In the courtyard of the tower belonging to the Family of Em, a group of young men and women trained under the unforgiving gaze of a veteran Victrix soldier. Trainees darted and dashed between tall posts erected in random patterns on the smooth granite flagstone, clanging dulled swords against one another in mock combat. This sort of training was a shift from not so long ago, when soldiers-to-be trained in the wide-open spaces and streets common to the nation-state of Seena. With the Scalus war dragging on for a year now, the military had finally adapted to the forest setting where their battles took place.

My Lady Em watched from the fifth floor of the stone block tower, where her chamber took up nearly an eighth of the entire level. She sat on a stone bench built in beneath the room’s single broad window, gazing down as her thin fingers automatically embroidered a long wrap for Mero, her third such gift in as many months. When the trainer, a flamboyant woman named Leance, caught her observing, Leance sent a wave and a smile My Lady Em could see even from this height. Everything about Leance was bold, from her smile to her gaudy off-duty clothing and loud, boisterous laugh. It was this ebullience, in part, that led My Lord Samrose Em—My Lady Em’s father—to invite the veteran to their courtyard for practice. He’d delighted in watching the training, when he was well and able.

It had been some time since he was either.

My Lady Em wriggled her slender, pale fingers back at Leance, then picked up her needle again, only to promptly poke herself in the hand.

“Damn!” the girl said, dropping the whole bundle in her lap. It landed silently in the spread of her gray gown.

Huffing more than sighing, she snatched the small clear bottle of amber Daeromacht brew from the shelf beside the window. She turned it upside down, soaking the glass stopper, then pulled the stopper out and sucked it clean between her lips. The brew smelled of earth and flowers; tart pine and bitter roots. She’d never been to Daeromacht lands, many miles from Seena, but this smell often made her wonder what sort of people they really were—rumors notwithstanding. They never came to Seena; anyone wishing to trade with them had to make the long trek themselves. While merchants grumbled at the time spent, My Lady Em knew it never prevented them from doing business.

Thank the stars for that small mercy.

The sharp pain in her hand dulled almost immediately. My Lady Em put the stopper back in and replaced the bottle on the shelf. She lifted her hand and squeezed the base of her palm to make the small pinprick of blood well.

“If you were here, my love,” she said aloud to herself, “this wouldn’t have happened.”

She reached again for the bottle, now to dull the emotional rather than physical pain, but snatched her hand back as someone knocked on the bedroom door.

“My Lady?” Rossa called from the hallway. “I’m here to fashion your hair. It will be sundown soon.”

“Yes, come,” My Lady Em called. The brew had somehow still come into her hand, so she went ahead and took another pull from it, managing to return the bottle to the shelf before Rossa entered fully.

Rossa was a tall woman, well-shouldered and wearing a practical canvas gown of simple but elegant construction. She smiled at My Lady Em as she went about with a twist of wood, lighting oil lanterns in Em’s chamber. Rossa’s smile, as always, showed no teeth, as if she was ashamed of some defect in her mouth. As a child, My Lady Em had searched for such a defect; a missing tooth or something crooked, but never found any.

My Lady Em felt the same pang of jealousy observing Rossa glide around the room as she did while watching the trainees down below. She poked at the pinprick in her hand, wanting to be stronger. Rossa and the soldiers probably pricked their hands all the time, or cut them with knives while training or cooking, and didn’t wince and whine about it.

Maybe, she thought, if I could be more like that, Mero would love me more.

She flung the half-finished wrap out the window, needles and all. The setting western sun, Righa, larger of the pair of stars that crossed the sky over Seena, caught the needles and made them sparkle on their descent.

My Lady Em crossed her arms, wanting, briefly, to join them out the window.

“Here, now,” Rossa said, bringing a plump wax candle to the shelf and setting it beside the bottle of brew. The older woman sat behind My Lady Em on the bench. “What’s the matter?”

My Lady Em glowered at the trainees as Leance laughed mightily and corrected their tactics. “I want to be a soldier.”

Rossa pulled a sculpted wooden comb from My Lady Em’s thick hair where it had been keeping the girl’s locks up off her neck. Removing the comb let the strait tresses fall across the girl’s thin shoulders. “It’s a bit late for that, my lady.”

My Lady Em leaned against the window sill on her elbows, propping her chin in her hands while Rossa combed her hair. Rossa always smelled of kitchen smoke and beeswax, and My Lady Em detected the scents now, familiar and calming. Or, perhaps, it was the Daeromacht brew. Well, either way, the combination of Rossa’s brushing, her scent, and the bitter brew in her belly made My Lady Em pliable.

“Leance could teach me,” she murmured.

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“Teach you what, exactly, my lady?”

“How to fight. To be strong.”

Rossa picked at a stubborn tangle. “You are stronger than you know, My Lady.”

“Ow!”

“Sorry, My Lady. You are strong in heart.”

“Mero isn’t interested in my strong heart.”

“I’m not so sure about that. He is a warrior, and warriors must be strong in many ways.” Having cleared the knot, Rossa set aside the comb and slid to Em’s other side to look her charge in the eye. “Oh, I see. So that’s what this is about. Mero.”

Em sighed, eyes darting to the bottle. She’d have to reach past Rossa to get it, and so resisted. Rossa might be her servant, but My Lady Em still felt childish guilt when taking the brew in front of her.

“What if he doesn’t truly love me, Rossa? What then? What if I’ve only purchased our marriage?”

Rossa brushed an errant black hair out of Em’s face. “Your pardon, My Lady, but I find that idea highly unlikely.”

“Then why won’t he take me to bed?”

