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I gasp.

The vegetation in front of me dissipates like steam from a pot, revealing a palace made entirely of glittering, white marble. I take a halting step toward it, mesmerized by the sight. It looks like something the gods themselves designed. There’s a columned entrance and colonnaded walkway as well as three domed roofs, the grandest set beyond the main entrance. The longer I stare, the more unbelievable it seems.

“Thisis your wedding present,” Ilyapa says proudly.

I stagger back. Even Memnon halts, his face wiped clean of expression. “What?” he says, turning to look at his father.

Ilyapa looks immeasurably pleased. “I didn’t mumble, Memnon. This is yours.”

Memnon glances from him to the palace. I follow his gaze, my breath hitching in my throat.

It’s been hard enough to accept the copious wedding gifts we’ve received from my new people and harder still to wear the diadem that rests on my head. But a palace?

Not even Memnon, king that he is, has such a thing.

“Come, let me show it to you both,” Ilyapa says. Already Eislyn wanders ahead of us, her fingertips trailing over the flowering plants she passes.

There are columns of marble carved into the shapes of trees, gold vines wrapping around them. The leaves are made of gilded marble, and the flowers that bloom along these stone trees and vines appear to be made of blown glass, their centers golden. I touch the tree trunk, the bark of it as rough as the real thing, and then my finger runs over the slightly serrated edge of a marble leaf. I marvel. No mortal craftsman could’ve made this. This must be the work of gods or magic, though I know not which.

The stone trees bend into an archway of sorts, and beyond them lies a set of massive, bronze doors. Ilyapa steps up to them and pushes them open with ease, a little of his pine-green magic leaking out with the action.

Our soft footsteps echo inside.

“This is the Khuno River Palace. No one besides Eislyn and myself know about this place—and now you.”

I don’t know what to make of that—any of this, really—but Memnon seems to. He strides forward and embraces his father. “Thank you. You honor us.”

“No, no, my son,” Ilyapa says, pulling away and lightly gripping Memnon by the back of his neck. “It isyouwho honorme.”

I remember Ilyapa’s earlier comments about how blunted his emotions are, and I wonder what it is, exactly, that he feels right now, giving his son an entire palace. I wonder if his heart is truly as cold as he says it is.

“Come,” Ilyapa says to Memnon, patting him on the shoulder. “There is more yet I want to show you.”

I watch the two of them enter the palace, though this time, I don’t follow. Blunted emotions or not, Memnon is having a bonding moment with his father, and I sense he doesn’t get this much.

“They are quite a pair, are they not?” Eislyn says, coming to my side.

I startle a little. I’ve been so consumed with this place that I forgot she was here with us.

She continues, leaning in conspiratorially. “Ilyapa says he doesn’t have a favorite child, but, well, you have eyes and ears.”

I nod absently, my skin prickling with awareness now that this woman is at my side. I still cannot decide whether she is a goddess or something else, but when I turn to her, I’m just as ensnared by her features as I was the first time I laid eyes on her.

Finally, however, she meets my gaze.

“Congratulations,” she says, nodding to my diadem, “on both your marriage and your crown.”

“Thank you.” I dip my head, proud when my diadem does not topple off.

“What did you do before Memnon found you?” she asks, her gaze wandering over me as though her eyes might uncover my secrets.

“I was a seamstress.”

Eislyn raises her eyebrows. “From seamstress to queen. What an immense leap.”

I cannot tell whether the words are meant to be sweet or unkind. Eislyn’s face gives nothing away.

“Come,” she says, her hand moving softly to my upper back. “This calls for a toast.” She leads me into the palace, steering me to the left, the opposite direction that Memnon and his father went.