Episode 151: Besties (Indigo)

Indigo asked Apa, Aadya’s dragon, to let her know when Aadya was back in the realm, and then went about her business. She scrapped her efforts to learn the meal; Mallory had finished it while Indigo panicked quietly in her painting room.

So she focused on lesson plans, instead.

It was going to be her first time teaching little kids. She hadn’t ever pushed Talise to learn the language; Talise’s interest in it had awakened when she started at the palace school. Indigo spent years skeptical about whether it was duty or passion that drew Talise to take all her classes.

She settled on skill and passion combined.

Now Indigo would be teaching Talise’s kids, because Fort asked her to.

She looked through the material she had for her entry-level kids. None of it was appropriate for five-year-olds. It was designed for kids over ten, who had mastered certain skills that five-year-olds hadn’t even dreamt of yet.

It would have to be more simple than any of this: Maybe start with the alphabet, make up some silly songs, nothing too advanced.

Or maybe the silly songs would insult Fort. Emma would love them, though. Fort would take more effort…poetry, maybe? Little rhyming bits of history to make him feel like he was learning and not having any fun whatsoever.

Apa pressed an urgent message into Indigo’s mind: Aadya was home.

She slid everything back into its file folder and replaced it in her one filing cabinet in her painting room. She liked the organization the cabinet provided: Each drawer was assigned to one class, with the top drawer reserved for the advanced students who primarily did independent studies.

That was the drawer where she placed the lesson plans for Fort and Emma. It would be a lifetime of independent studies for them, starting with the alphabet and growing until Fort was capable of negotiating the toughest of contracts on his own. Emma would learn as accessory, backup.

For now, Indigo closed the drawer on that project and redirected her attention to Aadya, who Apa insisted was just walking past Indigo’s apartment door at that exact moment.

She rushed out. “Hi!” she called, loud enough for Aadya to hear and turn around. “I’m glad I ran into you.”

“Hi,” Aadya said. She waited a minute, probably because Indigo wasn’t prone to accosting people in hallways. When Indigo couldn’t think of what to say, Aadya followed with, “How are you?”

“Better than you’re about to be,” Indigo told her. “Zero kidnapped the heir to the Caelum. Do you have a minute to talk somewhere?”

This time Aadya’s hesitation was more thoughtful; not waiting, but sifting through mental layers. “Sure,” she agreed. “I have a place in mind. How private does this need to be?”

They were right next to the conference rooms, so she nodded toward one of them. “A conference room, or just somewhere you trust.”

Aadya started walking, in completely the wrong direction from the conference room. Down the hall, down some stairs. “How are you otherwise?” Aadya asked.

Besides the extra son and the about-to-die stress and the about-to-lose-Elliot stress?

“A little anxious,” Indigo covered, “but Zero has protected what he can.”

Aadya opened the door to Shea’s architecture room. No one had been in here, as far as Indigo knew, since Bentley’s trial.

Aadya only worried about architectural stuff out of necessity or stress. Indigo smothered the laugh that wanted to bubble out of her. Aadya, for all her poise, was just as secretly panicked as Indigo about this one.

“I don’t think this will come up as a big issue, actually,” she reassured. She walked over to one of the miniature models of a Nivernese village and replaced a roof that had fallen off a building. “It may be why Acheron dies.”

The bottom fell out of Indigo’s stomach.

Indigo knew she was going to die. She also knew she was coming back. It was why she was more worried about things like Elliot and pain, than about no longer existing.

The way Aadya said Acheron dies made it sound like the other type of death.

“Ach?” Indigo clarified, demanded more.

Aadya shook her head as if to clear it. “I think the heir matters in some way, in regards to Spence and Spaden.”

That didn’t answer the Ach question at all. Indigo bit back her frustration, her worry about Spence and Ach and their family. “Mm,” she agreed. She suspected Aadya knew the broader details of Spaden’s conception, but they’d never discussed it before. “Sam did a spell binding her to Spaden, years ago. I suspect it included Spence but I haven’t asked anyone.”

“It did,” Aadya said.

