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Chapter Text

I was quite aware as I tottered the steps from the library to the Great Hall of Eddis that I was in no state to be making such a journey. I had slept for several days after bestowing my cousin who was Eddis with Hamiathes's Gift, and had finally taken a proper bath- well, three proper baths, if I was being honest- and the proper ceremony for Eddis to receive the Gift was tonight.

Galen had argued I was not well enough to participate. He did so quite convincingly, though perhaps that was simply my irritation at having to repeat myself so formally in front of the entire court of Eddis. Unfortunately, Eddis needed this ceremony. I knew I needed to be healthy for tonight, or else Eddis might lose the support of her barons. If all of Eddis's Barons didn't see her recieve the Gift, then it wouldn't matter I'd gone through a prison and an underwater temple and another prison and far, far too much time on a horse than should ever be required by a single person to get it to her. 

My father had forced his dresser into my rooms while he and Galen had a quiet discussion full of sharp, low voices and pointed remarks. They were large men, in both body and spirit, and neither seemed to be willing to bow to the other. In the end, I believe the Minister of War won out over the Queen's Physician only because of the damage not having the Thief present would cause in the court. I didn't hear much of it, too concentrated on not ripping my shirt sleeve as the dresser forced the offending article over my bandaged arm.    

My mind felt as if it had been stuffed with the down in my pillows, in my nice soft bed with nice soft Eddisian linens that I so longed to return to. My limbs too; at least, the ones that weren't tied so tightly I could only waggle my fingers at Sophos as I passed him in the main hall. The Minister of War kept one hand steady on the small of my back, lest I try and wriggle out of the formalities, and I walked in front of him as I made my way to the dais behind Eddis and the Priest of Hephestia.

The Minister of War took his spot with the other members of Eddis's Cabinet, and the steady reassurance of his shadow retreated with him. All I needed to do, I told myself, was get through the ceremony and long enough at the banquet that would follow.  The mountain swallows overhead seemed to be closing in on me, and without my father behind me I felt quite exposed. There was a small sea of people in front of the throne, and I thought the undulating motion of the crowd might cause me to lose the small amount of porridge Galen had forced into me that morning. I swallowed. 

I thought a strong breeze, or perhaps the gaze of so many people on me at once, might blow me away completely. Somehow, I managed to stay on my feet. Perhaps it was the pressure of all of those eyes, or my own willpower to see this task finally completed, or perhaps it was simply the will of Eugenides, not to see his disciple be so utterly humiliated. Whatever it was, I heard clearly when the priest called out for the Thief to give the Gift to the rightful sovergin of Eddis. I stepped up to the dais, surprised at how steady my legs felt, and took the stone off the platter it was sitting on, removed from Eddis's neck for ceremony. With the steady hand I'd prized for so long, I bent to one knee and offered the stone to my Queen. 

"I give you, freely, this gift My Queen, that you may rule Eddis uncontested for as long as the gods will it so." I'm sure I'd been told the proper words to say, and I'm also sure those were not the words I'd been told. It did not seem to matter, as Eddis bent to take the stone from my hand, still strung on the golden torque, and raised it for all to see. 

"I accept this gift, freely given, so that I may reign without internal strife or bloodshed over Eddis, as long as the gods will it so." 

With that, I stood, my vision going fuzzy for a moment. I did not waver. My grandfather had taught me too well for that. A thief who wavers and wobbles when he does not mean to is no thief at all. I did not stagger as I returned to my spot behind the throne, and did not take in a single remaining second of the ceremony until I realized they were removing the dais and pulling out the tables and benches for the banquet. 

I was seated between my father and my brother Temenus, and I almost felt Eddis wince as she studied the seating arrangement. It was most likely my father's doing. He approved of what I had done and wanted to demonstrate that to the court, and he wanted have Temenus nearby so I would not make a fool of myself. Boagus and Aulus both came up as if to thump me on the shoulder - a bit too hard for a job well done, from the looks on their faces- but a glare from Temenus made them change course. Crodes too came by to say that he was quite surprised I'd been able to find such a little stone, and perhaps I could help him find some missplaced earrings. I said I'd be happy to, if he had any of value left after loosing so many. 

