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‘Despite the flowerbeds you removed?’ I said, and she laughed out loud.

As we sauntered down tree-lined avenues and the occasional towering marble statue, I told her about the Underground, leaving out any details that could be used to locate the Alliance’s hideout. Told her how Creon had left, how he’d warned me, how we’d followed him to the Golden Court and run straight into a twelve-hundred-year-old fae male with snake familiars and infuriatingly polished manners who also, impossibly, shared my eyes. I recounted how my newfound father had tried to stop me from finding Creon (‘Men,’ Rosalind muttered), how I’d found him anyway (a heartfelt ‘Excellent’), and how we’d won the battle against the empire’s superior force with a bottle of cursed divine blood and an unexpected show of demon power. She laughed again when I told her how I’d stuck a knife through Ophion’s wings, and it was the triumphant laugh of a woman who celebrates all allied victories as her own.

We arrived at the Sailor’s Park at that point, which turned out to be a memorial for all those lost at sea, heroic statues included. With its vivid red trees and its fields of crocuses, it was a vision of autumnal beauty, and we spent a few minutes admiring the landscaping while Rosalind exchanged cheerful greetings with passing citizens. I wondered if she’d brought me to this busier spot on purpose, if she was quietly demonstratingmy harmlessness to the wider public this way. It did seem the sort of thing she might be capable of.

I didn’t ask. We had plenty of more pressing matters to discuss.

So I told her of our journey across the plague-cursed continent, of Zera’s temple and the island outside time where I’d found the goddess herself. Even then, she did not bat an eye. She had heard of godsworn magic before, it turned out. The story of the battle at Tolya had already reached the White City, too. Only the news of the bindings at the Cobalt Court made her whip around and blink at me for a moment or two, followed by another one of those triumphant laughs – albeit a more bewildered variety this time.

‘You’vefoundthem?’

‘We just can’t use them yet,’ I said wryly, wondering for the first time that day how Naxi was doing and, consequently, whether Thysandra had gone insane yet. ‘We need to find out how to match them to the bound individuals first.’

Rosalind blew out her cheeks and kicked a small pebble off the path, into the pond we were passing. It gave a satisfying splash. ‘Now I see why you wanted to be sure I would not run off and tell the Mother about your endeavours.’

‘Or the rest of the city,’ I said hastily. ‘You know how news spreads. If even one merchant has a glass of wine too many and forgets to keep quiet …’

‘Oh, yes. I’ll be silent as the grave.’ Her grin at me still looked a little dazed. ‘Can’t let the people think for themselves, once again. But if you agree, I can tell the assembly you’re working on a way to deal with the disadvantage of the bindings – Halbert won’t like that, which means it’s almost guaranteed to be good news.’

I laughed. ‘I’ll let you tell them whatever you think will work.’

‘Pragmatic. Very good.’ She closed her eyes for a moment, drawing in a lungful of the crisp morning air. ‘Let me stew over it a little. I’ll come up with something.’

We walked in amiable silence for a minute or so. Rosalind seemed to be brooding on something beside me, and I saw no reason to interrupt her; the city was diverting enough on its own, with its bustling abundance and its odd lack of fae traces. No warehouses for tribute food, untouched even while people were starving. No one-handed or one-eared victims of punishments. This, I realised, was what the continental cities must have been like before the Mother unleashed the plague upon the land and sent the surviving humans fleeing to the islands – a bitter, chafing thought, with the charred corpses in Lyckfort still in the back of my mind.

Finally, the impressive marble façade of the White Hall loomed before us, and Rosalind jolted from whatever thoughts had occupied her to say, ‘Is there anything else you’d like to discuss, Emelin?’

A polite but clear sign that we were nearing the end of our walk. I suppressed the one question that hadn't stopped itching since the moment I’d passed through the city gate, instead saying, ‘Would you mind showing me the way to the guest wing one more time? I tried to memorise it this morning, but …’

‘Lots of rooms. Yes.’ She did not seem at all annoyed by the request, even though she must have better things to do than play lackey to visitors – even to visitors attempting to change the world. ‘Just follow me.’

We navigated the maze in silence as I imprinted every twist and turn on my mind’s eye – the ugly paintings, the memorial, the winding staircase. Far too soon we stood in that dead-end corridor with the window again, and still I hadn't figured out whether I should speak or stay silent, whether my questions would be silly and sentimental or entirely understandable.

I shouldn’t take the risk. I needed her good opinion too much; the world needed this alliance.

I bit my tongue once again.

‘There we are,’ Rosalind said, slowing to a halt with another probing glance in my direction. ‘Do you think you’ll find it by yourself next time? If you’re in any doubt …’

‘Oh, no, no,’ I hastily reassured her – not entirely confident that I would be able to repeat the walk without any delays or detours, but more than sure that my pride could do without another round of instruction. ‘This will be fine, thank you so much.’

‘Alright.’ She did not look fully convinced. ‘In that case, please don’t spend your day locked up here – as I said, you’re free to go wherever you want. I’ll let you know about the outcome of the assembly as soon as possible.’

‘Yes, thank you.’ I forced a smile. ‘Good luck convincing them, then.’

She laughed and turned – movingjusta fraction too slowly, as if she, too, was waiting for me to say more. As if she had already felt the questions crowding my tongue. It was all my heart needed, that little hesitation as she moved away – the realisation that soon, perhaps as soon as tonight, I would leave the city and never see her again and live without answers for what might be the rest of my immortal life.

Good sense and caution crumbled.

‘Rosalind?’ It sprung from my lips with a force that shocked even me. ‘I’m sorry, I just thought— Could I ask you one more thing, perhaps?’

‘Yes, of course.’ She turned back again, nothing but saintly patience in those blue eyes. ‘Ask away. What is it?’

‘I – I was just wondering …’ Gods help me. How could a question I’d thoughtsomuch about still emerge so stuttered, as if I still hadn't mastered the art of speaking full sentences aftertwenty-one summers of existence? ‘If you can’t tell me, I fully understand, of course … I just wanted to ask … did you by any chance ever meet Valter and Editta? My … my adoptive parents, I mean?’

And at once she no longer looked so saintly.

It was just a flash, the flicker of something dark and bitter passing across her face – the smallest tightening of her lips, the subtlest narrowing of her eyes. But the hollow silence that followed was just as meaningful, and her carefully crafted unreadable expression could not conceal the simple fact that her smile had gone dull and lifeless: an answer in itself, and not a happy one.