Niccola was not ashamed of the ten heartbeats it took her to process what Verde had just said. She was fairly certain she gaped like a fish the entire time. In a realm as obsessed with appearances as Calis, Verde might as well have just told her that crows preferred swimming to their usual means of transportation.

His expression remained amused. "You look surprised."

"Are you pranking me right now?"

"Not in the slightest. To tell you the truth, I'm a touch impressed he came out so soon after his parents distributed that notice; poor man gets plagued by enough would-be suitors already. Couldn't keep away from the people when there's fear of a beast running around, I suppose." A shadow of the frown he'd worn while speaking to Isaiah shrouded his face.

"You look like you have more to say," said Niccola.

"Not that's mine to share. What brings you here?"

It was a clear diversion from whatever he'd prodded Isaiah on earlier. Prodded the crown prince of Calis. The Cantor royal family had only one child. Niccola resisted the urge to rub her temples. She still struggled to wrap her head around this. Isaiah had spoken so casually with Verde, too, like they'd known each other well for years. In the three moons since Niccola had met him, Verde had never told her about this.

She dropped her hands. "Well, talk of a marriage proclamation was half of it, so we might as well start there."

Verde's eyes twinkled. "Interested?"

"No!" Niccola rounded on him, offended, and realized he was teasing. "You're insufferable."

"I daresay you could do worse. As could he. Who knows, might give you both someone to work with 'stead of breaking your backs trying to do everything on your lonesomes."

"I have my criteria, and it takes one in a hundred to match even the most basic of them. I am not in the business of partnering off to just anyone simply because others find them attractive."

"Yet you inquire about the marriage proclamation. What would you like to know?"

Niccola bit her lip as she considered how to phrase the question appropriately. Verde knew where she was from and why she was here, at least on a superficial level. He knew she was from Varna. He'd guessed it early, and she'd asked him to swear himself to secrecy. As far as she knew, he'd kept his word. He himself was born Madeiran—Calis's neighbor on the other side—though he'd lived in Calis all his adult life. Realm relations made their circumstances differ significantly, but he understood the challenges that came with identifying oneself as a foreigner.

He also knew she was here after her sister. She'd claimed Phoebe had run away from home, and though she doubted Verde believed her, he'd made no attempt to pry.

"I told you about the diviner," said Niccola. She'd kept that part of the story, at least. "Well, I haven't found the woman in the picture yet. I was hoping a marriage proclamation would bring people together from across the realm, so I might have a better chance at it. So my first question is, will there be a ball?"

Verde snorted. "Have you met the Cantor royal family?"

It was hard to stay serious when talking with him. Verde's dual citizenship with a more powerful realm enabled his bluntness of speech, as did the high regard he and his Calisian wife Margaret held within the community. Little was more validating than watching him take pot shots at Calis whenever the topic arose.

Niccola fought a smile. "How big?"

"In all? Depends what they have planned for him." Verde blew out a breath. "I know things I'm not supposed to, so I won't disclose. But I can tell you it will be big indeed, and you will likely be invited. So will whoever you're looking for, if they're around."

"Us and half the realm?"

"Something like that."

"Am I correct in guessing that all women in Calis are invited, then, and he gets to pick his bride?"

Verde gave her a look through half-squinted eyes. "I will neither confirm nor deny that guess."

"I'll take that as a yes." She gave him a grin for his troubles. "What about timing?"

He sighed. "Should hear more on that within a week at most. Keep an eye out for a letter. They'll go to every house."

Niccola weighed the benefits of pressing him for more information. But though reading between the lines and guessing correctly was fun, she didn't actually want to force Verde to disclose more than he was comfortable with. If he was serious that he knew things he shouldn't, those things could only have come from Isaiah.

The thrice-damned crown prince of Calis.

"You had more to ask me?" said Verde, terminating the marriage conversation.

"Yes. About the warning of danger at the forest's edge. Well, about the disappearances. A vendor I spoke to said there's been 'another' one... I didn't hear about the first."

Verde went silent for a long time. Then a customer approached the stall, and Niccola was forced to step aside and wait while the coppersmith fielded a consultation on a dented pitcher, then took into the back. It was a straightforward fix. He sent the man on his way, then beckoned Niccola into the stall. With wooden walls around them, the clamor of the marketplace faded.

Verde lowered his voice. "There's been more than a first. Took three just to get the City Guard involved, scattered over the last year. The fourth was half a moon ago. Yesterday was the fifth, and that's only what we know about. The first three were all vulnerable folk at the Talakova's edge, so there could be more. Hermits and foragers who were never on record to go missing."

Niccola stared at him. "And it took this long to send out a notice?"

