Two years after Hava returned to Bitterblue City and participated in Danzhol's plan to throw Bitterblue out a window, Bitterblue visits the art gallery for the first time in several months.
She and Hava have spent endless time together, of course, but when the art gallery ceased to yield answers to mysteries and became instead rooms full of painful evidence of Leck's crimes to Bitterblue, she stopped coming.
Hava is not at home. Bitterblue knows where she is; Bitterblue sent her into the city in the early afternoon to tail an informant.
It is past midnight, though, hours after the job should have ended, and no one has heard from her. Twitchy and nervous, Bitterblue leaves her bed and walks along the dark, moonless corridors to the art gallery. Perhaps as being among her mother's sculptures makes Hava feel closer to her mother, being in Hava's sanctuary will make Bitterblue feel closer to Hava.
Somehow, in the years since Hava moved in, the art gallery has become less frightening. As Bitterblue pushes through the rooms of tapestries and paintings, she swallows her fear and pain.
The sculpture room, the furthest from her point of entry, is different now. The sculptures, once menacing and circling the room like birds of prey, have been arranged tastefully in a whole new way, leaving a corner free.
Bitterblue's heart hurts when she beholds this corner. A mattress with a mess of blankets and several trunks (of clothes, like hers? Weapons, like Katsa's? Books, like Teddy's?) litter the floor; a clever configuration of rods and beautiful curtains close the space off from the rest of the room, simultaneously brightening and darkening it. There is a simple metal tub for bathing, although Bitterblue can't imagine where she gets the water up here.
Trembling, Bitterblue sinks to the floor beside this bed. One of her dearest friends, her sister – living as if on the streets. She wonders if being surrounded by Bellamew's sculptures make Hava feel she doesn't deserve better.
Bitterblue doesn't know how much time passes before something flickers to her right; with a little gasp, she jumps and turns.
Hava is soaking wet, covered in mud, and clearly exhausted.
"Your informant is dead," she says with a sigh. "I'm sorry, Lady Queen. I followed him for several hours. When I was on my way back, he marked me, and jumped into the river to get away. I searched for him, but everyone I've spoken to says he barely knew how to swim."
"Do you think I care about that now?" Bitterblue exclaims, jumping to her feet. "Look at this!"
Hava, in the slow act of squeezing out wet hair and dragging her washbasin away from her valuables, stops to look. Bitterblue reads her shame in the flickering, the droop of her head and her hands. "I know it isn't fitting, Lady Queen. But I feel most at home with the sculptures."
"You've moved them," Bitterblue accuses her. She sweeps an arm at the emptiness around Hava's little nest. Then, restraining herself, she helps Hava, who is shivering, undo her coat and boots. "I understand, Hava. My mother's embroidery frightened me too."
"You put her embroidery away," Hava whispers, shaking harder than ever now. "I don't know that I could ever do that."
"I couldn't stand being so close to it," Bitterblue continues. "But I get it down often. I understand that their art is all we have left of them, Hava. But it frightened me. It's all right if some of the sculptures frighten you."
Hava starts to cry, and Bitterblue understands. Guilt – guilt that she is afraid and wary of these living, transforming sculptures, sculptures that scream to and pity their watchers, their maker.
"It's all right," she breathes to Hava, clutching her. Hava resists weakly, mumbling something about getting the Lady Queen's nightgown wet, and Bitterblue snaps, "What have I told you about that, Hava? I'm just Bitterblue to you."
"Bitterblue, Bitterblue," Hava sobs wildly. "I can't leave the sculpture room. I don't deserve to. I'm not normal. My Grace is like his, it's bad. I'm his daughter."
"I'm his daughter too," Bitterblue says fiercely, pushing Hava back, away from her, holding her by the shoulders and shaking her until Hava looks into her face. "But I'm also Ashen's. And my mother didn't sleep on a mattress on the floor. Your mother had a room, Hava. Bellamew wouldn't have wanted this. Let me find you somewhere to go."
"I can't, I can't," Hava whimpers. "I'm scared."
"He's dead. We're undoing everything we can, Hava. You don't need to be scared anymore. Don't you know that's what big sisters are for? Chasing away the nightmares. I'll protect you from what's left of Leck, and I don't even need a Grace to do it."