On any other subject, Indigo would have felt a little smug for seeing the way things connected. She always prided herself on that.

When it was her own sons, though, all she could feel was a sickness. Especially if Spence was going to lose Ach. They’d always had each other, since earliest childhood, been all but inseparable. She needed to bring this back to that subject somehow, so she could prepare to help Spence. “She’s similar to Ach,” Indigo prodded, “in appearance and personality.”

“I’m sorry for what he has put you through,” Aadya responded, about Sam.

Great. She could spend all day avoiding talking about what happened with Sam, and Aadya could spend all day avoiding talking about what was going to happen with Acheron.

Nope. Indigo wasn’t wasting one of her last days alive – even if death was temporary – tiptoeing around subjects she needed answers to. “Ach is going to be temporary like the rest of us, right?”

“I can’t tell,” Aadya admitted. “I wanted to talk to you about Sam, while you’re here.”

Dodging again. Ach was doomed. Spence would…she didn’t know what Spence would do, but it would be bad and involve a concerted effort to push Indigo away.

Since she had that answer, she moved on to Sam. “What about him?”

“How are you feeling about him?” Aadya asked.

Indigo pressed her lips closed. Maybe she should ask Aadya how her divorce was going, since they were delving into ugly topics.

“Zero worked with him this morning,” she evaded. Hopefully that conveyed the message: Zero would never do that if Indigo weren’t comfortable enough with it, if he didn’t think it was worthwhile.

“And you?” Aadya pressed.

Indigo shrugged. “If you need him for something, I’m not averse to working with him.” That was her job, after all, to work with people she couldn’t stand.

“I think he should come to tomorrow’s meeting,” Aadya said, referencing the weekly Rovish meetings all the high-ups held to recap the week and plan for the next one. Dorvish, they all took the day off unless there were emergencies.

“And maybe more after it,” Aadya added. What she was really saying was that she thought Sam should be an advisor. “That would be a large shift though,” Aadya went on, giving Indigo room to say no.

“The thing is,” Indigo said, careful. She knew Talise would be queen someday, and she knew Talise was close to Sam. It was better for everyone in the long run if Indigo went along with things as soon as they came up instead of fighting them until she was the only one left against it.

Zero was already half swayed. Spence, Talise, Niels…

“The thing is,” she repeated, “I’m not the biggest fan of what he did, by any means, but it wasn’t about me. It was about Naomi. Spence and Talise trust him.”

Aadya would understand that one at least: Long-term, Sam was going to be in the picture. If Indy wanted to be in the picture too, she had to let go of her feelings on the matter.

“Spence and Talise are young,” Aadya countered in a gentle voice. “You…could you ever trust him? Maybe if he had Naomi even, or something.”

It wasn’t about trust. Sam was who he was. The things that motivated him hadn’t changed: Family, being the chief among those, but breeding strong magic and increasing diversity were also important to him.

Family first, for Sam.

“I don’t think he’s likely to repeat what he did,” she assured Aadya, and herself. Sam’s grandson was the heir to this kingdom. He wouldn’t push for anything, in that climate. He would wait and see how the tide turned.

Aadya laughed a little, probably at Indigo’s refusal to explore her emotions. “I appreciate your attempt to sound reasonable,” she pressed, her voice warm. “I’m asking as a friend.”

And Indigo was avoiding, as a friend. She tried not to laugh at this circuitous conversation. “It was strategic, in a war,” she said.

She remembered it too well. War or not, strategic or not, she’d never in her life been made to feel bovine, little more than a breeding machine. Her encounter with Sam had been the single most dehumanizing experience of her life.

And yet for him – as he said at the time, as he’d stated numerous times in his defense since then – for him, she was the criminal, taking over his girlfriend’s body and using it as her own.

He hadn’t known that Naomi had given it up, to protect her son.

Indigo hadn’t had the chance to tell him.

And so Sam, the criminal, had spent his life in prison here, while Indigo, the criminal, had spent her life free. Using the body Sam believed she’d stolen.

