Falling into her bed as the sun rose, Yalira expected to see the destruction of Antalis, to hear the screams of soon-dead children, and to churn over the promises of monsters. After a night of harrowing sleeplessness, it seemed Eheia had taken pity and blessed her with the dreamless sleep of exhaustion.

For the first time in Semyra, Yalira's head was clear. Against the hazy light of the afternoon sun through the airy linen curtains, her mind was focused and certain. Yalira was confident that Andar would not murder her. She had pushed against his pride and carved into his grief, and he still made no move against her.

Like pulling details together from a fuzzy dream, Yalira woke with the clarity that Andar wanted something from her. Wild theories and ideas of what buzzed in her head, but Yalira knew he needed her breathing. No matter her distemper, her thoughtless tongue, he needed her enough to hold tight reins on his brutal nature, to spare the lives of her priestesses, to grant her gifts and wishes.

A thrill of power sang through Yalira, as blistering as the sun, as fierce as lightning. Yalira dao Eheia held power over Andar of Tyr. If she could make it last, then she could restore Antalis, save her people, and redeem the crimes she committed to do it. The possibilities were so tangible, so close.

Consumed with the dreams of her temple-city, Yalira's mind snapped to an image of a sleek chest, hewn from cypress. In Andar's chambers, stifled with wary anxiety, she had not recognized the letters carved into its surface. It hadn't seemed important. Her ability to read was a growing thing, a tender vine. Fresh with sleep, the letters now spoke. They shouted.

Antalis.

Andar possessed a chest marked with the symbols of her temple, as he had promised.

Yalira had ignored the burden of oleander and had refused to believe his words. He had to be mistaken, deceived. For truth was a tenuous thing. Subjectivity, change, time. All three pulled and pushed at perceptions of certainty.

Andar believed he had proof of a written record of Antalis, he believed it with every fiber of his being. It did not matter if that was not the objective fact — humans were bound by their lack of sight. Only Antala knew all and chose when to share her infinite wisdom.

The contradiction twisted through Yalira, writhing snakes in her core. Now that she had seen a hint of evidence, now that Andar had introduced a crack of doubt in her foundation, uncertainty surfaced. A part of her yearned to push away his questions, his claims. It was easier to cling to the secure memories of her upbringing. There was comfort in that.

But it would not erase the mystery. Illiterate priestesses who knew how to write, the reason to conquer Antalis, her unknown importance to Andar of Tyr. They clashed with the secrets in Semyra—power hungry politicos, scheming wives, enemies who wore the faces of allies. Stillborns and monsters. Loose and frayed, each thread was connected in a bigger picture Yalira did not understand.

It chafed.

Through the unknown, however, that sharp certainty stabbed. The cypress chest. The conflict between curiosity and fear—the same battle that had plagued Andar—wrestled within Yalira.

"I need to know," she whispered to the empty room.

Silent sunlight streamed through linen caught in the summer breeze. Though bathed in its warmth, Yalira's skin erupted in gooseflesh.

The goddess's presence had flickered in Semyra, intermittent and faint, but it had flickered. Ashamed after a blatant lie, a hastened death, filled with treasonous questions, Yalira still reached for Antala. No ghost of oleander, no divine presence. For the first time, she was alone.

The apprehension that grew from that soil of isolation was a strange bloom. Hadn't she dreaded Antala during each new moon? Every submission was a trial, a forced surrender that left her raw and weak and helpless. Yalira had feared the dark crawl into the mountainside. She loathed binding away her spirit to make room for the goddess. Month after month, she quieted that rebellious cry of her heart, locked away the secret horror of losing control.

And now, alone, Antala's absence was like a loss of her hand, the death of a protector.

Her heart flooded with self-loathing.

I cannot have it both ways, she told herself. I cannot be in control of my destiny and also devote all that I am to Antala.

"If I have my justice," she breathed. "I will return to you, Antala. Completely."

Until then, I will do what must be done.

Yalira tried not to notice the lack of oleander.

Liar. Murderess. Doubter.

Spurred by sudden guilt, she threw off the coverlet in haste to busy her thoughts away from the conflict. Rebellious independence. Steadfast devotion.

Yalira shook her head, determined to focus her attention on the chest, on its secrets. The growing fracture in her spirit could wait.

I don't think Andar will be keen to do me any favors, she guessed. Her lips twitched with a dark humor. The man might need her alive, but after his display of untempered anger and icy fury? Yalira imagined he'd ask for a pound of flesh in exchange.

The dilemma of whose flesh was the concern. Clever Andar knew where best to strike her.

No, she decided. I must find another way.

The answer came as she looked toward the entrance to her rooms. A shock of cream against the cool stone floor. A note on vellum.

Signed in the tidy flourish of Oristos.

If you haven't starved in your sleep, please visit me soon.

As if prompted, her stomach growled in discontent. It was not until that moment that Yalira realized that she had slept, not for a few daylight hours, but through the night and well into the next day.

Food first, she said to herself. And then I'll figure out what Oristos knows.

Oristos permanently occupied guest chambers that overlooked the palace gardens. During their first lesson together, he had mentioned that while he kept an apartment in the city, he preferred the views from his rooms in the high city.

Yalira understood why. The view stretched from the largest garden, fragrant jasmine wafting into the large stone windows, and over the lime-washed city that touched the shadowy bases of the mountainside. Somehow the bustle of the city below did not reach the rooms, for instead, birdsong lilted. It was the same view, the same ambiance, of Rishi's rooms. Of Sasha's. The favored.

