Voser's widow didn't cry. She was a tall, thin woman who served us tea in her good cups and asked precise questions aboutthe pension, the insurance, and whether her boys could continue attending school. I answered every one of her questions, and I promised her more than she had asked for. She thanked me with a composure that was worse than weeping.
I almost let myself believe she was bearing it well.
Then, at the door, she asked me to describe exactly where on the mountain her husband had fallen, because she wanted to know what the last thing he saw had been.
I told her. It was the only thing she had asked for that I could give without paying for it, so I gave it.
Then we drove to Moran's house, and I learned that there were worse things than a widow who doesn't cry.
His wife opened the door with a baby on her hip and three more children orbiting her legs who were too young to understand why their mother was weeping.
"Your Highness." She tried to curtsy, and I caught her elbow before she could.
"Please don't. May I come in?"
She stepped back to let me through. Ursa waited by the door.
There was nowhere to sit but the kitchen table, so I took a chair, and the woman lowered herself into the one across from me, the baby drowsing against her shoulder.
Her chin trembled. "He was proud to be chosen, Your Highness. A royal commission. He wouldn't stop telling everyone who'd listen."
"He was one of the best men on the crew. Everyone liked him." I made myself hold her gaze for the part that mattered. "I take full responsibility for your husband's death. I pushed into a dangerous terrain, past where it was considered safe. The avalanche wasn't my doing, and it wasn't his or the crew's either, but we were in a vulnerable spot because of my decision."
She stared at me, the cup forgotten in her hand. Whatever she had braced herself to hear me say, it had not been that.
"They only told me it was an accident," she said.
"It was, but it might have been prevented if I hadn't insisted on us climbing so high."
For a moment she said nothing. The baby stirred and settled.
"I don't know how we'll manage," she finally said, very quietly, as if she were admitting it to herself. "We have no other source of income."
"You'll never have to worry about that. This I can promise." I leaned toward her. "The expedition was insured, and that payment alone will keep this house and feed your children. But I'll take care of all the rest. You and your children will want for nothing."
"Your Highness?—"
"I'll cover their tuition through university, and I will provide well-paying jobs for them once they graduate. Everything you and your husband ever wished for your children's future will be supplied. You have my word."
Everything except the love of their father, but that wasn't something I could give them. That was lost forever.
"Thank you." Sella looked down at the sleeping baby, and then she surprised me by reaching across the table and covering my hand with her free one.
"It wasn't your fault, Your Highness. It was Elurion's will. Us mortals do not have dominion over destiny."
She was comforting me. The woman I had widowed was trying to assuage my guilt, and it devastated me worse than any accusation could have.
That was when the small girl slipped her hand into my other one.
She couldn't have been more than three, with her father's dark curls and a wooden horse clutched in her free fist. She looked up at me with the frank, fearless curiosity of the young.
"Are you the princess?"
"Yes."
"You go up the mountain." She said it in the way small children state facts, certain and uncomplicated. "My daddy goes up the mountain too. When is he coming home?"
Sella pressed her knuckles to her mouth.
