Bubbles slid a single sheet of printout across the table, the now familiar signature across the bottom and a sticky note attached to the front. “The girl gets the heir to the throne of Somewhere.” She tapped a finger against the note containing the information too specific to be safely included in the official legalese of the contract. After all, if a jealous witch turned a prince into a statue before the wedding, it was easier and more cost effective to find a replacement than disenchant him. “At the moment, that person is Rupert Devlin Golden Montclaire Charming: square-jawed, golden-haired, and a reputation for being what PR departments commonly refer to as a ‘rake.’”
That remark was a pointed suggestion to get the job done as quickly as possible. Princes who were “rakes” tended to make a job easier for the first fifteen to twenty minutes after he and the girl met, at least until the prince got drunk or was caught staring down another woman’s dress and the girl lost interest entirely. Once warned, most Fairy Godmothers dumped on True Love as soon as the halves of the intended couple were close enough for the physical contact needed to make the potion work.
Kate’s muscles were so tight her head was starting to hurt, a traditional side effect of these special little meetings with Bubbles. “When do you want me to get started?”
“As soon as possible.” Bubbles swung her chair around to her office-sized enchanted mirror, clearly ready to dismiss Kate. “Another Fairy Godmother will be taking over your current case, and I’ll be expecting your report of the completed contract in two days.”
Kate’s eyes widened at this last-minute shove off the cliff of certain failure. “I can’t do this in two days! It usually takes a whole day just to do the initial consultation, and then we have to get the dress together, wait for the next scheduled ball since we haven’t already made arrangements with the local royalty—”
“Fine.” Bubbles waved her away with a hand. “A week then. But if you try and argue for more time, you’ll be talking to the board of directors.”
Knowing that a week was as good as she was going to get at the moment, Kate nodded and escaped. Clearly, this was not going to be one of the more pleasant happily-ever-afters she’d had to pull off.
TWO
Attack of the Ball Gowns
The ball was in full swing, which meant a few guests had grown bored enough to actually start dancing. Prince Jonathan Alistair Crispin Lorimer Charming was busy hiding, though not even he could escape Lawton when his friend had been fortified by five glasses of sherry.
“You do realize, of course, that you kissed the young Countess Hanslen’s hand a half centimeter too far to the right?” Lawton shook his head, tousled chestnut hair brushing the edge of his perfectly styled collar. “Bad show, Jon—your poor mother would be scandalized beyond repair.”
Jon’s gray eyes narrowed at him over the edge of a supposedly edible canapé, choosing not to dignify the comment with a response. Jon was, to his horror, actually a little jealous of the glass in his friend’s hand. He could have been downing his own dose of sherry, or at least fortifying himself with a sip or two of that unfortunately pink champagne his mother loved so much, if he hadn’t foolishly realized years ago that it all pretty much tasted like jewelry cleaner. “With the way her perfume was making my eyes water, it was lucky I managed to make contact with her hand at all,” he muttered, glaring at the swirling, chattering crowds. “Rupert should be here.”
“Do my ears deceive me, or did you just actually wish your older brother’s company upon us?” Lawton stared at him hard for a moment, then his eyes widened in horror. “When you say things like that, it makes me fear for your sanity.”
“I’m serious.” Deciding that the canapé had been left too long under the heat spell, he checked to make sure no one was watching before shoving it deep inside a nearby flower arrangement. Almost immediately, the roses started to wilt. “With Rupert here, all I would have to do is keep an eye on his champagne intake and be ready to drag him away before he managed to crawl all the way down the front of some woman’s dress. Without Rupert, I need to wear an outfit with enough gold braiding to hang someone, remember the names of at least forty-two pet poodles, terriers, and miniature dragons, and dance with women who can barely remember my name and keep referring to me as ‘Prince Jeremiah.’”
