I forgot my walnut and stared at the mad fairy.
“Visit again in a year,” Cyril challenged. “You’ll see what the heart loves.”
“From now on all giants will elope,” Claudia said, “rather than risk a wedding with you as a guest.”
“I shall return! And I’ll be right and they’ll thank—What are you staring at? I mean you! Wench!” Lucinda whirled on me.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
She’s probably another supplicant,” Cyril said, “come to beg you to take away a gift you gave her at birth.”
“Don’t turn this one into a squirrel. I can’t bear to watch it.” Claudia grasped Lucinda’s wrist. “You can’t know squirrels lead ‘charming, contented lives.’ I’m sure she prefers to be a human maiden.”
A squirrel! I had to keep her from making a squirrel of me.
“Abensa eke ubassu inouxi Akyrria,” I said, wondering if she spoke Ayorthaian. I had just told her I didn’t understand Kyrrian.
Lucinda’s expression softened. “I’m sorry, my sweet,” she answered in Ayorthaian. “I asked why you were staring at me.”
“You’re so beautiful.” Let her think me simple.
“What a darling child! What’s your name, dear?”
“Elle.” This was Ella in Ayorthaian.
“Beauty isn’t important, Elle. Only what’s in your heart is important. Do you understand that?”
“Yes. I’m sorry I stared.”
“No need to be sorry, sweet child. You did nothing wrong.” Her smile was dazzling.
“Thank you, lady.” I curtsied.
“You may call me Lucinda.” She lifted her chin. “They would not have me say so”—she indicated Cyril and Claudia—“but I am a fairy.”
“A fairy! That’s why you’re so beautiful.”
“My friends—”
“Are shopkeepers,” Cyril said firmly, also in Ayorthaian. “We sell shoes.”
“For tiny feet.” Lucinda laughed.
“For children,” Claudia amended.
“Oh,” I said. “I don’t need shoes, but I need help, magical help. Can you help me, Lady Lucinda?”
“You don’t need her help,” Claudia said. “You should leave her while you still may.”
“I’d be delighted to help you. You see, Claudia, they do need us. Tell me, Elle.”
“I want more mettle, if you please, lady. Whatever anyone tells me to do, I do, whether I want to or not. I’ve always been this way, but I wish I weren’t.”
“The maiden is naturally obedient,” Cyril said. “Isn’t that one of your gifts? And she doesn’t like it.”
“I knew how sweet you were the moment I saw you. Obedience is a marvelous gift, Elle. Sometimes I give that gift to little babies. I certainly won’t take it away from you. Be happy to be blessed with such a lovely quality.”
“But …” I began, then stopped as Lucinda’s order gripped me. My mood changed, and I smiled joyously. The curse had been turned into a blessing. “Thank you, lady! Thank you,” I said, almost forgetting to speak Ayorthaian. I kissed her hand.
“There, there. You don’t have to thank me. You only needed to see it in the proper light.” She patted my head. “Now run along, Elle.”
My first order in my new state. I was delighted to obey. I rushed off.
I knew I was happy only because I’d been ordered to be, but the happiness was absolute. I still understood why I had always hated Lucinda’s gift. But I was glad nonetheless. I imagined future commands, awful ones, ones that would kill me, and I glowed at the idea of obeying them.
For the first time since Mother had died, I was free of fear. I would embrace whatever happened. I felt as light as a cloud.
I decided to find Father. If anyone would have commands for me, he would. I found him outside Uaaxee’s house, climbing into his carriage. He turned when he heard my voice, and I received a shock. He was actually pleased to see me. I had never before seen him smile without guile.
“Ella! My dear!”
I didn’t care if he was angry. “I ran away from finishing school.”
He laughed. “I knew the lass had courage. And are you a lady now or still a clumsy cook’s helper?”
“How shall I show you?”
“Curtsy for me.”
I swept him my finest.
“Excellent.” All his cunning returned. “You are pretty enough. Foolish of me never to have thought of you. Get into the carriage, Eleanor. I trust you will not damage your gown this time.”
