The girl sitting across from me had not once looked up since she arrived.
She was dressed beautifully — a lehenga chosen with obvious care, the fabric and embroidery befitting a daughter of a prestigious house — but she might as well have been wearing a sackcloth for all the comfort she appeared to take in it. Her eyes were fixed on the floor with the determination of someone who has decided that the floor is the only safe place to look. Her hands worked continuously at the hem of her shawl, folding and releasing and folding again, the restless motion of someone whose anxiety has to go somewhere.
She was on the softer side, rounder in her features than her friends, and her skin was considerably lighter than the typical Selonian complexion. When she had come in and offered her greeting, I had caught a glimpse of grey eyes — an unusual colour in this part of the world. That, combined with the fairness of her skin, pointed fairly clearly toward a mixed heritage.
She was, underneath all that anxious stillness, genuinely lovely. It was simply difficult to see past the discomfort.
"You've been helping us behind the scenes since the beginning," I said, keeping my tone easy and unhurried, the way you speak to something startled that you don't want to bolt. "I wanted to thank you properly for that, Niwara."
"It — it was nothing, your Majesty," she managed, in a voice barely above a murmur. The stutter was slight but present.
"Will you look at me? I'd feel rather terrible thinking I'd caused you distress simply by asking you here." I set my teacup down. The tea was piping hot by any reasonable standard. For me it registered as barely warm.
The instruction seemed to require some internal effort on her part, but she lifted her head.
Now that she was actually looking at me, I could see her properly. Grey eyes with a quiet spark in them, catching the soft morning light from the windows. Raven hair, well-oiled and carefully kept, with the particular sheen of something that receives daily attention. Rounded cheeks and fair skin. She was genuinely pretty in the way of people who don't know they are, which is always a more interesting kind of pretty than the sort that's been polished into performance.
"You're of mixed heritage, aren't you?" I asked. It was not a delicate question, but it was an obvious one, and dancing around obvious things tends to produce more discomfort than simply stating them.
"Yes, your Majesty." A pause while she gathered herself. "My mother is from the west."
That was apparently the extent of what she could offer on the subject, at least for now.
"You're the youngest in your family, I understand. How many siblings?"
"Three brothers, your Majesty." Then, as though suddenly remembering the proper form of address had been waiting: "Your Majesty."
The youngest and only daughter of House Gorawa. The house itself had an honourable history — established roughly sixty years ago in the aftermath of the war with the western kingdom of Relika, when Gorawa's founding ancestor had served as the general of Selon's campaign. They had been decisive in that victory, and Relika had become a vassal state. The house had maintained its military tradition ever since; both her father and her brothers held positions in the imperial army.
She was almost certainly beloved in that household. The only girl, surrounded by soldiers, youngest of four. She had probably been looked after with considerable thoroughness. Which made her personality — this extreme, almost painful shyness — somewhat surprising, and also perhaps explained it. Sometimes being very carefully protected produces exactly this: someone lovely and capable who has never quite learned that the world beyond the immediate circle isn't uniformly dangerous.
I found myself wondering how she had formed friendships at all, given the nature she presented. Childhood, most likely. Friends made before self-consciousness fully sets in are often the most durable.
I decided to stop trying to draw her out through gentle conversation, which was clearly producing diminishing returns, and simply ask what I had brought her here to ask.
"Are you willing to continue helping us going forward?"
She looked at me directly for the first time.
"Yes, your Majesty. As long as I'm able to remain at home, I'm willing to do whatever is needed."
I paused.
That was not the reflexive, agree-with-everything answer I had half-expected from someone this visibly intimidated. That was a condition. Stated plainly, without apology, by a girl whose hands were still fidgeting with the hem of her shawl. She had priorities, and she knew what they were, and she was not so overwhelmed by the situation that she had forgotten to name them.
I was quietly impressed.
"If that is your only condition," I said, "then I would like to formally appoint you as a special lady-in-waiting — one who works from behind the scenes, from the comfort of your own home, with any task that requires a physical presence here at the palace handled by someone else on your behalf." I let that settle. "I would also ensure you receive an annual allowance for your service to the imperial household. Does that seem like an arrangement worth considering?"
Her eyes widened.
The reasoning behind my offer — and behind the position itself — had taken me some days to arrive at. When I had first been introduced to the formal structure of the Selon court, I had learned that an empress was expected to maintain ladies-in-waiting from noble houses, companions who occupied a clearly defined space between social equal and official attendant. It was nothing like Draga, where my maids had simply been my companions without any formal distinction between the roles. Here the line between a maid and her mistress was drawn firmly, and the convention of ladies-in-waiting existed precisely to give the empress someone she could actually speak to.
When I had been asked to make my appointments, I had been at a complete loss. I knew no one. I had considered Aathi and Ruthi, until it was pointed out that they were too young and, being imperial family, were exempt from such appointments regardless. So I had asked them to introduce me to suitable candidates, and they had produced Rewathi, Gayathri, and Sangya — three women who had proved, over the course of the fair preparations, to be resourceful, capable, and genuinely pleasant company. I had decided to appoint all three without further deliberation.
They had then pressed me, collectively, to give Niwara a chance as well. Despite her reluctance to appear, she had been quietly essential to the organisational work — meticulous, thorough, and, as I had since learned, fluent in over ten languages and skilled in both accounts and bookkeeping. Two things I needed rather badly and currently had no good source of.
The shyness was a real limitation in terms of court functions. The work I was envisioning for her was not.
"I am not worthy, your Majesty," she said at last, though with slightly less conviction than the words suggested.
"I disagree, and I'd rather you didn't say that again." My tone was gentle but direct. "You don't need to come to the palace. You don't need to attend events or meet people you don't want to meet. I'll have Rewathi handle anything that requires a physical presence here. What I need from you is what you already do well — the quiet work, the careful work. In exchange, you receive a formal title and an income that is entirely your own."
I watched her absorb that last part.
An income. Her own income, earned through her own capability, belongs to no one else. I could see the implications registering behind those grey eyes — the particular calculus of a young woman in a society that had very clear opinions about which people were entitled to their own paths and which were expected to follow the paths laid out for them. Selon had its complications, but on this point it was consistent: those who contributed economically had standing. They had a voice. They had, in the most practical sense, choices.
House Gorawa clearly adored their daughter. But adoring families were not always proof against social pressure, and social pressure in Selon had a way of expressing itself through marriage arrangements for daughters who had no income of their own and no formal position to point to.
This was a door. Small, modest, dressed in the quiet language of bookkeeping and correspondence. But a door nonetheless.
I watched her think it through, and said nothing, and let her arrive at the conclusion on her own.