Lion Head Mesa it's the same old trick, they played their hand

her eyes were for him, drifting toward the paw that eclipsed her own with a smile. she loved him, this man before her, and moved nearer to him. we must understand this debt. this price that must be paid. my father was too clever a being, and my sister as much as him. both saw the wisdom in being aligned with her—and I think it far more than those things she has to offer, she breathes, gemstone gaze turning in the direction the woman had gone. 
but they both have failed her. and now my father is dead, and… her tongue stilled. Toula could still not speak the words, and would not—it felt a curse to! but Qiao could not be a woman without power herself, that father and sister both made the choices that they had. 
her gaze turned back to Rashepses. Osiris. what was on Her mind? she would not return if the sum of this debt was some small thing, she worried then. no game afoot then, not yet—she wondered if Qiao had been much more than a companion of the great court. and neither of them had shared with her any debts they two had incurred.