It was a few hours later, and Sarisa still had not left her room.
The light had changed three times without her noticing. Afternoon gold had bled into that heavy hour before dusk, when the sky outside her windows turned pale lavender and the whole palace seemed to pause, gathering itself for evening formalities.
A dress for dinner had been laid out carefully across the chaise by one of the maids, silver and soft and impossible. Sarisa had not touched that either.
She sat on the edge of her bed with her hands in her lap and felt like she was full of broken glass.
Nothing in her mind would settle.
Every thought she reached for split into three others. Lara in the dungeon. Lara in the courtroom. Lara saying I fucking love you with tears on her face.
The little boy, solemn and thin and frightened, standing under the court lights with yellow fire trembling in his hands.
The judgment. The exile. Her mother's voice. Vaelen's bruised face. The paternity test glowing cold and absolute in a silver basin. Then back again, in loops so tight they made her nauseous.
She wanted answers and did not know where to begin asking for them.
Most of all, she wanted Lara.
Wanted her in the most simple, impossible way. Wanted to sit beside her and ask what do we do now and have Lara answer with some profane, reckless plan that would ruin half the realm and somehow still make sense by the end.
Wanted to press her face into Lara's neck and breathe until the day stopped feeling like a nightmare someone had designed for her specifically.
Instead she had her room. Her silence. Her mother's palace pressing in on every side.
And Aliyah.
Aliyah had been with her for nearly an hour now, small and restless and sharp-eyed in the way children became when they sensed the adults were lying.
She was barefoot, her hair half-falling out of the braid Elysia had probably tried to do properly earlier, and she had spent the first ten minutes crawling over the bed and the second ten trying to build a nest out of pillows before finally settling at Sarisa's side with all the determination of a tiny interrogator.
"Where is Lara?"
The question came again, for perhaps the seventh time.
Sarisa closed her eyes for one heartbeat before opening them. "I told you, sweetheart. Lara had to go away for a little while."
Aliyah's face tightened immediately. "That's not a real answer."
No, Sarisa thought. It isn't.
Aliyah tucked one leg beneath herself and leaned closer, eyes big and hurt and furious in equal measure. "Did Grandma send her away?"
The question struck with terrible precision.
Sarisa could not bring herself to lie outright to her daughter, not after a day of watching lies dressed up as judgment.
"Yes," she said softly.
Aliyah's mouth dropped open. "That's mean."
"Yes," Sarisa said again, because there was nothing else honest enough.
Aliyah crossed her arms so hard she nearly tipped over. "I don't like Grandma."
Sarisa should have corrected her. Should have said something measured and motherly and diplomatic. Instead she just looked at her daughter and thought, neither do I.
Aliyah, apparently taking silence for permission, went on. "I want Lara. I want her now. I want her for dinner and bedtime and tomorrow and after tomorrow."
Her voice wobbled on the last part. "You always say people don't just disappear."
The words sliced cleanly through whatever composure Sarisa had left.
She drew Aliyah into her arms at once, pressing her lips to the top of her head. Aliyah came willingly, climbing into her lap with the limp, trusting ease of a child who still believed grown-ups could fix things if they just tried hard enough.
"Lara didn't disappear," Sarisa whispered.
"Then where is she?"
Sarisa held her tighter. "She's… with Aunt Malvoria."
That, at least, was true now. Or true enough.
Aliyah pulled back and studied her face with painful seriousness. "Then why can't we go there?"
Because your grandmother would rather choke on silver than let me run after the woman I love.
Because I am a coward.
Because I don't know how to save everyone at once.
Sarisa swallowed. "Because things are complicated."
Aliyah huffed with all the disgust of a five-year-old confronted by adult stupidity. "Everything is always complicated."
Sarisa nearly laughed at that, though it came out broken and thin. "Yes."
Aliyah narrowed her eyes. "Did Lara do something bad?"
The question sat in the air between them.
