“Let me see . . . yep! Here it is.”

  “‘Tesseran History of Chocolate’?” Chioni asked, pulling pins out of her hair. Her elaborate updo tumbled down her back in a long braid as she tucked the pins away in her pocket, still damp from the rain. “It’s in the wrong category.”

  They stood in the library, its floors deserted as the Presentation Ball continued without them, its light crystals dimmed. The soft silver light washed over the shelves, just enough to make sense of the titles.

  “Book I was reading,” Asimi responded. “Shelved it here to mark the right place.”

  “You read?”

  “Yes, princess. A girl must keep herself entertained.”

  “Hm. I’d assumed your entertainment would be . . . rowdier.”

  “We can make that happen,” Asimi said with an infernal wink. She planted a hand on the side of the shelf and gave it a hard push. It swung open, revealing a dark tunnel.

  Chioni’s mouth dropped open. “What . . .”

  Asimi laughed. “Close your mouth,” she chided. “You’ve lived here how long?”

  “I knew of these passageways, but . . . they’re all meant to be sealed. Queen Arete ordered it so.”

  “Looks like they missed one.” Asimi tapped the Freedom Stone, still fixed to the silver bow at her head. A tiny ember sparked in its center, before growing into a full illuminating glow.

  “How did you do that?” Chioni demanded, staring.

  Asimi gave her a quizzical look. “I tapped it.”

  She tapped the Service Stone, hiding her hands behind her back. Nothing. Of course not.

  “Well?” Asimi smirked. “After you.”

  Chioni squinted into the dark passageway, a hand on the hilt of her sword. “Does it lead to the vault?”

  “Who knows?”

  “You haven’t gone in?”

  “Nope. Not yet.”

  I’m surprised you didn’t go in and rob it blind. “I can’t believe they didn’t tell me about this,” she murmured. “The advisors always told me . . . they always agreed with the history books.”

  “Maybe they didn’t know,” Asimi said with a shrug.

  She didn’t like the thought of that. Something this notable, going unnoticed for so long . . . someone had to have known. And they didn’t tell me.

  But she did, she realized, with a little jolt of dissonance. Asimi had pulled her here by the hand, showed her the entrance. Aconite’s heir, showing her the secrets of her own palace.

  She’s a liar, she reminded herself. But how was this a lie? She could’ve opened it herself. A sealed door? Ftero’s stone. Undo any lock. Open any entrance. Did she have that much mastery? The stone loves her, Chioni thought, with a pang of bitterness. But, at the same time, her mind whispered: Of course it does. How could it not?

  “Princess? Theia to her highness.” Asimi raised an eyebrow. “Want to see where this goes?”

  “Yes.” The word tumbled out of her mouth before she fully registered the question. She cleared her throat. “You’re stalling more than usual. I thought you would’ve barreled on without me.”

  “I’ve got a few manners.” Asimi offered her hand again, and they started down the narrow corridor, their path lit by the jewel on her head. After a few minutes of silence, she turned to face her, walking backwards down the curving hallway. “So who’s that girl you’re always with?”

  “What?”

  “She’s got the kohl around her eyes and the bright red shawl.”

  “Lady Clarity Hearth,” Chioni informed her. “Our exchange from — that’s none of your business, actually.”

  “Aw, come on.” Asimi pouted. “What’s the harm?”

  “How do you know who I’m with, anyway?”

  “You only go three places, princess,” Asimi said, drawing a triangle with her finger. “It’s not hard to spot you.”

  “Really.”

  “Mm hm. I tried napping in the portrait hall once, but it was impossible with you marching back and forth for forty minutes.”

  Chioni’s face burned. “I didn’t see you.”

  “I’m always up on the ceiling beams,” Asimi told her, pointing a finger up. “What, I’m not sleeping on the floor. I’ve done that too much already.”

  “We provided you with a bed.”

  “I like to mix it up. I’ve got the stone, might as well use it.” She laughed. “I climbed before it, but it’s nice to know I’ll land on my feet if I fall now.”

  And then they found the stairs.

  As in, Asimi stumbled backwards into the stairs, began tumbling down, and Chioni tripped and fell in after her before registering what was going on.

  There was a lot of undignified yelping and squawking.