If the war had gone the other way, Indigo would have been killed so that Naomi could be returned to her body.

She suspected that whatever happened at tomorrow’s meeting, whatever words either of them spoke, seeing her in Naomi’s form would be just as difficult for Sam, as seeing Sam was for her.

What he’d done to Indigo, from her perspective, he’d done for Naomi, from his. All in an effort to save the woman he loved and ensure their place in the machiavellian world of the Caelum.

Wars. They claimed things no one was prepared to give. In the last war, Sam had lost at least as much as Indigo. More, really.

In this war, Aadya asked them to join hands, across the divide of misunderstanding and rage and grief, to face enemies that threatened the family Sam had ensured they would share.

Indigo swallowed back all of her misgivings.

Spence and Zero were both phenomenal judges of character. Each of them, independently, had given Sam a chance.

She wasn’t ready, but she was out of time.

It wasn’t forgiveness. It wasn’t excusing what he’d done. It was a recognition that nothing productive could come of ongoing anger or resentment. It wasn’t about her feelings; it was about the fact that Sam had talents possessed by no one else she knew, and in a war those talents could make all the difference.

To protect her family, yes, she would do this.

She smiled at Aadya. “It’s not what we would have done, but I believe he’s on our side now, and he knows we don’t work that way.”

“I appreciate your attempt to sound reasonable…” Aadya tried again.

Indigo bit back her annoyance. It wasn’t about sounding reasonable it was about being reasonable, and if Aadya was going to push the emotional talk…

Ah.

Aadya felt guilty. This was about needing reassurance that Aadya wasn’t asking the impossible, or the unreasonable, from Indigo.

She put her hand on Aadya’s shoulder. “You’re a terrible person,” she teased, playful enough to get rid of any doubt. Indigo could get through this. Sam would be an asset. The end.

Aadya nodded her head once and then refocused. “Where I struggle is Spence moving to security. He consults Sam on many complex spells. I wish he’d stick to Zero, but Sam is effective.”

Sam also knew other magic, older magic that Zero’s family eschewed.

Further, Sam was…Indigo sighed. “Sam is a masterful strategist, with knowledge of magic Zero has always avoided. Maybe you should offer him a job. Something that makes him official and accountable and lets us keep track of him.”

“And he has grandchildren to protect, heirs. I agree,” Aadya said. “I want to see how Sam responds to this meeting, then make a formal offer to him.” She met Indigo’s eyes, her voice firm. “But I am thinking of you, and I do care that this makes you comfortable.”

Indigo nodded her head.

Occasional misunderstandings like the beginning of this conversation aside, Indigo cherished her friendship with Aadya. Indigo wasn’t good at understanding other girls, which made it a relief that she had mostly sons. Mallory terrified her. And now they had this extremely feminine girl, Delaney, living with them too.

Aadya, at least, she could understand most of the time. They had too many shared experiences – loss of self, loss of children, raising children together, insecurities about their identities, a willingness to shove emotions aside in order to get things done – to not be close.

“Can we talk about two other things, or do you have your own agenda?” Aadya asked after a moment.

“Three,” Indigo modified. She loved that she could answer both questions with one concise word. “Go on.”

“We need scientists,” Aadya began. A complete change of subject matter, then. “A college program. Meldrick will want Giana to run it; Delphine won’t.”

Scientists. If Aadya wanted a science program, Indigo knew about one very talented, very repressed scientist.

“Is there anyone you can send to the Sea Kingdom?” she asked. There was no way Aadya could go in person. She might not be allowed to leave, if she did.

Aadya grinned – she knew something, through luck, that she wasn’t sharing.

Obviously Aadya wouldn’t have ever heard of Pish: His works had been silenced before her last memory erasure, and Drey’s interest in Pish’s research had been replaced by things like war, and losing Nell, and newborn babies. And dying.

“There’s a phenomenal scientist there with an interesting history,” Indigo explained. If the stories were true…she doubted even Pish or his family knew them.

Aadya’s countenance went vague, something Indigo noticed she was doing more and more. It must be related to the luck magic. “I was at risk of marrying him once,” she said, amused.

