"Oh, and here I've been dripping all over you. I'm sorry, Merrigan." Belinda flung her arms around her and rocked them both back and forth for several moments. "I'm so sorry. I swear, no matter what happens, I shall be here for you, and we will find a cure for your curse as well as mine. Let us be friends, shall we?"
She sat back, gripping Merrigan's shoulders, holding her out at arm's length with such a charming, pleading smile on her glistening wet face. How could Merrigan deny her?
Shouting erupted at the far end of the warehouse, where the children were gathering for story time. Merrigan and Belinda held hands as they ran to see what had happened. She wasn't surprised to see Aubrey come running, shouting for everyone to come with him.
"It's happening tonight. Any minute now. We have to be there. I need the children," he shouted, as he turned back to the doorway. "Mistress Mara, please, you have to come with me."
"What's happening tonight?" Merrigan demanded.
"The managers caught the weavers leaving the inn and accused them of leaving the city, and now they're pretending to be hurt, insulted, falsely accused—" Aubrey's handsome, stern, princely face showed through the bony illusion for a moment.
"They're going to unveil the clothes tonight?" she guessed.
In the end, they gathered up all the children over the age of five and under the age of twelve, and left them in their nightshirts and robes. The orphanage had two wagons. They crammed as many children as they could into the wagons, and for good measure tethered them in long lines, anchored to the foster parents, to ensure they didn't lose anyone. Merrigan concentrated on Gilda and the mortal embarrassment that would shatter her young friend, every time she considered this was too much work, useless, a waste of effort.
Their wagons pulled into the courtyard in front of the warehouses and drove into the loading area inside the one on the far right. Moments later, massive freight wagons pulled out from the far left warehouse. In the time it took to unload the children, three freight wagons became a platform, with planks thrown across them and then carpets. Merrigan and Belinda clung to each other as they stared at the streams of people flowing into the open area in front of Gilbrick's warehouses. Guardsmen wearing the livery of several noble houses forced their way through the rapidly growing crowd, making them give way for the nobles to come in and stand on the back side of the platform on the wagons.
"This is awful." Merrigan turned to look for Aubrey. He had to be in a panic over the massive audience gathered for the mortal embarrassment of both Gilda and Gilbrick.
The young man was nowhere to be seen. Then she was busy keeping the children together, stopping the milling crowd from stepping between the children and breaking the tethers. Merrigan held back a rising urge to shriek her frustration, simply because she knew no one would hear her in the rising clamor. Finally, they had to retreat back to the orphanage wagons inside the warehouse. There was no room to stand without being pressed from every side. The children were constantly under threat of being trampled.
Merrigan realized with a bubble of relieved laughter that climbing up into the wagons gave them all a vantage point. The only better place where they could see what was about to happen was to stand on the platform.
The crowd's noise grew louder, then suddenly dropped to a murmur. Belinda let out a cry and pointed, and Merrigan turned, nearly falling off the wagon, to see. Aubrey stood a head taller than many of the people around him, and he led a cloaked figure with his arm wrapped around her. Merrigan knew that had to be Gilda. They edged their way around the perimeter of the crowd, their progress made easier as the surging current of onlookers turned toward movement coming from the first warehouse. Four apprentices came forward, dragging a loading ramp covered in several carpet runners, and leaned it against the far end of the wagon platform. Four more apprentices came from the shadows of the warehouse, supporting a curtained framework. There was a gap between the curtains and the ground of about a foot. In that gap Merrigan saw an old man's legs, bare but for a pair of grand, crimson and sapphire and gold embroidered shoes, like a courtier would wear for the most formal occasions in court.
"Oh, no," she whispered. "Please, please, please tell me they didn't talk the king into trying on the clothes first?"
"No." Aubrey helped Gilda up into the wagon. "The king's clothes are still waiting to be delivered to him. At least, what the weavers say are the king's clothes. We know better, don't we, Mistress Mara?" He grunted as he climbed up into the wagon.
Gilda sobbed, leaning into Aubrey. The cloak's hood fell back enough to show her glistening, tear-swollen face. Merrigan gasped when she saw the red mark of a hand on her friend's cheek.
