I reach for a strawberry and set it on my plate, then add a biscuit and some jam and take a bite before setting it back on my plate. The others begin to serve themselves.
“I know things are different in Iskvaland,” Marian says as she reaches for a slice of bread. “You’ll learn how it works around here, and it won’t feel so different soon. I’m sorry you couldn’t bring any of your ladies. It must have been hard to leave them behind.”
“It was.” I think of my best friend Anya. I left her a letter under her pillow saying goodbye. I knew if I saw her in person, she’d have talked me out of it. She’ll never forgive me for agreeing to this. I hope I will see her again someday, but a lot of things will have to go perfectly for that to be a possibility.
“You said everyone here is from a noble house?” I ask.
“Are your ladies not nobles?” a younger woman with auburn hair asks. Then, she covers her mouth with her hand and looks over at Marian with wide eyes.
“Do I need to give you permission to talk?” I ask.
She nods.
“Please, please talk. All of you. You never need my permission.”
The ladies freeze, then look around at each other, and I swear I have not heard them this quiet once.
“That’s not really how it works around here,” Marian says.
“Can it, though? In my rooms at least?” I smile at them. “It would help make me less homesick.”
The others look to Marian, seeking her approval. I notice how young they are compared to her. Marian is probably in her late thirties. The others in the room are closer to my age or younger. At twenty-three, I am nearly the same age as the real princess was. She would have been twenty-three at the winter solstice this year.
“In the princess’s rooms, we will do as she wishes but know that as she grows more used to our customs, she may change her mind,” Marian says.
The others beam, and the woman who spoke to me looks over expectantly. “Can you tell us about your court? What was it like? What is Iskvaland like?”
“What are the men like?” a brunette with tight curls asks. Her cheeks turn bright pink, and the others around the table laugh.
I don’t know how Iskvalandian men differ from those in the empire, but I figure they are likely similar in how they behave. I frown, then catch myself. The ladies are watching me expectantly. “They’re not much different from here. Though, they dress better.”
“Like your dress yesterday. All that color,” someone says wistfully.
“I miss color,” someone adds.
“Never anything besides black, white, and gray here?” I ask.
“They take their house colors far too seriously,” someone says.
I continue to converse with them and ask them their names and questions about their lives. Listening to them talk about what they enjoy and why their families sent them to court helps me understand more about the way things work around here.
There are rules that aren’t officially recorded anywhere. About whom to talk to and who to avoid. They have guidance about which dances to sit out and tips on how to get past the legionnaires who guard the doors so you can get some freshair at the stuffy official events. They even share stories about sneaking into the city, but Marian shuts them down before I get too much information.
“Have any of you ever met the emperor?” I take a bite of my biscuit.
The room goes silent again.
I swallow. “Should I not ask about him?”
“It’s just that nobody really does,” Antonia, the brunette with the tight curls, says. “At least not publicly.”
“My father says he’s been away from the empire on a quest for the gods, but we’re not supposed to know.” Katherine stabs a mushroom with her fork.
“That’s ridiculous,” Genevieve says. “He was already anointed by the gods; he doesn’t need to curry any more favor by going on a quest for them.”
“Nobody’s seen him in a long while,” Marian says. “Sometimes, the crown prince will relay messages from him, but other than that, he sees very few visitors.”
“Why?” I ask. “Is he sick?”
