“You haven’t talked sense in months.” She burbled with coughing again. “You’re the one facing the dark night of the soul, Princess.”
“Love that melodrama. Is there Eighth somewhere in your family tree?”
“Gave yourself up … gave all of us up … for what? Propaganda and a leash … promise of salvation without understanding the sin. Hect and the hideous Sixth House mechanism … and now they are taken too. For what? Our lives? Is this living, Corona?”
“You’ve never lived a single day of your life,” said Corona bitterly. “It’d be against regulations.”
The Captain said, “Name and rank: Captain Judith Deuteros. House … Second,” and Crown scrubbed at her face with her hand, little licks of hair escaping from their elastic and curling over her forehead like light. The Captain broke off and said, “You think you’re walking the tightrope with fast talking and your face … steeled myself to the talking long ago. But you’re slipping, Princess … can’t save you from that … Hect, my hands are too filthy to save you…”
It was funny to think of anyone wanting to save Camilla. The Captain’s eyes restlessly passed to Nona. Sweat was beading on her temples. The Captain focused, and said hoarsely, “Ninth, where is the mercy of the Tomb? Where is your sword in the coffin? Who are your masters now, and who do you master? Where is my cavalier, Reverend Daughter? Where is yours?”
Her voice rose. “Because I saw her in the waves—she was there in the grey water—I saw them all—they hurt me—where is my hunger? I eat and eat and eat without surcease, my green thing, my green-and-breathing thing…”
The Captain screamed wordlessly again. Palamedes put his hand on her forehead, and she cut off midscream to lie back in the pillows. Her eyelids fluttered shut and her breathing was suddenly even, and the sweat all dried away. He said, “Sleep now. You need it. My time’s up.”
Crown said, “Time? Master Warden, what are you talking about?” but Palamedes had put Camilla’s hand on his shoulder and then was Camilla again; shivering briefly, once, staring at the hand on her shoulder as though she didn’t remember how it got there, taking that hand and running it through her short dark crop of hair. She cracked her knuckles and stretched her hands behind her back, clasping and loosening the muscles of her shoulder blades, and said—
“Update?”
Nona said, “Palamedes told Crown he was Palamedes, and Judith woke up and talked a lot, but then she had a bit of a yell and went to sleep. It was all kind of weird, in my opinion.”
“Noted,” said Camilla.
Crown, who had checked the Captain’s neck and then her forehead, noticed Camilla watching and roughly turned away. She said, and not very approvingly, “Palamedes supersedes you, doesn’t he? He takes over, and you’re just—not there?”
“Vice versa too,” said Cam, avoiding her gaze.
“For the love of God, Cam, that’s a slippery slope downward…”
She only said, “Still swearing by God? The Warden shouldn’t have told.”
“He could hardly have bluffed his way out of it, Cam, he used necromancy,” Crown began, but Camilla said sharply, “It’s called lying. What now? You spill to your bosses upstairs? Do we become part of the package deal?”
“No. I swear by my sister,” said Crown. Camilla’s shoulders relaxed minutely. Crown added, “It’s not my secret. And I’ve kept your secrets before … you know that.”
Cam said, “I still don’t trust you.”
“Doesn’t matter. You know, I really am glad you two are together … in whatever way you’ve managed. I’m glad Harrowhark helped you both. I know I said it was dangerous at the time … and I’m sorry that we didn’t believe you when you said he was in there.”
Camilla still did not look at her, but she suddenly said at the bottom of her voice, “Come back with me. Leave the facility. Before the negotiator arrives, come back with us.”
Crown stared at her. For a moment Nona thought she would say Yes and was very pleased. She didn’t mind sleeping in the bathtub. But Crown said, brightly— “I like my prison cells more obvious. And I hate not knowing where my next meal is coming from.”
Camilla said, “That’s not it.”
“Well, you know, the Captain wouldn’t last a day without me, and then how the hell am I getting out of here?”