"Who hit you?" she snapped, and turned to Aubrey.
"The weaver woman." Gilda sniffled and flung herself from Aubrey to Merrigan. "Oh, Mistress Mara, you were so right. How can I ever thank you?"
"Right about what?"
"Well, that odious woman was so furious when she came in to dress me and I wouldn't take off my underclothes and exchange them for the ones she claimed she had brought for me. I kept feeling for them on the rod where she said they were hanging, but they just weren't there. She tried to rip my underclothes off me. She was so angry, and she laughed at me for being a prude and a coward. She said I was being a silly little girl, because we were both women and then—well, I tried to explain that I was afraid there were people who wouldn't see the clothes and I didn't want to be embarrassed, and then she got really nasty!"
"As if she wasn't before," Aubrey said, a growl adding masculine music to his voice. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders again. "I arrived just as she knocked Gilda to the floor and was trying to tear her clothes off. She said some vile things about it being too late to start using her brain. I honestly thought she would shift into some vile beast. She already seemed to be foaming at the mouth." He sighed and turned to the platform, where the four apprentices carrying the curtained enclosure had come to a stop in the middle, and a hush rippled through the waiting throng. "We can only hope that Master Gilbrick at least had the sense to wear underclothes too, despite what the villainous weaver told him."
"Oh, Aubrey, what if ..." Gilda looked like she might burst into sobs again.
Aubrey met Merrigan's eyes, then he leaped off the wagon and fought his way through the crowd to the platform. He yanked off his outer coat as he went.
The curtain fell when Aubrey was a good twenty feet from the platform. Gilbrick spread his arms wide, turning slowly to display every inch to the waiting crowd, a wide, beaming smile contorting his face into something almost childish and pure in his delight.
Gilda let out a scream and hid her face against Merrigan's shoulder.
The crowd fell so utterly silent, the snorting and stamping of the horses in the stables beyond the warehouse came loudly through the night air.
Merrigan looked, from curiosity, the aching need to know and prove to herself what kind of fool Gilbrick had become. She was both relieved and disappointed.
The weaver had indeed talked the merchant into discarding the long linen shirt that even the upper ranks used for underclothes and sleeping. Gilbrick's legs and arms and chest were bare, bony in some spots, sagging in others, and an odd fish belly white. Merrigan supposed all older men came to look like that.
Chapter Fourteen
However, Gilbrick had retained a combination of loincloth and swaddling that encompassed his hips and went halfway between hips and knees. Merrigan couldn't see much more than that in the few seconds it took for Aubrey to leap at the platform, catch hold of the edge, vault up, and fling his coat around his former employer's middle. He snatched up the fallen curtains and pulled them up around Gilbrick as the impact of their two bodies colliding sent the merchant to his knees.
"You're not wearing anything!" Aubrey shouted, before Gilbrick could recover enough to shout the rebuke visible on his face. "There are no clothes, no magical cloth! You're not wearing anything at all."
"He's not worthy of h
is place," one of the apprentices holding the now-empty framework cried. A second young man joined in, but no one else. They pointed at Aubrey and laughed, but their laughter choked off under the glares of the other two apprentices.
"They always disliked Aubrey," Gilda whispered.
"They're bigger fools than the others standing there," Merrigan whispered back.
"Mistress Mara, please, tell me the truth. Is my father—"
"He's wearing nothing but that diaper and the curtains Aubrey threw at him."
Gilda whimpered, but managed not to burst into tears again.
Other voices cried out from the crowd, insisting the clothes were glorious, and Aubrey was a fool for claiming nothing was there. They died out just as quickly as they had risen up.
"Do you see anything?" Aubrey shouted, turning to the children in the wagon.
"He's got nuttin' on but a diaper!" a boy cried out with glee. Several of his friends joined in, then others, until all the children had spoken.
Gilbrick's face went so pasty white, he seemed to glow in the encroaching darkness. Even the torches set up to illuminate the grand display faded under the onslaught of embarrassed, then cruel laughter that trickled across the wide courtyard, then grew stronger, until it was a crashing wave. Aubrey wrapped the curtains further around Gilbrick and gestured for the other apprentices. They surrounded their master and escorted him into the shelter of his warehouse.
