"What is my aunt doing?" she asked.
The servant hesitated for precisely half a second — the hesitation of someone who knew the answer and was calculating whether delivering it was survivable.
"Your Majesty," he said carefully, "the Duchess is currently... sleeping."
Heena's eye twitched.
"She's 'sleeping.'"
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"The patriarchs of four ducal houses arrived at my palace at five in the morning," Heena said, with the calm of a woman holding something very explosive very gently, "and my aunt is 'sleeping.'"
"I did inform her, Your Majesty," the servant said quickly, clearly sensing what was coming. "She was awake. I told her the patriarchs had arrived."
"And what," Heena said slowly, "did she say?"
The servant looked at the floor.
"Your Majesty..."
"What did she say."
A pause.
"She said," the servant reported, in the tone of someone reading their own execution order, "that I should go wake up the grizzly bear instead of disturbing her beauty sleep."