“Shouldn’t we say good-bye to Uaaxee?” I asked, climbing in.
“She won’t miss us. She’s too heartsore over a gift from a fairy.” He frowned. “They say three were here, and I never saw a hair of them.”
The carriage began to move. I didn’t care where we were headed.
“You are just in time to put your training to use,” Father said.
“Only tell me what I must do.”
His eyebrows rose. “This is more transformation than I had hoped for.” He was silent for a long while. I began to feel drowsy.
“I am a ruined man.”
His voice startled me. “What?”
“I sold an estate that didn’t belong to me. The gnomes who bought it have found me out. When we reach Frell, I shall have to repay them, and it will take all I own. I shall have to sell our manor, our furniture, the carriage. And I shall have to sell you, in a manner of speaking. You must marry so that we can be rich again.”
So that he could be rich again. “Yes, Father. Gladly. When?” I understood the monstrousness of his plan, but nothing could lessen my joy at the prospect of obeying.
“What did you say?”
“I said, ‘Yes, Father. Gladly. When?’”
“You ask when, not to whom? You are so anxious to wed?”
“No, Father. Only to do your bidding.”
“What did they do to you at that finishing school? No wonder you ran off.”
When we reached our manor, Father stayed outside to speak with the coachman while I hurried inside to find Mandy. She was scrubbing vegetables, and a parrot perched on her shoulder.
She hugged me so tight, I could barely breathe. “Ella! Ella, my sweet.”
The parrot squawked in Gnomic, “!chocH !choe echachoed dh zchoaK !chocH”
I wished she’d never stop squeezing me. I wished I could spend the rest of my life as a child, being slightly crushed by someone who loved me.
Father spoke from the doorway. “I shall be away from home this evening. However, tomorrow we shall entertain. Elvish mushrooms will arrive from the market. They’re a delicacy, Mandy. Serve them as a first course for Lady Eleanor and her guest.”
“What guest?” Mandy asked after Father left.
“My husband perhaps. I’m so glad, Mandy.”
She dropped the pot she’d been washing. It fell into the washtub, but rose back into her hands a moment later. “Your what?”
The parrot squawked again. “!chocH” Mandy had named him Chock, after his favorite word, which was an exclamation in Gnomic meaning “oh,” or “oh my,” or even “eek!” In this case, I’m sure it meant “eek!”
“My husband. Father has lost all his money. I must marry so he can be rich again.”
“This tops all,” she stormed. “What is he thinking about, marrying off a chick like you? And why are you glad about it?”
“Not just glad. I’m …” I couldn’t find the right word. “… ecstatic to do it, if it will please them both, my father and my new husband.”
Mandy cupped my chin in her hand and examined my face. “What’s happened to you, child?”
“I met Lucinda, and she made me happy to be obedient.”
“No, baby. No, honey.” Mandy blanched. “She didn’t.”
“It’s much better this way. I don’t feel cursed anymore. Don’t be sad.” I smiled. “See. I’m giving you an order. If you obeyed it, you’d be happy too.”
“She turned you from half puppet to all puppe
t. I’m supposed to be glad about that?”
I didn’t answer. While Mandy stood dumbstruck, I looked around the kitchen, greeting every familiar object.
Finally she muttered, “Lucinda’s up to new tricks.” Then she spoke to me. “I’m starved. Are you ready for dinner, love?”
We supped together in the kitchen, only the two of us and the parrot because Father had dismissed the other servants.
“He must like my cooking too much to get rid of me,” Mandy told me over cold chicken wings and warm bread. She spoke no more of my new obedience, but it must have been on her mind, because she changed toward me. She stopped being bossy. I suppose she wouldn’t give Lucinda the satisfaction of using my new state. However, Lucinda wouldn’t have known, and I was denied the joy of obeying.
The next afternoon we prepared the broth for a fish stew with wild onions—dinner for my guest. I was slicing the onions when a boy brought the mushrooms Father had promised.
Their carton bore the label “torlin kerru.” “Kerru” meant mushrooms, but I didn’t know the meaning of “torlin.”