  “How — long — are — these — stairs —?” Asimi asked as she bounced down the steps. “My — bones — are — going — to — be — as — bad — as — Zeid’s —” She hit the floor.

  Chioni knew that, because she fell on top of her a moment later, and then both of them lay on the stone floor for a solid while trying to recover.

  “Ow . . .” Asimi complained.

  “What were you saying about landing on your feet?”

  “Only works if I can see my feet.”

  Chioni blinked in the darkness, feeling the unexpected urge to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. Maybe she should’ve felt embarrassed or angry, but . . . nobody was down there, but the two of them. Everyone else thought the entrances had been sealed, so, for now . . . she was safe, in the dark, and Asimi couldn’t see her face, and maybe the dark could hide her forever.

  “Are you bruised? I’m very bruised. I think, as princess, you should outlaw stairs.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Outlaw stairs?” she repeated.

  “Yeah, so they don’t hurt me anymore.”

  “Not their fault you were walking backwards in the dark.”

  “It is their fault, for being so pointy and ouch.”

  A rustling noise.

  The Freedom Stone’s light was visible again as Asimi sat up, straightening the bow in her hair. Her nails were silver — Chioni had never noticed it before, but the way light bounced off of them made it seem as though they were made of metal. Her hair had become even more disheveled from the tumble, but it only served as more proof that she had this inexplicable way of looking good no matter how she looked. Maybe it was her smile — still sly, still confident, completely unshaken by the fall. The smile that Chioni just couldn’t forget.

  “What is it?” Asimi asked.

  “What?”

  “You’re looking at me funny.”

  “What?” Her neck burned as she spluttered. “No, I’m not. I’m still — I’m still shaken, is all. From falling. Down a flight of stairs. Because you weren’t looking where you were going.”

  “Ooo, princess is shaken by something? Woah. Our princess can be shocked by something? This is newsworthy! We need to publish it in the paper! Heir to the throne — shocked for the first time in her life!”

  “Don’t you dare.”

  She stuck out her tongue and stood up. “Well, let’s see what’s at the bottom of these stairs, eh? Didn’t fall for nothing.”

  “We fell for nothing,” Asimi groaned, a moment later. “There’s nothing here.”

  They passed another set of locked doors. Chioni had kicked the first three open to reveal empty rooms full of moths and spiderwebs.

  “Nothing . . . nothing, nothing . . . oh, a room! Oh. A boring meeting room. Nothing, nothing . . .”

  Chioni paused as they passed, and glanced into the room. It took her eyes a moment to adjust; unlike the rest of the tunnels, this room was not pitch black. There was a soft luminescence that lit the chamber in silver, cast from light crystals strung over a table. A circular table, with several chairs arranged around it, one crystal over each chair. Papers and teacups were scattered across the table’s surface. There was a coat tossed over the back of one of the chairs . . .

  How are those light crystals still . . .

  “Princess?” Asimi’s voice broke her train of thought.

  “I’m coming,” she called, unable to linger on the room as Asimi grinned at her from a few yards down the hall.

  “Ooo, now this is what I’m talking about!” Asimi beamed, standing just outside an old armory. A room full of displayed weaponry tacked to the walls, spiderwebs clustered in the corners. “Ooh, how old do you think these are?”

  “These must be decorative,” Chioni speculated, peering closer. “We have an armory.” And the gold detailing seems too flashy to be used as a proper weapon.

  Why is it down here?

  “Okay, but consider; you never know when you might need to stab someone.”

  “That’s why I carry my sword on me. Besides, these are in no condition for battle . . . the edges have dulled.”

  “I thought most blades were enchanted to prevent that.”

  “Those enchantments guarantee a good swordswoman who treats her blade well will have a lifetime companion. Not that a sword discarded carelessly in a dark room will still hold its edge after decades, maybe centuries.”

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “A ‘lifetime companion’,” Asimi echoed, raising an eyebrow. “Does yours have a name?”

  Chioni cupped a hand over the pommel of her sword. “It is an extension of me. It doesn’t need a name.”

  “Whatever you say, princess.” She stepped inside. A click, and a volley of arrows shot over her head, materializing from holes drilled in the walls. Chioni had tensed, dropped already into a fighting stance, but not a single one grazed Asimi.

