Beatriz
The day after her lesson with Nigellus, can’t stop thinking about the stark difference between the ancient star map and the current one. Yes, stars are only killed by inexperienced or desperate empyreas, but she’s been both three times already, and there are roughly a dozen other empyreas in the world at any given time. How long will it be before the stars disappear entirely?
“Triz,” Pasquale says, drawing her out of her thoughts as they step into the bright and cheerfully decorated teahouse. The two of them are meeting Ambrose here, just off Pellamy Street—Hapantoile’s busiest shopping area. After spending the morning dragging Pasquale from shop to shop, she feels fairly confident they’ve slipped whatever spies her mother sent to follow them. The guards, who is sure will report to her mother as well, have been instructed to wait outside the front door, which means they won’t notice Ambrose, who should be here when they arrive.
Sure enough, sees him in the otherwise empty back room, at a table in the corner, pouring from a pot of tea into a porcelain cup. The table beside him is empty, so and Pasquale slide in to sit there. offers Ambrose a polite if distant smile, as if they are strangers.
When a woman bustles over, orders a pot of cinnamon black tea. and Pasquale watch the woman walk away, and when they are alone, the three turn toward one another.
“I’m glad you two are safe,” Ambrose says, just as Pasquale asks how he is and asks if he was followed.
After they get the pleasantries out of the way, Ambrose glances around the room uncomfortably. “I went to visit Violie’s mother yesterday, as I told her I would,” he says.
The way his voice drops tells it isn’t good news, and while her feelings about Violie are still mixed at best, she feels her chest tighten.
“Dead?” she asks.
“Nearly,” Ambrose says. “She won’t last the week.”
Violie won’t be able to see her again, then. Even if could get word to her today, she wouldn’t arrive in time to say goodbye.
“Nigellus was supposed to cure her,” Pasquale says.
“You’re assuming my mother isn’t cruel or petty enough to retract her gift when Violie retracted her loyalty,” says. “If she kept her word in the first place—why should she, when Violie would have had no way of knowing the truth until it was too late?”
Ambrose stares at her for a moment, brow furrowed. “Surely she wouldn’t,” he says.
isn’t sure whether to envy or pity him. Even after spending years in the Cellarian court, Ambrose has lived a soft life, with kind parents and books about heroes triumphing over villains. He can’t fathom someone like her mother existing in reality, let alone without a hero to check her.
“She would,” says. “Oh, and Gisella is in Bessemia.”
That causes Ambrose’s eyes to widen and he glances at Pasquale, who nods. “Making herself at home in the dungeon, luckily, where she can’t do any harm.”
snorts. “I think you may be underestimating your cousin,” she says. “Though my mother is planning on shipping us back to Cellaria with a paltry army at our backs, so I doubt she’ll have a chance to cause too much trouble before then.”
Pasquale stares at her, agog. “You didn’t tell me that!” he says.
shrugs, though a touch of guilt niggles at her. It wasn’t that she intentionally kept the information from him, but between dodging her mother’s barbs, Nigellus’s late-night lessons, and worrying about Daphne, she simply forgot.
“It isn’t as if we’re actually going to return to Cellaria,”she says before pausing. “We’ll go to Friv instead.” When Ambrose and Pasquale exchange a look can’t read, she lets out a heavy sigh. “Unless either of you has a better idea?”
“Is it an idea?” Pasquale asks. “Or is it simply the only possibility left?”
opens her mouth and closes it again. “It’s both,” she manages. “I need to speak with Daphne myself…” She trails off. Even as she says the words, she doesn’t believe them. She could go before Daphne with proof of their mother’s misdeeds, proof that she was behind Sophronia’s death, and Daphne would still take their mother’s side.
“If I were your mother,” Ambrose says after a second, “wouldn’t I know that you had no intention of returning to Cellaria?”
frowns. She wants to say no, but the more she thinks about it, the more she wonders if he’s right. Her mother insisted that go to Cellaria, against all reason. And has never been one to do as she’s told, her mother knows that better than anyone. Could this threat to send her back to Cellaria be an altogether different trap? And if so, where is her mother trying to lure her? Friv, or somewhere else?
