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All through the autumns of her childhood, young Plumbeline Uvano plays in the central courtyard of the Imperial Palace with her cousins. There are dancing games and hand-clapping games, tests of riddles and of nerve—who can hold their breath the longest, who will climb up the low sugarstone wall, who dares to eat a worm. Plumbeline is the youngest of them all, a season younger than her Riesling cousin and a mere week younger than Augusta Merlot, who has committed the great crimes of being just a little taller and just a little older than her at the same time.
The Emperor’s private balcony overlooks the courtyard, and on rare occasions they catch a distant glimpse of him there. In many ways, Gustavo Uvano is a ship on the horizon of his daughter’s life; never all the way absent, but not close enough to touch. He is a very busy man, all of Plumbeline’s teachers and governesses and servants remind her, until she learns not to ask after him.
Only once does she look up and see someone else watching. There’s a beautiful woman on the Emperor’s private balcony, watching the children tussle and play in the courtyard below. Red hair tumbles past her shoulders, unbound, and for a split second Plumbeline meets amused orange eyes. The stranger looks—just for a moment, when the light is cool and golden on her brow and she tilts her head in acknowledgement—like a queen.
Augusta jostles her, daring her back into the games, and when Plumbeline looks back to the balcony the woman is gone.
---
Her ninth winter, a terrible fever scythes through the capital. Plumbeline is kept in her chambers, where her servants take every precaution for her health. She is the only child of the Emperor—and though she will not inherit all of his dominion, she has the strongest claim to the Fructeran throne of anyone alive. She is precious, and well-guarded.
It’s that winter when she figures out how to slip through the false back of her wardrobe, into the secret tunnels of the Imperial Palace. She is careful. She only goes at night, and only on nights when no one has recently fallen ill, which whips everyone around her into a frenzy each time.
And her escapades, trying to map out the twisting passages and listening in hidden alcoves, are the only reason she learns the truth: the Emperor fell ill at the very start of the sickness, and it has settled in his lungs. There is talk that he will never breathe easily again.
Plumbeline presses her ear to the door, having neatly made it past three chambers of Imperial guards that never expected a young girl to go crawling through their walls.
“They will bury us, my friend,” Father is wheezing. He sounds unwell.
“They won’t,” the woman’s voice is low and throaty, full of smoke. “They won’t. I won’t allow it. Our people will be well; take heart, Gustavo.”
Plumbeline is an only child with a protective mother and an Emperor for a father. She can’t remember the last time someone called him by his first name.
---
It is spring—Lady Plumbeline Uvano is thirteen years old and bitter with it when she sees the woman again. She must be a friend of the Emperor’s from the war if she is permitted to be so close to him, with so few guards around. The pair are taking a slow circuit of the gardens when they cross Plumbeline’s path.
Plumbeline flushes deeply, profoundly aware of the smear of dirt on her cheek and the tangles in her green hair, before dipping into a curtsy. The Emperor, ever-awkward with the daughter he does not quite know, pats her shoulder twice.
“Raise your head,” he tells her, an odd note in his voice. “Perhaps it is time for the two of you to meet. This is—”
“Gustavo,” the woman interrupts, “the Candian delegation will not wait.”
Plumbeline does her best to swallow her shock. People do not interrupt the Emperor. And they do not give him commands, no matter how subtle. And he goes along with it, patting her shoulder one more time and clasping one of the woman’s hands, bowing over it as if she’s a visiting noblewoman before striding off.
“Who are you?” Plumbeline asks, flabbergasted.
“No one important,” the woman says, her expression smooth and unconcerned. “You are young Lady Plumbeline, then. Interesting.”
Plumbeline’s face feels hot, her stomach twisting. Her mind summons up the image of this stranger on the Emperor’s balcony, the red of her hair like a banner of war. And the way she says his name, like it is easy, like he does not rule the world; does she even bow when she meets him? Plumbeline’s mother, before she went to stay in the newly-constructed imperial villa to take in the country air, would not even lift her gaze without his permission.
Who is this woman? By what right is she here in the garden, walking beside the Emperor as if he is any other man? She opens her mouth to ask either of these questions in a reasonable, mature manner, but what comes tumbling out is, “Are you in love with my father?”
The woman hums. Her hair is up today in a braided bun that only
looks
simple; there are three long pins holding it together, each with a very sharp-looking tip. Her armor is forgettable, studded purple fruit-leather that Plumbeline has seen thousands and thousands of times. But her eyes catch Plumbeline’s and
hold.
