It does not occur to Bitterblue to ask Hava more about how Hava's Grace works until Hava has been living in the sculpture room for several months.
It is a secret shame of Bitterblue's that, despite how much she relies upon and trusts and even loves Hava, Hava's Grace still frightens her.
She can't help but understand that Hava's Grace is a derivative of Leck's. It is a lie every time she flickers into something else, a trick to make other people's eyes and minds believe she is a sculpture, a gargoyle, a tree. A pretender. It is so similar to what Leck did with words.
Except that Hava is timid and loyal and kind, and has not a greedy or mad bone in her body.
Bitterblue has not forgotten that Hava defended her twice, during both attacks on her person. But she is a Monsean, and it is her duty to serve her queen. Countless others have fought on her behalf.
Unforgettable to Bitterblue is how Hava cradled her head in her lap – so tender and awkward and careful – afterward.
It is a surprise to Bitterblue to discover, bit by bit, that Hava's Grace is not the weapon Bitterblue thought it was. She'd always imagined that Hava chose what disguise to use; that in the way Katsa chooses between a stranglehold or a bone-breaking blow, in the way Saf chooses between sweet dreams and nightmares, Hava could choose whatever she wanted to be – cart, canvas, sculpture, painting, beautiful.
The reality is more frightening.
"It sort of seizes me, Lady Queen," Hava explains quietly one night. Bitterblue could not sleep, and wandered to where she knew Hava would be. "I have only some control over it. If I get the feeling I need to hide, I've often already done it without even knowing. I learned the trick to doing it on purpose, Lady Queen, when I was a child, but only sometimes am I able to choose what to hide as. Most of the time it goes by so quickly my Grace has already chosen something convenient."
"Like a piece of canvas when you're at the docks, or a sculpture in the art gallery," Bitterblue muses.
"Yes, Lady Queen."
"And I suppose you couldn't practice very well, could you? Not since your Grace is disguise, and the only people who would know your disguise was working are the ones you were hiding from."
"No, Lady Queen. It was confusing to me as a child. I was very lucky my mother understood it from the start. I can't see my disguised reflection, you see, Lady Queen. I thought everyone around me was mad for a time."
"I thought you hid in the art gallery when you were a child," Bitterblue says, confused and aching to know more.
"I did, but my mother came to visit. And…after, I made my way around the city and the countryside. It was then I eventually learned how it worked for myself."
Bitterblue takes Hava's hand, her chest crushed in sympathy. If only she'd known. She, ten years old, unable to leave her mother's rooms. Bleeding animals, bleeding serving girls. It was very frightening. Hava, unable to know anyone, instructed to hide if any person entered her haven. So much freer, but so threatened anyway. She taught me to hide from King Leck, always. Leck's daughters, closeted and hidden away from him in his own castle. So much power that one man had had over them. Over everyone.
"So the night I first came to the sculpture gallery, you didn't choose to change your eye color or the shape of your nose?" Hide the red eye. The wrong eye. His eye.
"No, Lady Queen. I just knew I had to be human, and I was afraid to show my real face. Truth gives other people power over you, you know, Lady Queen."
"I know, Hava."
They sit quietly while Bitterblue puzzles over this. A Grace that seizes on the fear of its Graceling and whips her out of control. It is almost like a mental ailment, the effects seen in everyone around her.
"If you were to decide to hide, right now, would you be able to, say, disguise yourself as a sculpture or gargoyle of your own choice?"
Hava flickers, but doesn't change. "It depends on what's around me, Lady Queen. I don't know what I'm disguised as if I've done it unconsciously, Lady Queen. But sometimes I'm able to decide for myself."
"That must be a relief," Bitterblue decides.
"Yes, Lady Queen."
"Hava?"
"Yes, Lady Queen?"
"Please don't call me Lady Queen anymore. I know you want to, but I'd like it very much if you would call me Bitterblue."