“Seriously?”

Aadya’s little impish smile spread across her face. “So enjoy meeting him,” she said. “He’s on his way for his own reasons. I will hire him. But a school, and Delphine. Do you trust her?”

Trust? Yes. Delphine wasn’t out to hurt anyone. She just had her own agenda when it came to who she expected to marry, and he persisted in preferring other women.

“Can’t stand her,” Indigo admitted. It was the fact that Delphine let her frustration make her passive aggressive, and even directly aggressive, that pushed Indigo away. “I don’t think she’s up to anything, just ambitious and cold.”

“She’s going to want the new role,” Aadya stated, “and Giana wants it. I think Giana could do a good job with it.” She paused, and Indigo could hear the unspoken but. “I’m tempted to make them work together. Giana is too poised to cause issues, so if something went wrong it would be a nice excuse to dismiss Delphine.”

“You’re really hoping to strengthen your friendship with Giana, aren’t you?” Indigo teased.

Aadya laughed. “I want her to know she isn’t just an accessory. Greg has ideas for the kingdom; she must, too.”

“Probably,” Indigo agreed. She hoped Giana would come out of her shell more. Since her arrival in the Dells, Giana had been generally closed. Watching her pine after Meldrick – no, watching her and Meldrick build an emotional relationship together – had been almost as painful as watching Delphine’s perpetual jabs at Aadya.

What Indigo really wanted was for Aadya and Giana and whoever else was inclined, to show some strength as themselves without needing men. Look at Aadya: She hadn’t even been single for a week before she’d found Greg.

Not that Indigo could talk. She’d fallen for Zero, hard and fast, and never looked back. She had no interest in a reality without him in her life, just to prove to herself – the world? – that she didn’t need him there by her side.

She absolutely did need him there, anyway. They were a team.

Aadya had said there was something else she wanted to discuss. “What else?” Indigo asked her, now that Pish was dealt with.

“I’m not done,” Aadya told her. “I was thinking: We could perhaps sway you to allow your family’s lake for the campus. It would be ideal to form a small city around.”

Ah.

The lake.

Aadya probably didn’t need Indigo’s memories of Nell and Drey and that lake. Them flying, Nell just skimming Drey a hair’s breadth above the surface, taunting him with the closeness to something he hated; Drey managing to writhe in Nell’s grasp and turn so that they were facing each other, kissing, spiraling upward into the sky with matched wing beats.

Or the night they burned Indigo’s step-mother’s boat, so lost in each other’s arms that they forgot the world around them.

Indigo didn’t visit the lake often, but giving it up to something that would change it meant giving up still more of Nell’s past, after he’d lost so much.

This week, he’d seen Drey, lost his wife-marriage of hundreds of years, died and been brought back, lost his marriage to Konrad…and he was going to lose Acheron, which would crush him almost as much as it would Spence.

He’d lost most of the places he’d shared with Drey, when they’d turned the Senat Gile into a school.

Why not tear the lake from him, too?

And yet…a college. It could be done in honor of Drey, or Drey was coming back like Aadya thought and things were about to get very messy.

Either way, a college could be presented in a way that honored Drey, that gave to Nell rather than taking away from him. Maybe even a scholarship named after Nell’s family…

“I think that’s reasonable,” Indigo decided.

“I was contemplating the name The Linnaeus School of Something, or…I’m not even sure how to honor your family.”

No, this would be done as a present to Nell, which meant it wouldn’t honor her broken family. It would honor people and things that mattered to Nell, so that he could always feel at home when he visited the lake.

Maybe even a veterinary program.

“What about Woodroffe University, after my dad?” Indigo suggested. Nell had been close to her dad. Not as close as Drey, but her dad had always supported him with whatever he needed.

Aadya grinned. “That’s perfect. And excludes Eutropia entirely.”

“Thank you,” Indigo murmured. It might have been phrased like a sacrifice, but the gesture itself…

No, she wasn’t going to cry. But she did say, “He would have liked a school, and I know it will matter to Nell too. My dad all but raised him.”