One of my aunts came by and said I looked a bit wan, and perhaps I should spend more time in the sun. We'd moved onto the second course of the banquet, though I had only managed a few bites of whatever appetizers had been placed down in front of me before they'd been whisked away. I tried not to consider the lamb stew in front of me as I mentioned that the Sounisan jail didn't have a luxary spa. Temenus laughed a bit too loudly, and I wished Sophos were sitting next to me instead. 

By the time the third course rolled out, I patted my father's arm and said quietly that I was off. He grunted, which I took for a sign of understanding rather than a remonstration. Of course, I was not twenty feet from the tables when my uncle who was Cleon's father came up to me. 

"Eugenides!" 

"Uncle." I bowed my head. I was quite certain the throbbing in my shoulder was more persistant than before, and no matter how important to Eddis this had been, I wanted nothing more than to be upstairs in my library and my bed. 

"You know," he said, voice thick with the unwatered wine of the night, "You're turning out to be far more like your father than we anticipated." He hiccuped. "Not at all like your grandfather as we feared!" He laughed again. 

I nodded. I knew I should be angry, but I couldn't justify causing another scene for Eddis to have to clean up. In truth, I was too exhausted and fevered to think straight. 

"Thank you, Uncle." I said, and bowed again as I walked, steadily and purposefully, from the hall. 

I made it out of the Great Hall and up the first staircase to the library before my legs finally gave out and I found myself falling. I almost swore, but I still needed discretion. It would not do to have the Queen's Thief be found dazed from a fall only hours after giving her Hamiathes's Gift. However, as I fell, the stone step coming closer and closer to giving me a nose that would match my Queen's, the world seemed to freeze. It hadn't frozen, not really, but my braid settled over one shoulder and my hand came down to brush the stone step while it remained inches from my face. 

You will only fall if the god himself drops you. I knew the adage. I hadn't realized it went the other way. The god himself will catch you, it seems, I thought to myself as I put my good hand out to lower myself safely to the floor. Instead, I found myself being moved, like a child's doll, with her hand around its middle, until I was safely on the top landing with my two feet on the ground. 

"Thank you," I said aloud, and then more quietly, "my god." 

"Your god indeed," came a voice from below me, and I was surprised to see the Magus looking up at me from halfway down the staircase. 

"I knew you looked healthier than you were, and thought I'd make sure you made it back to your rooms. Although," he looked somewhat uneasy, "I did not expect you to have divine providence to keep you from breaking your face on your way." 

"Neither did I," I said, taking a step towards him and then juding that to be a terrible idea, and so sinking to my knees at the top of the staircase. 

"Gen," he almost cried, and took the stairs more than one at a time to slide himself under my good arm and hurry me to my bed.

Time passed strangely after that. The Magus had sat me on my own bed, I knew that much, and then had left for some time. Then Galen was there, with Stenides, of all people, who I had not thought would be back to Eddis in time for the banquet. 

"Where'd you come from?" I murmured as he carefully undid the buttons on my fancy coat and freed me from my requisite finery. 

"The studios up north, where the master clockmakers are," he said, though I knew he knew that was not quite what I'd been asking. 

He helped me into my nightshirt and did away with the fancy clothes far more kindly than I would have. Galen took that moment, when I was undefended, to poke and prod at me, laying a hand on first my forehead, then under my jaw, which hurt, and then to shine a light from a candle and a series of mirrors into first my eyes and then my throat. He called in an assistant to help redress and assess the wounds in my back and shoulder, and by then Sophos had managed to slip upstairs, where he stared for a moment at all the buzzing assistants in my room. I thought he looked like he was about to cry. 

