The System tucked itself closer to her shoulder, wings folding neat, enormous eyes fixed on the entrance ahead. Its presence was warm and still and had been with her since the beginning — through the poison and the episodes and the politics and the frog reports — and showed up for every single thing she did regardless of how many tis she told it the working list took priority.
Four sentences per day for ninety-two days.
It had stayed anyway.
She filed that in the left drawer too.
Sowhere next to Bernard’s progress reports.
"Open the doors," Elara said.
Ken signaled.
The throne room doors swung wide.
She walked in.
The System flew at her shoulder.
Ti to work.
The eting went as usual ....
**Location:** Elara’s Office, Next Morning — Before the Second Consort Arrived
***
The tea was wrong.
Not wrong in any way Elara could specifically articulate — it was the correct temperature, the correct blend, sitting in the correct position on the corner of her desk where Demorti always placed it. Everything about it was technically right.
She drank half of it anyway and pushed it aside.
Demorti noticed. She could tell by the way he didn’t say anything, which was sohow louder than if he had.
"The tea is fine," she said.
"Of course, Your Highness," he said.
"I’m just not—" She stopped. "It’s fine."
Demorti made a small sound that communicated *I believe you completely* in a tone that ant the opposite, and went back to his correspondence stack.
Elara looked at the working list.
Seventeen items, two crossed off, three with progress notation. The second consort was due at first bell, which was in approximately twenty minutes. Liam had sent his overnight report at dawn — the secretary had made one movent at the third hour, a brief visit to a location in the east administrative corridor that Liam was cross-referencing against the room assignnt records. Nothing yet that constituted a reportable contact, but the movent itself was information.
She was reading the report for the second ti when the door opened and Ken ca in, which was unusual because Ken’s rotation didn’t start until the second bell and he generally used the gap between rotations to eat sothing, which she’d had to formally suggest he do because she’d noticed he wasn’t.
She looked up.
Ken was carrying a small cloth package.
He set it on the corner of the desk — not where the tea was, the other corner — with a brief precise movent, then straightened and clasped his hands behind his back.
"What is that," Elara said.
"Breakfast," Ken said. "Your Highness."
Elara looked at the package.
"I ate this morning," she said.
"Demorti sent a ssage," Ken said.
Elara turned to look at Demorti, who had discovered sothing extrely interesting in his correspondence that required his complete attention.
"Demorti," she said.
"Your Highness," Demorti said, to his correspondence.
"Did you send Ken a ssage about my breakfast."
A pause. "I may have ntioned that Your Highness had not eaten since yesterday’s midday al," Demorti said carefully.
"That is my business," Elara said.
"Absolutely," Demorti agreed. Still to his correspondence.
Elara looked at the cloth package. Looked at Ken, who was presenting his most professional expression — the one that ant nothing whatsoever was happening and he was simply executing standard operating procedure. Looked back at Demorti’s very interesting correspondence.
She opened the package.
Inside: two small pastries from the kitchen’s morning batch — the kind with the almond filling that she had eaten three of three weeks ago at an administrative breakfast and which were apparently now considered significant data points by her staff. Also a small wedge of hard cheese. Also, inexplicably, a single plum.
"There’s a plum," she said.
"Yes, Your Highness," Ken said.
"Why is there a plum."
A very slight pause. "I like plums," Ken said. "Your Highness. I thought you might as well."
Elara looked at the plum.
Looked at Ken.
Ken’s professional expression remained absolutely intact. But sowhere around the eyes — just slightly — there was sothing that was almost certainly being suppressed.
"You thought I might like a plum," she said.
"It seed reasonable," Ken said.
"Based on what evidence," she said.
"Based on—" Ken stopped. Reconsidered. "None specifically, Your Highness. It was more of an intuition."
Elara looked at him for a mont.
Then she picked up the plum.
Took a bite.
It was good — ripe, sweet, slightly tart at the skin. She ate it in three bites without ceremony and set the stone on the edge of the desk.
Ken said nothing. His professional expression remained exactly the sa. But the thing around the eyes intensified slightly and he had to look briefly at the window.
"The pastries are also good," Elara said, trying one.
"Yes, Your Highness," Ken said, to the window.
Demorti had found sothing even more interesting in his correspondence.
***
The second consort arrived at exactly first bell.
She was thirty-five, Elara noted. Thin in the way of soone who’d forgotten to eat consistently for a long period of ti. She had the docunt Elara had sent with her — the protection letter — folded in her left hand, held close to her palm like a physical anchor.
She was also, Elara saw imdiately, frightened in a genuine and substantial way. Not the managed anxiety of the sixth consort who had arrived early with careful composure. Real fear — the kind that had been living in soone’s body for six weeks and left marks.
"Sit down," Elara said.
She sat.
Elara looked at her directly. "You’re safe here," she said. "That isn’t a political statent. It’s a factual one. The docunt you’re holding is legally binding. Nothing you say in this room today will be used against you."
The second consort looked at the letter. Looked at Elara.
"She told the sa thing," she said. "The woman who approached . She said I was safe. That everything was for the children’s benefit."
"She lied to you," Elara said simply. "I’m not going to."
A pause.
"How do I know that," the second consort said.
Which was, Elara thought, a completely reasonable question.
"You don’t," she said. "Not with certainty. But you ca here anyway, which ans you’ve already decided sothing." She paused. "What made you decide to co."
The second consort was quiet for a mont.
"i," she said. "The sixth consort. She gave your letter and she said—" She stopped. "She said you asked about the children first. Before you asked about anything else." A pause. "The woman who approached never asked about the children. She only ever asked about what I could give her."
Elara filed that.
The second consort talked for fifty-three minutes.
***
What she said added the following to Elara’s working picture:
The network was larger than four. The second consort knew of seven mothers who had been approached, including herself and the sixth consort. Three of those she knew by na. The woman who administered the compound had a distinctive physical feature — a scar along her left jawline, partially concealed by hair but visible in certain lights — that the sixth consort hadn’t ntioned, either because she hadn’t noticed or because she’d been too frightened during the interaction to register detail.
The secretary.
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