Hopefully that would motivate Aadya to include Nell. If not, Indigo would turn it into a surprise for him – the kind he saw coming, because he could read minds, but still a surprise, still a gift to him.

“What was your thing?” Aadya asked. She pulled out one of the stools from Shea’s drafting table and sat, drawing on paper.

Stressed, even if she wouldn’t admit it.

“I,” Indigo promised. She would be the most senior family member involved in this attack and she wanted Aadya to be as unworried as possible. “I’ll keep an eye on everyone with this attack, to the best of my ability. If we’re taken and moved elsewhere, they won’t be alone if I can manage it.”

Especially not Acheron, though that was more for Spence than for Aadya.

“Do you want luck magic, for the week?” Aadya offered. “I don’t advise it long term.”

Huh. Luck magic. She thought about Gramm suddenly being back, about her insecurity over being in someone else’s body…her husband’s ex wife’s body, no less.

Indigo could do anything, except trust people with herself. That was hard. She didn’t want to ruin the trust she’d built, over the possibility that something good might come out of it.

“I think I’d rather not, thank you,” she said. “I’ve gotten the impression that it answers too many questions.”

“It does,” Aadya agreed in a heavy tone that made Indigo wonder what things she’d learned, through luck. It made Indigo feel exposed. “I’d rather not have it, in the end,” Aadya continued, “but it is useful too.”

It was. And it would be a final, useful tool in evaluating Sam. But Aadya had luck, and she’d proposed this, so…

Indigo decided to pry a little, see what she could learn through Aadya’s luck magic. “With Sam…there are kinds of trust. There are people you trust to look out for the same things that matter to you. And there are people you trust to be themselves, every time. With Sam, the two types align. For now.”

Aadya gazed at whatever she was drawing, unfocused but pensive. After a minute or two of silence, she said, “After this week, Sam may have his own heirs to the kingdom. That’s my other point.”

His own heirs? Talise?

“That’s…” Indigo didn’t even know what to say to that. “How are you?”

“Concerned for Talise,” Aadya said, unnecessary.

Maybe someone thought this spell was a good idea, somewhere, but it was going to devastate the older two heirs, and with Nim just having newborns and Terren missing, it was a good thing Aadya wouldn’t be involved. The kingdom could continue as it was, give Talise time to recover.

Aadya’s voice lifted a little as she added, “Optimistic about Sam’s commitment to the realm for the next few decades.”

Yes. Sam was already invested, with grandkids there. If he had children of his own, he would be even moreso.

“I agree with all of that,” Indigo said. “Is Niels solid?”

For the first time, she wondered what it meant when people said the attack would create extra heirs. From where? With who as the father?

Indigo had two sons who already had kids with Talise. Would more be made, somehow? She suddenly wanted a comprehensive list of everyone involved in the attack, so she could prepare for the changes.

“Almost to a fault, yes,” Aadya assured her. “This won’t be easy, but he is so likely to be king it’s almost not worth exploring what conditions would ruin that.”

One thing, and one thing only. “Permanent death,” Indigo joked. “Exclusively.”

Aadya nodded her head. “And one other thing: Talise can try and reject him, and at some point he would back off.”

Of course he would, because Niels was a gentleman who could take no for an answer.

Indigo’s job would be to keep Rhyss away from Talise while she self-destructed, if that was the course she went. She was too likely to do something new that would make her hate herself more, because moderate self-loathing wasn’t good enough for royalty.

Indigo recognized the symptoms.

“Best son in law ever?” Indigo joked. “I hope Mal finds someone that devoted.”

“How is she?” Aadya asked.

Headstrong, closed, determined to leave the realm for school. “You know, if you start that university we may just be able to keep her in-realm.” Indigo took a deep breath. Time to delve back into the Ach problem. “Spence…you think he can do security well if he loses Ach?” Do you think you can rule well if you lose your son?

“I think Spence will do a very good job,” Aadya assured her. “Even with luck, I have no doubts about his ability.”