"Gen," I heard him say, and realised he'd come right up to the side of the bed, where he could see me without getting in the way of the physician. "Please don't die. I can't have seen- can't have lost-" he swallowed. "Don't die." 

I took his hand in my good one and squeezed it. "I don't plan on it."

Chapter Text

Gen had seemed, at least to Eddis, well on his way to recovery over the last few months. Since the theft of Sounis's Magus, he'd seemed, if not back to his old self, then at least better. No longer lashing out in anger or holing himself up in the library for days on end, nor repeating letter after letter until his penmanship was perfect. He regularly attended court dinners and had once again taken up sparring in the evenings with her Minister of War- always in private, of course, though Galen had worried over some of the bumps and bruises enough that the rest of the court was well aware. She had almost considered removing her restrictions of the roof. Almost. 

However, in the last few days, it seemed, he'd reverted to the Gen of last winter.

 
Maybe it was the weather, Eddis thought. Maybe the short days and heavy snows were reminding him of the previous winter spent in convalescence, or perhaps being stuck inside so much with the mountain passes blocked with snow had always had a negative impact on her Thief. 

Her Minister of War had gone out this evening, surveying the cannon that was being built in the forgeries and paying a visit to his second son. He wouldn't return for three days, and that was if the weather held. The Magus was currently in quiet seculsion at an old hunting lodge, and so Eugenides would have not reason to leave his room for the next few days. If all of that weren't true, Xenia had informed her that several of her Thief's meals had been returned to the kitchen almost untouched over the last few days. With this all in mind, Eddis resolved to pay her cousin a visit that evening. 

It took longer than expected to retire for the night, but eventually Eddis made her way up to her library. No one was in the actual library, as she expected, and the light from several candles flickered from behind Eugenides's closed door. She took the candles as a good sign, that he was probably awake and not laying in bed staring at the ceiling.

She knocked on the door only as a warning, and did not wait for him to respond before she pushed it open. It was unlocked, as she'd expected, and, as she'd expected, Eugenides was sitting at his desk, wrapped in one of the woolen blankets from his bed, his dinner on a tray pushed to one side, and was painstakingly copying over some treatise or other with his left hand. It wasn't nearly as slow going as it had been last winter, but it was still startling to see Eugenides, quick, sharp, agile Gen, do anything that she could describe with the word gingerly. 

"Helen," he said, smiling and standing, though he kept the blanket wrapped around his shoulders like a cloak. "To what do I owe the pleasure?" 

Something was off, she realized immediately. The fire was roaring in his hearth, yes, but he had the look of someone who was far too invested in something. The blanket around him had slipped a little when he turned, and she could see he was wearing an embroidered nightshirt, though it still dwarfed him, like a child wearing his father's clothes. She wondered if he'd been sleeping much the last few nights. 

"Can I not simply pay my cousin a visit?" She asked, moving to sit on the window seat. Gen resettled himself in his desk chair, and began to stopper some of his inks. She watched him place an open jar carefully in the crook of his elbow, then find the cap and slowly retwist the cap, grimacing as he braced it against his body to prevent a spill. His hook and cuff were on his bedside table, and she decided, had been unused for the past few days.

"You're always welcome to visit, but I have a sense you're not here simply for tea time." He glanced to the door, where her attendents waited. "Especially given there's no tea." 

"Would you like tea?" her brow furrowed, and without waiting for a reply she crossed to the doorway and sent for some. Maybe it would get him to wind down, a little. 

"What are you working on?" she asked, coming back to stand directly over his shoulder rather than resettle on the windowseat.

 
"You'll find out in due time."

"I could order you to tell me."

"No, you couldn't." He was right.

 
"I could order you to actually eat your dinners," she ventured.

 
"Ah, so this is a pity call! I was wondering who'd get here first: you, or Galen." 

"Gen, I'm allowed to worry. You aren't eating." 

"Maybe I just don't like what the kitchens are serving."

"Gen."