Sarisa thought of Vaelen going through the wall. Thought of Lara in chains. Thought of yellow fire in a little boy's hands. Thought of the queen saying for the best as if that phrase were not a curse.
"She did something angry," Sarisa said finally.
Aliyah considered that. "That's not the same."
No, Sarisa thought. It isn't.
Aliyah rested her head against Sarisa's shoulder again. "If I do something angry, you tell me why it was bad. You don't make me disappear."
There was such simple, merciless logic in children.
Sarisa's throat tightened. "I know."
For a little while they sat like that, the room dimming around them as the sun lowered.
Below the window the palace gardens had begun to blur into shadows, the neat white paths turning silver under the first lamps. Somewhere far away a bell rang once to mark the hour.
Dinner soon.
The thought made Sarisa feel ill.
She did not want to go. Did not want the formal room, the polished silver, the queen seated at the head like righteousness given flesh.
Did not want Vaelen's face across the table, still bruised in all the places Lara had marked him. Did not want the careful silence everyone would wear like lace while the whole household pretended the day had not split open.
She wanted to stay here with Aliyah and lock the door and let the palace rot around them.
But that was not how royal daughters survived. They survived by rising, dressing, attending, smiling when necessary, speaking when useful, and never letting people see which blade had gone deepest.
A soft knock came at the door.
Sarisa stiffened.
One of her maids entered after a moment, bowing low. "Your Highness. It is almost time."
Of course it was.
The maid's eyes flicked once toward the silver dress on the chaise, then toward Aliyah in Sarisa's lap, and something in her face softened. "Shall I help you dress?"
Sarisa looked at the gown as if it belonged to someone else.
"Yes," she said at last.
The maid bowed again and withdrew just long enough to gather the necessary things. In the meantime, Aliyah slid out of Sarisa's lap and stood on the bed, glaring at the dress with open distrust.
"It's ugly," she announced.
Sarisa turned to look at her daughter and, against all reason, smiled a little. "It is not ugly."
"It is if you don't want to wear it."
Children, Sarisa thought, should not be allowed to be this perceptive before supper.
By the time the maid returned, Aliyah had appointed herself chief consultant on all wardrobe matters and declared that if Sarisa absolutely had to go to dinner then she should at least wear the moonstone pins instead of the plain silver ones because Lara liked those better.
That sentence nearly undid her all over again.
So yes, Sarisa wore the moonstones.
The dressing itself felt unreal. Layers of silk. Fastenings at the back. Hair combed and pinned. Powder brushed lightly at her temples to hide the worst of the strain in her face.
She submitted to it all with the stillness of someone being prepared for ceremony and execution in equal measure.
Aliyah sat on the edge of the bed through the whole thing, swinging her feet and asking questions no one could answer.
"Will Lara come back tomorrow?"
"I don't know."
"Can Aunt Malvoria beat Grandma in a fight?"
Sarisa coughed on her own breath. "Aliyah."
"What? She looks stronger."
"She is not allowed to fight your grandmother."
"She should be."
Sarisa could not argue that convincingly enough to bother.
When the maid finally stepped back and declared her ready, Sarisa rose and turned toward the mirror.
The woman staring back at her looked every inch the future queen. Pale silver gown. Moonstones in her hair. Straight spine. Calm mouth. Grief hidden so well it was almost elegant.
She hated her.
Aliyah came to stand beside her, smaller, fiercer, her own expression stormy.
"You look pretty," she said solemnly. Then, after a pause: "Still sad."
Sarisa crouched so they were eye level. "Yes."
Aliyah reached out and touched one of the moonstone pins. "When Lara comes back, can we all eat cookies in your room and not invite anyone else?"
The simplicity of that wish hurt worse than all the court's cruelty.
Sarisa kissed her forehead. "That sounds perfect."
Then she stood, took Aliyah's hand, and made herself walk toward the door.
Dinner was waiting.
The palace was waiting.
And Sarisa's head was still a fucking mess.