Niccola was glad she had brought one nice dress with her to Calis, smuggled deep in her bag so as not to raise suspicions of thievery if she got waylaid at the border. With an hour to go before she had to leave for the palace, she turned in front of the mirror in it, dissatisfied. The dress's fit was impeccable, but its glamor paled in comparison to the crow-black gown. For the hundredth time in as many days, it hurt to be a serving-woman.

Niccola dropped the dress's skirts and felt a lump in her throat as she stared down her market shoes by the door. Her sister's remaining slipper was tucked beneath her mattress, as safe as she could keep it. The thought of never wearing the pair again would have been enough of a blow. Never wearing it again when the slippers were all she had left of her sister here, and when she wanted so badly to look nice for this visit, brought her dangerously close to tears.

She just wanted to look pretty. Not even regal. Just pretty. It was a foolish thought, when she cared little about Isaiah's parents, and when Isaiah would not see what she wore. But that did not stop her from wanting it.

Her hands moved to her hair, done up in a satin scarf since the night before. The temptation to wear her family's braided crown had been strong, but she could not give into that, either. Not when there was a risk of Isaiah's parents recognizing it up close. She'd settled on something just as beautiful, if less significant in its beauty. The scarf flowed over her shoulders as she pulled it off. Niccola grabbed the bottle of hair-oil from her bedside table and set about drawing her hair into a thick braid wound around her hairline like a flower crown. She'd spent hours after dark last night on the preparation for it, moisturizing and detangling her dense curls so that they would bounce like this beneath her hands. She loved the feel of them. With her hands busy and the aesthetic satisfaction of the style, she soon used up the extra time until she had to leave. Which was just as well, really. Any longer, and the thought of how she would look at Isaiah's side would only mess with her further.

The walk to the palace fairly flew by. Niccola arrived with her head held high. If she could not look the part of a highborn woman, she was determined to at least act like one. Isaiah met her at the gate again. Pekea was noticeably absent from his shoulder, and he wore a smile, but a nervous one.

"You arrived early," he said, as they had agreed he would: an act to assuage any suspicion among the guards. "Perhaps we can tour the palace while we wait for the table to be set. I admit I have not yet shown you the most beautiful parts."

"That sounds lovely."

They fell into step with an ease that had become practiced without Niccola realizing. Isaiah wore a white, button-down shirt with cinched cuffs and loose sleeves, and over it, his favorite vest. He looked neat and dapper, and Niccola felt her own lack of a nicer dress all the more acutely. They would look a fine couple if she were better dressed.

What flashed across her mind next was an image of Isaiah introducing her—in a full gown—as his partner. Niccola snatched the thought and stuffed it away, appalled at its existence. The warmth it spread through her proved less stuffable, and crawled up to her cheeks as Isaiah pointed out features of the gardens on their walk to the doors. This was an act, and she would not let herself forget it. Yet the image resurfaced, and this time she did not immediately push it away. It was not an unpleasant one. And if she was to act the part of the woman he was courting, she might as well enjoy it while it lasted.

They were holding hands again. Isaiah squeezed hers lightly as they reached the front doors, and Niccola swallowed back her fantasies. She had not heard a word he had spoken since they'd left the gate, and she would have to be quicker on her feet for the task at hand. Her search for the woman in the sketch rested on these next few minutes. She could not afford to get distracted.

"My parents will appreciate your interest in the family history," said Isaiah as they stepped in the door.

If they catch us here, flatter the family line.

"I am sure they have every right to be proud of it," replied Niccola. The lie in the words nearly choked her. She twisted them around in a desperate search for something that would make her sound more genuine than the flicker in Isaiah's expression betrayed.

I am sure they have every right to be proud of you.

Niccola took a breath to clear her throat, and added much more smoothly, "If they present themselves as thoughtfully and competently as you have, I will appreciate the chance to meet them, if only in portrait form."

For a moment, Isaiah stared at her, taken aback.

"What," said Niccola with a smile—the closest she could get to teasing while maintaining the code. "You are not used to flattery?"

He looked away. Niccola's smile lost its force as his failed to appear.

"Not between these walls," said Isaiah quietly. "And it might help maintain the image if you did not flatter me."

It was Niccola's turn to search his face, suddenly at a loss for words.

Before she could muster any, Isaiah tugged her hand again. "Come. It won't be long until dinner, and I've much to show you before the night-lamps burn low."