  Statheros, she’s too short for the traps.

  “Oh, it’s booby trapped!” Asimi seemed awfully happy to discover this. She ran over to ogle at a slender rapier displayed on the back wall, completely unfazed by the near miss. “I wonder what they’re protecting here. If these are just decorative.”

  “I can’t believe these traps still work,” Chioni murmured, glancing at the wall. “. . . How long has it been since someone came down to maintain them?”

  “Ooo, there’s a label,” Asimi called, pointing at a tiny plaque under the sword. “‘Pride’.”

  “They . . . named their rapier?”

  “Ahaha,” Asimi said, all too smug. “Looks like I was right. You hoighty-toity upper class folk do name your weapons.”

  “’Hoighty-toity’?”

  “Agh, it’s all swords,” she complained, twirling away. “Swords and spears. Did they ever think to spice it up a little? How about a club in here? Ooo, how about an axe?”

  “Spears are effective,” Chioni told her. “They have the reach. For most, a spear is the natural choice.” She looked back at the black rapier, its blade coated in a layer of dust. She traced a line over the metal, exposing a gleaming bit of steel. The needle-thin edge was etched in delicate patterns of gold, words in old Exrish she could barely recognize. “But a real soldier uses a sword.” Whose blade had this been? A rapier . . . not the typical longsword of the military. A noble?

  “And that’s what you are?” Asimi asked, a teasing note in her voice. “A ‘real soldier’?”

  Chioni drew her hand back. She could see her face, warped in the bit of exposed metal. The unfamiliar, muddy watercolor eyes. “That’s what I must become.”

  Asimi huffed, standing on her toes to look at a spear angled against the wall. “Well, I think axes are cooler.”

  “Only barbarians use axes.”

  “Maybe the barbarians are cooler than you,” she said with a shrug.

  Chioni frowned, unreasonably miffed.

  Asimi turned to her and laughed. “You should see your face,” she giggled. “All scrunched up. I’m joking, princess. I’m sure you’re also cool. The barbarians are just cooler. I mean, the sense of style –“

  Chioni tugged her collar up and cleared her throat. “Yes, well – the more pressing issue, in the sense that –” She was blabbering. And overheating. Statheros’ sake. She cut herself off and asked simply, “Who put these here?”

  “Who knows?”

  “I should.”

  Asimi glanced at her, eyes gleaming in the dark. “Because you know everything?”

  “About my palace, at least. About my history.”

  “History gets lost,” she said, turning back to the wall of weapons.

  “No,” Chioni insisted. “No, history gets recorded. It should be recorded.”

  “I mean, who knows if those dusty old dead people were telling the truth to begin with? Imagine if Statheros —”

  “Stop,” she warned, her own voice biting in her ears. She turned away from the sword. “. . . I can’t deal with this right now.”

  Asimi scoffed. “What, the possibility that your ancestors might not have been perfect? I mean, hey, Statheros does sound cool! In all the history books written by his devout worshippers. Ever heard of a flawed narrator?”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she snapped. “Tesseran rulers have always been gracious and loyal.”

  Asimi rolled her eyes and put up her hands in surrender. “Sure, whatever. Let’s get out of here.”

  Silence, as they wandered through more hallways, more twisting paths, more dark corridors.

  Chioni felt a pit form in her throat. She had done nothing wrong, and yet . . .

  “That wasn’t as exciting as I thought it would be,” Asimi said, finally, breaking the silence. “There’s literally nothing to do here.”

  “You can’t think of anything?” Chioni asked. “Asimi Dilitirio, I thought you claimed you could make anything entertaining.”

  “Well . . . we could start a fire.”

  “Is that the first thing you think of? Arson?”

  “What do you think of, huh?”

  Explosives. “. . . Reasonable alternatives.”

  “Suure, Chioni, suuure.”

  A quiet laugh escaped her, and Asimi laughed in response.

  “. . . You called me by my name,” she realized, then hit herself internally for it. What a ridiculous comment to make.

  “You’re not wearing your coat,” Asimi said, somewhere to her left. She’d disappeared into the dark again — a bit unnerving, how their only light source flickered on and off with her moods, letting her slip away. “It’s harder to remember your title.”

