She nodded once.
“They are answers beginning to hold shape,” she said. “The formal is meant to force one before the other two become undeniable.”
“Why does that frighten them so much?”
“They need one answer because one answer can be owned.”
“And three?”
“Three means no one man can claim you.”
My fingers tightened around the mirror.
“That’s the threat?”
“Control,” Juno said. “Not romance. Not scandal. Control.”
I looked down at the faint lines.
“One man makes me safer.”
“One man makes you easier to own.”
“And three?”
“Three makes you harder to own.”
“And if the other two become undeniable?”
“Then the Council loses the round. For now.”
I was thinking about my mother, who had made it out of Zenith Hall, but who the Council had still caught up with, when the basin brightened.
Words formed across the surface.
Astra Verita. Report to Room 114 for formal preparation.
The letters held for three breaths, then dissolved.
Juno stayed very still.
“This is your basin,” I said.
Her hand closed around the rim.
“Yes.”
“Could they always send a summons here?”
Juno looked at the water.
“Not that I was aware of.”
Then she looked at me.
“Go,” she said.
“That sounded like an order.”