Examining the box, Mandy frowned. “Sweet, would you look up that ‘torlin’ word for me?”
“‘Torlin (tor’lin), n., justice; fairness,’” I read in my dictionary. “‘Tor’lin ker’ru, justice mushrooms; induce feelings of liking and love in those who eat them; used in elvish courts of law to settle civil disputes.’”
“I’ll torlin kerru him!”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said.
“It matters to me.” Mandy yanked on her boots and flung her cloak over her shoulders. “I’ll be back soon. Please keep the broth from coming to grief.”
I stirred the soup and thought about our dinner guest. I would be glad to marry him, but would I be glad afterward? He might be cruel or dull-witted or mad. Father wouldn’t concern himself with my happiness, only with his own.
If he were terrible, Mandy could order me to be contented anyway. Or perhaps I could persuade my husband to issue the command.
Chock landed on my shoulder and pecked lightly at my ear. “!chocH !jdgumkwu azzoogH”
Lovely! An order. I had to kiss him. I turned my head and managed to kiss a wing as he flew to perch on a high shelf.
“!jdgumkwu azzoogH” he squawked again.
I approached the shelf and extended my hand. The bird obligingly hopped on. I brought him close to my face, but before I could touch my lips to a feather, he flew away to the top of a window shutter. I ran for the chair so I could climb up to him, but as soon as I was high enough, he flew off.
When Mandy returned half an hour later, I had a spoon for stirring the broth in one hand and a strainer for catching Chock in the other, and I was breathless from running from one to the other. The curse must have known I was trying to obey, because my complaints hadn’t started; I wasn’t dizzy or faint or in pain, but I was weeping. Chock wouldn’t let me obey and be happy.
“Ella! What’s afoot?”
“A-wing! What’s a-wing,” I corrected, starting to laugh through my tears. “Chock won’t let me kiss him.”
“Don’t kiss the filthy creature,” Mandy ordered, releasing me.
“!jdgumkwu azzoogH”
“He did it again,” I said.
“Don’t kiss him.”
“,pwoch ech jdgumkwu azzoogH” I told Chock, hoping he’d adopt my addition. I repeated it. “.pwoch ech jdgumkwu azzoogH”
He liked it. “.pwoch ech jdgumkwu azzoogH”
Much better. The new version was “Don’t kiss me.” I’d be delighted every time he said it.
After we put the kitchen to rights, we began to replace the torlin kerru with innocent mushrooms.
“Maybe I should eat the elvish ones.”
“I don’t want you hoodwinked even if you don’t care.”
Father came into the kitchen. “How is our dinner faring?” he asked genially. Then his face darkened. “Why aren’t you using my mushrooms, Mandy?”
She dropped a quick curtsy. “I don’t know these elvish ones, sir. Maybe they’re not fine enough.”
I didn’t want her to be blamed. “I told her to exchange them when she wasn’t sure.”
“I sent you to finishing school so you wouldn’t be a cook’s helper, Ella. Use the elvish mushrooms, Mandy.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
My guest’s name was known to me. He was Edmund, Earl of Wolleck, uncle of Hattie’s friend Blossom, the uncle whose marriage she feared because it might cause her disinheritance. I suppose I should have been amused, but I was too lost in worry that the uncle would be as unpleasant as the niece.
I waited for him in the study, a half-finished square of embroidery spread across my lap. I had barely seated myself when Father opened the door.
“This is my daughter, Eleanor,” he said.
The earl bowed. I stood and curtsied.
He was older than Father, with shoulder-length curled gray hair. His face was as thin as a greyhound’s, with a long nose above a drooping mustache. He had a hound’s sad eyes too—brown with white showing above the lower lid and bags of skin below.
I sat again and he bent over my handiwork. “Your stitches are neat and so tiny. My mother made the smallest stitches too. You could barely see them.”
When he spoke, I saw teeth as small as a baby’s, as though he’d never gotten a second set. I could picture the toddler earl, peeking into his mother’s lap and flashing those wee pearls at her exquisite embroidery. When we married, I would try to imagine that he was almost as young as his teeth.