“Do you know, just between us, I’ve never been in love at all.” Her gaze, orange like a sunset and completely unreadable, bores into Plumbeline’s face. And then, unforgivably, she says, “This has been amusing. Be well, Lady Uvano.”
And she turns her back on Plumbeline, who is abruptly incandescent with rage, who will not be an amusement. Naturally, and with all the talent of a princess whose tutors call her ‘promising’, Plumbeline hurls herself at the woman’s unprotected back.
The next thing she knows she’s completely winded, knocked over in the dirt. One of the long, sharp hairpins is poised beneath her chin, resting against the soft skin without breaking it, but only just. The high, ringing fury in her ears drowns out everything, muddling her hearing until she pushes through it, watching the woman’s mouth move.
“—understand that you are a child, you are not strong enough for this. Grow teeth. Grow claws. Grow sharp. Remember this feeling, being small. Carry it with you always, so you know what you are fighting.” She releases Plumbeline, stepping back, and there’s not even a speck of dust on her. “The world is a harsh place,” she tells Plumbeline, who lays on the ground gasping for breath. “Even to princesses.”
And then she is gone.
---
It is high summer, when Lady Plumbeline holds a celebration for her nineteenth birthday. The Imperial Princess has exactly as much power as she projects, no more—even the title
Imperial Princess
is an affectation, not something that carries weight. But even affectations and projections have their usefulness. People do not reject invitations from the Imperial Princess lightly, not anymore.
The heat in the gardens is oppressive, even at dusk. She has spent the last three hours making circles through the party, indulging the tiresome stories of old nobles who did parties
much better in their day
and reminiscing on childhood adventures with no less than twenty people who are nothing more than passing acquaintances to her and gossipping with all the hungry-eyed vultures that have attached themselves to the court over the years. Yes, it is
such
a shame that the Emperor could not attend, but trade negotiations between the Meat Lands and the Dairy Islands must take precedence. Yes, the Imperial Princess
is
very gracious and understanding.
Darkness is finally settling over the gardens when something catches her attention, and Plumbeline turns—in the shadow of one of the stone alcoves that line the path, not stepping into the garden proper, Amangeaux looks nothing like a queen. The evening dark softens her cheekbones and the sharp cut of her jaw, and her orange eyes are weary as she takes in the triumph of this year’s social calendar.
She is only a woman, Plumbeline thinks, and it feels strangely like a revelation. Yes, yes, she is Amangeaux Epicée du Peche, or was at one time if the stories are to be believed; but she is not a declaration of war, nor is she the towering figure of memory who forced Plumbeline to push herself for the first time in her life, to become more than she was.
She slips away from her own party, shaking off her hangers-on with ease, and joins her in the alcove.
“Happy Birthday, Imperial Princess.” Her well-wishes are pensive at best. “A fine party. You have a knack for it.”
“For birthday parties?” Plumbeline laughs in an easy way, the kind that seems unpracticed.
She shakes her head. “For all of it. You are clever, and your social graces are to be admired.”
Irritation sparks in Plumbeline’s chest. "You speak as though I am a child—"
"No, I speak as though you are a fool," Amangeaux spits, the venom in her voice at odds with her placid expression. “Imperial Princess? You think a crown will make you happy—hah! A crown will not even make you safe. But I will not waste my words trying to convince you, I know you will not listen."
Plumbeline's face burns, her stomach churning in humiliation. "You would know about crowns, wouldn't you, Lady du Peche."
"How clumsily you swipe, Princess! Ah, shall I weep? Shall I fall to my knees and beg that you keep my past a secret? Do you really expect me to lower myself so, for you?" She scoffs, and Plumbeline wants to reach out and wring her graceful neck. "If you are to be Queen of Fructera one day, you must do better than this. Do not settle for such petty jabs—when you attack, always aim to kill."
I will be more than Queen of Fructera, Plumbeline wants to snap, but seven years of growing up help her keep the words behind her teeth.
From the twist of her mouth, Amangeaux hears them anyway. “Watch yourself,” the former Queen of Vegetania warns her, somehow already another step away, fading into the shadows as Plumbeline fights to master herself. “Ambition is a dangerous thing.”
Plumbeline wants to scream in frustration, turning to find herself alone once more. But there’s a murmur rising up from the party, her assembled crowd of game pieces lost without their player to direct them, so she smiles and sails back into the crowd instead.