"Into their full form?"
"Yes."
"At what age?"
"It varies."
Jessamy's voice follows easily. "It is one of the more foundational traditions here. I am surprised that was not explained to you."
Colsar answers without hesitation. "Then I should have explained it."
"Then I will learn it now," I say, my voice remaining even.
"It is not taught directly," Colsar continues. "It is observed. Prepared for. The body knows what to do before the mind does."
"It is usually something learned very early," Jessamy adds. "Among those raised for it."
The Sovereign's attention shifts briefly between us and then returns to the discussion. Trade routes. Supply lines. Names I do not know and places I have never seen. Jessamy moves within the conversation without pause, referencing last winter and the western line and the second incursion as though these are rooms she has lived in for years.
Perhaps she has. That is its own thing to sit with. I hate that she and Colsar have a past. He told me that it was nothing compared to what we have. Yet, somehow in watching her confidence and ease something in me stirs.
In Alarna, I had finally gained confidence. Learned to wield my power. Yet tonight, in this room, I feel small and insignificant. I feel uneducated. I do not feel like a queen at all. I had come here to speak of Veynar. The words do not come. There is no opening for them and I am not certain I would take it if there were.
I reach for the food though I do not taste it, trying not to think of Jessamy in my husband’s chambers on our wedding night. Colsar had assured me nothing had happened, but watching her now the image burns in my mind as though it happened last night.
Colsar does not look at me again in full. The distance between us is not physical. It is something quieter, something that has everything to do with where I entered into this and where they were already standing when I arrived.
By the time the meal ends I am no longer hungry. My dress is damp, my breasts leaking through the fabric. It is not time for the twins to feed, I do not know why my body is behaving this way. I do not know my body. I do not know why anything is the way it is.
I rush to rise when the Sovereign does, not wanting to draw attention to the wetness now seeping into the front of my dress. He gives me a small nod as he passes. The Duke follows, inclining his head toward me once more before he goes. Jessamy stands more slowly and her eyes find mine for a brief moment, something moving through them that I recognize because I have seen it before, dressed differently but carrying the same intent as the last time she stood close enough to make certain I understood exactly where I stood.
"My queen," she says.
The title is correct. The tone is not.
Then she turns back to Colsar, saying something low that I do not hear, and I do not stay to listen. I leave the hall the same way I entered it. Quiet. Controlled. The mask holding because it has to.
The corridors feel different on the walk back, clearer in a way that is not entirely comfortable. Jessamy’s insults. My father’s disrespect. Mysin. Yvara. I have always allowed myself to be made to feel small. In many ways it is a comfort to me. But small got me stabbed, humiliated, and almost killed. And a queen cannot be small.
I understand something now that I did not before. This kingdom may be mine by right. But I do not yet move within it the way they do. I realize too, that I do not know much of Shalvar’s customs. Yet, these are now my children’s origins. And Ari is siakar. I only know what Colsar has told me. That will need to change.
And I will not wait for anyone to teach me.
CHAPTER 57
Porraya
The library is empty when I enter. I had not meant to come here, but I do not turn back. The doors close behind me. I move through the shelves slowly, my hand drifting along the spines until something familiar appears.
Siakar. Kyvarin. Lineage. Transition.
I stop and pull one free, then another, and carry them to the table.
The silence holds as I open the first page, the rest of the room falling away as the words begin to take hold.
The night of transition. He had said it without pause. She had not needed to think at all.
I turn the page.