Leaving my side, he turned eagerly to Father.
“You could not hold such a position as I heard you express yesterday, my friend,” the earl said. “I hope you will explain yourself more fully.”
They were discussing punishments for bandits. The earl thought they should be shown mercy. Father believed they should be treated harshly, put to death even, as an example.
“If a bandit came here and made off with these valuables”—Father waved his hands at the things he was in the process of selling—“I’d be unnatural if I weren’t enraged. And unnatural if I didn’t act on my rage.”
“Perhaps you couldn’t help being angry,” the earl answered, “but you could certainly stop yourself from repaying one offense with another.”
I agreed with the earl and thought of an argument tailor-made for Father. “Suppose the thief didn’t steal outright,” I said. “Suppose he robbed you through deception. Would that thief deserve the same punishment as a bandit?”
“A different case entirely,” Father answered. “If I allowed a rogue to cheat me, I would deserve my fate. The knave would deserve some punishment perhaps, but not a severe one. I would have been a gullible fool and not worthy of my wealth.”
The earl nodded at me. “The cases are not so different,” he said. “If an armed bandit made off with your possessions, you might be at fault for failing to protect your home. You might then also not be worthy of your wealth. Why should a robber sacrifice his life for your carelessness?”
“Your logic is irrefutable, although its foundation isn’t sound.” Father smiled. “Two opponents are more than I can defend against. You have much in common with my daughter, Wolleck. You are both soft hearted.”
Neatly done, Father. Now the earl and I were a pair.
Dinner was announced. Father led the way to the dining room, leaving the earl to offer me his arm.
The torlin kerru appeared in our first course, as a salad accompanying chilled quail eggs.
“The mushrooms are elf-cultivated,” Father said. “Our cook found them in the market and I wanted to serve them to you, although, frankly, I detest fungi. Try them, Ella.”
The mushrooms were bland. Their only flavor came from the lemon and sage Mandy had sprinkled on them.
“I’m sorry, Sir Peter,” the earl said. “Mushrooms of every variety make me ill. I do enjoy quail eggs, however.”
The torlin kerru’s effect was rapid. By the time Man
dy had whisked away my plate, I was wondering why I had thought the earl resembled a hound when he was really quite handsome. I was liking Father too. By the time we reached the soup course, I was calling the earl “sweet Edmund” in my thoughts and smiling at him after every spoonful. When the fish stew arrived, I suggested to Mandy that she give him an extra ladle.
Father struggled not to laugh.
Even without mushrooms, the earl warmed to me. “Your daughter is charming, Sir Peter,” he said during dessert.
“I had no idea she’d grow up so well,” he answered. “I must marry her off quickly, or spend all my days looking over her beaux.”
Back in the study after dinner, I drew my chair close to the earl. Then I picked up my embroidery and tried to make my stitches so tiny that they were invisible.
Edmund and Father were discussing King Jerrold’s campaign against the ogres. Father thought the king’s knights weren’t aggressive enough; the earl believed them to be valiant and praiseworthy.
Although I wanted to pay attention to my sewing, I couldn’t. Every time the earl or Father made a point, I nodded my agreement, even though they disagreed.
Then I noticed that the room was chilly and settled back into my seat for warmth.
“Perhaps we should build up the fire, Father. I should hate for our guest to catch cold.”
“I’ve never seen Ella so solicitous,” Father said, adding a log to the fire. “She seems enamored of you, Wolleck.”
“I am,” I murmured.
“What did you say, dear?” Father asked.
Why shouldn’t he know how I felt? I wanted him to know. “I am enamored of him, Father,” I said clearly, smiling at sweet Edmund. He smiled back.
“This isn’t the first time I’ve sampled Sir Peter’s hospitality and his superior table, but you were never here before.” He leaned toward me in his chair.
“She was away at finishing school,” Father said. “At Madame Edith’s establishment in Jenn.”
“The time was ill spent,” I said, “if it delayed our meeting.”
Father blushed.
“My niece, Blossom, is at that school. Were you friends?”
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