— A Dangerous Idea — "There's nothing I can't accomplish."
Quiggin's smile was thin and brittle, but it held.
"You're insane."
"The Princess may be young, but she isn't too young for marriage. Youth simply makes her easier to handle."
"*We?*"
The head maid did not flinch.
"That depends on your appetite, Minister."
"Duke Claudio has no intention of sharing power. Surely you never planned to stay loyal to him forever. Or was I mistaken?"
The bait had been cast.
Now she only had to watch for the bite.
Silence stretched between them, taut as drawn wire.
Quiggin waited with the patience of someone who had burned through the last of her options.
Slowly, the tight line of Etienne's mouth relaxed and curled upward.
"No. Your timing is excellent."
If he became State Secretary, if he acquired a tie to the royal family—his influence could rival the Regent's. The justification and status would be more than enough.
"You won't regret this day, Minister."
The toad had taken the hook.
Only time would show whether it was bait—or a slow-acting poison.
— A Note at Midnight — Long after the lamps in the Princess's wing had gone dark, Marieu slipped out through a service door, cloak pulled tight against the cold.
A folded scrap of parchment lay hidden in her sleeve—summoning her to meet Madame Cuisine.
"What is this about? What does that message mean?"
she snapped, the moment the head maid appeared from beneath an archway, smile polished to a shine.
"I hear you've been treated like a stray dog of late," Quiggin said mildly. "I thought you might wish to compare notes."
"Perfect timing," Marieu shot back, anger giving her courage. "Shall we share sob stories—the woman discarded by the Regent, and the maid tossed aside by the Princess?"
How did that girl manage it…?
"We do seem rather alike at present," Quiggin replied coolly. "I hear the Princess barely looks at you these days. That you're made to scrub floors with the scullery maids."
"While Neril, of all people, has taken your place."
Marieu's mouth flattened into a hard line. For all her pride, she could not deny a single word.
"If you don't secure another path, you'll be thrown out like kitchen refuse. You know that, don't you?"
"What do you want from me?"
Quiggin's smile deepened, satisfaction softening her features.
As though she had been waiting for that exact question.
She drew out a pale blue handkerchief from within her robes.
Neat, expensive embroidery crisscrossed the silk—a single set of initials formed in red-gold thread.
"L… Etienne? Wait—Larque Etienne? The Minister of Palace Affairs?"
Quiggin said nothing. Her silence was answer enough.
"Why give this to me?"
"Because," she said, voice almost gentle, "you are going to hide it in the Princess's bedchamber. Somewhere intimate. Somewhere no one would believe a stranger's hand had placed it."
Marieu flinched.
In an aristocratic court this conservative, there was only one interpretation when a man's possession was found in such a place.
It would mean a lover.
"What exactly are you planning?"
"You've already grasped it. Why pretend you haven't?"
"You're mad. Her Royal Highness and that man? It's disgusting. No one would believe it."
The age gap alone made her stomach turn.
Even if Medea was scorned as the royal family's disgrace, she was still the King's sister. Etienne was old, coarse, and infamous for his private tastes.
Rumors said he preferred boys.
If such a story spread, it would obliterate what remained of Medea's prospects.
Even Marieu, who had always measured herself against Medea with raw resentment, was appalled.
She stared at Quiggin as if seeing her clearly for the first time.
"It only needs to look believable from a distance."
"Do you fear nothing? Not even heaven's judgment?"
"You'll soon find yourself where I stand," the head maid replied dryly. "Do you really plan to leave without securing anything for yourself?"
"If this succeeds, I'll help you launder that inconvenient blood of yours."
"Launder… my status?"
"You know how I became a lady, don't you?"
Quiggin folded her arms, leaning back against a stone pillar.
"My late husband's nephew still lacks an heir. Serve as their adopted daughter for a few years, and you will emerge as a proper noblewoman."
Noble.
Samon's words from that night rang in her ears:
As the heir to a dukedom, I need compelling justification to take a commoner as my wife.
If her status were washed clean, she could stand beside him in daylight.
"What do you say? I cannot give you long. You understand what kind of opportunity this is."
Marieu said nothing at first.
