieving doesn’t mean the dance has stopped. If anything, the pace has increased as the coup solidifies and the dissenters are clipped one by one. While Cassius may be gone, I still have Pytha to protect. Seems a lofty goal at this point.

Gaia is unaware of my inner turmoil as she touches the keys and strokes out a simple melody. A strange sense of belonging courses through me and I forget about the dance.

“Must be grotesque for you, seeing age,” she says. “I know how the deviants in the Core love their rejuvenation therapy. Pfah.” She hacks something into a crusty handkerchief, examines the prize, then makes the kerchief disappear back into her thick kimono. “Your grandmother never looked older than sixty, but I remember her when we were both girls dancing at her father’s galas. I was a plain little thing to her. She had such jewels. Such refinement. But was always so haughty. Pretending she didn’t know who I was. A sizable stick up her gahja ass, that one. But now I have the last laugh!” She cackles again. “How old are you, child?”

“Twenty.”

“Twenty? Twenty! I’ve ingrown hairs older than you.”

I laugh despite myself. “You’re not very discreet, are you?”

“Ha! I’ve earned indiscretion.” Her cloudy eyes soften and she pulls on her pipe before pointing it at me like a finger. “I know you wear the mask of court. What did they call it again?”

“The dancing mask.”