She laughs. “Everyone has their games, little lamb. The Kaiser plays them in the palace, the Theyn plays them on the battlefield, Søren plays them on his ships. Even your friend plays them—quite well, too.”

For a heart-stopping second, I think she means Blaise, but it’s Crescentia she’s talking about.

“She’ll make a beautiful prinzessin,” I say.

“That’s all a prinzessin has to be,” the Kaiserin says with a scoff. “No one expects more from them than beauty and grace. You know all about that, though. You’ve been playing that part since you were a child. The pretty little Ash Princess with her sad eyes and broken spirit. Or maybe not so broken.”

The Kaiserin’s words send a jolt through me that I try to ignore. I pretend to misunderstand them. “The Kaiser was kind to let me keep my title,” I say.

She laughs. “The Kaiser is many things, but we both know kind is not one of them.” When she takes my hand, her touch is ice cold. There is little more to her than bones and thin skin. “He always wins his games. That is why he is the Kaiser.”

Because he cheats, I want to say, but that isn’t the right response. There isn’t one, but she seems to know that.

“Surviving is enough, little lamb.”

She presses a chilled kiss to my forehead before walking back into the crush of courtiers, her lips black with ash.

THOUGH THE MASKENTANZ STRETCHES ON until the eastern sky is bleeding pastels and the moon is rapidly fading in the west, I spend the rest of it clinging to the edges of the room, hoping to avoid the Kaiser’s gaze. I’m not sure whether it’s the energy from the ball itself or the Kaiser’s threat hanging over my head, but sleep feels miles away, even when my body grows heavy and lethargic. When the last guests begin to file out through the main entrance, I reluctantly follow, ready to turn in for what I’m sure will be a restless couple of hours in bed, but when I reach the doors, Cress is waiting, holding two steaming mugs of spiced honey coffee.

Relief seeps through me at the sight of her, my friend, but it’s quickly quashed by the sharp memory of the poison hidden in my room and what I’m meant to do with it. My conversation with Blaise echoes in my mind, but I push it aside.

“The night is young,” she tells me with a grin, passing one mug to me.

I thank her and take a small sip. In the Astrean tradition, the coffee has been mixed with honey, cinnamon, and milk. It’s too sweet for most Kalovaxians, but it’s the way Crescentia always orders it. Not for the first time, I wonder whether it’s because she has a sweet tooth or because she understands how much the small gesture means to me.

The coffee tastes like my mother’s breath when she kissed me good morning, and the memory soothes me and breaks me all over again.

Crescentia links her arm with mine and steers me not through the crowded entrance hall, but through a smaller one that shoots off to the side. Having her so close and knowing what I’m expected to do feels like a splinter in my heart, sharp and nagging, no matter how I try to ignore it.

“I should go to bed, Cress,” I tell her. “I’m exhausted.”

“That’s what the coffee’s for,” she says cheerfully, squeezing my arm. “We hardly had a chance to talk the entire night, Thora.”

“I know. You were such a wonderful hostess and I didn’t want to steal you away. But we’ll talk tomorrow, I promise.”

Crescentia glances sideways at me as we walk, though she doesn’t let go of my arm.

“Are you angry with me?” she asks after a long moment of quiet. She sounds wounded and, despite myself, my heart lurches.

“No,” I say with a laugh. “Of course I’m not.”

“You’ve been avoiding me,” she insists. “This week. Tonight. Now, even.”

“I told you, I was sick.” The words sound hollow even to me.

“Just one hour, Thora. Please.”

She sounds so hurt that my soul cracks and I’m tempted to say yes. And why shouldn’t I say yes? What’s waiting for me back in my room? Another argument with Blaise and Artemisia, with Heron trying to play the mediator? And Blaise will want to talk about the Kaiser, what he saw, and I can’t do that. I shudder thinking of the Kaiser’s hand on me, his breath against my skin.

If Blaise asks me about it, I will fall apart and I will lose what little respect they have for me.

Crescentia is easier because being around her means becoming Thora, and Thora doesn’t think about things too much. Right now, Thora feels like a blessing.

“All right. I’ll stay up a little longer.” I hesitate for a breath. “I’ve missed you, Cress.”

She beams at me, almost glowing with her own light in the dim hallway. “I’ve missed you, too,” she says before pushing a door open with her shoulder.

I realize her intended destination just as the brisk early-morning air hits me. The gray garden. It could never be as beautiful as it was under my mother’s care, but in this light there’s something eerily lovely about it. It’s a ghost of a place, filled with ghosts of its own. Skeleton fingers of the bald tree branches stretch out high overhead, casting smoky shadows against the stone in the dawn light.

Next to me, Cress wrinkles her nose in distaste as she looks around at the garden. It isn’t her sort of place. She prefers color and music and crowds and life, but still, when her eyes find mine, she smiles. Another thing she does for me, because she knows what this place means to me. Because she also knows what it is to lose a mother.

The realization causes another stone of guilt to fall into my already heavy gut.

“It’s because of the luncheon, isn’t it?” she asks me. “I made you wear that hideous dress and then I acted so jealous when you spoke with the Prinz. I shouldn’t have acted that way. It was…unbecoming. I’m sorry.”

The apology takes me by surprise. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard Cress apologize to anyone before, at least not genuinely. Not when it wasn’t simply a way to get what she wants. But there’s no mistaking the regret in her voice now. I smile and shake my head.

“Nothing you do could ever be unbecoming, Cress. I promise, I’m not angry with you.” She doesn’t look convinced, so I give her arm a squeeze and look her straight in the eye when I lie, hoping that will make it seem true. “I’m not interested in the Prinz. I promise you that.”

She bites her lip and looks down at her coffee. “Maybe not. But he likes you.”

I force a laugh, as if the idea were ridiculous. “As a friend,” I tell her, surprised by how smoothly the lie rolls off my tongue. I nearly believe it myself, even with the fresh memory of Søren’s mouth against mine. “Of course a boy considering marriage with a girl will seek out the friendship of her closest friend. When we talk, it’s always about you.”