Chapter Four Rules of the Crown #2
"Why?"
"Because Candidate Twenty-Two told her women who cry on camera become sympathy favorites and now Junia thinks if she cries where anyone sees, the Crown will turn grief into strategy."
That sounded plausible enough to be horrifying.
They found Junia sitting between two linen carts, knees pulled to her chest, spectacles in her lap. Mirel was already there. She had somehow obtained tea.
"Where did that come from?" Anya asked.
"Kitchen."
"The kitchen is locked."
"Not well."
Anya looked at her with new respect. Junia wiped her face.
"I am fine."
"You are in a laundry room at midnight," Sela said. "None of us are fine."
Mirel handed Junia a cup.
"Drink before it gets cold."
Anya leaned against a dryer cabinet.
For the first time since arrival, none of them wore candidate dresses, number pins, or makeup approved by someone with a clipboard. Sela's hair was braided badly. Mirel had removed her earrings. Junia's eyes were red. They looked younger. More dangerous, somehow.
"What happened?" Anya asked.
Junia stared into the tea.
"My mother called the residence desk."
"We're not allowed family calls yet."
"I know. She said my school received a notice asking whether my position should be held during 'extended Crown service.'"
Anya's stomach tightened.
"That's not supposed to happen until finalists."
Mirel's gaze sharpened.
"Supposed is doing a great deal of work in this building."
Junia twisted the cup between both hands.
"I teach music. There are two other teachers. If they replace me for the term, the school cannot afford to keep a fourth position when I return."
Sela sat beside her.
"Then we make sure they don't."
Junia laughed wetly.
"How? Win?"
No one answered. That was the problem.
Every harm attached to the Trials pointed in the same direction. Cooperate. Advance. Become valuable enough that the Crown stopped treating your life as disposable.
Anya had thought losing would be refusal.
The residence was teaching her that losing could also be made into punishment. Mirel spoke first.
"My father has already contacted three judges."
Sela looked at her.
"Can he do that?"
"No."
"Will anyone stop him?"
"Also no."
Mirel's voice remained calm, but a small muscle moved in her jaw.
"He expects me to reach the final four. He sent a list of acceptable public answers and another list of dresses he says make me look 'expensive but reproductive.'"
Junia made a strangled sound.
"That cannot be a phrase."
"I have the letter."
"Burn it."
"I am preserving evidence against my bloodline."
Sela leaned back against the machine.
"My family is thrilled."
Three faces turned toward her. She shrugged.
"We have goats. Goats are expensive and stupid. A royal stipend could improve both problems. My brothers have started taking bets on which Trial I fail."
"Comforting," Anya said.
"Very."
Sela's grin faded.
"But the district council told my mother our grazing lease renewal would be 'viewed favorably' if I represented the uplands with dignity."
Silence.
Anya looked from one woman to another.
Different districts. Different class. Different families. Same hand at the back.
"They attach consequences where cameras won't show them," she said.
Mirel nodded.
"Because then participation looks voluntary."
Junia wiped her cheeks again.
"I hate that I still want to do well."
"Why wouldn't you?" Anya asked.
"Because doing well means cooperating."
"No. Doing well means doing well. They don't own the meaning just because they built the stage."
The sentence surprised her. Sela looked at her.
"For someone planning to lose, you give very competitive speeches."
"I contain contradictions."
"You contain plumbing."
"Also true."
Junia's mouth curved.
Good.
Anya crouched in front of her.
"What exactly did the school notice say?"
Junia recited it almost word for word. Mirel frowned.
"That language sounds like a ministry form, not a school decision."
"Can we get a copy?" Anya asked.
"My mother can send one when family communication opens."
"Do that."
Mirel looked interested now.
"Why?"
"Because if the Crown is contacting employers before the rules say it can, I want to know whether it is doing it to all of us."
Sela pointed at her.
"There. That face."
"What face?"
"The face you make when a pipe lies to you."
"Pipes don't lie."
"Exactly."
Footsteps sounded in the corridor. All four women froze. Mirel killed the laundry-room light.
They stood in darkness between sheets and towels while a night guard passed outside.
Anya became aware that they were four Crown candidates hiding like children after curfew. It should have been absurd.
Instead it felt like the first honest thing that had happened all day.
When the footsteps faded, Sela whispered, "If we are caught, I am blaming the teacher."
Junia whispered back, "I will fail you." They laughed too quietly.
Mirel turned the light on again.
"We need rules."
Anya groaned.
"The palace has enough."
"Our rules."
That changed the room.
Mirel took a clean laundry card from a shelf and a pencil from her robe pocket.
"One: if the Crown sends something to our families, employers, creditors, landlords, or district offices, we tell each other."
Sela added, "Two: if anyone learns a Trial rule that affects Release, we share it."
Junia said, "Three: no sabotaging each other." Mirel looked at Anya.
"That should not need saying."
"It absolutely needs saying."
Anya considered.
"Four: if one of us wants to leave, the others help her understand the cost before she signs anything. No persuasion either way."
Junia nodded slowly.
"Choice with information."
"Exactly."
Sela raised a hand.
"Five: if any of us accidentally falls in love with the prince, the others are legally permitted to mock her."
"Why are you looking at me?"
"No reason."
"We met him today."
"And you argued with him in under four minutes. Efficient intimacy."
"Write a real rule."
Sela grinned and took the pencil.
RULE FIVE: NO DYING FOR ROMANCE. Junia looked at it.
"That one may actually be useful."
Mirel folded the card and tucked it into the sleeve of a linen ledger where no palace camera would care to look.
"Then we have an agreement."
Not an alliance.
Not yet. Alliances implied strategy. This was simpler.
Four women had discovered the Crown could reach into their lives from directions no Trial brochure admitted existed. So they would compare notes.
Anya went back to her room just before one.
The gold leaves on the ceiling looked no less ridiculous.
But when she lay down, she no longer felt like Candidate Forty-Seven alone inside a machine.
Three doors down, a goat farmer snored.
Across the corridor, a freight heiress was probably cataloguing violations.
One floor below, a music teacher had stopped crying.
The Crown had brought forty-eight women together to compete.
On the first night, four of them had started building a record instead.