I shot her a look. “Just as you know that Farrin won’t care whether you look exactly the same as you did. She’ll be overjoyed to see you. Besides, we have a war to fight, and your presence would be helpful.”
For a moment, Ankaret stared hard at me. Then her shoulders relaxed, and she inclined her head.
“When you are healthy enough to join them in their meetings,” she said quietly, “I will come with you.”
That seemed fair. I nodded at her and resumed my pacing. Moving was painful, but it felt good too. Useful. I’d just begun to consider marching out of the room and demanding that Welma bring me to the council meeting when the door opened.
Gareth entered looking grave and contemplative, but when he glanced past me, his eyes widened. He drew in a sharp breath and quickly shut the door behind him.
“Ankaret?” he whispered. His eyes cut to me, then back to her. “She’s— You’realive.”
She returned his stare proudly. “Mara found me. She called to me, and her power pulled me back from where I had gone.”
He looked astonished. “And where was that?”
“A place beyond life and death. A place without time.”
“The Great Dominion,” Gareth whispered.
“As it is called here, yes.”
Gareth’s eyes sparkled with curiosity, but he drew a long breath and visibly reined himself in. “I should very much like to discuss this with you someday,” he said evenly.
“Yes, I am certain you would,” Ankaret said, amused.
“But…” Gareth looked between us once more. “Why have you not shown yourself to us? You’ve been here with Mara all this time?”
“She wanted to wait for the right moment,” I said carefully, glancing at Ankaret. “It will be a startling revelation, as you might imagine.”
“And the right moment is now.” Ankaret held her arms stiffly at her sides, her hands in fists. “Mara’s heartbeat is steady, her gait uneven but strong. She is ready, and so am I.”
***
Welma turned white at the sight of Ankaret, but she got hold of herself quickly and led us all to the council room through hallways used by the household staff. They were blessedly empty, except for a young kitchen boy who burst into tears at the sight of his late queen, but a stern word from Welma and Ankaret’s gentle hand on his shoulder quieted him. He swore passionately that he would not speak a word to anyone about what he had seen. The look he gave Ankaret as we moved past him was one of pure, proud adoration.
Still, the incident made me nervy. As we neared the council room, I braced myself for an outcry. Gareth had gone ahead of us to warn Talan and Ryder that something extraordinary was about to happen and that should the council members or the generals or the guards standing outside the main doors react poorly, they were to promptly set them straight by whatever means necessary.
But I needn’t have worried. The moment we stepped past Welma through the servant’s door, a stunned silence swept through the room. Farrin’s chief advisor, Thirsk, put a hand to his heart. Gemma sat frozen at Talan’s side, struck speechless for perhaps only the fourth time in her life.
And Farrin, who had been standing near a window, fiddling with the end of her braid and looking troubled, turned to us with a look of slight annoyance on her face—that is, until she saw Ankaret, and then she let out a sound so anguished that I felt compelled to banish everyone else from the room. She rushed toward us, her face crumpling,and didn’t hesitate for an instant before pulling Ankaret into a fierce embrace.
“I searched for you,” she said, sobbing. “I was starting to think it was hopeless, that I’d imagined what you said, or that there was a secret somewhere that I wasn’t clever enough to see, or—”
She broke off, no longer able to speak, and shook her head.
Ankaret put her arms around Farrin with excruciating care, as if afraid that moving too quickly might undo all of this, or in disbelief that it was happening at all.
“My dearest friend,” she said at last, her voice clear and low, like some huge gentle bell. Fire flickered in her hair, and the love on her face was so overwhelming that I had to look away.
“Back to your notes, everyone,” Gareth said briskly, shooing his hands at the others in the room. He sat in an empty chair and began straightening a messy stack of papers. “There’s much to discuss, and I believe lunch will be here soon.”
For a moment I could only stare at him, frozen with gratitude. Then he took off his glasses and quickly wiped his eyes with his sleeve, and I felt suddenly and unbearably fond of him—his glasses, his quick thinking, his love for my sister. I took the empty chair beside him, found his hand under the table, and gently pressed my thumb into his palm.Thank you.
Chapter 33
After lunch, Ankaret requested the room, and though her advisors and generals were reluctant to leave, they could hardly disobey. Her return was miraculous, a sign that perhaps the tides of war would shift in our favor.
Soon the seven of us were alone. I faced the others, relieved and almost giddy.Finallymy body was allowing me to do something besides lie abed in pain.
