My Beloved Queen

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

xv. the princess and the duchess

sage
// her eyes are warm, but her gaze is jaded. her steps are sure, but her feet are rooted to the earth. lost to her is the path to the stars, but she has no need for them here, on the ground.

————

Idryla and her two children had arrived yesterday, just as her letter had foretold. The sky had heralded her advent in robes of sapphire and cotton, and the sun had celebrated with a bright fervor ten times as brilliant as any man-made fire.

The joy had been immediate: a warm-colored embrace, soft and yet firm, and greetings fraught with inquiries that spilled out from hearts too light to be kept bound to so tight and cramped a chest. Delight had been strong and unyielding, and even your mother, whose face was still colored by the bitterness of two weeks past, could not fight the pull of a bright and satisfied smile.

Yet time had been no ally to the soft and the welcoming, and before bellies starved of physical affection could have been properly filled, the night had devoured the day and conquered the sky. But now day had come again, and the sitting room was awash in the sun's warm, inviting colors—flush with all the pleasantries of sympathetic daylight. The scent of tea hung in the air and wound itself about yours and Idryla's bodies, and your beloved mask sat on the table at your side, just beside your brimming cup. Well within reach, just as it should be when not decorating your lips—cupping your cheeks and brightening your eyes.

The taste of hot tea coated the flesh of your tongue and dripped from the skin of your teeth, and the heat spread into your lips and softened the curve of your mouth until the corners of a soft smile pressed at the bottoms of your eyes. But behind the warmth lurked a cold thought—a dark worry, coiling and uncoiling on itself, waiting patiently in the shadows just out of the sun's reach.

"Mmn."

The hum fell, soft and delighted, from your sister's lips, and your eyes moved to find hers. Though she'd lifted her cup to her mouth, you could still spy the corners of her smile—the edges of her lips, pressing up into the apples of her cheeks. A warm satisfaction had softened the planes of her familiar face, but her eyes were closed, blind to your peering gaze.

"Hmn?" you prompted her lightly. Sunlight flooded the room in soft lines of pale yellow and gold, warming your hands and cheeks and casting an inviting glow upon your sister's face.

When her eyes opened, they did so slowly—languidly, as though it took all the effort in the world to pry her eyelids apart—but then her gaze found yours, and whatever frown impatience could have forged crumbled beneath the familiar weight of her stare.

"Alaimoran tea—how I've missed it." She spoke slowly, and when she lowered the cup from her lips, her thoughts curled clear and warm off her tongue. "Imports simply aren't the same." Her movements were graceful, delicate, and after setting the cup down upon the porcelain saucer nearest her, a short, soft sigh fell from her lips. "Their taste is always much too sour."

You inclined your head, and a question rose to your smiling lips. "Why did you never write of such longing, Lia?" you inquired lightly, your gaze never straying from hers. "I would have had some sent to you."

"Tea is such an insignificant worry, dear; the thought had never crossed my mind." Idryla brought her hands to her lap and folded them there neatly, her movements as refined and noble as her blood; she sat with dignity and poise, and every breath that fell from her lips was one of grace and elegance. "But now one does." She leaned forward then in her seat, the edges of her smile moving to press at the corners of her eyes. "Marriage!"