Eighty-eight:
The Myth
No one knew where the girl came from who showed up on the day of Zale’s coronation. If you believed the passersby, they said a coffin carried her in. People talked. About how The Argenti had kept Sirena’s body when she mysteriously died or vanished or whatever it was that had happened. There were rumors that her body had been kept and cloned for the new Imperator as a way to make peace. The truth, whatever it was, had been firmly kept shut by The Argenti and the royals.
The official story was that the girl that was marrying Sirena was someone Zale had secretly been in love with all along. A cousin of Sirena’s, or some such nonsense. That finding out about the cousin had been why Sirena had run, and that Sirena had fallen off cliffs wh