The emptiness of the Calisian palace felt even more stark now, on Niccola's second time seeing it. Two tapestries depicting beast-hunts hung in the echoing entryway, but they were the only ones. A first impression. The lights were too low to even see what the hounds' and hunters' prey was. This lack of illumination only grew more noticeable as Isaiah led the way into the hallway beyond. Lamps on the walls grew few and far between, until every other hook for one hung empty. In a perverse way, Isaiah had an advantage in navigating a palace so poorly lit.

"Where is the little one?" murmured Niccola when they stood far enough down the hallway that no lurker at either end would hear them.

Isaiah kept his unseeing gaze fixed on the floor some ways ahead. "Crated."

The tremble in his hand as he clenched it said all.

Did his parents truly have so much power over him? For the second time, Niccola searched his face not to determine if he was against her, but to determine what troubled him enough to stiffen his whole gait as they walked together down the never-ending hallway. Isaiah must have been counting steps, because his head lifted a moment later. "The first of the portraits start just past the next alcove. They are the most recent." He smiled, but it looked painful. "You will see how the painter placed me."

Niccola's unspoken questions were answered as the portrait came into view. Her throat tightened. Front and center were what could only be Isaiah's parents, whom she recognized only by familial resemblance. The severe-faced woman in the middle looked unpleasant, and her heavy-browed husband sat calmly at her side. Their formal outfits must have weighed thirty pounds apiece. It was another stark contrast to Varna, where Niccola and her sister had run freely about the streets while their parents went from crow-keep to crow-keep, lending their services to tend sick or obstinate birds. It was beginning to sink in just how unusual Isaiah was among his family. A Calisian prince dedicated to the service of his people seemed as uncommon as a Varnic royal who shunned such a duty.

Isaiah was in the portrait, but it was clear he had not been given any prominence. Pekea was absent entirely. That could not have been Isaiah's choice, no matter how indisposed the dragon might be to sitting still for so long. Which, having seen her at her job, Niccola doubted in and of itself. Pekea served her master.

Perhaps she was the only one who did.

The next portrait sat opposite the first. The family resemblance was strong here, too, but marks of royal bearing were absent. A sister to the throne, perhaps. Niccola broke from Isaiah's hand and moved close enough to read the plaque mounted beneath the portrait. Claudia Cantor. She moved back to the first, and found the same last name there: Isaiah and his mother, Meribah, both shared it. His aunt, then.

"How many get portraits?" she asked.

"All who stay in the realm."

"In good association with the palace?"

"That only matters if the relationship held until the painting was completed. Those who cut ties after are removed in other ways."

A few portraits down was one with a curtain over it.

"Cloaked, I see," said Niccola.

"Some are a shame to the family line. In my family, that means nobody should have to look at them."

"But of course."

Niccola moved down the hallway. Isaiah followed her, paying more attention to the sound of a drip somewhere in the walls. Almost like he was avoiding her.

The plaques had dates on them. Niccola tracked these as she moved slowly down the hallway, scanning each portrait for anyone with the sharp eyes and cutting cheekbones of the woman in the sketch. Some were a close enough match that she had to pull it out to confirm, but the diviner had been a talented artist. No suspect held when compared directly. As the dates on the plaques dropped back through the decades, Niccola's confidence began to falter. Only the youngest princesses in the next portraits would be young enough now to match the woman in the sketch, but their faces were already repeated in more recent paintings. Niccola began to check these compulsively, searching for any who left the family before her face was captured again. There were a startling number of these. But none matched the sketch.

Isaiah said nothing as Niccola's own heartbeat pulled her to a stop. Could she tell him that this had all been for nothing? The thought of losing their only lead so soon muted her. With no other option, she continued to move down the line of portraits, stopping all too soon at the one with the curtain. The cloth was heavy. Niccola nearly touched it before realizing that would leave marks in the dust that dulled the fabric. She slipped a hand beneath it instead, and lifted it just enough to let light reach the portrait behind.

The woman's eyes stared back at her.

For a full half-minute, Niccola could not move. Then she dared to lift the curtain further, and pulled out the sketch. The angle differed only slightly, and the diviner had done his work. Every angle, every line, every twist of the woman's severely plaited hair—it was all identical. The sketch was older, but not by a lifetime. Only by a decade or two.

She checked the plaque. The date lay seventy years in the past.

The world narrowed to nothing more than the woman's face. Niccola's suddenly ragged breaths became the only sound in the hallway. The names on the plaque were arranged in the same order as the people they corresponded to. Last on the list, able to mean no one but the woman, was her name.

Dinah Cantor