“Oh, of course,” Kate said seriously, not moving an inch. The Fairy Godmothers, Inc. janitorial staff made sure the only way to get a hold of them was in person—management tended to bother them less that way—and if Ned didn’t come running down the corridor in the next thirty seconds she didn’t have the slightest idea what to do next. Pretending to drop something would give her maybe fifteen extra seconds in the office, tops, but with the janitor standing there the delay wouldn’t be nearly en—
Both Kate and the janitor’s heads jerked up at the immense, multi-part crash that suddenly rolled down from the ceiling. The sound was loud enough it echoed through the empty offices for a minute. After it finally faded into silence the janitor swore creatively and looked at Kate. “Listen, I need—”
“It’s okay,” she said quickly, shaking off her own surprised reaction as she waved him toward the stairs. She resisted the urge to look up again and tried not to picture what had happened to turn the simple cracked pipe they’d planned on into whatever caused that noise upstairs. “You go do whatever you need to do, and I’ll make sure to shut everything up so you can come back and lock it when you’re done.”
The janitor didn’t even hesitate before hurrying off. Trying not to think about whether or not Ned had gotten away in time, Kate slipped into the office and shut the door behind her. Tucking the folder into the waistband of her skirt, she took a quick survey of everything she’d have to deal with. She knew she was going to get caught, but there was no sense in making it easier for them. There were several rows of filing cabinets, all of which seemed to be full of rigidly organized folders. Different editions of the company manual lined the shelves, and Bubbles’ performance awards from when she’d been out in the field covered the walls. Knowing the woman, there were probably at least a few secret panels stashed around the room, but if Kate started thinking like that without checking all the logical places first she was going to be here all night.
She had almost finished examining the desk drawers when a hesitant knock came at the door. Kate froze, knowing there wasn’t a hiding place big enough for both her and her Fairy Godmothers uniform.
Then there was a second knock. “Kate, it’s me.”
Her shoulders sagged in relief at Ned’s attempt at a stage whisper. “It’s not locked,” she said, bending back down to the drawers as he came in. She re-closed the center one—it was unsettling to see paperclips laid out that precisely—and realized Ned’s footsteps had a distinct sloshing edge to them. Brow furrowed, she looked up as he came around the other side. “Do you want to talk about it?”
Solemnly, Ned shook his head. A single forlorn drop of water slid off the tip of his nose. “Have you found anything?”
Kate straightened, pointing to the bottom right-hand drawer. “That one has a lock, even though it’s hard to see it.” Pulling the folder out of her waistband and handing it to Ned, she retrieved her wand and took a few steps back. “If we’re lucky, this is where the patches will be.”
Ned raised both eyebrows. “Since when have we ever been lucky?”
She sighed. “You’re right. Start looking for secret panels.” Then, taking a deep breath, she pointed the wand at the drawer. Neither she nor Ned had ever picked a lock in his or her life, and all Fairy Godmothers, Inc. wands were only useful for a limited set of spells that unfortunately had nothing to do with breaking and entering. As for destroying the lock, Ned’s misadventure upstairs made it clear even magic didn’t make it easy to destroy something only a little bit.
There were some things, however, the wands had no trouble doing.
She concentrated on keeping the spell as tightly focused as possible, carefully moving the wand as she closely watched the swirl of fairy dust form. After a few seconds the front of the drawer burst outward, stretching and swelling into a full skirt made out of thin strips of wood paneling. The newly formed skirt pushed out a little further as an inch or so of bodice became visible beyond the edge of the desk. As she wrapped up the last flourish, the brass handle was transforming into a rosette.
She dropped to her knees, the knot in her stomach finally relaxing a little as she lifted up the edge of the wood skirt and rooted around inside. Ned crouched next to her, finger tracing the curve of the half-formed flower with something close to awe. “Wow,” he whispered, looking nearly as excited as when he’d walked in the door the first day of his internship. “I didn’t say anything, but I didn’t really believe you when you said you could do this. The edge of the desk didn’t even ruffle.”
