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March 10 - March 14, 2025
“A good quality,” said Cabrol, “for the head of a Charter Family. Is her daughter like her?” “No,” Kel said flatly. “She isn’t.” They all looked at him—even Conor.
plan, but I have my plans, too.” For a moment, Antonetta’s eyes glittered like a cat’s. “But Gremont is trying to change the game.”
“For you, no. For him, perhaps. Has anyone warned him you tear princes into little pieces?”
Gd I LOVE Connor and Lin
“Perhaps not all of these girls had grandfathers who knew the Exilarch when he was a child.”
“I did not get the impression he recalled you fondly.”
I saw you dancing with Lin, she wants to say. I saw the way you looked at her, and the way she looked at you. It must tear you apart not to get what you want.
Suddenly everything my mother had ever disliked about me was proved right in her eyes.”
Ah my heart 💔
Still smiling, Antonetta says, “I truly don’t think that would present much of a problem, Monseigneur.”
ANA WHAT ARE YOU PLANNING?!?!
He needed to be alert not just to danger but also to the authenticity of his portrayal. He owed it to Conor and to his oath.
The Princess has taken to calling him Seven, as that is the position of his chair on the clockface of the Dial Chamber.
“it’s the Prince. He loves him like a brother. Won’t hear a bad word about him. I’ve tried.”
No wonder the people of the city called him the Eagle of the Fall, though she had never been sure which Fall they meant exactly—the fall of the cliffs away from Marivent? Or a more metaphorical fall, the fall of the Empire long ago?
Or last night, when she was sitting up with a patient in the Sault?
She smiled slightly. “You forget your own magic,” she said. “Those who know who you really are can see you as you really are. There is no purpose in lying to me, Sword Catcher.”
but a closer look told her they were shards of broken glass. Odd.
“You know, the one he speaks of often.”
He who???
Not quite expressionless, not at all; his eyes were wide and seemed to stare fixedly past them, as if he saw something horrible in the distance.
In his more lucid moments, my father asks for him. But Fausten is dead. My father had him executed months ago.”
“Hollazekyer di niellem pu nag.”
how had they gotten hold of that name, Prosper Beck? The name of the man who’d first taught her sword-fighting when she was just a teenager?
But before I agree to remain, I need one thing. I need to speak to Prince Conor. Honestly and without the King or Queen there.
“Hollazekyer di niellem pu nag,”
“I imagine it was given to him,” Lin said. “But by who, and why?”
“A killing dose.” Merren regarded the jar, which continued to boil away. “This is pure poison.”
It was Malgasi, I think. Hollazekyer di niellem pu nag.” “What an odd thing to say.” Mariam looked puzzled. “It’s Malgasi, yes. It means ‘They are trying to prevent me from becoming what I am.’ ”
And a voice replied to her. Such a dark, rough voice as I have not heard in all my days.” Magali shuddered. “It said, ‘You are now implicated. Should you attempt to betray me, we will fall together, and your fall will be far harder than mine.’ ”
Beck had once run games out of the place, but that had been a long time ago. Now it housed something quite different from games of chance.
One he knows by name and sight: Artal Gremont. Beside him is the Malgasi woman. Jerrod hasn’t been told her name, only that she is someone significant in Malgasi circles of power, and that she is determined to talk to Beck.
The man he calls Beck only shrugs.
“Stop twitching. I’m going to let you live, and this is why: Go back to Prosper Beck—the real Prosper Beck—and tell him Elsabet Belmany is looking for him and doesn’t suffer fools gladly. Nor will I easily forgive him for trying to palm me off with a trick.”
And how rare it is for you to look at anyone the way you look at Lin.
❤️❤️❤️❤️
“To ask me, or the Prince?” “You, koya-mitimi. Or is it too difficult to be both the Prince and yourself at the same time?”
“You will be Queen one day, so they will wish to please you, because to be close to the throne is to be close to power. And that, at least, you can rely on.”
Legend has it that, before the Sundering, blackroot was used to suppress the effects of magic. Sorcerer-Kings
The wound was pale red, almost glossy, unusually shaped. Lin ran her finger lightly over the skin, feeling the smoothness of the burn.
“But…how odd for a spill of candle wax that it should be in the shape of a hand. Look, here is the palm, and here the fingers—”
“Your father did this, didn’t he?” she whispered. “He burned you with the touch of his hand.”
Atma az dóta. Fire and shadow.
“Conor,” he said. “What on earth’s going on with the art on the walls?” Now Conor did grin. “Malgasi sent a gift in honor of my nuptials,”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I don’t know what to ask for. Only—” She lifted a hand to caress his cheek, her eyes dark with desire. “Don’t stop.”
Gremont sneered. “Always angling for an advantage, aren’t you, Joss? The great problem solver, Joss Falconet.” He spat, narrowly missing Falconet’s boot. “Never mind. I’ll handle it myself.”
“Really,” said Joss. “What about Liorada?” Kel pressed closer to the banister. Why were they discussing Antonetta’s mother?
Dun dun DUN 7?
“Not every secret I know is a secret that is mine to tell.”
“I have begun to understand, in these recent days,” Lin said, “that sometimes we are chosen to do things we do not wish to do, but that if we do not do them, there will be no one to take our place.”
She was under orders from two different Princes.
“But Alys said he’ll learn what we’ve done the hard way soon enough.”
Alys is involved?!
“I did not realize how responsible he holds himself for the death of the little Princess.”
Until then, tread carefully. A man who blackmails for money is one thing. A man who blackmails for love is far more dangerous.”
The magician and the stone must then travel together to the caves of Sulemon, where, having passed the Halls of Hewn Stone, the gem must be cleansed in the Place of Bitter Water before it being bound unto the Sorcerer whose power it will hold.
He shrugged. “Much was destroyed in those days. Much was lost and much was hidden, but some things stay hidden for good reason.” “You speak in riddles,”