“Something my mother and Gisella have in common is that it is all too easy to underestimate them,” says after a moment. “I’ll see if I can find more information on what her true plans are.”
“Any word from Violie yet?” Pasquale asks, looking to Ambrose. Violie sending letters to the palace would be too risky, so she’s been directed to send them to Nigellus’s address instead, where Ambrose has been staying.
“Not yet,” Ambrose says.
“Daphne sent my mother a letter after their encounter—at least I’m almost positive it was about Violie and Leopold. There should be one from her soon. Send a note as soon as there is,” says.
Ambrose nods. The server appears in the doorway with a tray holding a teapot and two cups, as well as a small plate of biscuits. Immediately, Ambrose turns back to the book open on his table and and Pasquale pretend to be deep in conversation about the shopping did earlier in the day.
When the server leaves again, pours both Pasquale and herself a cup of tea, idly dunking a biscuit into her cup before taking a bite. The biscuit is perfect—buttery and just sweet enough, it melts in her mouth. She finds herself thinking that she’ll have to bring Sophronia here, before she remembers and sets the biscuit down.
“My mother has layers of plots,” she says after a moment. “It feels impossible to understand what she’s going to do next, how she will react to moves we haven’t yet made.”
“It’s chess, with a grand master,” Ambrose says.
“Chess with five grand masters, conspiring together,” corrects before pausing. A solution appears, one she’s shocked she never thought of before. She blinks, casting a glance around the room to be sure they’re completely alone.
“What if…” She trails off, unable to believe she’s about to speak these words. She lowers her voice to a whisper. “What if we…what if I killed her?”
Silence follows her words, and for a moment, worries she’s horrified them, that for all of her mother’s evil acts, Pasquale and Ambrose will see killing her as somehow more immoral. She isn’t sure it isn’t. What sort of person discusses the murder of their mother in a teahouse? But then she thinks of Sophronia, of Violie’s mother, of the countless others her mother has hurt to hold on to her power. She thinks of the threat she poses to Pasquale, to Ambrose, to Daphne—to herself.
She isn’t na?ve enough to believe that killing her mother will solve all of her problems, but she isn’t sure she can solve any others while her mother continues to draw breath.
“Could…could you?” Ambrose asks. “I mean, it’s difficult to imagine that others haven’t tried.”
They have. remembers three separate attempts in her childhood—poison that left her mother violently ill for a week, a trespasser discovered in the royal wing of the palace with a dagger on his person, a bullet shattering the window of their carriage as they returned from the summer castle. She remembers too what followed each attempt, her mother taking her and her sisters to witness the assassins’ executions. Those were ’s first experiences with death.
She wonders now if that was another lesson from her mother, a warning of what would come if any of them found themselves considering what is considering now. She knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that if she fails, her mother will show her no mercy. Her life will be forfeit. But then, her life is forfeit anyway, isn’t it? In many ways, assassinating her mother is her best chance at surviving her.
“They failed because they didn’t know her, not like I do,” says, shaking her head. “There will only be one chance at it, though. I need to make sure I do it right.” Already, she is thinking of how she might do it, but her mother is always one step ahead of her, and doesn’t trust her own instincts.
She lets out a low curse under her breath.
“What is it?” Pasquale asks, frowning.
“I just realized the one person I know who has experience killing a monarch,” she says, watching as understanding dawns on his and Ambrose’s faces. “And I’m not keen on asking for her help.”
—
That evening, pretends to be too tired to attend dinner with the rest of the Bessemian court, while Pasquale attends just long enough to make an appearance at the first course before leaving early under the guise of checking on her. She meets him in the hall outside her rooms, dressed again in his spare set of clothes and a long black cloak, the hood drawn up to cover her hair and face.