"I'd ask again if you know the Cantor royal family, but that'd be on me; this ain't a laughing matter." Verde leaned on the edge of the counter and gazed out over the marketplace. "Truth is, I suspect the City Guard were getting counter-orders. Head guard Gideon is a good man. Known him for years. But he's duty-bound. Might get orders he doesn't agree with, but chances are, he'll follow them until they drive him to a breaking point. Only way to keep his job, and he's got kids to feed and an aim to do good things for the realm. He's a skeptic in a good way, but I don't believe he'd hold off for so long without orders from the palace to stand down."

"If you know him, have you asked him about it?"

Verde shook his head. "Margaret and I did, back when the situation stood at only two disappearances. Both in plausible circumstances, so he had a right to be skeptical. The palace told him they'd be contracting the Pereira and Pasternak families themselves. Then told those families to keep hush about it. Said it was 'not to stir up panic,' but you can probably see why I had difficulty believing that when I found out."

He dropped to his elbows and ran both hands down his face. "Gideon's been run into the ground ever since. I did ask again, but I suspected I might be pushing too close to something he wasn't supposed to tell me. Margaret and I planned to ask a third time if the situation escalated and he didn't pressure the palace for a notice like we told him to, but that's happened now, and I've probably already overstepped."

Niccola understood that in a different way now that she'd been working as a serving-woman for a time. Even as a highly regarded member of the community, Verde wasn't invincible. While he could push the envelope farther than most, he too had limits on what he could say if he wanted to maintain his influence in circles of relative power.

Yet there was one sensitive question she needed an answer to, whether it pushed him over the edge or not. He knew how deep the tensions between Calis and Varna ran. He knew about the Catastrophe in her grandparents' generation. Everyone did. He would know that the trigger back then was also deaths... murders, not disappearances, but the two were close enough to be comparable. Especially if their patterns were the same.

"Is Calis the only realm that's been seeing disappearances?" she said, and saw Verde's eyes cloud over like he was in pain. He recognized the parallel she was drawing. And it was going to be a challenge for him to talk about it.

When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet enough that Niccola had to lean forward to hear it. "I say this to you in confidence," he said, "because I know where you're from, so I know how important it is. But as much as I hate to say this, please keep it to yourself. At least for now. Any broader disclosure puts Isaiah at risk until it's public knowledge. I'm trying to protect him as well as the community, and protect him for the community, and I wouldn't ask this of you if I didn't fear for both those things."

This was not what Niccola had been expecting to hear. The sudden weight in her stomach told her the news would not be good no matter how she sliced it, but over that feeling prickled another. She had scarcely met Isaiah, but she knew he was a prince. Calis's only prince, and the heir of the Cantor royal family. He was set to inherit a realm and carry on a lineage that had done unspeakable harm to Niccola's own realm in the past, and he did so from a position more secure than hers had ever been. She did not feel compelled to protect him.

"Please," said Verde. He was begging. "Take my telling you this as a sign that I trust you. Please don't make me regret it."

He did not know the full weight of responsibility she owed towards her realm.

He did not know who she was. Who Phoebe was.

He did not know the implications of asking her to promise her silence.

"I won't tell," she said.

It was not strictly a lie. She had no plan to tell anyone yet; whatever information Verde carried would be better addressed to Phoebe, who would take it back to Varna in Niccola's stead. But nor was it a promise of the kind Verde was seeking. Whatever danger Isaiah faced if she disclosed this information, she owed him nothing. If anything, she would feel worse about disappointing Verde.

"Both Madeira and Drevo have seen disappearances," said Verde. Drevo was Madeira's other neighboring realm, the farthest east of the four in this corner of the Ring of Thirty. "Madeira began reporting disappearances a year ago. Drevo has said the same. But both suspect it started earlier. Potentially much earlier." His face was drawn as he watched the market bustle by outside. "That's all I know."

Niccola said nothing. She had begun this conversation glad of Verde's support. Like they could work this out together. That sentiment had sunk into a cold void of isolation now, leaving her trapped in the spider's strings of everything she wasn't telling him. It would do no good to tell. He would only make assumptions, or worse, try to bring her to the Calisian royals if he thought this was a task she should not be doing alone. Or that someone else was better suited to. She had made her decision, and she was not about to let such a slight befall her again.

Especially with the continuity of Varna itself at stake.

What Verde did not know was that she was not a serving-woman from the Varnic lowlands, come to Calis in search of a runaway sister. That sister was the crown princess of Varna, and if she was one among a pattern of disappearances, the stakes were higher than a few lives lost or livelihoods ruined. If the disappearances continued, more powerful realms like Madeira would begin to point fingers. And if Varna proved a convenient scapegoat to save Calis's skin, the Catastrophe could play out all over again.