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Both started at the sight of Kel, their faces momentarily eager before relaxing in disappointment.

“It’syou,” Lilibet said, marching across the room toward him. “I don’t suppose you have an explanation for this?”

She thrust out a folded note. This, Kel knew, could not be good. He took the paper with a feeling of deep foreboding and unfolded it to see Conor’s familiar spiky hand slashing across the page. He read:

Dear Mother,

I have decided not to attend the welcoming banquet this evening. I wish to reassure you that I have thought deeply about the issue, and the many very good reasons I ought to attend. Please do not imagine it an ill-considered decision when I say that I will not beattending because, frankly, I do not want to. I leave it in your capable hands to manage my absence. If it will trouble you, I suggest you cancel the banquet. If not, it is my opinion the banquet could be held perfectly well without me. If you really consider it, this entire engagement and wedding could proceed perfectly well without me there, to say nothing of the marriage. My part could as easily be played by an empty chair.

If you demand to find me, I will be in the Temple District. I have heard that they occasionally throw orgies, and while I have never attended one, I find myself suddenly curious. If nothing else, it should be an education in how to manage a party involving a large number of guests.

All best, yours, etc., etc.,

C.

“Grayhell,” Kel said, forgetting not to swear in front of the Queen. “He’s serious?”

Lilibet snatched the note from his hand. “Don’t pretend as if you didn’t know,” she snapped. “Conor tells you everything; surely he would have mentionedthis.I’m sure he thought it was the wittiest sort of joke, that stupid boy—”

“No,” Kel said. For all the bite to Conor’s letter, there was nothing about it that made Kel think it had been penned by someone who was amused to be writing it. It was bleak, no doubt informed by the knowledge of Fausten’s death, not that Kel could say that. “I do not believe there is any chance Conor imagines this a joke.”

Lilibet pressed her lips into a thin line. She looked to Mayesh, who was gazing at Kel, his eyes seeming to bore into him in a way the Queen’s had not. “Think,Kel,” he said, his deep voice gruff. “Something must have happened, to so affect Conor’s attitude, and so suddenly—”

Surely he cannot want me to say it,Kel thought. To mention the execution of Fausten, carried out by the King’s own hand.But hemust imagine I know nothing of it, unless Jolivet told him I was there. Jolivet saw me—

“Counselor. My lady,” Kel said. “The Prince has been miserable. Ofcoursehe has been miserable. That ought not to be a surprise to either of you.” He looked to Lilibet, who glanced away, her right hand toying with the emeralds at her throat. “But he has beenresigned,not rebellious. I cannot speak to what is in that letter. I do not understand this sudden change. Only that he must be unhappier than we have all thought.” He spread his hands wide; he was only telling the truth. He did not know where Conor had gone, or why. “I blame myself.”

Lilibet muttered something that sounded very like,I blame you, too.

“Leave him be, my lady,” said Mayesh. “Kel is the Prince’s Sword Catcher, not the guard of his emotions.”

Lilibet had started pacing again. She wore a dress of dark-green velvet, to match the emeralds at her throat; her black hair was lacquered into coils. “I am sure he thinks me very cold,” she said, half to herself. “As if I would want my own son to be in despair; I could never want that. If I could have shielded him from the consequences of this mistake…” She glanced at Mayesh. “The King must not know. About tonight. He will not be at the banquet, but still.”

Her tone was brittle. Kel thought of the King lifting Fausten over his head, as easily as if he were a bag of feathers. Thought of the blood in the water, the slick green slide of the crocodile beneath the waves.

“It would be preferable,” said Mayesh, “if no one outside this room knew. Which means we cannot postpone the banquet. Sarthe would take it as an insult if we did, besides.”

“You could say Conor was ill,” Kel suggested. “Surely they would have to accept—”

“They would not believe it,” said Mayesh. “They are already very much on edge. The Roverges’ display the other night did not help.”

“Much as I’d like them to take that ridiculous child and gohome, it would mean severing the last amiable ties we have with Sarthe,” said Lilibet. “If they wished, they could harry us at will at the Narrow Pass, cut off half our trade, murder our people—”

“That will not happen,” said Mayesh. “The evening’s plans will go on, with Conor in attendance.” His gaze rested on Kel, who had guessed, the moment that Mayesh said the banquet could not be postponed, what would happen. He could have protested, he knew; he also knew it would make no difference if he did. “My lady, let us ready the attendants. Kel, fetch your talisman; we have only a little while to get you ready.”

—

It had been a long time since Kel had taken Conor’s place at a Court event—years, he thought—but there was, at least, a rhythm to the pantomime. Kel let himself fall into it, even as his thoughts raced.

He went to the tepidarium first, where he scrubbed his body with handfuls of flaked lavender soap, and used the strigil to shave himself clean. (Conor would never appear anywhere in public with even the shadow of a beard.)

When Kel emerged, stripped down to nothing but the talisman at his throat such that he appeared a perfectly naked Conor in truth, the Prince’s attendants had been summoned and now swarmed around him like fashionable bees. His hair was dried, curled, and perfumed, his hands rubbed with scented lotion. He stepped into the clothes held up for him: a shirt of bleached cambric, the sleeves wrapped with gold thread, with a cuff of gold embroidery around the neck. A hip-length black velvet doublet with bands of gold brocade, trousers of the same material, and tooled-leather boots. An overrobe of gold brocade, lined with the fur of white lynxes. A ring on each hand, set with jewels the size of plover’s eggs: an emerald on his left, a ruby on his right. Lastly, the Prince’s circlet was set on his head: a plain gold band that always left a mark across Kel’s brow when it was removed at the end of the day.

His talisman remained, tucked down under the neck of his shirt, now invisible even to those who knew he was wearing it.

Their task complete, the attendants melted away like ships vanishing at the horizon, and were replaced by a somber Mayesh. Kel gazed at the Counselor wearily. Mayesh wore Ashkari gray, but his tunic was silk, belted with silver, and a heavy silver Court medallion hung around his neck.

He nodded curtly at Kel. “You’re ready, then?”