“Why do you look better in my clothes than I do?” Pasquale mutters.
manages a brief smile, though her mind is too distracted to put much meaning behind it. “Let me do the talking with Gigi,” she tells him. “Cornered beasts are always the most dangerous, and she’s not to be trifled with.” knows that she fell for Gisella’s tricks as hard as he did, and though Pasquale must know that too, he doesn’t say it aloud. For that, is grateful.
It’s still a sore spot. The fact that Gisella and Nicolo were able to fool her so thoroughly, that her gullibility very nearly cost her her life, floods her with a deep embarrassment. She knows she is better than that, and there is a part of her that is itching for a chance to prove it.
knows all of the hidden tunnels the servants use to get around the palace quickly and quietly and knows too that the majority of those servants will be tending to the dinner in the banquet hall or cleaning bedchambers while their employers are dining, so she leads Pasquale down the narrow, dimly lit halls, winding down staircase after staircase until they find themselves in the dungeon. Gisella is being kept well away from where the common folk are, her cell twice as large as any other.
Gisella has made herself at home in her cell, lounging on her narrow bed with a book in hand and a stack of others on the small table beside her. Beside the books, a candle burns, casting enough light to read by.
Gisella doesn’t look up when and Pasquale approach, instead turning her page and continuing to read. Still, knows that Gisella is aware of their presence and that even this is a battle. So she waits, even when Pasquale begins fidgeting.
After a long moment, Gisella’s eyes dart up and she affects shock, setting her book aside but not standing or even straightening up from her slouch.
“Well, isn’t this a surprise,” she drawls. “Come with more of that truth serum? My throat was sore for hours after all that coughing.”
shrugs. “If you didn’t lie as often as you drew breath, that wouldn’t have been such an issue,” she replies.
Gisella laughs. “You can hardly judge me when you aren’t exactly a beacon of honesty, Triz,” she points out. “You’ve lied to me as much as I’ve lied to you—I’ve just done it better.”
opens her mouth to retort but quickly snaps it shut again. She isn’t sure Gisella is wrong about that.
“And me?” Pasquale asks, his voice so soft that nearly doesn’t hear it. Gisella does, though, and her spine stiffens.
“I did what was necessary,” Gisella says, and if didn’t know better, she’d think there was a trace of guilt in Gisella’s voice. “And that includes the lies I told. But whether you believe me or not, I am sorry that you had to fall so that Nico and I could rise.”
“Not exactly an apology, is it?” asks. “All three of us know you’d do it all again if you had to.”
“Would you rather I say I was sorry for all of it?” Gisella asks, raising a single eyebrow. “Would you rather I tell you how I would never in my life betray you again, how guilt over it keeps me awake at night? How I regret it all? It would be another lie.”
clenches her jaw to keep from saying something she would surely regret. “When did you decide to poison King Cesare?” she asks instead.
Gisella blinks, looking for the first time truly surprised. “More than a year ago now, I suppose.”
“After he had Lord Savelle’s daughter killed for using star magic?” asks. Between Lord Savelle and Pasquale, had an understanding of what had happened that night—King Cesare had accosted Fidelia, just as he had so many other women and girls before, and though they were in a crowded banquet hall, though she struggled against him, no one had helped her. So Fidelia had caught sight of a star flickering through an open window and, in a fit of desperation, uttered six words: I wish you’d let me go. Innocuous enough, if Fidelia hadn’t been, like herself, a fledgling empyrea with no control over her gift. Lightning had struck through the window, creating such a distraction that King Cesare had been forced to release her. But having heard what she’d said and seen the effects, he’d had her executed for using magic.
“That,” Gisella says with a shrug, “was a drop in the bucket. I’m sure Pasquale can tell you better than I can.”
For a moment, Pasquale says nothing, but then he clears his throat. “I don’t mourn my father, and I won’t pretend he was a good man or a good king,” he says, his voice coming out even. “Was it your decision, or Nicolo’s?”
That earns a snort from Gisella. “Mine, of course,” she says. “Nicolo was content to bide his time, earn the king’s favor. He would have been happy with a seat on his council and never reached for more. The poison was my idea, though my brother was the one who began corresponding with Queen Eugenia, first as Cesare, then revealing himself.”