 
He glowered up at her, and she could almost see her little cousin again. Being Eddis wasn't working. She tried a new strategy.

 
"If you refuse to eat, I may have to send for Galen again," she said, almost teasing, and went to lower a hand to his forehead. "You could be wasting away up here for all we know, and I'd have to come up and wrap you in a blanket and-" 

He moved so quickly she barely was able to track his movement as he lept from the chair and twisted out of her reach, but he forgot that she, too, had been trained by the Minister of War and had not just begun regular sparring practice again. She stepped with him and, by instinct, grabbed his wrist to prevent him from getting away. 

Even though he'd spent much of the last year convalesing and had only just begun to retrain his body that summer, Gen was still much more agile than Helen had ever been. She was built like a stone house: squat and strong, whereas he had always moved with a catlike grace, even when they'd been children. She was shocked to have been able to catch him, so much so that she raised her other had to his cheek to look him in the eyes. 

The heat that came off him was astonishing. He knew he'd been found out the same moment she realized what he was hiding, and his eyes darted about the room like a rabbit caught in a snare.

 
"Gen," she breathed, and then released him.

 
He didn't say anything. Before...before Attolia, he would have tried to play it off, or joke, or spin into dramatics so fierce she would wonder why he had never thought to pursue being a player at one of the festivals. Instead, though, he just leaned into her hand, cupping his cheek. He looked exhausted. 

Helen took a moment to smooth some of his hair behind his ears and move the blanket up around his shoulders a liitle more snuggly. Then she sighed. "Bed, Eugenides." 

"I thought you wanted me to eat first," he said, and though she knew it was a facade, it was comforting to know he could still play-act at being annoying.

 
"Fine," she said, smiling. "I'll send for Galen and he can force feed you soup. In your bed. I'm sure it will be quite entertaining to watch."

 
He grumbled something, but turned to sit on his rumpled mattress (it wasn't as though he'd let anyone in for the last few days to change the linens). Helen put her head out the door to request another, simpler meal for Eugenides and for someone to discreetly, quietly, send for Galen. 

"So you'll betray me anyway?" Gen asked from the bed. He'd put away his drying papers and scrolls and had flipped open a book, acting for all the world as if he'd been comfortably in bed the whole time. Now that he wasn't so hunched over his work, she could see the bright spots of color on his cheeks and recognize the fever-brightness of his eyes.

 
"Betray your wishes for your health? Why yes, Thief."

 
He scowled at the use of the title. 

The tea arrived before he could say anything, and Xenia placed it on the bedside table before returning to her post outside the study door. Helen sighed and sat down on the covers next to Gen. "I'm just worried about you, when you start hiding like that. You're like a cat, Gen, going off and curling up to die without telling anyone."

"I'd tell you, if I thought I was going to die." She grimiced. He had told her, when he thought it was a bad idea to go to Attolia. 

"Still, what if you didn't know how bad you'd gotten? If you couldn't get out of bed?" She would have grabbed his hand, but he was using his only one to drink his tea. "I care about you, even if you never want to be my Thief again." 

He didn't say anthing to that, but he set down his tea and leaned back, resting his head on Helen's shoulder. He started tracing the embroidered patterns on the edge of his right sleeve cuff. Helen frowned, then relaxed. 

She waited with him, just like that, until Galen and his assisstants descended upon the room. Neither of them mentioned the Minister of War's stolen nightshirt.  

Chapter Text

Costis was not entirely certain what to do with his King. 

He'd long since earned the respect of the guard, despite his order to decrease their numbers, and he'd kept reasonable standing in court, despite holding to his aloof and careless tendencies. So Costis was quite surprised when it was the King who did not appear on time for his morning sparring practice.

Appear he did, ten minutes later than normal with the morning shadows slowly shortening across the yard. Hilarion amd Philologos marched behind him, their eyes wary. Costis sighed and wondered what Eugenides had been up to the night before to make him so late. He noted the powders on the King's face, most likely concealing dark bags beneath his eyes. 