“Good,” Indigo pressed. “And you?”

Aadya’s wrapped her arms against her chest. “What about me?” She breathed out and released her arms. “I’m certain he won’t be gone forever. And I feel the benefits of upcoming events, but…it’s a hard choice.”

No kidding. “Losing one of mine would kill me,” Indigo confessed. “Sometimes I think that’s what happened to Naomi.”

She’d never said those words to Zero before. It shocked her, that she’d said them to Aadya. She knew what it was; it was fear that there was something broken about her, that in losing Elliot she would lose herself.

She didn’t want to lose Elliot, and he wasn’t even a person yet.

Losing Ach would be hard for her, for everyone in the family.

“Recovering her is going to become an option,” Aadya said, out of the blue. “You should be prepared. You won’t lose yourself; it’s complicated magic.”

Naomi, back.

What would Zero want? Which of them?

Who would she be, what would she change?

It was difficult enough, letting Spence and Spaden be around Sam. The idea of letting them have a second mother, who would take an interest in their lives…

“Lovely,” she murmured.

Aadya laughed. “Have you missed Drey?” she teased, because lovely was one of his favorite expressions for when something was as unlovely as it could be.

“I have a question before we go,” Aadya switched subjects, tone of voice, everything. “How many closets is too many?”

Too many? How could anyone have too many closets? “No such thing,” Indigo joked. That would be like having too many dresses.

“Do you want to go to the festival, or are we parting?” Aadya asked. “I could use company.”

“I’d love to,” Indigo muttered. She’d had enough of talking about death for one day. “I could use the distraction.”

Aadya set the drafting pencil down and stood up, walking out of the room with Indigo. No more confidential conversation, just light, fun, happy fluffbubble.

It was a huge relief. They couldn’t talk about anyone’s deaths out here.

“I met Greg’s mother today,” Aadya offered up. “She’s an improvement from Titania.”

That wouldn’t take much. “I love your grading system,” Indigo said. “How did it go?”

Aadya tilted her head, thoughtful. “Well, I think. She has a garden.” That alone was enough to sway Aadya in anyone’s favor, as far as Indigo knew. “We’re going back tomorrow. If he can find the time in his busy schedule, we’re going to Poland later.”

Busy schedule. Aadya wanted someone to hang out with at the festival. Why? Because Greg was busy elsewhere. Why was he busy elsewhere? He had no job, only one son, who was grown, he had no responsibilities or obligations.

Something was up.

“Why is he interested in Zero?” she asked.

“He hopes to develop some sort of friendship,” Aadya said, like she knew Indigo would know she was lying, but didn’t care. She was a little smug, even.

“He’d probably have better luck if he was honest about it,” Indigo pointed out.

They stepped from the cool shade of the interior palace out into the garden in high summer; from quiet and peaceful to festival.

Because of that, she almost missed it when Aadya said, “He has enough luck.”

“You gave him luck?” Indigo asked. They barely knew him! What if he was secretly working against them all? Except…if he were, Aadya’s own luck magic would warn her.

“What?” Aadya asked, with a guilty smile.

“I just thought you were keeping that…limited,” Indigo deflated.

They’d welcomed Zero, and all the enemy baggage he brought with him, for her. She would be more open to the idea of Greg, for Aadya.

“We elixired,” Aadya stated flatly.

More open to Greg apparently meant accepting him as king consort.

For a second, anger boiled inside her at the idea of this complete stranger, this arrogant out-of-nowhere man, outranking her in her own kingdom. Having a say in the politics that should have been hers.

Sharing with Aadya, with Mel, was easy. They were practically family.

Sharing with Greg shouldn’t have ever even been necessary. He was a stranger, a foreigner, a human.

Obviously she needed to work on her apparent severe case of racial superiority, especially since she wasn’t even a fairy herself, anymore.

What would a normal woman do right now? She was Aadya’s friend, Aadya had just gotten secretly married…

Hug. She needed to hug Aadya and push herself quietly through whatever it was that had just flared out out of nowhere.

