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He took another sip of wine and hoped she was.

His father looked at him. Then he turned back to his food and the conversation moved elsewhere and Tamal ate what was in front of him and said what was required and sat in the room until he was permitted to leave it.

The brothel was two streets from the palace, which his father had always found convenient and never acknowledged.

Tamal walked there with the sound still faintly ringing in his head. It faded eventually. It always faded.

He pushed through the door and the warmth of the place came at him all at once, candles and wine and the low sound of music from somewhere above. The woman at the entrance looked at him and stepped aside. He was known here. He had been known here since his eighteenth origin day.

He walked through the main room without stopping.

His thoughts returned to Ivanoxa. He had known for some time that she was in Morrath, strengthening herself. He had known for longer than that what she was. She had never said so but she had never needed to. She had always been a liar but a consistent one, which in his experience was almost as useful as honesty.

He hoped she was not getting in Dali's way.

A woman touched his arm as he passed. Dark hair. He kept moving.

He thought about the cottage in Gyarin. The one along the northern shoreline with the water audible from every room. He had furnished it himself. The small room at the back that caught the light, because Maridale had said once without looking at him that morning light was the best kind to wake up in.

The nursery had been ready.

He did not say that aloud. He did not intend to.

In truth he had always known. His father would have killed her where she stood the moment he found out. He would have smiled while he did it and the smile would have been the handsome one. That was simply who his father was. But that did not change what Nox had allowed to happen. She had stood in that room with her power and done nothing and his child had died and Dali had swallowed whatever was left of Maridale after that and he had spent every year since watching Maridale grow quieter and weaker and less certain until a year ago when something had shifted and sharpened and she had walked into Rathmor Palace as a maidservant with a plan.

She had been so certain then.

Another woman appeared at the top of the stairs. He looked up.

Golden hair. Not the same shade. Close enough that something in his chest did something he did not acknowledge. He went up.

He thought of Jularin briefly as he followed her down the corridor. He would tell Nox the next time he saw her that their mother was dead. He had meant to tell her sooner. It had simply slipped his mind.

The woman opened a door and looked at him over her shoulder and he followed her inside.

The plan was clean. Dali would get the amulet. The moment Dali let her guard down Maridale would take it and activate it. Then Dali would be gone and Maridale would be whole and permanent and they could live whatever life his father permitted them to live until Nox one day attempted to kill him and perhaps won.

Unlikely, but her odds were better than his, he had to admit.

That was always the problem. His father. The thing at the end of every plan like a wall you had not noticed until you were already running toward it.

Nox had been the better chance. Feeder power. The ability to compel. If anyone was going to rid the world of the King of Yorali it should have been her. But she had not done it. She had had years and she had not done it, which told him something about how this ended.

The woman sat on the edge of the bed and looked at him. Now, close up, he could tell her hair was more of a honey blond than golden. Good enough, he thought to himself. Golden hair falling over one shoulder. She smiled.

He looked at her.

Then he crossed the room and sat beside her and did not look at her face again.

CHAPTER 39

The Amulet

He was already in the hut when I arrived.

The vial was on the table. I sat down and picked it up and drank it without being asked. He noticed and said nothing.

"Tell me about the amulet," I said. "The one your sister is so obsessed with. And why."