Yet all of Costis's concern needn't have mattered, for no sooner had the King approached the sparring circle he and Costis favored than the King had drawn his sword and began to move through Third position with Costis, a simpler warm up exercise, yet one that still required ample effort on both their parts. 

Fifteen minutes in and, despite how his muscles were still groaning with the weight of holding a sword upright for so long, Costis was surprised when the King raised his hand for a pause. Costis cautiously stepped back, and welcomed a water flask from a runner boy eagerly as the King did the same.

"Late night, your Majesty?" Costis asked, wary of the roving eyes and ears, but Eugenides just chuckled. 

"No later than normal, I'm afraid."

"I see," Costis returned the flask to the boy, who had been hovering anxiously for the last minute, and who scurried off after receiving the empty flasks. Costis readied himself back for true sparring, but the King still had his sword tucked beneath his handless arm.

"I fear that will be all for today, Costis. I thank you for your time." The King turned to his attendants and moved to walk away.

Costis stood, momentarily dumbstruck. This could not be happening. He could not have gone through all of those months of humiliation- first for losing his temper, and then for being used as a false Luietenent, and further still as he realized just how skilled the King was and how desperately he wanted to hide those skills. The months of being thought a fraud, or a well trained dog, with the King firmly gripping his leash.

And now it was going to happen all over again. The stunt with the guards wasn't enough. Oh, those who had been there would see and believe, but Eugenides needed Attolia to think he was still a foppish princeling from backwards Eddis, of course, and so he'd slowly remove the half of the gaurd that hadn't been on patrol that morning, and reassign the rest of them to scattered outposts around the country. Soon it would be just back to how it had been: Costis and Teleus knowing the King's full ability, and the rest of the gaurd thinking Costis a liar and a man willing to give his own honor for a man more suited to court jester than king.

"My King," Costis called, and belatedly began to hurry after Eugenides and his attendants back towards the palace. Eugenides did not stop, and so Costis was forced to almost jog after them, falling into step behind the attendants. "My King, you cannot mean to avoid demonstrating your skill again. That cat is out of the bag, so to speak."

The King did not stop to look at him. He did, however, glance back, refusing to meet Costis's eye. He continued to walk.

"If you do not hone your skills, the guard will lose what faith they have gained in you, my King." Costis was teetering dangerously close to treason, but given the events that had lead him to this situation, he was confident a rude word would fair better than an errant fist.

Eugenides did not glance behind him again, but instead turned sharply into the front gardens before they reached the door to the palace. He lead Costis and his attendants through a series of hedges in a silent forced march until he stopped, facing a bush that seemed no different than its fellows, and promptly proceeded to lose what little he had in his stomach.

Hilarion and Philologos both jumped to attention, one hurriedly pulling the King's fine overcoat back from being in danger of any of the mess, and the other finding a handkerchief and a waterskin to hand to the King. Only Costis, it seemed, had the presence of mind to hush the other two. He stepped forward with hard earned grace and put a hand on the back of the King's neck. He was burning.

"Oh, do keep your hand there, Costis," the King said without opening his eyes. He braced himself with the hook on the ground, and Costis placed his other hand on the King's shoulder to steady him as the King accepted the handkerchief from Hilarion. "It's quite nice and cool."

The sweat that had only begun to dry from the morning's exercize was being quickly replaced, and the King grimaced as he wiped first his forehead and then his mouth. He folded the offending piece of fabric and tucked it into his coat pocket; Philologos mirrored the King's face behind his back. No doubt Costis could guess who would be in charge of the King's laundry for the day.

"Is there any concern of poison, your Majesty?" Hilarion asked under his breath.

"Oh, I doubt it, but I'm sure Petrus or my wife will want to give me an emetic either way, despite how little I need one." He frowned. "That is why this must stay between us, yes?" 
Hilarion and Philologos shared a look. Costis kept his eyes firmly on the back of Eugenides's head. "Yes, your Majesty," Hilarion spoke finally, and the King let out a soft sigh and drew himself to his feet.