She hugged Aadya. “How did that go? You must be even more into him than I thought, especially with the luck.”

“Yes,” Aadya confessed, like she could hardly believe it herself. “Very. I can’t imagine a world without him. And I don’t think I have to. It’s exciting.”

See, that was what she should have done right away: Be happy, open to Aadya’s needs, not instantly defensive and upset and selfish.

“Good,” Indigo said. Then, because she felt like being generous to overcompensate for what a bitch she apparently was, she offered, “We should go out after all this settles, the four of us.”

Seeing the hope in Aadya’s eyes, that Greg would integrate into the family smoothly, was worth the effort it took Indigo to bite back her own feelings.

“That would be fun,” Aadya agreed.

Indigo rolled with it. This could actually be fun, and genuine and good for Aadya, if Indigo could address and dismiss the source of her resentment. “You’re having a real wedding someday too, right?” she asked. “Maybe after Ach comes home?”

“Of course,” Aadya said. Indigo decided to start planning a surprise for them now, to keep herself focused on the positives of this; that Aadya needed Greg and that her happiness was everyone’s happiness.

And that Indigo wanted to be a good friend to her, even if she sometimes struggled with the finer details of that.

“A big wedding,” Aadya promised. “And Spence and Ach will need their wedding.”

“When?” Indigo asked. Maybe her luck had warned her of what their plans were.

“Today,” Aadya said. “Soon. And again in a few weeks.”

Her baby was getting married. And nothing like his last wedding, which had felt like somewhere between a mediocre idea and a punishment for him and Talise.

“Konrad must have warned Spence,” Indigo mused. “That explains why they left the festival.” She’d thought that Konrad had put them in charge while Talise fixed a village problem, but they’d left. And then Nim and Soren had never even shown. “It doesn’t explain why Endy and Eurydice took over.”

Aadya’s face went vague again for a second and then she burst into laughter, one hand on the wall to hold herself up while she laughed. “Poor Nim,” she managed finally. “She’s so tired.”

“Did she fall asleep somewhere public?” Indigo asked.

“She took the news of running the festival a bit heavily. She’s taking the ascension trial.”

The trial.

Indigo gripped the hem of her shirt tightly, trying to figure out why Aadya would be amused. The ascension trial had changed Indigo’s life, ruined and ended Drey’s, changed Nell’s. And Indigo was rightful heir to a kingdom that needed a queen.

Nim and Soren…

Indigo had lost everything in her trial.

“That’s funny?” she managed, when she’d found words again.

Aadya’s laughter stopped. “It shouldn’t be,” she allowed, “but the whole thing feels fabricated. Like a joke. I don’t trust the selkies, but Nim and Soren are safe.” She looked out across the garden, at all the revelers and booths and chaos. “Have you ever questioned the trial before?” she asked, eyes suddenly and sharply on Indigo. “What would happen if you denounced it? Nell never took a trial, nor did Rylena.”

That was because pixies didn’t care about selkies and trials. Seal maidens didn’t matter to people who could communicate with any animal.

It was different, in the Dells. “No one in this kingdom would honor someone who took over without ascending,” Indigo pointed out.

She’d tried it, hadn’t she? Not herself, but her alter-ego, the not-her who had taken over her body years ago.

After a moment of more crowd-watching Aadya mused, “I’ve been neglecting the sea for too long.”

And good riddance.

“Are you planning on changing that?” Indigo asked.

“I don’t know how I would,” Aadya said, even though she had luck magic. What she probably meant was I don’t want to. To confirm Indigo’s suspicions, Aadya added, “This is home, since the first memory I have. But the sea keeps coming to me.”

“Pish, you mean?” He wasn’t exactly the sea. Aadya would learn. Pish was more like a meticulously sanitary petri dish that refused to acknowledge what it was. Drey had always assumed he was gay, which made Aadya’s marriage suspicion entertaining.

“And someone else,” Aadya answered her. “Pish’s family, too. My sister maybe.”