  A joke, a gibe, meant to rile her up. Chioni should’ve been defensive — why did she feel almost a bit pleased? Her ‘title’ was a thing of pride — her purpose, given to her by generations of monarchs, the birthright for an empire. The opportunity to serve.

  But she liked the way Asimi said her name; liked the way it left her tongue, with a slight lift, like a bird taking flight. Liked knowing she knew it.

  By the time they emerged back into the library, the sun had painted the sky magenta in anticipation of its rise. Asimi slid the shelf shut until they heard a quiet click — a latch sliding in place, preventing accidental entry.

  Gold light flooded through the windows as they entered the hallway, and Chioni noticed at once how disheveled she was. Mud staining the hem of her dress, her feet calloused and her slippers nowhere to be seen. The guilt was waiting for her, just beyond the giddy haze. She reached into her pocket for her hairpins —

  “Hang on,” Asimi said. “Before I go —” She reached up, undid the silver ribbon the Freedom Stone had taken as its nest. The stone hovered there for a moment, as if unsure of its place now, before drifting closer to her skull.

  “What are you —”

  She took the end of Chioni’s loose braid, deft fingers tying the ribbon into a bow. “There,” she said, satisfied with her own work. “Makes you look a bit more like a teen, and a little less like a soldier.” She smiled, then waved a cheery goodbye and disappeared around the corner.

  Chioni watched her dark braids disappear, fingers creeping up to the bow. It doesn’t mean anything. Just another veiled insult.

  Why was her heart beating so fast?

  “Princess!”

  She flinched, looked over and found her advisor standing directly in front of her. How had she not noticed? She yanked the ribbon off and crumpled it in her fist, put her hands behind her back.

  “We were searching for you the entire night,” he stressed, his mustache more oiled than usual. “Lady Clarity was beside herself with concern.”

  Chioni bit back a comment. She couldn’t imagine Lady Clarity expressing an emotion more intense than vague appreciation.

  But the guilt turned the resentment in a different direction; she'd known this would happen, she'd argued for it, she should have gone back inside, and she knew it. Dilitirio — she couldn't believe she'd let her sabotage her like that.

  ". . . I'm sorry," she said. She hated how she sounded like some meek five-year-old, apologizing for some petty crime. "Please accept my apologies," she amended. "It will not happen again."

  "Clean up," he ordered, turning away. He stroked his curled mustache with his thumb and index finger. "She'll have an audience with you today, to make up for your absence yesterday. Training begins today, as well."

  "Today —" She glanced out the window, the reality of the sunlight slamming into her.

  "Yes, your grace," he responded. "Today. May I take this moment to remind you that you have yet to submit any of the paperwork from spring? It's nearly winter.” He rattled on about all the duties she’d neglected — the forms she’d pushed off filling, the meetings she’d missed.

  He’d begun hovering over her as soon as the first reports of the queen’s ailing health had reached them. He’d been involved before, working with the queen to determine her activities and schedule, but he’d never been so constantly present until then.

  She remembered it down to the day, the hour: Loch 18th, in 293 P.F., three minutes past midnight.

  She had been in the orchards, studying the moons. It had been a rare night, with four new moons and two whole ones, making it seem as though only two moons existed to begin with. A unique pattern astrologists had been waiting on for a century. To make things even more exceptional, Eru and Qua had been the moons displaying their full light; the moon with the shortest cycle and the moon with the longest.

  She had been watching the sky with a sense of glee; to be here for such a historic moment, a precious astronomical event, that astronomers had been waiting on for decades. The world had seemed so stunning, then — so full of tiny miracles, this pattern of two moons in the sky, one large and glowing, the other smaller, like a drop of milk.

  She had returned to the palace. Returned to frantic whispers as the servants gossiped among themselves. Returned to rushed safety measures, returned to plans for a gate around the palace, for doubled security, for an investigation into every enchanter in the kingdom. Returned to the scholars and advisors now looking at her with a new gleam in their eyes, returned to the suddenly relevant title of ‘heir to the throne’, returned to Queen Dynami’s personal attendant stopping in front of her and asking her to come with.

  “The queen appears to be ill,” the attendant had informed her.

  That didn’t make sense. Queens never got ill. Especially not Queen Dynami. She was terrifying; Chioni couldn’t fathom how any disease could be stupid enough to touch her.

