Thembeka and Mthobeli were diplomatically silent on the trip back to the hotel. The two Dora Milaje had been Princess Shuri's personal guards for seven years. It was they who had been called back home when she was cut out, and they who had returned to her service after her hearing by the tribal council. They were devoted and loyal, but they could not protect her from the gossip, censure, and sometimes even open mockery of the Royal Court (Princess Ross, some of them called her, scornfully, behind her back). Thembeka and Mthobeli would tense at hostile glances, ready to protect their Princess if need be; but glances could not physically wound, and so they did nothing.

For three years they traveled the world with her and witnessed other indignities inflicted upon her because of her ethnicity, her gender, her age. Their Princess bore up with strength and dignity. She used her intelligence and her sense of humor to shift perceptions, to defuse hostility, even to soothe egos bruised by her mere existence. They were both proud of her conduct, but they had no illusions as to her happiness. There were nights they heard her sobbing behind her closed door, or cursing, or breaking dishes. The Royal Court took its toll, as did the outside world.

Why she would return to this city, this very hotel suite, and seek out the man who had caused her such grief, was a mystery to them. On the way back to the hotel they observed her as minutely as they could without drawing attention to themselves. Her eyes shone, and her step was light ... almost a dance. But at least she was alone. So perhaps the situation was under control, and their Princess would draw no more vexations to herself on account of that man.

Shuri came to on the ship, half an hour before landing. Disoriented, and with a throbbing headache, she blinked at her mother and wondered if she had overslept. "Mama, what time is it?"

"My baby," Ramonda said, smiling gently so as not to overwhelm her child with her own relief. "It is so good to see you."

"What is going on? Why are we flying?" She tried to sit up, but gave it up as a bad job. "We are flying, aren't we?"

"Yes, my dear. We are flying home."

"Where have we been?"

"Budapest," she said, trying to sound casual.

The name unlocked her memories. They opened like a series of doors to interconnecting rooms, quick as a flock of fluttering wings, and they ended with Everett packing, Everett being hateful. A bloom of color and pain made her wince.

"Did he strike me?" she asked, meaning, of course, Everett. Had he struck her? Would he strike her? She couldn't remember, and she didn't know.

"No. But Agent Ross -"

"Who struck me?"

"Nobody struck you, my dear. Your head struck the table as Agent Ross covered you. And the man who shot Agent Ross -"

"Mmm!" she said, brow furrowed. "No more talk for now, please, Mama. My head hurts so."

"Agent Ross is not badly wounded."

Shuri squeezed her eyes shut tight.

"I thought you would like to know." Subtle note of confusion in her mother's voice.

Shuri refused to respond. She focused solely on the ache in her head. Her thoughts wandered, but she brought them back sternly to the simple fact of physical pain. She didn't want anything else to matter - not that somebody had shot Everett, not that he was not badly wounded, not that she couldn't remember anything past Everett packing, Everett being hateful.

Back in the hotel suite, Shuri tapped a Kimoyo bead and scrolled through tomorrow's itinerary. She was interrupted by an incoming call from Tilelli, her secretary, who was in the next room.

"You are up late," Shuri said.

"As if I could sleep until I heard your report! How did it go?"

"I was bored stiff. Why must nationalist operas be so unrelentingly butch?"

"That is not what I was talking about and you know it!"

Shuri sighed. "He has grown a beard."

"Is it an unrelentingly butch beard?"

"Tilelli, go to bed! We have an early start tomorrow."

"Good night, Princess."

Shuri took off her bracelet of Kimoyo beads and her tiara and placed them on the table. It was late. She should go to bed. But she knew sleep would be impossible.

She paced the suite. Book his ticket tomorrow, would he? Well and well. Either he was deeply out of touch with the difficulty of obtaining a visa to enter Wakanda or he still had some political pull of which she was unaware. She might have offered him a lift to Birnin Zana. She still could. But no. He could go through official channels if he really wanted to see her. She was not running afoul of the tribal council on this.

She stopped pacing and looked at her reflection in the full-length mirror. "You just want to make him suffer," she said. As if she had not suffered. As if she did not feel she were still on probation. Let him suffer for her sake, if he wanted.

She glanced at her dress. How much more obvious could she have been, wearing this dress?

He could suffer that way, too.

She found herself chewing the artificial nail of her right index finger. What on earth had possessed her to have her manicurist put those damned things on? They made everything so awkward. Perhaps she had intended them to act as panther claws, to give her a psychological edge. The fact was, she was trembling, which she only noticed when she stopped pacing. Back to pacing, then.

Three years. She had not seen him for three years. And he made her tremble. What was he playing at, making her tremble like that? How long had they stood kissing on that bridge? She had never had her mouth so gently, so thoroughly, so consideringly despoiled.

What was she doing, trembling over an old man? Great Bast, he was nearly 50! He had more grey in his hair now, but so much of red, and gold, and brown in his beard (which was soft and tickling, which smelled ever so faintly of sandalwood). Old, and a barista. Her husband was a barista. So the CIA had not wanted him back. Or had he not wanted the CIA back?

Three years. She had grown strong in three years. She could say no to him.

"And who are you trying to convince, woman? You have spent three years of your life living without reference to this man. What is it about him that the sight of him turns you into a stupid lustful girl? What a fool you are to return to this folly. What a fool to invite him back into your country and back into your life."

(She was strong. She could say no to him. But how much sweeter it would be to say yes.)