The confinement settled over the Inner Orchid Residence like a held breath.
Princesses retreated to their courtyards.
Doors closed.
Servants moved through the corridors gossiping, speaking low.
Guards took up positions at each entrance.
Elyndra walked back to her courtyard at the same unhurried pace she had walked out of the hall, Lyel a silent presence three paces behind her.
In the hall behind her she had left Lythia standing in the middle of the floor with her accusations and her fury and no evidence to support either, and a search now officially declared that would turn over every chamber in the residence.
Including hers.
She went inside and closed the door.
The announcement was delivered by the General.
Calm, formal.
All candidates were to remain within their assigned quarters until the search had been completed and the inquiry concluded.
Meals would be brought.
Attendants would be permitted.
No movement outside the courtyard walls until further notice.
She searched her own chamber first.
She did it thoroughly.
She moved through the room from the drawers to the desk and from the space under the bed, the gap behind the wall then the window.
She checked it anyway.
She was on her knees beside the bed when she heard the door.
She straightened and turned.
The crown prince stood just inside the doorway.
She looked at him.
Then she looked at the state of her room.
Drawers open, the bed slightly pulled from the wall, travel cases open on the floor.
”Your Highness shouldn’t walk in unannounced,” she said.
She began moving through the room, closing drawers, straightening things, putting everything back in order with the same energy she had used to disarrange it.
He stepped further inside.
He looked at the room.
Then at her.
”You’re tidying your chamber or…?,” he said.
”I am searching my own chamber,” she said.
He was quiet for a moment.
He moved to the centre of the room and stood there with his arms folded across his chest and watched her work.
”The accusations in the hall,” he said.
“What will you do?.”
She pushed the bed back into place.
“There is nothing to do. I’ll wait for the search to be completed. The truth will come out.”
”You’re not concerned.”
He looked at her steadily.
She moved to the desk and straightened the writing materials and did not look back at him.
”What were you actually searching for?,” he said.
She paused.
Just briefly.
Then she set the ink brush back in its holder and turned to face him.
”I was making sure my own room was clean before the officials arrived,” she said simply.
“I would rather find anything unexpected myself than have it found by someone else.”
He looked at her for a long moment.
”Was there anything unexpected,” he said.
”No,” she said.
He nodded slowly.
He looked around the room once more.
The straightened desk, the closed drawers and the bed back in its proper place.
He opened his mouth.
”His Highness the Crown Prince is requested to withdraw.
The officials have arrived for the search of Princess Elyndra’s chambers.”
The voice carried through the courtyard wall, formal and clear.
The crown prince closed his mouth.
He looked at her once more, his silver gray eyes gazing directly into hers.
”Be careful,” he said.
She said nothing but her heart fluttered as a response.
He turned and slipped through the back passage quietly, and a moment later the officials entered through the main door.
Elyndra stood at the centre of her chamber, her hands folded at her front, her face composed and entirely at ease.
”Please,” she said pleasantly.
“Search wherever you need.”
The search began within the hour.
She heard it moving through the residence, footsteps, the sound of doors opening and closing, voices in official tones giving instructions.
Her own chamber was searched thoroughly.
She sat at the writing desk while it happened and worked on a letter to Kyren and gave the searching officials exactly the polite cooperation of a princess with nothing to hide.
They found nothing.
Because there was nothing to find.
She heard them move on to the next courtyard.
Then the next.
The search was still ongoing the footsteps continued to move steadily steadily through the residence slowing.
Stopping.
—
The afternoon deepened into evening and the evening deepened into night and the residence stayed quiet and confined and full of tension.
She had eaten, a little, enough.
Senna was gone and she had not been replaced yet, so she managed alone and did not mind it.
She was sitting in the chair by the window with a cup of tea when she heard the door.
Not a knock.
Just the soft sound of it opening and closing and then Lyel’s footsteps crossing the floor to stand before her.
She looked up at him.
”Sit,” she said.
He sat on the edge of the chair across from her, straight-backed, hands on his knees.
He stood and waited for Elyndra to talk.
She lifted the cup and drank slowly.
The tea was warm.
She looked at the candle on the table beside her and let the silence settle for a moment.
She set her cup down.
”Tell me everything was done correctly,” she said.
”Yes, my lady.”
”The items,” she said.
“You are sure everything was placed correctly.”
”Yes, my lady.”
”Nothing could be traced back?”
”Nothing.”
She nodded once.
She drank again.
”The maidservant,” she said.
“Ressa. How far is she?.”
”Far enough.
Three days’ ride, my lady.
She will not find her way back inside the kingdom quickly.”
”Good.” She set the cup down on the table with a small precise sound.
“And the testifier.” She looked at him directly.
“You have someone ready. Someone who can stand before the queen and say clearly that they saw Lythia Grizelda of Naevana visit Moriah’s courtyard. Recently. More than once. With items she did not declare.”
Lyel met her eyes.
“She is ready, my lady. She was a kitchen servant on the eastern corridor. She has no connection to anyone in this matter and no reason to lie that anyone will be able to find.”
Elyndra looked at him for one more moment.
Then she reached for the teacup.
She lifted it slowly.
Held it.
The candlelight caught the pale gold of the tea inside it and the small curl of steam rising from the top.
Then a smile crept on her face slowly, quiet and entirely her own, more to say a smirk, a dark one.
She set the cup down.
”Good,” she said softly.