The reshaped guard lifts his hand and waves at me.
“Good morning,” he says.
“What in the depths are you doing here?” I blurt out, too freshly awake and surprised to hold anything back.
His jaw clenches briefly, but he doesn’t break eye contact. “There was an…incident in the night—“
“An incident? What kind of incident?” I taste the air as I wait for his answer, expecting it to sour with deception. The rich depth of his vitei remains mostly unchanged—though as my shift falls loose from one shoulder, the smoked-meat earthiness of it deepens and the berry sweetness comes forward.
“The kind in which someone made an attempt on your life, and was thwarted.” His words are even. Smooth, flat stones laid one over another. I know I should feel fear, but as long as I’m listening to him speak, it’s hard to.
“Who—“
“She was killed in apprehension, and we don’t know who hired her, though we shall do all we can to find out. Her Highness has decided it best to reassign me to your guard until she can be sure the threat has passed.”
I pull my sleeve back up over my shoulder.
“You’re replacing Zapatio?”
He shifts a little a bit before settling back into an even stance.
“I’m replacing all of them.”
I quirk my head. “But…when will you sleep? Eat? Have time off?”
“I can sleep, but I don’t have to. I’ll eat while I watch you, though I can go without much of any food for a while, too. Adares will step in occasionally when I need to relieve myself—forgive me if that’s too much information. And I don’t need time off.” He taps his forehead. “I’m of two minds.”
“What?”
‘I’m entirely reshaped, inside and out. I have two minds. While one watches, one can rest. Dream.”
Before I can ask anything else, there’s a knock at the door.
“Ellrys is here,” he says, expression apologetic as he unlocks the door and lets her in.
The couturier blows past him, arms full of rose-colored fabric, and she shuts the door hastily behind her.
“What’s all this?” I demand as Ellrys holds up the dress she intends to squeeze me into. “I can’t cook in this.”
“You’re not meant to,” she says, voice clipped as she eyes my hair, my face. “You won’t be cooking anything today.”
“But there’s a challenge today!”
“A two-parter,” she says, edging forward with hands extended as if she intends to force me into the dress herself. “We’re going up to The Heights, and staying a few nights there. The cooking part of the challenge is tomorrow.” Depositing my clothes at the foot of my bed, she jabs a finger at Cedro. “Fetch her trunk.”
He bolts across the chamber, snatches up the trunk at the other side of the armoire and deposits it beside the bed before returning to his post, all in less than a few blinks of an eye.
“Thank you,” sniffs Ellrys, opening it to pack away the wrapped set of chef’s robes as she parts them from my dress-of-the-day. “Go ahead and pack whatever you’ll need. Something to sleep in, toiletries, that sort of thing. I’ve got cosmetics and your clothes for tomorrow and the day after covered, of course.”
A few hours later, Cedro, Chiara, Ellrys, Rajvid and I are packed into a carriage together and on our way down to the train station.
“Is anyone going to tell me what exactly we’ll be doing up there?” I ask for what might be the third time. But Chiara just tsks at me.
“None of the other chefs know what they’re getting into just yet, no reason you should.”
“As if you haven’t given me every advantage it pleased you to give,” I shoot back, scowling.
“Every advantage that doesn’t break the rules,” she corrects.
My lip curls. “You didn’t care about breaking the rules when you married me. You said only those of the Blood were allowed up there.”
“Oh, I did. And that was the first part of the truth. The other part is that if they do step foot there, they must either leave having been brought into the Blood—you know, through marriage—“
“Obviously,”
“Or cast out of this world by death,” she finishes with a winning smile.
“I hate you,” I hiss.
“You’re such a charmer, my love.”
I look away from her, hands smoothing the rich silk of my skirts compulsively as my teeth threaten to grind each other to dust.
The train ride up to The Heights is short but dramatic, the tracks growing steeper and steeper and the curves tighter the further we go—skirting around more than one magnificent waterfall. I watch it all with heavy-lidded eyes, desperate for more sleep but unwilling to relinquish the view.
“You’ll love The Heights,” says Chiara, leaning into me and looping an arm around my shoulder. I shrug her off.
“There’s no place I’d like to be less, besides your bed,” I say, meaning it. I’ve never been to that detached piece of the Amoranti court, that ostentatious playground, and I would have liked to keep it that way.
Each breath leaves me less satisfied as we climb ever higher, and my head begins to swim. For a moment I even loll to the left, my head brushing against Chiara’s shoulder before I catch myself and snap upright.
