My heart and my gut twisted like the gears inside me were about to malfunction at the thought of her beautiful face, those large heart earrings she used to wear.
Since I’d remembered, the thought of her was constant. Just there in the back of my mind ready to come to the front whenever I wasn’t actively thinking about something specific. Always there.
And I wouldn’t have it any other way. It was up to us to keep her memory alive now, and we would. That was apromise I made myself, and I intended to keep it until my dying breath.
The Queens’ Palace was as vibrant from close up as it had been from a distance. I’d seen it for the first time that morning while Silas and I walked to it together. It sat at the highest point of Neverwhen, white marble and gold trim, its towers catching the sun from every angle so that no matter where you stood in the city, you could see it glowing.
Nobody had actually seen the inside, though. The palace was the home of the queens, and it wasn’t for ordinary people.
However, we were being told weweren’tordinary. At least not at the moment.
Which was possibly why the Red Queen had invited us for tea at her palace, for a small talk before…
Before she was no longer the Red Queen of the Clockrealm.
What a curious, curious day to be alive.
The palace had eight floors in total. The Red Queen met us on a balcony on the fourth. Not a throne room or a council chamber or even an office, like I’d expected. A balcony—wide, open, with a stone railing draped in flowering vines and a small table set with tea for three.
That’s where we found her—then lost our breaths for a tick.
The view was astounding. Below us, Neverwhen spread out in every direction, its rooftops and spires and winding streets alive with morning light. The Great Clock loomed in the sky, its hands moving without stop. We couldn’t really see the Labyrinth grounds from here, but just to know that it was right next to the tower was enough to raise goose bumps on my skin.
Farther out were the lush green hills that separated Neverwhen from the four courts. The realm stretched farbeyond them, but that was all we could see from here. And it was so very beautiful I had trouble convincing myself to blink.
The Red Queen was already there when Silas and I arrived, escorted by a Heart man wearing a butler’s uniform, with two soldiers covered in silver armor behind. She was standing at the railing, looking out at the city, her rich red hair loose around her shoulders. There was no veil on her, no crown, no gown like the ones she used to wear every other time I’d seen her. She wore a simple red dress—no embroidery, no jewels—and her feet were bare against the pale stone of the balcony floor. She looked like awoman,not a queen, though if you asked, I wouldn’t be able to tell you the difference.
I thought she hadn’t even heard us coming through the large glass doors, but…
“Sit,” she suddenly said without even turning around. “The tea is getting cold.”
I don’t know why I was tempted to smile.
I remembered her. I rememberedallof her—when we first met, when we first spoke, what she said, how she’d grinned and how she’d looked at us. I’d always been at ease around her, as if my instincts knew. Iknewdeep down that she was…maybe notgood,per se, butnot bad.Definitely not bad.
Which was far more than I could say about her sister.
Silas and I went to sit at the table. Before we did, he propped his cane against the railing—the new one, dark wood, a gift from Master Talik, though he could walk just fine now. But I suspected it was a Timekeeper thing, the cane, as Calren had one with him before, too. He was still in recovery, but he was doing well, could stay awake for hours at a time.
Everything was falling into place, even if it felt like it was doing so slowly.
Silas made himself right at home and poured for all three of us without hesitation, while the Red Queen slowly turned around, a small smile on her lips that weren’t painted red for once. Her face was bare, and her wrinkles took me a little bit by surprise. The gray of her hair, too—at the roots. She looked…more like herself than I could have ever guessed.
Then she came and sat in the only empty chair with us, took her cup and held it in both hands, and crossed a leg over the other.
For a while nobody said anything. We just drank tea and looked at Neverwhen waking up below us, and the silence was the comfortable kind. Not awkward in the least, which surprised me, too.
After a while, the Red Queen said, “You look well.”
“We are,” I assured her. “So do you.”
She threw me a quick look and a grin. “I haven’t felt more like myself in ages.”
“And her?” Silas asked.
I flinched; the Red Queen held herself.
We both knew who Silas was talking about.