  “The Service Stone —” Chioni had begun.

  The attendant had led her around to the Hall of Portraits. “Yes. It is puzzling. The advisors, the Council . . . they are attempting to find a reason. Thus far, the belief is that the queen was cursed.”

  “Cursed? No, the stone —”

  “She will most likely recover,” the attendant had continued, cutting her off. “She is our Indomitable Queen.”

  “Of course.” That wasn’t even a question. Queen Dynami would never die — that wasn’t a worry. For anyone. The worry was how strange all of this was. “But she’s never been sick. Or cursed.” Always perfect. Always sharp, focused, and fearsome.

  “Even so,” the attendant had said. She had stopped, in front of the queen’s portrait. Chioni’s empty frame hadn’t been made yet. “The advisors will be watching you. I will be watching you, as will the nobles. In the slim chance that something does happen . . . you will be prepared.”

  It wasn’t a ‘you will need to be prepared’. It wasn’t a piece of advice, but a command.

  “I will,” she’d responded, the chill of the palace suddenly freezing against her skin. The moons had suddenly seemed a million worlds away. Maybe they had always been that far; out there in space, too distant to ever reach. Maybe she had always admired something impossible to grasp.

  The attendant had stopped in front of the queen’s old study, and opened the door. The advisors had stood inside, a circle of solemn faces looking down at her with a strange mix of enthusiasm and pity. And their leader, handpicked by Queen Dynami herself — Antinous, the man who’d found her when the queen had died on Empyrea 5th, who’d handed her the forms for the funeral.

  She’d taken those forms down to the pebbly shore beneath the palace cliffs. The waters had been too violent for her to see her own reflection. It wasn’t hers anymore.

  Those papers had been signed, and more had been given to her, an endless flood of paperwork. Some part of her had expected the kingdom to collapse after the queen’s death, expected the ground to split in pieces. But the only thing that happened was work. Sunlight still filled the windows, and her signatures now filled the forms. How curious, how mundane her grief was. How silent. She hid the cracks she left in the floor, hid broken shards of furniture. And all the while he hovered there, her advisor.

  He was still rambling. She tried her best to pay attention. “You have a meeting with General Kryo at dawn, to discuss the Synoron border problem — I believe we should attack now; however skilled Lord Evgenis may be with his . . . diplomatic tactics, he values peace over Tesseran prosperity,” he was saying. “Then, after that, I've promised your time to Lady Clarity, again, to repair the shameful amount of damage you've done. I suggest you finish your paperwork at night, and submit it to me tomorrow morning."

  Her piles upon piles of paperwork. She thought of it all and cringed.

  "Clean up," he repeated, tossing her the slippers she’d discarded. "Hurry, now. I'm to escort you to your first meeting."

  She looked away as she shoved her feet back inside, wincing as her blistered toes squeezed back into the conforming spaces. She realized again how cold she was, with her exposed arms, without her jacket. She grit her teeth and started hobbling back to her room.

  "Chin up," her advisor reminded. "Straighten that back, sir."

  "I'll find the meeting on my own," she said, her voice rough. Two more weeks until this was history; two more weeks until Ash’s new schedule took effect. “You can go to sleep.” She’d disappeared an entire night — the longest she’d gone without his voice in her head. It echoed against her skull now, mixed with a dozen others, clamoring for her attention. The Council of Nobles, her advisors, the queen. And underneath it all, Asimi’s laughter, the curve of her smile, the way she said her name. A bird, she thought, faintly. Taking flight.

  He seemed to sigh in relief. "Well, I suppose you leave me no choice but to follow your orders. Do heed my other advice."

  "Of course," she muttered. Her head ached, a thousand pounds heavier than usual. She passed the queen’s portrait, unable to contain her guilt. Eight months after her death, and Chioni was already neglecting the responsibilities she’d left her. Already forgetting the warning she’d been given. She muttered a quiet apology and a prayer to Statheros.

  But when she reached her room, she smoothed the ribbon out in her lap. Opened her favorite book — Selini Foinix’s Six Moons, slipped it inside. Put it back on the shelf, sat back and stared at the dark blue spine with a pit in her stomach and a hum in her chest.