Lawton merely watched him with an amused expression on his face. “Even after all these years, it still astonishes me how you can sit through six hours of border negotiation meetings without a whimper of complaint, but consider dressing up and dancing with rich, supposedly attractive people to be a torture worse than listening to your mother’s singing.” He paused, as if contemplating something. “If I let you drone on about the intricacies of trade regulations for a few moments, will that soothe you?”
Jon’s eyes narrowed even further, pondering briefly whether anyone would notice if he grabbed the glass of sherry and dumped it over the other man’s head. “At least regulations and meetings eventually do something, Lawton. There, intelligence is considered important, and lying and remembering pointless details yield far more useful results than having some woman bat her eyes at you.”
“And yet somehow, no one ever seems to question that you and Rupert are genetically related.” Lawton’s smirk was tinged with affection. “Are you absolutely certain you’re not secretly a fairy changeling and no one’s thought to inform you of that fact?”
“Wouldn’t that be a lovely thought.” Jon let out a long, tired sigh as he ran a hand through his hair. “Has anyone found Rupert yet, by the way?”
“According to my spy network, no.” Lawton took another drink. “Both they and your mother’s footmen have checked all the haunts your elder sibling might find himself at this time of night, including nearby taverns, inns, bedrooms, conveniently located piles of hay, and certain alleyways. The next step is ditches, though that seems unlikely.” His expression brightened slightly. “Perhaps some cutpurse or jealous husband finally sent him off, and I should begin planning your eventual coronation party.”
“I hope not.” Jon shuddered as he stepped away from the corner, squaring his shoulders as he once again prepared to face the crowds. “Think of how much gold braid I would have to wear then.” Fixing his best politician’s smile back onto his face, he let the preening, bejeweled masses draw him inside for the next round.
“Duke Marin, welcome. Has your gryphon recovered from that illness yet? No? Do wish Snookums the best for me;” “Yes, yes, it’s an excellent vintage. A small vineyard in the southern provinces—we’re looking to increase its productivity;” “Baroness Stroud, you’re looking absolutely exquisite this evening. What, that enchanting creature beside you is your niece? I thought she was your sister;” “Rupert seems to have been unavoidably detained, but I have been assured that he shall be along shortly. Believe me, I keenly feel his absence as well;” “Have you tried the canapés? I’ve heard they’re delicious.”
Repeat, ad nauseam (except for a nicely distracting couple of minutes when he needed to assist the Fifth Earl of Lockney out of an ornamental fishbowl, an incident which somehow managed to make him annoyed at Rupert all over again). Knowing he could only expect the same for the rest of the night, Jon soldiered onward until the press of people backed him into nine feet or so of overly embroidered, ruby-studded gold skirt—it was, at one point, more than eighteen feet across, but Jon had ordered someone to sedate the queen and quietly lead the dressmaker away before any major damage could be done.
Knowing he would pay for it later if he didn’t, Jon turned around and looked down at the petite, white-haired, exaggeratedly-adorned woman. “Hello, Mother.” He could tell immediately that she was seriously worked up about something, her enormous upsweep tilting above her crown and her makeup showing the strains of too much emotion. He tensed, hoping desperately to hear that she’d worked herself into a fit over something as simple as the terrible-smelling canapés, or the discovery that rubies were suddenly out of fashion. “You’re looking as lovely as eve
r.”
“Jon.” Yes, that was definitely desperation filling her eyes. She took his arm, Jon’s brief wince of pain the only sign of her death grip. “Something terrible has happened!”
Jon swore silently, ratcheting the crisis up to a staff strike, or worse. Ordering himself not to have a headache until whatever was going on had been dealt with, he led his mother to an area of the ballroom more conducive to private conversation. Her smile fell almost as soon as they were out of visual range. Jon took a deep, steadying breath. “Now, tell me what happened,” he said.
“It’s your brother.” The queen sniffed and dabbed her eyes with the handkerchief Jon handed her, though thankfully, a full bout of tears didn’t seem to be in the immediate future. “They’ve . . . they’ve found him. They found my boy.”