Merrigan went with Gilda simply because the girl begged her. They were delayed for a while that seemed like forever, until the crowd left and the wagons full of orphans could leave. The two crept through the gathering gloom and darkness as the torches died and people fled the scene of mortal embarrassment with a speed that spoke of their own uneasy feelings. There was no one in the warehouse where Gilbrick had retreated, and another door hung open. They went to Gilbrick's house. Gilda's steps grew steadier and swifter as the two entered her house, went through the reception hall and headed for the stairs to Gilbrick's suite of rooms.
Only Edgar, the most senior of the warehouse managers remained, sitting in a corner with his head in his hands. Aubrey stood by a dressing screen, handing clothes over it to Gilbrick, who raged incoherently. Every once in a while, there would be a thud and his voice would break into heaving sobs, then quiet, then he would rage again.
"He's dismissed everyone," Edgar said. "Every single person who claimed they saw the cloth and then saw the clothes when they were being made. Only reason he didn't dismiss me is because I'm half-blind and he would have known I was lying if I said I saw them." He raised his head from his hands and managed a trembling, old-man smile. "You didn't see the clothes, did you, gal?"
Gilda shook her head. She hugged him, then turned to Aubrey, who watched her somberly. By this time, Gilbrick had taken all the clothes and his raging had slowed to mumbles. Merrigan suspected he was simply too furiously embarrassed to step out and face the few remaining in the room.
"Aubrey ..." Gilda finally dropped the cloak that had enfolded her. She wore the simplest, plainest gown Merrigan had ever seen on her. When she held out her hands, Aubrey caught hold of both of them and went to one knee in front of her. "You are a hero, my Aubrey. How can I ever express my gratitude—no, not gratitude. I adore you. I wish—well, we are ruined, our reputation is in tatters, but I wish I had an empire to give you, in thanks."
"If you are ruined, then you have nothing to be thankful for," Aubrey said, and pressed one of her hands against his cheek.
Merrigan thought she might be sick from the overwhelming sweetness filling the room.
Although, to be honest, she admitted a small part of her nausea might come from jealousy. When had anyone looked at her as Aubrey and Gilda looked at each other? When had anyone gone down on one knee to her like that, and risked everything he had, everything he was, to protect her?
"You alone were loyal enough to risk everything," Gilbrick said, coming out from behind the dressing screen with tottering steps. He looked gray, like old, cold porridge. "You spoke the truth, when everyone else was afraid to be honest. Including me. Aubrey, if I had an empire, I would offer it to you. By morning, news of my foolishness, my mortal shame, will have spread through the kingdom, and then through all the other kingdoms where I have done business, where I was admired, where I was considered wise ... and I will be ruined. All I can offer you is material wealth, and it is not enough to express my thanks."
Some people, Merrigan decided, came to nobility and a semblance of wisdom too late. Then they overdid it, to the point of foolishness again.
"Sir ..." Aubrey blushed slightly. He got up off his knee, but retained his hold on Gilda's hands. "Sir, I have little to offer your daughter other than a warehouse full of orphans I am trying to help raise, but we are rich in love."
"You are rich in the wisdom and honesty of children." Gilbrick tried to smile, but his mouth was so stiff it threatened to shatter. "I beg you, Aubrey, marry my daughter, and I pray your love will take care of her better than I have."
"Shouldn't someone ask Gilda if she wants to marry him?" Merrigan said, though she knew the answer. She had always hated the fables where the princess had no choice in accepting the prince.
"I have always loved Aubrey," Gilda declared. "Ever since we were children, and he gave me ..." Her face went white, and her eyes widened more than the eyes of the dogs serving Warden. She dug into the high neckline of her dress and pulled out the locket. "Aubrey?"
"Come with me, my love? If you remember—my father—" Aubrey barely waited for Gilda to nod. Retaining his grip on her hand, he fled the room, nearly pulling her off her feet.
"Where are they going?" Gilbrick murmured, tottering to the doorway. The clatter of their feet on the winding staircase revealed their progress, leaving the house.
