It was a beautiful morning until they found Plinius’s body.

  Ever since it happened I have often wondered about the fishermen who found him. They must have had a lovely day until then, the air was still, the sun was shining. Spring was coming and they could have finally taken off their winter sweaters and worked only in their linen shirts. Their nets were probably full of fish. I hope they threw away the fish that were in the same net as the him.

  It is not fully accurate to say that they found his body, they only found about a third of it, the ribcage and above. The bloated carcass had been in the sea too long to be recognizable, but whoever had thrown him in the ocean had not undressed him. He was still wearing his blue embroidered doublet, and most of his rings were still stuck on his white bloated fingers. The ones that had not yet been eaten by fish.

  I was in the courtyard reading poetry with Lady Ima and Lady Gwendolyn when I heard the news. Lady Ima screamed when she heard it. I simply stood still. I wanted to pretend that I was in shock, in reality, I was relieved. I had not been imagining what I saw that night, and now everyone knew the secret that had been haunting my mind.

  ***

  “They say he was murdered,” Lady Ilene told me.

  We sat side by side, each working on our own part of the rge embroidery. She was the first person from Medora who I had ever let work on the big embroidery from Havermark. It was the afternoon of that same day, and it seemed like Lady Ilene had talked to just about everyone in Medolina.

  “Really, how can they tell? Hasn’t he been in the water for two weeks now? Haven’t the fish eaten him?” I asked her.

  “Well he was st seen thirteen days ago,” she corrected me. “We don’t know that he’s been dead that whole time.”

  “Right, of course. But you did say the body was in a very bad way.”

  “Yes very bad, it certainly didn’t go in the water yesterday, but they say there’s no way the fish could have cut through him that cleanly. Sir Hallio was one of the guards that retrieved him, and he tells me everything he knows.”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “Nothing like that!” she ughed. “He’s just a loyal guard and he knows I tip well for extra information.”

  “So they say he was cut in two?” I asked.

  Of course I knew the truth, he had been brutally sshed open and had his guts spilled out. Maybe he had been sshed in half under the pile of intestines.

  “Something like that,” she replied.

  “And they say that Sir Titius has been missing as long as the prince,” I hinted. “Do you think he is dead as well or…”

  “That’s just the thing! Sir Hallio says that the other day one of the other young knights saw him skulking around the knights’ quarters. They said he covered himself up, but they recognized him from his clothes and his gait.”

  “What? Skulking? How strange!”

  I tried to not sound too cheerful. That settled it. Sir Titius had killed Plinius because of some weird dispute between the two of them. Alvar had nothing to do with it, and we would be all the way in the Midway Isles when people would finally find out what the whole thing was about.

  “Yes, one has to believe he had something to do with it, or at least that he knows something we do not.”

  ***

  That night Virtus found me doodling in my sketchbook, drawing a meticulous pattern of circles that my teachers always scolded me for wasting paper on. It soothed me when nothing else could.

  “My love, you can’t keep staying up this long, especially after your illness,” he muttered, as he struggled to take off his jacket.

  I stood up and helped him get it off and put it on the chair.

  “You should come to bed earlier then,” I whispered to him. “You know I can’t sleep without you.”

  He looked at me softly with his bloodshot eyes.

  “You know why I couldn’t do that tonight.”

  “I know, I’m sorry.”

  I felt horrible. My stomach was a big pit of guilt. Virtus was a good man, a wonderful man. He had just lost his father and his brother, and now he was about to lose his wife too. The only thing I could comfort myself with was the fact that he would be better off in the end. He would be better off without me. He would never forgive me if he knew I had killed the king, and I couldn't keep that secret from him forever. One slip of the tongue and I would end up skewered on the castle gate like Queen Reena.

  I got him dressed down to his underwear, and we y down in the bed together. He put his head on my chest. It was so big, compared to my ribcage. His arm slung over my waist as he softly started to sob.

  I stroked his hair until he fell asleep. Then I y still and awake for about an hour more.

  ***

  “So I’ll have to ask Sir Thanmar to exchange his shift with you?” I asked Alvar.

  I sat on the bench in the cultivated garden, trying to look as if I was mostly focusing on my sketchbook. Alvar stood beside the bench.

  “Yes, the old man is so stubborn. He doesn’t like the idea of me seducing one of the scullery maids.”

  I chuckled.

  “Why on earth did you think he would go along with that? He’s such a dutiful old knight, he would never go out of his way to try to get you id.”

  “Well you’re telling me now,” he sighed.

  “And you only need to be my guard before the big night? Not the actual one itself.”

  I was careful not to mention us leaving, although I was almost certain we were the only people in the garden, but you could never be too careful.

  “Yes, our friend has a special pn for the big night.”

  He was referring to Adora’s pn to make it seem like I was dead so that we would be able to escape from Medora.

  “That’s good… Sir Alvar, before you go…”

  “Yes, Your Highness?”

  “They found Prince Plinius’s body in the harbour.”

  I waited for his reaction.

  “They think Sir Titius did it,” he told me matter-of-factly.

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “I think it could be, these Medoran soldiers are animals.”

  ***

  We were sitting at the table in the great hall. I had asked Virtus if he really wanted to eat in front of everyone just one evening after his brother had been found dead. He said he just wanted his life to return to normal, so there we sat. I tried to entertain him by distracting him, but maybe it was more of a nuisance than a distraction.

  We ate in this awkward state, and stayed a little longer to finish our wine. It was then that Duchess Karina walked past us on her way back from the restroom to her seat at the edge of the table.

  “Your Majesties,” she bowed awkwardly. “I just want to tell you that I am so terribly sorry for your loss. Plinius was a good man, and one of the funniest I ever knew.”

  Virtus smiled wanly.

  “Do you remember how he used to chase us around when we were kids?” he asked.

  She chuckled.

  “I remember that time he cut all your hair off and glued it to your face when you were twelve.”

  Virtus ughed.

  “Oh our father even flogged him personally for that. In hindsight I think he was just jealous that I was starting to get facial hair before him.”

  “Yeah, he always wanted everything his big brother had,” she smiled. “I remember thinking you looked quite good like that.”

  “Well,” Virtus cleared his throat and looked awkwardly at me.

  “It’s fine. Actually, darling. I’m getting quite tired. I think I’ll go to bed now. If the duchess wants she can have my seat and you two can reminisce about the te prince for a while. I never knew him very well.”

  They both looked at me as if I had grown a second head.

  “Are you sure, my love?” Virtus asked.

  “Yes, just make sure you don’t come too te to bed.”

  They were already ughing together about some shared memory when I left the hall.