“Oh, sweet wife, the height’s getting to her,” exclaims the Heir as Cedro leans forward in his seat, hands coming up as if to steady me. I wave him off.
“I’m fine.”
But though I try to hide it, my breath quickens as I struggle to satisfy the thirst in my lungs.
And then Chiara begins to sing.
Her voice fills the car like liquid starlight, light as air, a glow that’s felt rather than seen. There are no words to her song. Just that voice—rising, falling, flowing, dancing. Enriching the air with its verdant light. No, enriching me. Giving my lungs the strength to take what they need.
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She sings for a long time, and when she stops the effect fades almost immediately. But it leaves me far better able to breathe than I had been before.
Raising her eyebrows, she looks to me expectantly, but I ignore her—fixing my eye out the window instead. If she’s waiting for me to thank her, she can wait until she rots. The train rounds a peak and begins to slow, and The Heights are in view at last. They’re gone again before I’ve time to make sense of it all, replaced by stone as we enter an arched opening in the mountain and chug to a stop in the rainbow interior of Heights Station.
Chiara launches to her feet and offers me her hand. I ignore it.
Cedro and the other guards circle protectively around us as we navigate our way through the station. I scowl at the stained-glass skylights and the brilliant, tinted beams of sunshine streaming through them, rubbing my forehead. I hadn’t had a chance to whip up a remedy for my hangover before boarding the train, and I’m beginning to doubt I’ll ever get one.
We follow the stream of Gourmands and nobles through a high hall that’s also a bridge between peaks, leading us across The Heights proper. As we step out of the chapel-like chamber at the other end into the unfiltered light of day, I put a hand up to shield my tortured eyes.
As much as I might hate its purpose and everything it represents, the sight is worth the pain. The Artisans who created this place were true masters.
The mountain stone at this height, though a light blue-gray in dull light, shines with iridescent brilliance in the sun…and everything is carved of it. Every building, bridge, walkway and statue. Amongst all of that, there’s green. More green than a place this high up has any business being. Much of it is my chosen namesake, juniper. Cloud juniper, in particular. But there are palm fronds here too, and something between a lichen and a moss, thick blue-green and dotted with violet flowers. Reshaped plants, perhaps. And then there’s the many waterfalls, their white froth fracturing the light and casting yet more rainbows to dance about the sculptures and bridges.
I imagine what the place must look like in other seasons—cast over with glittering ice and snow, the hot water channeled beneath the pathways making a road through the wonder—and have to admit to myself that it’s something I’d like to see. Then I haul in another unsatisfying breath of thin air, and reconsider that thought.
“This way,” calls my wife, gesturing to the other side of another bridge, where the grandest of the nearby mountain lifts awaits at its base. Like a broad balcony of ornate stone and metalwork, but set on a track that draws it up and down the cliff face, there’s room for all of our party and another two more. But Chiara’s guard shuts the entrance before any more can join us. Not that any would have dared.
We lift past level after level of buildings, terraces and walkways, drawing to a stop only as we approach the topmost reaches of The Heights. Above us rises what can only be an outpost of the palace, built and ornamented in the same style but carved of native stone like everything else. As the doormen welcome us in, the lift retreats to fetch the next batch of Chefs, guards, and attendants.
“Where’s our suite?” I ask once I’ve caught my breath, turning to Cedro.
“You’re off to the first part of our challenge,” answers Chiara before our guard can say anything. “I’ll have our things taken up for us.”
“And you?” I demand, scrunching my nose at her though she smells as spicy-sweet as her vitei. “I suppose you’ll be spectating again? Cheering me on?”
“Oh no,” she laughs, flapping a hand at me as though I’ve just told a fantastic joke. “No, no no. Not for this. I’m going to the spa.”
“The spa?”
“Have fun!” She waves at me before gesturing to her guards. They close around her with our luggage in tow. Rajvid gives me a quick freshener-spritz of the day’s scent as Ellrys checks me over, finishing with a small nod of approval before lifting her skirts to hurry after them.
I turn to find Cedro watching me with sympathy written across his handsome features.
“Shall we?”
I eye his dress uniform and sigh, knowing there’s no point in asking questions.
“Lead the way.”
The way he leads ends, yet again, into the harsh light of day—a large enclosed courtyard packed with water features, sculpted trees, and scores of young nobles in brightly colored finery. On a tiny island at the center of one of the artificial ponds, a group of Bards plays. Their song washes away my hangover, replacing it with a feeling like I’ve just finished a glass of champagne after a fine brunch.