A shade of cruelty flashed through Yalira. Even leaving Andar with a stillborn son might throw the queen from his good graces.

Who will scramble to take her place?

"Such a shame to hear about Sasha," Oristos echoed as he set their table with fragile porcelain cups. He'd been eager for company, eager to display his newest acquisition. Carried from Tern, a friend had gifted him the intricate tea set, complete with odd balls of twine-wrapped tea.

As he prepared the exotic display, Yalira wondered if he was also eager for information.

"Yes," she murmured, hesitant to lock eyes. She was not convinced that his eye possessed any uncanny ability, but it was safer to avoid it. In a nonchalance that was becoming too familiar, she asked, "You said it's called bloom tea? A mistranslation?"

His mismatched eyes crinkled in amusement. "So impatient!"

Since Oristos appeared delighted to play in one of his theatrical moods, Yalira smothered her questions with a soft smile, raised eyebrows. She folded her hands in her lap—a perfect statute of attention.

He barked a surprised laugh.

"Did you paint that little mask on your face for all your instructors, High Priestess? For all the simpering sycophants who begged for your favor?"

"Are you begging for my favor, Oristos?"

"I thought I was instructing you."

"On which subject?" Mimicking the cheekiness of his tone, Yalira glanced at their scrolls he used for their lessons. All neatly tied and tucked away.

"On tea!"

"Well, then I apologize. Please continue."

With a wink and a feigned grumble, Oristos ordered her to observe and poured from a bronze teapot.

For a breath, the ugly little balls sat unmoving in their steaming baths. Yalira opened her mouth, itching to tease him for the wasted suspense. And then it happened. Slowly, as if hesitant to bloom on the first days of spring, the balls unfurled into splashes of bright color. Purple amaranth, golden chrysanthemum, delicate leaves of emerald and jade. A tiny floating garden in her cup.

"Fascinating, isn't it? Change the environment, and a bundle of dried leaves transforms into something unexpected."

Yalira paused at the lilt of his tone and met his eyes through the fragrant steam. His brown and blue gaze was both soft and piercing.

"Are we still discussing tea?" she asked, bringing the cup to her lips. Though she aimed to smooth her tone, a whisper of wary defensiveness touched each word.

Perhaps it was the blossoming beauty in the cup, the exotic scent, but the tea itself tasted bland and stale. Her thoughts raced to her journey to Semyra, to another cup of tea shared. As if Oristos had plucked away leaves and petals, Yalira was thorny and vulnerable.

Oristos smiled. "You're so quick to find barbs where they don't exist, Yalira. I only mean to muse on perception, on transformation."

She pretended to drink more tea, to busy her hands and attention on the dainty cup. He sounded sincere, but the creeping feeling that the words had hidden intent persisted. The throb of a fresh wound.

"What if I don't want to be transformed?" she asked. Yalira had promised to no longer be kind, to play this dark game in Semyra with more cleverness and less heart. After a night of sleep, she wished she hadn't made that promise. A part of her wished that she might channel Rishi's mischievous smile, her biting humor. Instead, Yalira's question sounded childish in her ears. A warm bloom of embarrassment touched her cheeks.

Oristos paused and considered his cup, as if the words he sought might be found in the depths of his drink. A shadow of weathered patience whispered from the lines at his forehead. The crinkled frustration made Yalira wonder if she was not the first stubborn student he'd faced in this lesson.

To his credit, Oristos kept his tone perfect in restraint. "Life without change is a fragile thing."

In a fluid motion, Oristos let his cup fall to the floor. The porcelain shattered, shards skittering across the stone.

"You are what you chose, Yalira. But in Semyra, I'd be careful to not be the cup."

The sudden wry gravity of his voice, the sharp drama of his presentation, sparked her to surprised laughter. That she had found a person—a man—whose company she genuinely enjoyed sent spirals of shock and warmth to her chest. 

A stray whisper of thought wondered if was attraction, base human emotion.

As a brisk servant entered to sweep away the shattered cup, Yalira considered the man with a more careful eye.

Oristos was handsome in his own way. The intriguing brightness of his unmatched eyes, his symmetrical features, the balance of his amicable cleverness. Though there was nothing outwardly displeasing about the man, there was no warmth save that of friendliness. 

Yalira waited until the servant departed and said, "I suppose I have already transformed."

Oristos raised an eyebrow in mock surprise as he poured himself a fresh cup of tea. "And how is that?"

I am no longer kind, she told herself.

"I never imagined I'd enjoy the company of a man," she said aloud.

Though the words were true, Yalira had intended the brittle humor in them. A breath of stunned silence became a storm of laughter. The sound rang from the both of them until Oristos wiped a joyful tear from his blue eye and its brightness dimmed into soft contemplation.

Yalira hardly noticed the change. So caught in the pleasure of her own wit, it wasn't until Oristos shifted in his seat that she noticed the mirrored shift in the room.

From beneath the close crop of his mousy brown hair, Oristos's gaze was thoughtful as it met hers. In barely a breath, words hardly more than a whisper, he asked, "Don't you find it odd that Andar allows me such free rein with his wives?"

A/N

What do you think is in the chest?

Any guesses for Oristos' secret? 

:)