Costis moved his eyes to the sky, checking the courtyard and its walls for any sign of other occupants, but he saw no one. The King must have known he would not be seen, for as soon as Costis noticed this, he felt a hand on his own, still firmly on the back of the King's fever-warmed neck. "That's enough now," the King said with a soft smile. "I fear I must return to my regular timetable, lest the others worry I have been besieged by assassins or my own guards turned against me." The rest of the King's guards had stopped at a sign from him when they entered the courtyard and were thoroughly out of sight.

Costis sighed. "Yes, my King."

"Good." Eugenides set his jaw. They walked out of the courtyard in the same pattern as before, and Costis hurried to the guard's baths for a quick scrub before bypassing the messhall altogether. He would have to move quickly if his newly formed, stupid plan were to succeed.

He made it to the Queen's apartments in record time and with only one wrong turn, and was relieved to see her day's guard lined up on the wall, still waiting for Her Majesty to leave her chambers and descend to breakfast.

"I have a message for Her Majesty," Costis lied, and one of the guards turned and knocked on the door. Imenia, one of the Queen's attendants, stuck her head out.

"I can take any message to the Queen." She held her hand out, expecting a sheet of curled paper.

"It is a private message, to be delivered by word of mouth only."

Imenia disappeared, and then returned. "Her Majesty will see you within." 

Her Majesty was sitting at her vanity as her attendants bustled about, twisting her hair and pinning jewlery into her ears. "Unlike my husband, I trust my attendants. Speak freely here, Costis." Costis was uncertain he believed that statement, yet he saw only Phresine and Imenia had remained in the room, the others leaving behind him. He also saw the intentionally placed daggers on the surface of the vanity, well within arm's reach.

He swallowed.

"My Queen, I would have you know I am acting in His Majesty's best interest when I tell you this," Costis began, standing at attention several feet away from the vanity, though not far enough away if she decided to use one of those knives. Her eyes narrowed in the mirror.

"Go on,"

"I believe that the King is ill. He was lethargic during our morning sparring and was unwell shortly afterwards."

"And by 'unwell' you mean?"

"He threw up, my Queen."

"I see." Phresine stepped back and the Queen rose, intimidating in her regalia. Costis resisted the urge to step back against the wall. The knives on the table had vanished at some point in the last minute. He did not doubt they were still within range of Her Majesty's hands. "He did not want me to know this?"

"No, your Majesty."

"I see," she said again, and raised a hand to her face as if to pinch the bridge of her nose, but stopped. Costis wondered how long it would take to fix her make-up if she were to do so. "Thank you for bringing this to my attention, Costis. I am sorry for what wrath you might endure following what I am to do."

"I understand, my Queen."

He followed her out of her apartments, and then took up a position at the back of the line of guards. He had his sword belt on, but no partner in the day's company, and felt woefully out of place. It was all too soon that they reached the dining hall and he took a spot on the back wall. It was worse, a few minutes later, when Eugenides entered, trailed by his own guards and attendants. Hilarion made eye contact with Costis, then grimaced.

The King was wearing a new coat, and his face had been washed free of any remaining sweat or mess from the morning. He smiled as he entered, then took his customary silent spot next to the Queen. He ate his pre-cut fruit and yogurt without complaint, and Costis saw the Queen narrow her eyes at him thoughout the meal. Finally, he stood to attend his morning meetings and turned to kiss the Queen good-bye.

He kissed her cheek, and instead of bear it in solemn silence, she turned and cupped his face in her hand.

"My King, if you will join me in the garden for a moment?"

For those who did not know the King and Queen, this would seem a reasonable statement, leaving only the intrigue of which matters of state they would discuss beyond the threat of prying eyes and ears. For those who thought they had eyes to see, they could imagine the daring trysts of their monarchs.

