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Emma nods.

“Have you heard anything?” I ask her, alluding to our growing network of informants.

“No,” Emma says, dousing my hopes. “But it’s strange...”

Her voice trails off, which is unusual for her.

“What is strange?” I ask. I lean like a gossip reporter trying to listen to the latest scoop.

Emma looks back at me. “It feels deliberate. Like there is a secret people are tiptoeing around.”

.....

“Must be something big,” I agree. I start tapping my fingers on my bedspread as thoughts begin to flood my head.

“What?” Emma asks despite herself as I sit up aggressively in bed.

“Whatever it is, Julian is a part of it. Of that, I am absolutely certain,” I say forcefully. My throat twinges in response.

“Are you sure, your highness?” She cocks her head to the side like a confused puppy.

“Do you know what I think? I think that Julian planned this assassination attempt. Only he had not wanted it to be this serious situation. He wanted a farce, for them to just be going through the motions. Tell me, when does one plan a fake assassination attempt?” I ask Emma like a teacher asking her class for answers.

Emma shrugs. “When they need a distraction.”

“Precisely! He was just acting too strange when everything had happened,” I continue. “His behavior reeked of guilt. And then father, he said a few strange things I couldn’t make sense of either. Oh, I’d bet my entire fortune there is a good plot waiting to be uncovered.”

I rub my hands together and look at Emma. “What do you say, Watson? Shall we look into this mystery?”

“Emma. My name is Emma,” she corrects me, the equivalent of tossing a bucket of cold water over my head.

I sigh, my inner Sherlock Holmes shaking his head. “It’s a reference to a- oh, never mind. But what do you say we uncover this conspiracy?” I grab her hands in excitement.

“No.” The bucket of water has ice in it now.

“Hm?” I’m not sure if I heard Emma right. But she pulls up a stool and comes by my bedside

“Too dangerous. Much, much too dangerous,” Emma says seriously, her tone carrying a hint of finality. She won’t budge.

“But...” I comment reluctantly.

“We won’t even know how we died, your highness. Let sleeping dogs lie.” She speaks with a tone of finality.

“Let sleeping dogs lie,” I repeat in a sullen voice. But I know she’s right and as the excitement of potentially discovering something cool where’s off, I’m filled with a sense of dread. I was just standing at the edge of a cliff without realizing it, even after my countless experiences that have shown me how dangerous living at the epicenter of power is.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid!” I mutter, whacking my head. “You’re right. I’m just going to move on from this. But mark my words, Julian was involved. So if you hear anything about him or his movements, do let me know.”

“Yes, your highness,” she replies as we fall into a comfortable silence.

My lessons for the day have been canceled, so I move through the early afternoon with leisure. I blow at the bubbles in my lavish porcelain bathtub, cupping them in my hands as the water runs through my fingers. It reminds me of time, the way it keeps ticking closer and closer to my potential death. I’m turning 12 about a fortnight from now, which would mean I’m 4 years away from dying at age 16 like the original Winter did in the webnovel.

The warm water soothes my legs that ache from the growth spurt I’ve begun to undergo, but it does little to soothe my fears of the future and my wellbeing. When I was younger, it was easier to pretend that there will be a happy ending for me at the end of all this. I’d survive the imperial family long enough to grow up and move far away.

But let’s be real, I’m not sure I can escape any of this.

The constant fittings with Arabella for my growing body and the accidental stares I get from male servants all just confirm that. A sword called “what if” seems to hover over my neck at all times.

What if Katya finds a way to hurt me or those I care about?

What if I lose the little power I’ve managed to accumulate until now?

What if... what if Julian is right about Travelers dying when they were originally meant to?

I twirl a strand of damp hair around my finger, which takes on a grayish color much like Bianca’s when it’s wet. Marie brushes at the rest of it, getting ready to braid it into some elaborate updo. Despite my protests, it seems she’s going to put ribbons in my hair again.

“Marie,” I whisper. “I’m scared.”

“About what, your highness?” she asks, each stroke of the brush rather comforting.

“The future. Of growing older. Of being hurt. Of becoming someone I’m not. Of dying.” I run through the laundry list, eliciting a chuckle from my nursemaid.

“Everyone’s afraid of those, your highness. It’s a part of being human,” she reassures me.

“I know. I’ve felt this before,” I say, vaguely alluding to my previous life although she wouldn’t know it. But back then I was more scared about what my first job out of college would be like rather than trying to survive to adulthood in an imperial family.

“But I’m scared of being betrayed. I’m scared of losing,” I continue feverishly. “I feel like I’m winning the battle, but losing the war. And the worst part is that the ones I’m trying to fight don’t even take me seriously yet. But the second they do, I’ll die. Maybe I won’t even know how I died.”

I look at Marie in the mirror, where her hand has long frozen with the brush. “If it seems like I’m going to die, I’ll find a way for you to get out. No point in sinking along with the ship.”