Jon froze, then mentally indulged in a string of curses that would have horrified his mother’s sense of propriety had she been able to hear them. “Where?” His mind raced to account for a situation that would sufficiently worry his mother, who had previously dismissed one particular incident involving Rupert, an entire vat of stolen gravy, three serving girls, and an extremely friendly troll woman as “boys will be boys.” Did he need the palace lawyers? The fire brigade?
Not to mention that he was now definitely on his own for the rest of tonight’s ball, and possibly even longer.
“In the . . . oh, I can’t quite bear to say it . . . library,” she continued, glancing around, in case anyone had overheard, then lowered her voice ever further, “by the books. Can you imagine?” Her face tensed in remembered worry, though not quite far enough to crease and risk wrinkles. “I don’t know what could have happened to him. He’s resting now, poor dear. He looked so peculiar . . .”
Jon’s eyes snapped into focus as a few key words dropped their calling cards into his brain in an entirely unexpected order. “Reading?” he asked slowly, unwilling to keep the incredulousness out of his voice. She should be cheering that her oldest son had expressed some sort of interest in words that had nothing to do with a wine list or an invitation to the next party. Admittedly, the book had probably something to do with hunting, or women. Still, any attraction to written words lined up sequentially could be seen as a hopeful sign for the future. “You want me to save him from reading?”
His mother nodded emphatically, missing the emotional subtext of her son’s statement entirely. “Of course. It’s far too unsettling for my darling boy.” She released his arm, relaxing as if all had once again been settled with the universe. “You need to talk to him, delicately of course, and find out what led my poor angel to such a state.”
“Not without dragging him down here and tying him to one of the ornamental railings,” Jon snapped, the anger rising a little faster than he was prepared to handle at the moment.
His mother blinked, face slowly filling with horror at the suggestion. “Don’t you dare! Rupert’s much too sensitive . . .”
Jon opened his mouth, then snapped it shut before he could say anything he would regret later. He took a quick step back, along with a deep breath that wasn’t quite as steadying as he might have hoped. “Naturally.” It would disturb the nearby guests, he was sure, if he shook his mother until her crown fell off. “Far too much so to be subjected to me in my current mood.”
“Well, of course, but—”
He backed away. “I’m going to take a walk, Mother. Don’t wait up.”
Her eyes widened, sparking with anger at the possibility of being dismissed. “But Jon, you need to be—”
“It’s for the sake of your hair, I assure you. Goodnight, Mother.”
Moonlit walks were best reserved for a city’s shopping district—not quite as much privacy, but less chance of attracting farmers with shotguns or embarrassing questions from the local constables. Few people in the kingdom got close enough to the royal family to know what any of them looked like, and the average homeowner didn’t consider gold braid a sufficient excuse for a strange man to wander around his property in the dead of night.
Not that Jon had even the braid as an excuse anymore, having abandoned it for basic, comfortable black before he’d left the palace. Grinning once more in relief, he tilted his head back, soaking in a sudden breeze that, at this corner of the city, smelled faintly of cheese and horse carriages. His city, he’d always secretly considered it—though he doubted the store owner closing up across the street would have been suitably impressed by the claim.
He should be heading back in the direction of the palace, he knew. He was calm enough now that he was ready to soothe his mother, make sure the band had been paid, and find out exactly what was happening with Rupert. He’d fantasized through the years about what would happen to life at the palace without him there to keep it running smoothly, but his imagination kept pointing out possibilities like roving bands of creditors and his father permanently going into hiding, which always caused him to lose the taste for fantasizing rather quickly.
Jon’s grandmother, who hadn’t visited the kingdom since he was about twelve, remained horrified that Jon refused to do his duty as a proper younger son and start questing. After all, hadn’t Cousin Horace already won a bride and one-sixteenth of a kingdom by defeating an ogre that could only be smitten with an enchanted safety pin on alternating Tuesdays? And Rupert was two years older, and the product of the son she actually liked.