“That’s okay. I didn’t really believe me, either.” Pulling out the first thing her fingers touched, Kate grimaced when she realized she was holding a huge, half-full bottle of True Love. “Luckily, the spell wasn’t smart enough to know it wasn’t working with fabric.” Shoving the bottle back inside—hopefully, it would still be there when the dress turned back into a locked drawer at midnight—she tried not to think about anything else she might be touching until her fingers brushed against something box-shaped. Pulling it out and yanking off the plain brown lid, she let out a breath of relief at the row of tightly packed, star-shaped patches lined up inside. “This is it.”
Ned leaned over to get a better look at their find. “How many do you think we should take? I know that one was enough to fix Thea, but if we lose one or something else goes wrong it’s not like we can come back for more.”
“Which is why we’re taking all of them,” she said, standing up and sliding the box into her pocket. “Bubbles probably knows the exact count of how many patches she has left, and we’ll get in the same amount of trouble no matter how many are missing.” She didn’t add that Bubbles was capable of trying to dose Jon and Rellie again even after they fixed things. They needed all the ammunition they could get. “Now, we need to find a quiet corner for me to set up the—”
Something loud rumbled upstairs, followed by an ominous rushing noise. They jerked, then looked at each other, and without another word ran for the exit.
The transport door, which Kate had needed to set up more quickly than she’d originally planned, took them to the spot on the palace grounds where Jon had found her after she’d ran out of the ball. She still remembered the coordinates for the room inside the palace where they’d held the dance lesson, but with their luck they’d either land right on top of a guard or get completely lost. This way, at least, they could ask for Lawton at one of the doors and convince him to let them in.
Ned looked down at his still wet uniform. “I know this is serious, but are you sure we shouldn’t have taken the time to stop somewhere and change? I’m kind of obvious wandering around like this.”
Kate shook her head. “My wings are enough to give us away, and if we can get Lawton to say it’s okay we’re here, it won’t matter what we look like.” She stared at the palace, which was still mostly lit despite how late it was. Jon was in there somewhere, either constantly fighting the inside of his own head or composing love sonnets to the majesty of Rellie’s eyes.
She pressed her lips together, the knot that had spent the day in the pit of her stomach tightening into a hard little ball. They had one chance.
“Not that I’m one to talk, but I really don’t think you’re supposed to be back here.”
Kate’s breath hitched as she whirled around at the unexpected voice, grabbing Ned’s arm in case they needed to make a run for it.
When the blonde, square-jawed man popped up from behind one of the ornamental hedges, she stopped and squinted at him. Palace guards didn’t walk around in gold shirts that would probably shimmer in better lighting. And something about his face told her brain she should recognize him. “And how do we know you’re not the one who isn’t supposed to be back here?” she asked. “Hiding behind a bush in the dark doesn’t say much for your sense of belonging.”
She felt Ned tense beneath her grasp, and she turned to see him glaring at the other man. “It’s the prince,” he said darkly, pulling his arm from Kate’s grasp. “The first one
, who was supposed to marry Rellie.”
The man—Rupert, her brain confirmed with a resigned groan—lifted his eyebrows in surprise. “No one told me I was supposed to get married. It’s kind of hard to go out and seek self-act . . . actu . . . that philosopher thing, when you’ve got a wife who doesn’t like to travel because it gets her hair dirty. Though if she really is that much like Mother, maybe being away all the time would be a good idea. We’d start running out of offices to hide in if both Father and I used them.”
Ned stepped forward. “You are not going to have to worry about any of that, because—”
Kate stuck an arm in front of Ned to block his way. “You no longer have to worry about getting married, Your Highness,” she said, resisting her own urge to throttle the man. If nothing else, Jon deserved to be the one to do it. “We’ve decided to go a different direction.”
“A very different direction,” Ned seconded.