For those who truly had eyes to see, they turned away from the warring concern and anger hidden beneath the Queen's mask and the petulance and distress hidden beneath the King's.

Costis, unwilling to be left a lone guard on the wall, followed with the Queen's guard as they escorted the King and Queen to the gardens. When they reached the enterance, the Queen waved a hand. "Aristogaitan, your squad may stay here and defend this enterance. Iomenus, take your squad to guard the other enterance." She fixed him with a look. "Costis may accompany us to the garden, along with our attendants."

There was a flurry of 'Yes, my Queen' s, and Costis found himself a lone guard, prowling after his monarchs as they lead the way in silence to a secluded corner of the garden.

They stopped as one near an orange tree. Attolia waved her attendants out of earshot. The King did the same.

"Costis, how could you betray me like this!" Eugenides exclaimed, pointing an accusatory finger and shattering the silence.

"Oh, do calm yourself Eugenides." Attolia placed a restraining hand on his shoulder, and another firmly on his forehead. "He's not wrong to tell me you should be in bed, and I doubt you could have kept a fever like this hidden all day."

"Oh, my own wife would bet against me?"

She gave him a level look. "You need to rest." She pulled on his shoulder and turned him about, so that he was forced to look into her eyes.

He sighed in defeat and rested his head against her shoulders. "Do you have any idea," he mummbled, "how much it hurts to throw up when you have only just had stitches removed from your gut?"

"I can imagine it was less painful than the last time I saw you do so," Attolia whispered into his hair. "Last time, you still had the stitches in place."

He chuckled, then grimaced. He pulled himself firmly off of her shoulder and away from her.

"Costis, will you please escort my husband to his secondary chambers? I'll have Ilia send Petrus there in a few hours. I fear I'll need to keep you there for the rest of the day to ensure he stays in bed. Perhaps I'll be able to send Ornon to relieve you of duty this afternoon."

"Yes, my Queen." The King's secondary chambers. That meant following the King through a strange series of passageways from his bedchamber to a second room nearly on the other side of the palace. Petrus and Ornon would know where to go, but Costis was sure he was one of perhaps ten people in the Palace, possibly in the world, who knew of these chambers and their importance.

"Off we go then, oh keeper of the King," Eugenides said without mirth, and they turned to go. He paused. "What am I working on while I leave the head of architecture to sit and twiddle his thumbs this morning?"

"Oh, you've developed a fever of fascination regarding Medean dresswear and simply can't be pulled away from the fashion folios. I'll be sure to have them delivered to your rooms before this afternoon."

"Of course, my Queen." He turned and this time lead the way back to his attendants, and then out back to the palace, and managed to make it all the way to his regular apartments before his breakfast made a not so surprising reappearance in the chamber pot. He grimaced.

"Best take that with us, Costis. We can't have the whole palace knowing about this."

"Why not, your Majesty?" Costis asked, offering the king a kercheif and grimacing at the thought of carrying the chamber pot through the hidden corridors for more than a minute.

"Because it shows I am vulnerable, and Attolia cannot have that."

"People are often unwell. It is no personal failing."

The king chuckled. "You sound like my cousin who is Eddis. When she falls ill, she anounces to the court she is taking a day of rest and seclusion, and proceeds to remove every single person from her chambers until she is well. It is one of the best times for me to break in through her windows."

Costis grunted.

"Besides, Eugenides continued, standing a shoving the soiled handkerchief in a laundry bin with its fellows, "Kings, I have learned, do not get to be people. Kings do not get to have failings, moral or otherwise." He sighed, and stuck his hand into a handsome armoire to manuver whatever was inside that caused the armoire to swing open and reveal the hidden passageway. The one time Costis had gathered the courage to study the back wall of the standing closet, he'd found only smooth wood.

"Now, let us depart before I have Medean fashion shoved down my throat. Doubtless it will come up just as easily as breakfast did."