The Shadows Between Us

After lunch, Alessandra writes to Kallias, asking him to accompany her to a play, but he declines. He’s too busy. She asks if there’s any way she can help, and he discloses that a bandit is stealing from nobles and giving money to peasants. Kallias plans to stop them, and Alessandra thinks that someone stupid enough not to keep the money for themselves will soon be caught.

They discuss Alessandra’s choice to wear gloves to protect her from illegally touching Kallias. She asks if he would kill her if they touched, but he doesn’t answer, instead insisting that he cannot trust anyone until his parents’ murderer is identified. He admits that someone tried to kill him with a topical poison the month prior and that only his shadows saved him. He suspects everyone, including his friends. His main suspects are the council because his death would allow them to rule indefinitely. Kallias switches topics, and they discuss the council’s approval of their courtship and how being courted by a king has made Alessandra popular.

Alessandra receives a letter from her father, congratulating her on her courtship and telling her that Orrin is “an excellent backup plan” if her courtship with Kallias ends (86). He writes that Hektor’s father is investigating his disappearance and that Alessandra may be questioned. She worries that Hektor’s body has been found. She recalls disposing of his body in the woods and almost ending up stuck in the grave she dug. She destroyed all the evidence of her crime and wonders what has changed to cause Lord Drivas to search for his son at last.

Several days later, Alessandra is sewing with Hestia, Rhoda, and Galen. She doesn’t understand why Rhoda is so kind to Galen but notes that the manservant watches Rhoda closely. A servant brings Alessandra a beautiful ruby necklace—a gift from Kallias. Alessandra tells the ladies about her courtship (including some false details) and enjoys their attention.

That evening, Kallias startles Alessandra when he walks through the wall into her bedroom. He is angry that Alessandra told the ladies they had touched; the palace is abuzz with the gossip. She counters that she said he kissed her gloved hands. He says she cannot admit to breaking the law, but she points out he could pardon her. Kallias says rumors about his touching Alessandra make him weak; he disappears abruptly. 

Alessandra wears a dramatic red dress to match her new necklace, which she wears even though she is angry about the prior night. Kallias appears at breakfast and apologizes. Alessandra forgives him and compliments the necklace. She spends the rest of the day with the ladies and returns to her room, musing that she needs to find a way into Kallias’s meetings so that she has more opportunities to make him fall in love with her.

She finds that Myron has once again snuck into her room. He gloats that his father has died, so her blackmail no longer matters. He says that now he controls her; if she doesn’t do as he says, he’ll tell Kallias she’s a “strumpet.”

The next day, Alessandra fumes as she sits beside Orrin and Myron instead of Kallias. She plots how to rid herself of Myron, but she can’t think of anything other than murdering him, which is too risky with the investigation into Hektor’s death. Alessandra notices Melita, Rhouben’s fiancée, looking admiringly at Orrin. She begins to plan how to get rid of her unwanted suitors. Kallias arrives and asks Alessandra to sit with him. He asks about Myron, whom Alessandra characterizes as an unwanted suitor. She switches the topic to politics; delegates from the recently conquered kingdom of Pegai report resistance to Kallias’s dominion over them. They coldly discuss flogging or killing peasants, thinking only of how only able-bodied workers can pay taxes. Alessandra proposes giving them the “illusion of power” to stem dissent (106). Guessing they will choose the head dissident, she suggests allowing them to elect a leader, so Kallias may crush that person. Alessandra is pleased when he praises her for her diabolical thinking. As part of her burgeoning plan, she speaks to Myron’s brother, the new viscount and the owner of a gambling den Myron frequents.

Alessandra wears her most spectacular dress to remind everyone she is courting the king even if he is not attending the play with her. Instead, she is stuck with Myron. Hestia’s reference to Alessandra as “the future queen” flatters Alessandra (108). At the play, when Myron leaves to sit with a duke, Alessandra tells Hestia and Rhoda that he is using Alessandra to get close to the king. She asks if they are using her for the same reason, but they assure her they are not. Leandros sits next to Alessandra and flirts. Hestia and Rhoda tell him to stay there so they aren’t seated next to Lady Zervas, whom they find boring and melancholy but who has been ordered to stay at the palace. She courted the late king before he married his queen and never recovered from the rejection.

Alessandra’s next outing is a ball hosted by Kallias’s distant cousins; again, Kallias is too busy to accompany her. On her way to find him, she encounters Leandros. He offers to escort her to the meeting rooms to find Kallias. She and Leandros bond over feeling pushed away by Kallias though Leandros doesn’t blame the king, who lost his brother as well as his parents. Alessandra hadn’t known Kallias had a brother who died in a carriage accident shortly before the previous king and queen’s deaths. Leandros was brought to the palace after the deaths to be a new friend for Kallias.

Leandros leaves her at the meeting room door. She tells Kallias she is there to “[put] on a show,” demonstrating their courtship for others, and asks him to slip away with her, but he is too busy (120). She inquires about his previous meeting, which was full of nobles robbed by the bandit, whom Kallias has failed to locate. He grows angry then cuts himself off as the council watches avidly. Alessandra proposes that, instead of targeting the bandit, they target those to whom he is giving the money by allowing specially marked coins to get stolen and then tracking where they show up. Lady Terzi, the council treasurer, is reluctant, but Kallias insists. With his decision, Alessandra presses him to attend the ball with her, but he declines. She emphasizes that they need to be seen together to maintain their charade. Kallias says he will send her more gifts though Alessandra isn’t sure if this is for appearances or to appease her. He has her removed from the meeting room.

Alessandra seeks out Rhouben and locates him in a billiards room with Leandros and Petros. She asks for his help in her plan to rid herself of Myron and Orrin, which she wishes to do without Kallias’s knowledge. Rhouben is eager to help when Alessandra says her plan would rid him of Melita, as well. He reports that Melita’s chief desire is to marry someone rich, handsome, and higher ranked than her father; Orrin is higher ranked than Rhouben. She says she needs money, 5,000 “necos,” which Petros comments is more than his father’s annual income. Rhouben readily offers the money, however. She tells him to bring his father to the palace and “play the perfect fiancé” in the meantime (127).

For the next several days, Alessandra receives beautiful gifts from Kallias. She is annoyed to receive them in public because it seems he sent them only for the sake of appearance. She gets a romantic letter from Orrin but doesn’t reply. She attends the duke’s ball without Kallias and is annoyed when Myron appears to escort her instead. She stands by the wall, annoyed that nobody asks her to dance. Lady Zervas chimes in from nearby that nobody else will dare now that she is courting Kallias. She advises Alessandra to keep her distance from Kallias and warns that her heartbreak will be inevitable otherwise. She says it was harder to see the late king love another than it is to have him dead.

Alessandra sees Rhouben and Melita and cuts in on their dance. He has the money she requested. Alessandra will use Orrin’s love letter to replicate his handwriting; once they get a hold of Orrin’s seal, they will send a letter “from” Orrin to Melita, but obtaining the seal will have to wait until Orrin returns from his weeklong journey. Rhouben anticipates his father soon, now that he has withdrawn the large sum of money from his account. Alessandra cautions that timing will be essential in their plot.