She looked at Ned, voice firm. “You’re not helping.” When he finally stopped pushing against her arm, she lowered it. “And how, by the way, did you know what Prince Rupert looked like? I haven’t even opened that file since I finished Rellie’s dress and shoes!”
He shrugged, looking a little sheepish. “I was doing a little light reading?”
Rupert, who had shrugged off his earlier concern the moment Kate told him not to worry, became mournful. “I tried that reading thing—it’s not nearly as easy as Jon always made it look. Even the wise old lady waiting at the crossroads, whom Father always said I should listen to if I was traveling anyplace, didn’t have any idea how to help me understand what I was talking about. Not even after I gave her some of my bread, because she was complaining about being hungry.”
Kate had thought Jon was exaggerating when he said Rupert had been looking for help understanding big words. Not that she hadn’t met other royals who were clearly a few dwarves short of a mine, but most of them didn’t seem to be bothered by it. “As tragic as that undoubtedly is, I still don’t know how you ended up hiding in your own backyard. After taking all that trouble to run off, you certainly didn’t stay away very long.”
Rupert lifted his chin with an air of arrogance that made him look royal for the first time since they met him. “I didn’t just run off, I was trying to find out how to actualize myself and be a happier person like the book said I should.” Then he deflated, shoulders dropping with a sigh as he looked back at the palace. “Only I rode all day yesterday and asked everyone I came across, and no one knew how to explain the stuff in the book in a way that meant I could actually do something about it. So, I spent all day today riding back to ask Jon if he could give me some advice about where I could find someone to talk to. He wasn’t that specific the first time.”
Kate rubbed her hand across her eyes, feeling guilty for getting angry at Jon the night before. “Okay, but why don’t you just go inside and ask him?” she said finally, waving a shushing hand at Ned when she saw him mouth the word crazy. If Rupert could be persuaded to let them in to find out where Jon and Rellie were, they wouldn’t have to worry about whether or not Lawton was mad enough to torture them a little. “From the way he was talking last night, he’ll be more than happy to have you come back and take over your old spot.”
Rupert shook his head. “I don’t think so. Jon always did all the stuff the heir’s really supposed to do anyway—he mostly just needed me for the parties. It’s a lot easier if he just keeps the job, and after I’ve got this whole inner child business taken care of I can smile and shake people’s hands when he needs me to.” He scratched his nose thoughtfully. “The problem is, Mother really doesn’t like it when people do things she doesn’t want them to, and I don’t think she wanted me to go off and do the whole cosmic search thing.” He glanced back at the palace. “She’s probably going to cry when she sees me again. A lot.”
Kate fought for her last shred of patience. “If it would help, you could probably get someone to sedate her for you.”
Rupert smiled a little. “That’s what Jon always says.” He narrowed his eyes at her in enlightened speculation. “You sure sound pretty friendly with him for someone I’ve never seen before. Plus, you made me talk about what I was doing out here, but you never said what you were doing.”
Kate grasped for a relatively simple explanation, then realized one didn’t actually exist for this particular situation. “He’s under a really evil spell,” she said finally, wincing, when she saw Rupert’s eyes widen in alarm. Still, if it was enough to get him to risk facing his mother and let them both in . . . “I’ve brought something that will help get him out of it.”
Rupert started toward the palace, quickly enough that Kate and Ned had to run to catch up with him. Before they’d made it past the ornamental fountain, however, he slammed to a halt and turned back around. “How did Jon get put under an evil spell? He doesn’t do stupid things like kissing witches’ daughters or chopping down enchanted trees. He keeps me from doing stuff like that. People who like using evil spells don’t usually bother with princes who act sensibly and spend most of their time doing paperwork.”
“That part, actually, is my fault,” she admitted, the knot in her stomach tight as ever. “I dragged him into it without meaning to, and I’m trying really hard to set things right again.”