“He is fighting a war far from Seena. That strikes me as a valid reason.”

My Lady Em folded her arms on the ledge beneath the window and rested her head upon them. “But when he’s here. You know what I mean.”

“My Lady, you are not yet wed.”

“We are not Cerchi, Rossa. We may love whenever and however we wish. Except that he won’t.”

“There is still such a thing as appearances, I’m afraid,” Rossa said, tugging on the ends of Em’s hair to get her to lift her head. “The Cerchi’s ways still hold sway in the Assembly. Now I, for one, not being noble, can dalliance with whomsoever I choose, and I take that right quite liberally!”

Rossa laughed with her mouth closed, and Em surrendered a tired grin. She felt tired more often than not these days, awaiting Mero’s too-infrequent breaks from the front line against the Scalus.

The serving woman’s jovial expression dimmed as she gazed at My Lady Em. She even ran the back of one finger down the flawless skin of Em’s cheek, and My Lady Em closed her eyes in response. Rossa’s finger was cold.

“You are still so young, my lady,” Rossa said gently. “If I may say so, you don’t yet know the years that lay ahead of you. There is time for Mero’s love. He knows your strength. You show it even tonight.”

Em groaned. “By dancing?”

“By attending the events. Fate, if such a thing existed, has called you to lead in your father’s stead. You have done so willingly, and readily, if I may. That is strength. Believe me, My Lady. And Seena needs that strength now more than ever.”

Em opened her eyes and straightened up, mostly to make sure the bottle of brew hadn’t somehow magically absconded from the shelf. It had not, and her panic abated. “You mean the Cerchi? They will not sever themselves from the Assembly. They haven’t the courage.”

“I am no political scholar, but they seem have the courage of their convictions. That is, if I may, My Lady.”

Em gave a most unladylike snort. “How can one have conviction over a superstition?”

“Your parents often asked the same question, My Lady.”

The mere mention of her parents gave My Lady Em a dark chill. She was eighteen years old now, and her mother had been gone for more than seven of those. She’d quite naturally turned to her father when her mother died, and the man had done well, raising her up in the courts of the Assembly, teaching her by example the finer points of politicking. My Lady Em did not consider herself a politician, but as time went by, she found herself rather enjoying the game of it all.

“I wish my father was well. There’s so much to learn.”

Rossa drew her into a hug. “Ah, my ladybird. We all mourn his illness.”

My Lady Em let herself sink into Rossa’s embrace, the practical brown material rough against her face even as Rossa’s full chest was soft and pliant beneath. Replace Rossa’s rough dress with fine silk, and it may have been Em’s mother.

My Lady Em squeezed her eyes tight at the thought; her mother was dead, and pining for her was no help. Pining for her father was of no help, either. The man lay in his bed for weeks now while some grave ailment drained his life. Some in the tower whispered he had been poisoned; Em had heard the whispers herself. The thought of such treachery chilled her—with Mero gone, who would protect her from such fatal designs? Of course, she had scores of guards keeping her safe, but then, so had her father. She hoped, fervently, his illness was organic.

“Would you like to visit him before the dance?” Rossa asked softly as she stroked Em’s hair.

My Lady Em sighed, debating. She would like to see him, and she would not. Visiting My Lord Samrose Em was a double-edged sword, giving her comfort to be in his presence but sorrow that he was little more than a shadow of his former self. Whether she visited him on any particular day depended largely, she knew, on how in control of her emotions she felt.

Today? She exercised very little control. Even now in Rossa’s maternal embrace she felt like weeping.

Em pulled herself away and ran fingers beneath her eyes to dry the tears leaking there. “Yes,” she declared, trying to make herself sound like the royalty she was. “Yes, I would like to see him, will you arrange it, please, Rossa?”

Rossa smiled. Without teeth. “Certainly, my lady.”

The older woman stood, briefly cradling Em’s chin in her fingers.

“Your mother is so proud of you, my lady. There are great and wonderful things in store for you and Mero.”

Em nodded briskly as fresh wave of sadness swept through her body at Mero’s name.

“I shall go and prepare for the visit,” Rossa went on, and if she saw Em’s sadness, she let it pass by, to Em’s gratitude. “When I return, we shall do your hair and dress you for the dance.”

“Very good.”

Rossa dipped her head deferentially and walked to the door.

“Rossa!”

The serving woman paused.

Em looked out the window, down into the courtyard, where Leance’s hearty laugh reverberated. Training was over for the day as Righa set over the forest, and Leance, per usual, was now engaged in wild antics with her charges. Mero, she knew, sometimes fretted over Leance’s methods of instruction, but her results could not be argued with. Leance turned out some of Seena’s finest soldiers.

“Set me a meeting with Leance as soon as possible,” Em went on, still watching Leance and the trainees. Leance was teaching them how to do cartwheels.

“Of course. Regarding what, my lady?”

“My training as a soldier.”

When Rossa wasn’t quick to reply, Em turned to her. Rossa held her expression impassively, but she’d been Em’s serving woman since birth; Em recognized when Rossa was in disagreement with one of her pronouncements, whether it was demanding a second dessert as a child or trying to wriggle out of some official function as the only daughter—and now reigning Lady—of the family of Em.

But Rossa knew her part well and brought a small smile to her face. “Of course, my lady.”

“Thank you, Rossa.”

Rossa let herself out, and only after the door shut did My Lady Em reach for the bottle of brew. She gave herself two licks of the stopper, knowing she would need the courage it gave her. A pleasant numbness began at the back of her neck and spread down through her body, and the young royal sighed gently, riding the brew’s warm waves.

Now everything would be fine.