The head maid's expression soured at her silence.
"If you're unsure, forget it. I won't wait around to be caught standing next to you."
She reached out to reclaim the handkerchief.
Marieu's fingers tightened around the silk.
"Wait."
Quiggin's lips curved—small, satisfied.
"So you've made up your mind."
After the head maid left, Marieu stared down at the handkerchief.
Samon must never hear of this.
A scandal between a young Princess and an aging minister would be too filthy. It would stain Valdina's honor, the royal bloodline's dignity.
And he would certainly not approve of her working with a head maid he had already written off as useless.
The offer of adoption into nobility was bait meant for her alone.
She loved Samon. But she understood his nature now—cold where it counted, calculating where it mattered most.
If not, he would never have kept her hidden this long.
In her mind, the blame slid easily toward distant targets: Etienne and the Princess.
Those cold eyes. That dismissal.
The horror she'd felt at the scheme's cruelty seeped away, replaced by a simmering, personal hatred.
Even if Medea married that disgusting old toad, would she still look down on me? When I am Duchess Claudio?
"Medea, you shouldn't have treated me with such contempt."
The golden embroidery on the handkerchief gleamed faintly in the dark. After a brief hesitation, Marieu curled her fingers around it.
"You pushed me away first."
"So don't blame me for this."
— Dawn at the Fortress Road — Several days later, as dawn smeared pale gold across the horizon, Medea and Neril walked the road outside the capital, headed toward Marquess Gilliforth's cottage.
"A few nights ago, Marieu slipped out of the palace and met with the head maid."
Medea listened in silence, letting the cold morning air clear her thoughts.
"I had a bad feeling, so I never let her out of my sight. She lurked around Your Highness's chambers afterward."
Neril drew a pale blue handkerchief from inside her cloak.
"Marieu crept into your bedchamber at dawn and hid this in your jewelry chest."
Medea stopped walking.
"The initials are 'Etienne.' That's the Minister of Palace Affairs, isn't it?"
"Ha."
Clear, almost delighted laughter slipped out of her before she caught it.
"The head maid truly is desperate—entangling me with Etienne of all people."
"Those vile creatures dare sully Your Highness by pairing you with that… thing…"
Neril's hand twitched near her sword.
"I am confident in stealth and disposal. Two bodies, perhaps three—I can eliminate them without leaving a trace. If you permit it..."
Medea's lips curved, halfway between amusement and exasperation.
"Three, including the Minister? At that point, Neril, *you* wouldn't be safe."
"I don't care—as long as I can cut down the monsters reaching for you."
Medea swallowed another laugh.
"Not yet."
Neril's dissatisfaction showed clearly.
"You know I never let those who come for me live. They will die. When and where I decide."
"Then what shall we do with the handkerchief?"
"Give it to me. I'll burn it. Not even ash will remain."
Neril reached out, but Medea caught her wrist with a light, firm touch.
"Neril, you mentioned earlier you were confident in concealment."
"Yes, Your Highness."
Medea's expression softened into something that looked almost pleased.
She drew a small, gleaming object from her sleeve.
"Isn't that the trumpet-flower bracelet Marieu wore?"
The bracelet Samon had gifted, all golden vines and ruby buds.
"Your Highness, that's the bracelet she lost. She's been frantic, turning the palace upside down to find it."
Medea hadn't been the only one to notice it.
The maids, incensed by Marieu's faithlessness, had kept sharp eyes as well.
"She claims it's a keepsake from her mother, but it's far too costly. She's been parading it around like a trophy. I suspected she stole it."
"We were going to ask whether the Duchess or Lady Birna had reported anything missing."
"Do that," Medea said. "But don't tell Marieu we recovered it."
"Of course. She's searched herself sick for three days."
That was how the bracelet containing Samon's devotion had come into Medea's keeping.
Medea folded the bracelet into the blue handkerchief with meticulous care—imperial-branded silk wrapping a clandestine gift from the Regent's son.
Two secrets, bound together.
"Later," she said, placing the bundle in Neril's hands, "you will hide this among Marieu's things."
When the time came to pull the thread, it would tug on every neck that had slipped its head into the noose.
---