Ned moved forward, then took a fairly sizeable step sideways away from her. “They’re dating,” he explained—Kate realized he’d meant to move himself out of arm’s reach. “The evil spell came because our boss doesn’t think they should be, and we’ve come to save both Jon and Rellie so they can end up with us instead of each other.” When Kate glared at him, he held his hands up helplessly. “That’s what happened! Did you really want to keep standing here while he dragged the entire story out of you?”
“Are you embarrassed to be dating my brother?” Rupert asked, an edge of anger in his voice.
Kate’s cheeks reddened. “No! Of course not! It’s just . . . I . . .” She sighed, giving up. “I’m crazy about him, but I’m not sure he’s even going to be willing to speak to me after all this is over.”
Rupert smiled. “Of course he will. The hero always gets to marry the person they save.” He turned, gesturing over his shoulder for Kate and Ned to follow him.
TWENTY-THREE
If the Shoe Fits
Sometimes, a plan required holding secret meetings with top advisors and issuing half-veiled, precisely calculated threats. Other times, it required digging through your great-grandmother’s shoe closet.
Jon was in her collection of “Late Summer/Early Fall” shoes at the moment, a sizeable mound of rejects in a haphazard pile around his feet. He knew the pair he was looking for was still back here—if they’d been moved at any point during the last decade, he would have been the one to approve it. Of course, he hadn’t thought he’d end up needing them for anything.
He heard the closet door open behind him and the sound of someone crossing several yards of closet. “I knew you could work fast, Lawton,” Jon said lightly, coasting just ahead of his exhaustion. “But this is extraordinary even for you.”
“What is he working on, precisely?” His father’s voice was quiet, but there was an edge to it that Jon had never heard before. “Or, more importantly, what are you working on?”
Jon still didn’t look up as he dropped the empty box on the ground and reached for the next one. He’d already gone through at least half of his great-grandmother’s collection, and if he didn’t find the pair he was looking for soon, he’d have to rework that part of the plan. “If you’re trying to avoid Mother, she’s in the Powder Blue Sitting Room drinking tea and exchanging barbed comments with Rellie’s stepfamily.” He reached for the next box, yanking his mind away from the vision of the golden-haired little girl and the words “Rellie” and “family” created together.
He really needed to work in another few hours of sleep at some point.
The king paused. “Should I be expecting screams?”
�
��Maybe, but only worry if they’re Mother’s—she can do whatever she wants to the other women.” Jon found himself grinning at the thought as he lifted the lids on the next entire row of boxes. None of them held the shoes he was looking for, and he dismissively swept them off the shelf. “I’m just grateful she was willing to keep them out of my hair for a few hours.”
The king flinched when the boxes crashed to the floor, but didn’t step back as his son moved his attention to the next set of shelves. He watched Jon for a few minutes, silently, before speaking again. “Why is your mother convinced you’re in love with the wrong woman?”
That question made Jon jerk his head up, staring at his father with a surprise he no longer had the mental resources to hide. When their eyes met, the king shrugged. “I don’t get involved much, but that doesn’t mean I don’t pay attention.”
Jon shook his head, fighting a brief stab of guilt and the sudden urge to write Rellie that love poem he kept avoiding. “Let’s just say that I’m deeply grateful you and Mother never decided to hire Fairy Godmothers, Inc. for either of your children.” He took a deep breath, bracing himself to dive back in to the task at hand. “Do you remember where your grandmother stored those shoes you told me about? The ones her brother wore to his birthday gala?”
The king’s brow furrowed. “The glass slippers? They’re big enough you could wear them. Why would you . . . ah.” His eyebrows lifted as he mulled over the new information. “I noticed the pages dusting off the thrones and moving them into the ballroom.”
“The throne room isn’t big enough for all the people I’m going to need.” Jon turned back to the next row of boxes, lifting the lids on each to confirm that the slippers weren’t there either. “Plus, I wasn’t comfortable with the fact that it only had one entry and exit. I’m not sure I’m going to need more, but it seemed like a good idea to have them available just in case.”
“Should there be some extra guards ready?”
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