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"But you didn't notice that he's avoiding all of them, the same way he's avoiding you. As far as he knows, you're just another girl fawning over a handsome, heroic prince. Just another girl, and far too young for him. He's a man of great honor and high principles, your Bayl."
"Oh, I wish he were mine ..." She sighed, blotted her eyes one more time, and tucked the handkerchief into the collar of her dress, ready for more dripping and sniffling. Belinda picked up the dress pieces she was supposed to be pinning together for basting. "What am I going to do? It isn't safe for me to drop the illusion spell. Not until we're absolutely sure those scoundrels have put ten kingdoms between them and me."
"It's the enchantress out to get you we need to worry about."
"Enchantresses."
"What's that?" Merrigan stuck a pin in her finger and bit back a curse.
"I have been able to spare a few thoughts for something besides how rough-and-tumble gorgeous Bayl has become." Belinda sighed. "My sisters created the tracing spell. I have no doubt now."
"Why? I didn't get along all that well with my own brothers and sisters, but they would never do something so despicable. It's royal blood against the world and all that claptrap."
"Hmm, you would think so." She finished her pinning and got up to take the pieces down to the end of the table to the basting team. "I think the frustration of having their lives in perpetual waiting, until Father gets the succession to the throne settled, has rather turned them sour," she said when she returned to her chair. "You would think evil enchantresses would want the throne, all the wealth and manpower at their disposal. It's much harder to dislodge evil enchanters if they have some claim to the kingdom. You'd think those two would want me out of the way, rather than get me married and settled on the throne with a dimwit."
"Maybe they want a figurehead. They might have some spell to make you as useless and easily manipulated as those idiots we chased away." For a moment, they shared a grin, still feeling that triumph. "Or maybe ..." She remembered Bryan smiling at her. Other suitors had tried to smile, but went away pale with fear or some other emotion that had always made her feel triumphant and strong, until now.
"Maybe what?" she asked, when Merrigan paused too long.
"Maybe your sisters simply want you settled because they have sweethearts of their own, and your father won't let anyone marry before you. More claptrap and tradition about not letting the oldest daughter look bad, unmarried at her sisters' weddings."
"Those two?" Belinda let out a most unladylike snort. "They had plenty of suitors, but they tended to think of marriage as a punishment, not the sweet joy I saw between our parents." She sighed, and Merrigan was disappointed to see the featherheaded, moping expression return. "The sweetness I could have with Bayl, if I had just had the wit to snatch him up when I had the chance. Had. Past tense."
"You have a chance." Merrigan glanced at the girls. All seven had made some adjustments to their dresses, adding ribbons and embroidery. "While I'm sure your Bayl is too honorable to give our girls the slightest encouragement, you might want to find a way to discourage them without breaking their hearts or hating you."
"Oh. Yes." She studied the chattering, happily busy girls. "We need to match them with boys closer to their own ages and stations. Falling in love is the only cure for a broken heart."
~~~~~
MERRIGAN HAD SETTLED in the sewing area to think while the children were at their lessons. Bib was busy with his usual occupation, absorbing information from a new batch of books borrowed from King Auberg. Belinda was out running errands.
"Mistress Mara? Forgive me," Bryan hurried to say, when his sudden appearance at the sewing table startled a squeak out of Merrigan. "I was hoping to catch you in a quiet moment, but I didn't think ..."
Some men could blush without looking like overly sensitive twits auditioning for the tragic hero part in an epic poem. Bryan was one of them. Then again, he had good, healthy coloring and wide cheekbones, perfectly framed by that thin, dashing line of beard on his jaw. Merrigan scolded herself to stop being a ninny. There was far more to a man than just good looks and a voice that was a mixture of velvet and waterfall. Leffisand had all those qualities and more, and look how he turned out.
"It's all right, Highness—"
"Please." He rested his hand on hers on the table. "I'm no more a prince than you are a princess."
"Nonsense. I've learned quite a bit since ... well, I've learned in my travels that there's more to being royal than a throne and a palace and a crown. Some good fortune will smile on you, as a reward for all the good you have done. I'm sure Princess Belinda is deeply grateful for the work you and your brother have done, trying to defend her, help her. What?"
The deepening frown on Bryan's face made her heart squeeze and constricted her throat.
"We never said what her name was."
"Oh. Really?" She swallowed hard. "Are you sure?"
"Dolt." A shimmering voice came from Bryan's coat. "If you had done what I told you, in the sequence I told you—"
"Yes, yes," Bryan said with a sigh and an adorably crooked grin. He opened his coat and brought out a small hand mirror, round, with a handle twice as long as the mirror itself, encased in silver and ivory. The kind of mirror a fashionable lady would take on journeys, to ensure she looked her best before descending from her carriage. Why Prince Bryan of Sylvanglade would carry such a thing, Merrigan had no idea.
