A Posse of Princesses Read Online Free PDF Page A

her
sister-by-marriage more with every exchange. “That’s where I keep
my books, and my tiranthe. Elda’s too stout to go up there, and her
awful maid Sazu refused to climb all 538 steps.”
    “Sazu.” Shera wrinkled her nose. “How I
remember her! She used to spy on me, and report every mistake to
Elda and Mama. It’s her sister who I have as governess, and let me
tell you, if nothing pleasant—besides meeting you at last—happens
on this trip, at least I will have this time away from her.”
    “Poor Elda.” Rhis’s conscience gave her a
pang of regret. “Tried so hard to turn us into proper princesses.
Well, at least we’ll know how to behave when we get to Hai Taresal
and meet Queen Briath, because I’ll wager anything she doesn’t play a tiranthe or daydream in her garden.”
    “No!” Shera clapped her hands. “But we won’t
be going to the capital. Didn’t you get word? No, I guess you
couldn’t, for the letter arrived just before I left home, and you
would have already been traveling. We’re to go to Eskanda, which is
Crown Prince Lios’s own place. The celebration will be there.”
    “Is it? But we’ll still be meeting the queen,
won’t we?”
    Shera shook her head. “Papa says she never
leaves Hai Taresal.”
    Rhis tried to picture the map. Hai Taresal,
the capital of Vesarja, lay right in the center of the kingdom
where two great rivers met, a city whose beauty was legendary. She
remembered vaguely that Eskanda lay in the north-western quarter of
Vesarja. “I wonder why they changed it? We’ll have a lot farther to
travel.”
    Shera shrugged. “And we can enjoy every
moment of it. As for why, who knows? But this I’m sure of: if the
queen stays behind, all the older, stuffy courtiers will probably
stay too, unless they have daughters to try to marry off, which
means that things ought to be much more fun in Eskanda.”
    Rhis gave a sigh of pleasure. “So it will be
all people our age? How wonderful!”
    Shera wrinkled her nose again. “Well, don’t
count on that, for I know that Iardith will be there, and probably
we’ll find others like her.”
    “Iardith?” Rhis remembered the name from her
lessons. “Princess Iardith of Arpalon?”
    “That’s the one.” Shera fluttered her fingers
on either side of her head. “You’re lucky that your father and the
king of Arpalon are mad at each other over some trade agreement,
because you haven’t had to meet Iardith.”
    “What’s wrong with her? Is she evil?”
    “Oh, nothing so interesting,” Shera said with
a laugh. “She really is a perfect princess—and if you don’t happen
to notice all her perfections, she will tell you about them. But
only in private. In public, she’s just as sweet and dignified and
proper as Elda and the others could wish. We don’t have a hope of
attracting Prince Lios’s attention while she’s there, which doesn’t
matter to me—much—because I’ve been twoing with Rastian, the son of
the Duke of the Northern March, for eight months and seventeen
days—ever since I was formally introduced at Mama’s court.” She
waved her hand vaguely northward.
    “Is Iardith very beautiful, then?”
    “Very.” Shera rolled her eyes. “Hair blacker
than midnight with no moons, and glossy, and never messy, though it
is quite long, and light brown eyes—the boys who like poetry call
them topaz , how disgusting. She has long, dark lashes, and
perfect features, and a perfect figure, and she dances perfectly,
and uses her fan perfectly, she has perfect manners—when others are
around. And she knows more than you do—as she will tell you, ever
so nicely—about every fashionable subject, whether flowers or
artists.” Shera sighed. “When she came to visit us for my mother’s
birthday, every one of the fellows at court acted like puppies
around her. Disgusting!” She grimaced. “Even Rastian got a little
silly after she started looking at him over her fan and blinking
those long and perfect