Of course, if they stop playing at any point I’ll feel like turtle shit again within moments…but the reprieve is nice.
A woman in a billowing dress of cream and pearly pink hurries over to us, her pale wig quivering with blossoms and stuck through with silver-budded catwillow branches.
She purses her lips as she looks from chef-to-chef.
“I am Lady Valentry, Royally Appointed Matchmaker to the Amoranti Court. And they,” she gestures with a disdainful flip of her hand to the nobles meandering about behind her, “are beyond even my help. The absolute bottom of nobility’s aged-oak barrel. This season is their last chance at a respectable future.” She sniffs, letting her doubt in both their prospects and our abilities show plainly on her face.
“Each of you must convince one of them to accept your services. Get to know them. Observe their interactions with others. Tomorrow, you cook a meal to make them matchable using the equipment and ingredients made available to you. It will be served to them at that evening’s full moon ball. If the night ends in a match for your client, you move on to the next challenge. The better the prospects and pedigree of their match, the better your score.” She pauses, perhaps readying herself, perhaps for dramatic affect. I suspect the latter. “Should they fail to match, of course, your journey ends here.”
A prim smile curls her lips as she lets us think on that.
“There is a caveat. You may not alter your client in any way that they are not informed of and consenting to. Whatever changes you wish to make, you must first convince them to accept. I wish you the best of luck.”
When the only response to this revelation is determined silence, Lady Valentry’s features tighten with disappointment.
“You’re released,” she says after another pause. “Enjoy.”
Then, throwing up her hands, she turns and flounces off. The other chefs and attendants spring immediately to action, making for the unmatched nobles with the single-minded precision of sharks to spilled blood.
Cedro glances down to me expectantly, but I don’t bother to join the rush. My eyepatch and cool-toned skin will mean only the most desperate of desperates will take me on, and only when all other options are exhausted.
But I’d forgotten my change in station and the speed with which news spreads at court. As I make my idle approach, heads turn. Expressions change. And not in the way I’m used to.
“Your Highness!”
I look around wildly, wondering which royal was so miserably hopeless that even their divinity-touched blood won’t buy them a match. But then my eye catches on the lavishly dressed young woman lifting her skirts to hurry toward me, and she calls out again.
“Your Highness, please. Would you work with me?”
There are others on her tail already, but I’m not about to subject myself to such an onslaught.
“Yes, yes. Fine. Come, let’s find someplace quiet to talk.”
She beams, and I offer her my arm—an obvious sign that I’m taken to ward off the frenzy. We find a shady spot beneath the cover of a weeping willow and sit down together.
“I’m so honored to have your help,” she gushes, arranging her skirts meticulously across her thighs. I study her face, her movements, taste the air for her vitei. My palate floods with the flavors of figs and brown-sugar rubbed pork belly, yolk and clotted cream. Rich and sweet and salty—not bad-tasting, exactly, but very overwhelming. Her face is sweet and almost cherubic, her eyes wide and hazel, her other features slightly pinched. All of this framed nicely by chestnut curls. But though I’ve been silently preparing interview questions since I learned of our challenge, I’ve no need for any of them.
“If anyone at all can help me, certainly it’s you.” She sighs deeply, the sigh of one with the weight of the world on her shoulders. “It’s just…so hard for one such as me to find a suitable spouse. I’d truly almost lost hope.” Her voice hitches on the last word, and she produces a lacy handkerchief from a sleeve to dab at the corners of her eyes.
I lean forward.
“I’m sorry to hear that. What—“
“It’s just such a curse,” she goes on, cutting me off as the hand with the kerchief flies to her nose to suppress a sudden bout of sniffles. “Being so accomplished and well-bred and beautiful all at once. It frightens potential suitors, you see.”
She shakes her head, brows all twisted up in her fit of despair. “The only ones bold enough to make offers are delusional, to think themselves equal to my pedigree. Somehow, those who are most suitable are also the most easily intimidated.” Her head jerks up and her eyes search mine, her expression pleading.
“Do you think there’s any way at all you can help me?”
I try not to let my thoughts show on my face as I take a measured breath.
“I—“
“If anyone can it’s you,” she insists again, interrupting me once more before launching into a thorough accounting of her tribulations as a person too perfect for this broken world. My smile twitches. My hands slip into the folds of my skirts to clench and unclench compulsively. Suddenly I can’t help but wonder exactly what it feels like when the Reaper’s cry siphons away your sanity.