Of course Aadya must have sisters. King Thelos of the sea kingdom never would have taken a risk by only having one heir. Indigo wondered how many siblings Aadya had, buried in the murky depths of the ocean. No one even knew the real name of the sea kingdom, as a protection against anyone doing magic against it, but that was just one of dozens of mysteries the sea kingdom held.

Aadya, herself, was such a mystery under her most recent bundle of memories.

Aadya straightened. “I think they wanted you to fail,” she said.

It took Indigo a moment to follow Aadya’s train of thought back to the selkies and her question about denouncing the selkies.

“What for?” Indigo asked. “They’ve never moved against any of the ruling families.”

“If you hadn’t failed,” Aadya said carefully, as though she was sorting through it out loud, “where would the sea princess be?”

Ah. Aadya was definitely more valuable, as a ruler, than Indigo was. Stronger genes, more capable in the leadership role, loved by most of her people.

Indigo never would have been that queen. “They wanted you here, you mean,” she stated. Her throat was dry. Too dry, for a water princess.

“And change, new species,” Aadya confirmed. “I don’t know what their plan is, but you must know we’re facing extinction.”

Well. If that was the selkies’ measure of what would make a good queen, Indigo had never stood a chance against Aadya.

With Gramm, she’d already had her heir in Camilla. She wouldn’t have needed or wanted other kids, although Gramm had been trying awfully hard to talk her into a second, a backup, just in case.

But Indigo had been an only heir, and she’d lived. Camilla would too.

Aadya had an entirely different attitude about kids: The more, the merrier. Talise, too, and Spence and Acheron. And one of Aadya’s older kids, Cay, who lived in Keshmar with the pixies, had the most kids of any of them except Aadya herself.

“Maybe,” Indigo teased. “You seem to be making up for it.”

Aadya laughed. “Not enough, apparently.” She sighed. “The attack…we’ll see what comes of it.”

The attack, and the extra heirs, and fairy extinction…

And Aadya thought the selkies wanted Nim and Soren to ascend, for whatever reason.

“So Nim’s taking the trial,” Indigo murmured. The only line of thought that could have gotten her to that point would have been if she was too tired, and Konrad too vague, for the pair of them to communicate properly. Konrad had a way of summarizing, and Nim had a way of never sleeping because she had three kids. “Konrad really needs to take my class.”

Aadya’s voice became more pensive, her eyes on a sand art table that had turned into a disaster zone. “I don’t think he’ll need to.”

Indigo glanced at Aadya, her stomach like a ball of ice inside herself, and waited for her to elaborate.

“Recovery isn’t recovered. I think he’s ready to step down,” Aadya told her.

If he stepped down…if he left…

She was about to die. To lose a child for the first time since Naomi lost Zach. The kingdom was about to fall under attack.

“Is he staying?” she asked. “With Nell?”

“Yes, with Nell,” Aadya promised, misunderstanding. She knew Nell enough to know that wherever Konrad went, Nell would likely go too. Nell didn’t let himself feel often, because when he felt it was as deep as the deepest trenches in the ocean floor. He would never put himself through the unnecessary grief of extricating himself from Konrad.

“It isn’t solid,” Aadya warned, so that Indigo wouldn’t say anything. “I don’t want to pressure him by knowing too much. It’s his decision.”

“Nell will be okay,” Indigo decided. Whether Konrad stayed in the Dells or not, he wouldn’t just abandon Nell.

But Nell might abandon Indigo. The thought made her afraid. She thought they’d settled, but maybe all this peace was only temporary.

“Yes,” Aadya said, about Nell staying. “He and his babies.”

What had Indigo said? Nell will be okay.

He and his babies.

Indigo met Aadya’s eyes. “You too?” she asked.

Aadya nodded her head. “Yes.”

That was…it would be nice to not have to be the oldest, strongest, one there. She and Aadya could share that burden together. They would die together.

It was bizarrely comforting.

“We can all hang out,” Indigo joked. “It’ll be like old times.” Her, Aadya, Drey. Maybe they could kill Nell too so he wouldn’t feel left out.

Aadya laughed and raised her eyebrows. “I can’t wait.”

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