“And the wine was the perfect vessel for the poison, as Cesare always had a glass in his hand,” says. “But why the small dose? You could have killed him right away.”
“It was tempting,” Gisella admits. “But for one thing, it would have raised suspicions, and as cupbearer Nicolo would have borne the brunt of them. For another, it wouldn’t have accomplished enough—Nicolo needed to rise higher before Cesare was removed, and a mad king is as malleable as he is dangerous.”
“If you’d waited for me to become king, I’d have raised Nicolo’s position. There was no one at court, apart from Ambrose, that I trusted more,” Pasquale says, and is surprised to note how angry he sounds—not quite yelling, but closer than she’s ever heard him.
“That’s just it,” Gisella says, her gaze snapping to meet his. “How long do you think you’d have held the throne? Days? Weeks? Perhaps you’d have managed longer, after arrived, I’ll admit that much. But when you did eventually fall, we would have fallen with you. You would have made an awful king, Pas. And you would have hated every moment of it. So yes, we made other plans, with the poison and with Eugenia.”
Pasquale doesn’t reply, and is beginning to wish Gisella would go back to lying. She steps forward, drawingGisella’s attention back to her.
“Would I be wrong to assume you’d like to get out of this cell?” she asks.
Gisella shrugs, affecting disinterest, but catches the flash of yearning in her eyes. “I’m sure I will be soon enough, once Nicolo bargains for my release.”
“From what you said—or rather, didn’t say—I wouldn’t think he had much power left to bargain with,” muses, and Gisella’s silence tells her that she’s struck the truth of it. “Nicolo will be too busy saving his own skin to spare you a second thought.” This, doesn’t truly believe—Gisella and Nicolo are loyal to each other over everyone—but she sees the words find their mark in Gisella’s insecurities.
“I told you this would happen, didn’t I?” continues when Gisella remains silent. “You’ve climbed far, but you have all the further to fall because of it, and countless people who will be only too glad to push you off the edge.”
“Including you?” Gisella retorts.
“Oh, especially me,” says before pausing. “But not today.”
Gisella’s jaw tightens. “Why exactly are you here?” she asks.
and Pasquale exchange a look.
“Did you mix the poison for King Cesare yourself?” asks rather than answering.
“I did,” Gisella says, her voice wary.
“It was clever,” admits. “Using ground apple seeds. Even if someone were looking for poison, they very well might overlook that altogether.”
“You didn’t,” Gisella points out.
“My sister didn’t,” corrects. Daphne was always better at poisons than , though she knows she can’t ask her sister for help with this one. “If I were to ask you for another poison, one that would kill quicker but be just as undetectable, what would you suggest using?”
Gisella’s eyebrows lift a fraction of an inch, though the rest of her expression remains placid. “And who would the target be?” she asks.
“Not you,” replies. “Which is all you need to know.”
Gisella’s mouth purses. “I’d need to know some things about the target in order to recommend a suitable poison—age, weight, any health conditions they might have.”
doesn’t know the exact answer to the first two queries, but she hazards a couple of guesses. “Healthy, rarely ill.”
“If they drink often, the apple seed mixture I used with Cesare would work—you might need to up the dose to kill them quicker, though that would increase the likelihood of detection—”
“And it still wouldn’t be quick enough. It would need to work in less than a week,” interrupts.
Gisella stares at her. “You’re asking the impossible,” she says.
holds her gaze without blinking. “Then I suppose you’ll die in this cell,” she says.
Gisella’s chin lifts. “And if I tell someone about this conversation?” she asks.
“Then you’ll die here all the faster,” replies. “I might not have your talent for poisons, but I have my own two hands and quite a few daggers.”
Gisella tries to mask her fear, but sees it flicker in her eyes. Good, she thinks.
“I’ll be back soon, should an epiphany strike,” says before she and Pasquale leave Gisella alone once more.