My, this is an interesting page!
Queen Luheia... that name sounds familiar.
Zeetha says that Queen Luheia’s Mirror is supposed to have been her ancestors’ portal to Skifander... but the way she talks about it, it’s been inoperative for a very long time. Which fits with Albia’s statement here about the mirrors going dark. (And if Albia’s “sister queen”—actual sister, or simply peer?—Luheia is a figure of legend to Zeetha, she’s likely either dead or otherwise out of the picture in Skifander...)
I’ve seen a lot of speculation about Skifander and the geisters having some kind of link, and about Albia maybe being connected to Lu, based on the unthinkability of defying Albia and Lu’s happiness at the thought of fleeing to England. Maybe Skifander, Albia, and the geisters share some kind of history? Not to mention the Muse of Time...
Also: is that just the royal we, or something else?
I seem to remember an early sketch of Albia that looked quite different, for example. I wonder what’s going on?
One Albia in multiple bodies? Multiple Albias? Something like Lucrezia’s “essentiae” or something different?
Or of course, maybe that sketch is how she looks on special occasions, and for day-to-day wear she prefers something more practical. There isn’t necessarily anything sinister going on. It just seems plausible.
I mean, it’s possible the Foglios just changed their minds about what she looked like, but given how far in advance a lot of characters in this series seem to have been designed (e.g. Colette, who’s more or less unchanged from the Works to her first appearance in canon), I wouldn’t count on it.