He had tried pointing out to her that he technically had an entire kingdom, since he did most of the actual running of it, but she had scoffed and said that any sensible king would have advisors to take care of that part of ruling. She was perfectly aware those advisors inevitably ended up evil and tried to take over the kingdom, but that was the sort of thing that made life more exciting.
Jon sighed, turning back home as the final handful of shop lights flickered out to embrace the darkness. If he hurried, he might even have a chance of sneaking in a few hours of actual sleep.
He stopped as a sudden flash of light caught the corner of his eye, then turned to investigate the sound of tinkling bells that followed. Before he could, however, something bumped against the back of his calf, and almost immediately Jon hit the pavement stones as a falling weight shoved him forward and off his feet.
A hand landed on the pavement near his eye, wreathed by a lingering curl of purple smoke. A second later the weight was gone and a cloud of blue tulle was sitting beside him. “Sir, I am so, so sorry.” The woman sounded deeply embarrassed, hand touching his shoulder as if she was trying to decide whether or not he’d let her help him up. “I know it’s no excuse, but I was helping a friend of mine get some practice at work. The aim seemed good enough, and I was tired and wasn’t really looking where I was going. I am so, so sorry . . .”
Bemused, Jon pushed himself to a sitting position and discovered that all that blue tulle was attached to a head of soft-looking dark blonde hair, extremely guilty-looking green eyes, and a pair of almost translucent wings fluttering nervously at her back. When she realized he was upright, the apology trailed off. She moved toward him. “I hurt you.”
Confused, Jon reached up and touched his forehead, making contact with a slight bump that almost immediately started to hurt. Then her fingers were there, batting his away, examining the rest of his scalp with a surprisingly gentle touch. “Now, I know I’m not a nurse, but you’d be surprised how many girls end up doing a face plant the first time they try to walk around in glass slippers.” She leaned back enough to look into his eyes, no doubt checking for their ability to focus. “I don’t think you have a concussion,” she continued matter-of-factly, her earlier embarrassment disappeared. “But if you start feeling dizzy you need to see a doctor straight away.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He grinned up at her. After a moment, her own mouth started to curve upward in a tentative smile. Then, a clock started in the tower of a nearby bank, the chimes seeming even louder than usual on the nearly silent street. The woman tensed and pulled away from him.
“If you’re okay, I . .
. I need to go.” She scrambled to her feet, hands brushing at her skirt as she took a step back. “Work, you know.”
Jon stood as well, cursing whoever decided that enormous clocks were city assets, and himself for not thinking to stand up early and help her to her feet.
“It was nice meeting you.” She smiled at him again, a little regretfully, and gave him a half wave. “I really am very, very sorry about falling on you like that.”
“Wait.” Not the most creative line, especially when she hadn’t technically gone anywhere yet—though her eyes widened. At least there wasn’t any more backward movement. “I . . . It’s . . .” Nothing. For pity’s sake, he was royalty. He was supposed to be able to do this sort of thing in his sleep. “Where are you going?”
Oh, smooth, Jon.
But instead of looking horrified, the woman seemed almost relieved as she pulled a file out of the waistband of her skirt and flipped through a few printouts. “1612 Candlewick Lane,” she read off. He noticed she was nearly as tall as he was, a fact he found more intriguing than alarming. “Apparently, I should turn right at Broadway, then take a left at Pumpkin Drive.” She looked up. “Is that right?”
She was handing his excuse to him on a serving tray. Of course, he admitted to himself, he would have lied if he had to. “They built a wicked witch rehabilitation center right in the middle of Pumpkin Drive late last year. To get to the other side you need to double around to Sparkle Street, then take a left past the Cursed Items Pawn Shop and go down . . .” He shook his head with mock solemnity. “You know what? It would be easier for me to just lead you there. You can keep an eye on me and make sure I don’t succumb to that concussion you were worried about.”
Fairy Godmothers, Inc. Page 2