“Not presently,” Walraven replied. “You are a handsome lass, if a bit shy. There are certainly no shortages of offers for your hand. But it would not be politically prudent to finalize anything until it is clear whether or not your mother will give birth to an heir. As your father’s advisor, I must steer the ship the way the winds are blowing, not where I wish them to blow. If I judge them properly, you will one day rule this realm even though no woman ever has. That will make a difference in who I select as your consort, do you not think?”
Maia could hear shuffling feet coming up the turret stairwell. Chancellor Walraven stood and hefted the tome onto his desk, shoving aside a stack of parchments to make room. He frisked the front of his cassock and gazed through the window pane, out over the mass of shingled roofs and belching chimneys. The sky was a soot stain outside.
It was one of her father’s knights who breached the threshold. Carew. His face was damp with sweat, his eyes haunted with emotion, and Maia knew just from looking at him that the babe was dead. Her stomach shriveled at the thought, and she felt the ache press against her heart. She wanted a sibling, even if it meant losing her chance of becoming Comoros’s queen one day. She had always enjoyed the company of other children, but though she never lacked for playmates, every other child in the kingdom was inferior to her in rank and station. She knew the other children had all been trained to agree with her. To let her win at their games, to fawn over her ideas and her desires.
She hated that.
To her mind, it was nothing more than luck that had made her a princess. She considered everyone her equal unless they proved themselves not to be. Maia was competitive by nature, she wanted to win on her own merits, not because someone else let her. As a result, she did not have many friends her own age. Most, like the chancellor, were much older and wiser.
“The babe . . . is stillborn,” Carew said between gasps. He hung his head and shook it. “A boy. You must come down and console my master. He is beyond himself with grief.”
“I will come presently,” Walraven said gravely. Maia watched him as he peered out of the window again, steeling himself for the encounter to come. His jaw muscles clenched, and his hands fidgeted, but he took a calming breath and then turned toward the knight. “Come with me, Maia.”
She was shocked and pleased that he would invite her on such an errand. She clambered off the window seat and felt dagger slashes of pain shoot down her legs. Rubbing her calves, she began hobbling down the steps after the chancellor.
Maia’s heart was on fire with conflicting emotions. Her little brother was dead. Or perhaps he had never truly been alive, though she remembered pressing her palm against her mother’s abdomen and feeling his gentle kicks. The memory seared her heart, threatening to destroy her composure. Her mother’s previous miscarriages had happened long ago, when she had been too young to feel them keenly. This burden was much harder to bear without breaking, but she had to be strong for her parents. Yet there was a slender, guilty part of her that was almost . . . excited. For the last year, the chancellor had been preparing her to be her father’s heir, but his training had been more discreet lately given her mother’s pregnancy. Would she be given the chance to rule on her own right and not as a result of whom she married? The idea of becoming queen one day was sweet on her tongue, sweet as crispels, and it conflicted with the bitterness of the moment. She wondered if she was truly a wicked child for having such thoughts.
When they reached the main corridor, they marched vigorously. Moans and wails were already starting to echo throughout the castle as news spread. Her parents’ grief would be shared by everyone. Maia clutched her stomach as an awful, constricting feeling clutched at her chest. She kept close to the chancellor’s heels and together they mounted the steps to another turret. Leerings began to illuminate the way as they climbed, bathing the steps in cool, smokeless light. Around and around they climbed, and soon Maia could hear voices. The handsome knight shook his head and refused to go any farther. He crumpled into tears. Still Maia did not weep. She merely followed the chancellor as he walked around the man.
When they reached the landing at the top of the turret, Maia could hear her father’s voice. That he was suffering was obvious—his voice was husky and ferocious.
“Why did I even marry you?”
Her eyes went wide with shock as she took in the meaning of the words. She had never heard him say such a thing, and was stunned silent.
The chancellor paused at the threshold, his eyes narrowing with anger. His face became a mask of calm, his lanky body stiffening with resolve as he held out an arm to prevent her from entering the room.