"Sounds like out the front door," Edgar said.
"I imagine to see Aubrey's father, now that the curse has been broken," Merrigan said.
"The curse?" Gilbrick gasped and sagged against the doorframe. "The curse! But how?"
"Gilda told me there was something about making people see. I imagine that little ... debacle a while ago fit that requirement."
THE WEAVER AND HIS wife managed to escape during the uproar as the news of the clothes that weren't really there spread across the city. Hundreds of people who had loudly proclaimed the beauty of the cloth and the perfection of the design of the clothes were mocked, brutalized in public opinion for days afterward. Tales of fist fights and friendships irreparably destroyed, apprentices dismissed, businesses shattered, advocates fired, and even officials deposed from their positions ran rampant. Merrigan was heartily sick of the whole subject. For a while, she feared that anyone who made their living weaving cloth or making clothes would be gathered up like the worst criminals and ejected from the kingdom.
Still, it was easy to ignore the uproar in the rest of the city because the warehouse had turned into a wonderland, thanks to the generosity of Prince Aubrey.
The morning after the debacle of the invisible clothes, the warehouse occupants were awakened shortly after dawn when the massive doors opened with a loud bang. Even the most adventuresome of the children were slow to roll out of their bed shelves at the disturbance, because no one had gone to bed before midnight, after all the excitement. Nasius and the other adults called orders to the children to stay in their beds and asked the older ones to watch over the littlest ones, while they ran in their robes and slippers to see who had intruded.
Three dozen servants in royal livery spilled through the doors, carrying crates and bales of clothes and bedding, pillows, mattresses, books, toys, dishes, and swaddled cauldrons of hot food, fresh from the royal kitchens. Hot food such as the children had never seen in their lives. While the foster parents stood and stared, their mouths dropping open a little more with each new gift that appeared, a tall, handsome young man directed the distribution. He was evidently a prince, even without the thin gold band that sat at a rakish angle across his forehead. Hi
s square jaw and high cheekbones, green-blue eyes that glistened like jewels, the pure gold of his hair, the flawless complexion, the sternness of his mouth that seemed to be joyous at the same time, and the trumpet clarity of his voice. Anyone could tell he was pure royal blood, even without the rich clothes and the king's crest of a dragon coiled around a stack of books that adorned his surcoat. The foster parents bowed and curtseyed to him when the bounty had been put away and the royal servants left the warehouse again, and only the prince stayed behind. Merrigan stayed back, arms crossed over her chest, caught between laughter and delight and scorn, and she waited.
Some blindness obviously hasn't been cured, Bib remarked.
Honestly, didn't anyone remember what she had told them last night? They had discussed the entire revelation for what seemed like hours, before they could get the children to go to bed.
"Aubrey!" one of the littlest girls shrieked, when she had finally pushed her way through the crowd of children. Of course, they had disobeyed orders to stay out of sight and stood all around the kitchen area, silent with awe at the wonders given to them. The child giggled, her voice like bells chiming, and leaped at him. "My Aubrey!" She laughed as Aubrey lifted her up high, twirling her around, and then hugged her close.
After that, it was chaos as the children gathered around, wanting to touch him, hug him, tug on his royal clothes and make sure they were real. The hot food had started to cool by the time someone got enough sense to pull out the new dishes, enough for everyone, and serve up the food. Merrigan suspected no one even noticed, in the wonder of having sausages enough for everyone to have two each, and bowls full of a rich, fruity, hot cereal turned golden with honey, and bowls slopping over with cream, not milk that had to be mixed with water to make sure everyone could have a cup. There were muffins and a dozen different egg dishes and kippers and kidneys and sour, thick fruit soup and other dishes that Merrigan could barely remember from the days of more-than-enough in the palace of Avylyn. The children ate until some of them looked a little green from the surfeit of riches. Aubrey's rich new clothes were rather wrinkled and smeared with breakfast by the time everyone had had a chance to hug him and get close enough to look in his eyes and make sure that yes, even though he looked so different, he was still their beloved Aubrey.
The Kindness Curse Page 25