The carriage rocked gently over the uneven road as it made its way deeper into the southern reaches of the kingdom. Seraphine sat with her hands folded in her lap and her gaze turned toward the window, watching the landscape shift from the flat, open stretches of farmland into rolling hills studded with clusters of oak and pine. She did not truly pay attention to any of it. Her mind was elsewhere.
Two days. It had been only two days since the king's body had been buried, and Nheera had wasted no time in dismissing Seraphine from her duties as lady in waiting.
The words had been politely spoken, as Nheera always did when she was about to bury a knife in someone's back. "I will not be needing your services during this mourning period. Please, take this time for yourself," were Nheera's exact words that day. Said with a small, tired smile, as though she were doing Seraphine a kindness.