Of course, I’m alluding to the Duvernay family, who much like the Medici family of old Florence, have an astounding large portion of the empire within their pocket.

I’d been giving certain matters some thought during the deceptively calm days preceding the arrival foreign delegation, the hunting competition, and all the recent coming-of-age madness.

You see, I’m not dumb. I’ve always had a knack for smelling trouble. And that is the crux of the problem, right there. There is none. No madness brewing underfoot. No secretive actions. I smell nothing except for oil. And I have no idea when the match will be lit and set everything ablaze.

This secret matter involving Julian could be the flint for all I know.

“You can always trust me, your highness. No matter what, no matter where. I am always on your side.” There is a weight to Marie’s words, one replicated by the warm hand that settles on my shoulders.

My throat swells up. I want to reply, but I’m embarrassed my voice will come out sounding croaky. But I want know that her words mean something to me and I cover the hand on my shoulder. Maybe there is hope. Maybe I can beat the empress and her powerful House.

“So, who carried me back from the amphitheatre? I’ll need to send them my condolences for their sore back,” I quip in my obvious attempt to change the subject. I take all my weak, vulnerable emotions and shove them in a box deep inside my heart.

Marie sniffs, her voice somewhat warbly. “It was His Majesty.”

“Oh, which of his men?” My mind runs through the faces I recognize amongst the highly trained men who flank my father’s every movement during public ceremonies and outings.

“No, he did it himself, your highness,” Marie corrects, beginning to do the thin braids she intended to weave throughout my hair.

“Hmmmm,” I hum, less enthusiastic than when I had heard he had visited me. Thinking less like a daughter and more like a princess, it is odd for the emperor to do such displays of emotion.

Is this “kind treatment” my reward? Allowing others to think I have his favor to further improve my perception and treatment from the upperclass? It’s not a bad gift. I shall make good use of his fake favor.

“Say,” I look up at Marie. “I must’ve been receiving invitations for a while, no?”

“Yes?” Marie is confused, with good reason too as when she’d asked me a few years ago about a certain invitation I turned it down without a second thought and told her to never bring them up again.

But in webnovels such as these, noble girls always seem to be receiving invitations to plays and teas and whatnot out of courtesy. I’ve ignored social gatherings beyond the palace ever since I arrived, largely due to my unofficial grounding by my father and a lack of interest on my part. But if I’m to fight for my own power, the best way would be to get my face out there.

“Bring the latest ones to me,” I request.

“Your highness?” I’m sure her mind is running through the embarrassing, angry spiel I gave about how I’m never going to play nice with stuck up, privileged rich kids who’ve never suffered so much as a hangnail in their posh life.

“I know, I know. I said I never wanted to hear about them again, but now I’m older and wiser so I think I will see what these social gatherings are all about.” Seeing that Marie still needed one last bit of swaying, I threw in the one line that got any parent to agree to anything. “I don’t have many friends my age, so I really want to make more now,” I add sheepishly. Obviously, I don’t actually about making friends with middle schoolers, but Marie wouldn’t know that.

My bottom lip quivers a few times, I’m a little rusty at wielding my cuteness, but I haven’t lost my charm.

“Oh, your highness, this is wonderful! You shall have such fun! Friendship is a wonderful gift!” Marie gushes. “I’ve taken good care of every single one I’ve ever received, you can look through them here!”

She ruffles through a cabinet at the corner of the room, pulling out an ornate letter box that is stuffed to the absolute brim. Seeing my surprise, she wryly adds, “You have been very popular ever since you moved out of the Rose Palace and into the central palace, your highness.”

“You don’t say,” I marvel, staring at the box straining to hold the elaborately decorated invitations.

I let out a whistle. “You can tell they spent a pretty penny on their stationary.”

“You also have very lovely stationary, your highness, one befit for the correspondence of a princess,” chimes Marie.

“Oh, that’s right. That’s right.” I belatedly recall the very reason why I rarely write letters and told Madame Laroche that I will only orate during my lessons: my somewhat useless right hand and terrible penmanship with my left. “Well, I should write a response, shouldn’t I?”

My nursemaid’s senses are more accurate than a weather channel, picking up on my shifts in mood even though I hardly said anything.

“You most certainly should, your highness,” Marie says kindly. “You have always had a way with words.”

“You’re too kind,” I chuckle out. Talking my way out of a prickly situation or just trying to keep up with Julian’s verbal games have taught me a lot.

“Would you like to go to your writing desk or would you prefer for me to bring your stationary to the vanity?”

“Bring the stationary, please. Oh,” I suddenly say as a sly idea comes to mind. “And bring Sage. She shall write for me.”

I’m curious to see how Empress Katya will react when the princess she tried to murder and keep out of public eye decides to step into the social limelight. Will it be the flint I’ve been afraid of? Or will she once again perform the strange, tactical retreat she has been employing as of late?