Long May She Reign(33)
But sending guards after these people wouldn’t stop what they believed. They hated me. Hated all of us. Even if we found their presses, found them, their ideas would hold. I tightened my grip on the paper, bending it.
“Don’t worry, Your Majesty,” Holt said. “We will find them.”
We spent another hour going over etiquette and rules, but Holt’s enthusiasm waned as he discussed every showy ritual, like he did not really believe in it. Eventually, he called the session complete, and I stood.
“Thank you,” I said. “For all your help.” He nodded, and I began to walk toward the door.
“Your Majesty, if I may offer you another piece of advice?” He sounded tentative. I paused, turned back. “Be wary of William Fitzroy.”
“Fitzroy? I’ve barely ever spoken to him.” The last words we’d exchanged had been outside the banquet hall on the day of my coronation. He was hardly eager to befriend me.
“Perhaps not,” Holt said. “But it would be wise to keep it that way. Fitzroy has always been popular, and he is a dangerous element here.”
“You think he’s dangerous?”
“He is the old king’s son. Closer to him in blood than you, regardless of the law. If he decides that he wishes to take the throne, he could be quite a powerful enemy.”
I remembered Fitzroy’s words that night at the funeral and shivered. You don’t belong here. But he had seemed to be grieving, even in his aggression. They hadn’t been the words of a murderer.
“Thank you,” I said softly. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
ELEVEN
THE SOUND OF NAOMI’S SINGING ECHOED THROUGH my chambers. Her voice was softer than usual, sadder, but determined. Some people sang when they were happy, but Naomi sang when she didn’t want to think, letting the lyrics block any words of her own. I peeked through her bedroom doorway to find her hanging dresses in the wardrobe, hair tucked behind her ears. There were three open trunks in the middle of the room—her other possessions must finally have arrived from her house in the city.
“Hi, Naomi,” I said, as I slipped through the door.
She smiled. “Hello, Your Majesty.”
“That had better be a joke,” I said, as I walked to the nearest trunk. “Because if you start calling me that seriously, I’m going to have to reconsider our friendship.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Your Majesty. I didn’t know I wasn’t allowed to address you properly.”
“I’m not above killing you, if necessary. I get enough of that from everyone else.”
Naomi paused, smile frozen on her face, and I suddenly realized what I’d said. “I mean—I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s all right,” she said, but her voice was fainter than before. “I know what you meant.”
I opened my mouth to reply, but I had no idea what to say. I was saved by a rather demanding meow from the doorway. Dagny strutted in, her tail held high. She spared a second to rub against my legs, before hopping into Naomi’s open trunk of dresses.
“Dagny!” I hurried to sweep her up. “She’s so rude.”
“As long as she’s comfy in there,” Naomi said.
“She’ll get hair everywhere.” Having a fluffy cat was only fun until you realized that the fluff didn’t actually stay on the cat. Absolutely everything ended up covered in gray hair when Dagny passed by.
“Well, maybe we can start a new court fashion,” Naomi said. “A better way to wear fur.” She reached to take Dagny from me and held her against her shoulder like a baby.
“What’s that you’ve got there?” she said, nodding toward the speech I still clutched in my hand while she swayed Dagny back and forth.
“A speech.” I smoothed it out and held it up, as though I hadn’t already read through it about forty-seven times. “Holt gave it to me. For when all the nobles get here.”
“So is that where you were today? People were talking. Not to me, but I heard them, while I was eating—they were wondering why you were hiding.”
“I wasn’t hiding,” I said, more forcefully than I intended. “I was studying with Holt for some of the day. And I was setting up my new laboratory in the dungeons.”
“New laboratory?” Naomi’s whole face brightened. “To work on the poison detector?”
I nodded.
“You should have fetched me! I would have helped.”
“I’m sorry. I just got so overexcited with the idea—”
Naomi laughed. “Yes, I know what you’re like.” Dagny wriggled, so Naomi set her back in the trunk. Dagny leaped away, kicking the dresses for emphasis. Naomi sank onto the ground by the trunk, her skirts poofing up around her. “I heard from my parents today.” Her tone made clear that it wasn’t good news. A letter from Naomi’s parents was rarely ever good news.
I sat down beside her. “Oh? What did they say?”
She reached into another chest and began to pick out books, lining them up on the floor beside her. “They aren’t coming.”
“What?”
“They won’t come to the capital. Not even for the funerals. My father would struggle, and my mother—well, you know what she’s like. I think she blames the court for my brother’s death. She doesn’t want to see it.” She let out a long breath, eyes closed, then shook her head. “They’ve asked for Jacob’s body to be sent to them in the country. I’m supposed to travel back, too.”