The old audience room, she realized as they walked toward a high-backed throne of alabaster so elaborately carved it looked like sheets of lace. Queen Agathe sat upon it in the same white gown she’d worn at the processional earlier. Her back was straight, her sleek hair the color of pearl, and she wore a circlet of opals on her head.
Nina knew better than to speak first. She curtsied deeply and kept her eyes on the floor, waiting, her mind reeling. Why had she been brought here? What could the Grimjer queen want from her?
A moment later, she heard the doors close with an echoing thud and realized that she had been left alone with Queen Agathe.
“You prayed over my son today.”
Nina nodded, keeping her eyes averted. “I did, Your Majesty.”
“I know Hanne Brum, of course. But I did not know the girl who knelt beside my son and dared to take his hand, who spoke the words of Djel to ease his suffering. So I asked my advisers who you are.” Queen Agathe paused. “And it seems no one knows.”
“Because I am no one, Your Majesty.”
“Mila Jandersdat. Widow of a dead merchant who traded fish and frozen goods.” She said the words as if she thought disdain could cure them of their meaning. “A young woman of humble beginnings who has wormed her way into the house of Jarl Brum.”
“I have been very fortunate, Your Majesty.”
Nina’s cover was designed to withstand scrutiny. There really had been a Mila Jandersdat from a little town on the northern coast. Her husband really had been lost at sea. But when Mila had run off to Novyi Zem to begin a new life with a handsome farmer, her identity had been pilfered by the Hringsa for Nina’s use.
“I have sent my men to inquire about this Mila Jandersdat, to ask what she looks like, to discover if we have a spy in our midst.”
Nina let her head snap up at this, her expression shocked. “A spy, Your Majesty?”
The queen’s lips thinned. “A talented actress.”
“Your men will find I am just who I say I am. I have no reason to lie.” Nina had been tailored to look like Mila. It would do for a description. But if the queen’s investigators brought back any of Mila’s friends or neighbors to confirm her identity, that would be another thing entirely.
The queen studied Nina for a long moment. “My eldest son was not supposed to survive childhood. Did you know that, Mila Jandersdat? I miscarried three times before I bore him. It was a miracle when he took his first breath, when he lived through his first night, his first year. I prayed for him each morning and each evening, and I have done so ever since.” The queen tapped her fingers on the arm of her throne. “Perhaps I won’t wait for my inquisitors to return. My son is vulnerable. You saw that well enough today, and I do not take any threat to him or my family lightly. It might be easier just to send you packing.”
So why haven’t you? Nina waited.
“But I think that might cause him some distress, and … and I want to know what happened today.”
Now Nina understood. Brum hadn’t questioned the prince’s quick recovery, not even Prince Rasmus himself had. But the queen had a mother’s care, a mother’s fear—a mother’s hope.
She’d chosen to interrogate Mila Jandersdat, not Hanne Brum, because she knew Mila was defenseless, without name or status. If Mila wanted the queen’s favor, if she wanted to stay at the Ice Court, and if she knew something about Hanne or what had happened, Mila was more likely to talk.
And Nina intended to do just that.
When she had first heard the voices of the dead, she had shrunk from them, tried to ignore them. She’d been too deep in her grief, too desperate to keep hold of her tie to Matthias. Death had still been the enemy, the monster that could strike without warning and take all you held dear. She hadn’t wanted to make peace with it. She couldn’t. Until she’d laid Matthias to rest. Even now her heart rebelled at the thought that there was no loophole, no secret spell to return him to her, to give her back the love she’d lost. No, she hadn’t made peace with death, but they’d come to an understanding.
Speak. Nina reached out with her power, feeling the cold river of mortality that ran through everyone and everything, letting it carry her to the sacred burial ground that lay in the shadow of the Elderclock only a few hundred yards away. Who will speak the name of Agathe Grimjer, queen of Fjerda?
The voice that answered was loud and clear, a strong soul, recently gone. It had a great deal to say.
“Six miscarriages,” Nina said.