Then two amethyst eyes and a pair of plump, rosy lips appeared in the mirror.
"So you're the princess who set those fumblewits running," the shimmering voice continued, and one amethyst eye winked. "Pleased to meet you, Princess."
"My name is Mistress Mara." Merrigan clenched her hands together in her lap, praying Bryan wouldn't see them shaking. Now was not the time for her true name to be revealed. Mirror slaves were notorious for nasty streaks, being sly and speaking cryptically. She hoped that nasty streak didn't include revealing people's true names at the most awkward time.
"Of course, dearie. Whatever you say. Now, where's Bib?"
"You know—" She swallowed hard and made herself meet Bryan's eyes. "How did you find out about Bib?"
"I don't know who Bib is," Bryan said. "Crystal insisted when I woke up this morning that she had to find him. There's too much loose magic bouncing around this place to let them talk unless they're together."
"Bib." Merrigan nudged aside some of the books surrounding him, and poked his spine. "Bib, we have visitors."
"Crystal?" Bib's voice sounded like his spine would shred. "Can that really be you?"
"How are you, you old inkblotter?" The mirror shimmered. "Be a dear and let two old friends get acquainted for a little while, would you?"
"Yes, Highness." Bryan winked and grinned. "Your wish is my command."
"He's such a good boy—when he isn't being a cheeky brat. The sooner we get your princess untangled and set free, the happier you'll both be." Crystal chuckled, ending in a satisfied little sigh when Bryan put her down next to Bib on the table.
"I'm assuming the mirror is another magical item stolen from Bib's former master, during the enchanters' war." Merrigan knew she was babbling but couldn't help it, as Bryan settled down in the chair next to her.
"Ah, that explains quite a bit. I assume the book has been guiding you, as Crystal has been guiding Bayl and me for the last few years?"
"That pretty much sums up the story."
"Oh, but I hate summed up stories, don't you? I like all the messy details." He slouched down in the chair, so his head rested on the back rail and his tailbone rested on the front edge of the chair. He stretched out his legs with his ankles crossed and clasped his hands across his belly. "Let's share some war stories while those two old conspirators are catching up."
Merrigan didn't consider her travels and adventures with Bib to be "war stories," but she was pleased to get chuckles from Bryan when she talked about the odd characters she had met, the justice levied on Judge Brimble and the cheating miller. He slapped his leg and snorted when she talked about the bandits who had thought they were robbing a helpless old woman and ended up facing justice and humiliation. He wanted all the details of how she and Aubrey and the children had helped to protect Gilda, and approved of their efforts to catch the weavers.
Finally he consented to tell the tale of discovering Crystal. The mirror had been among the treasures of Sylvanglade for decades, but had been asleep until the two brothers, looking for mischief on a rainy day, snuck into the treasury. Bayl picked her up and declaimed some lines from an epic poem about a magician who fought dragons, while waving the mirror about like a sword. Crystal refused to tell them what exactly he had said and done to awaken her, but she had been their advisor, getting them in and out of trouble ever since. They had promised never to tell anyone she was with them, because she lived in genuine fear the enemies of her former master might find her. It had taken decades of maneuvering for her to get to the safety of Sylvanglade's treasure room.
"You trusted her and listened to her when she told you to lie to your parents?" Merrigan couldn't help interrupting.
"Well ... we were boys, at that age when we felt like everyone was prying into our business. We hated being left out of all the fun our older brothers were having." Bryan shrugged, a thoughtful frown creasing his forehead. "Besides, Crystal, like many magical objects of knowledge, can't lie. She can be awfully stubborn and a stickler for exact meanings, and if she doesn't like you, she won't offer any information beyond what you ask for."
"Ah, of course. Judge Brimble's uncle got into so much trouble because he didn't ask the right questions. So Crystal found all the adventures you were longing for."
"Harmless fun. A chance to grow up and learn some valuable lessons without getting into any real trouble." He sighed and sat up a little straighter in the chair, but still managing to look lazily relaxed. "She was training us to be heroes, and sensitive to magic. And most important, to follow the rules. Sometimes I do regret obeying her and keeping her presence secret so long."
"Why?"
"Sylvanglade is a rather small kingdom. We are—or at least, we were—more comfortable than wealthy. Enough to make us good neighbors. Neighboring kingdoms knew they could rely on us, but we didn't have anything to tempt invaders. We thought we were safe. More fools we." Bryan offered her a rueful smile. "Sorry. Shouldn't wander like that."
"I'm sorry. It must be heartbreaking, to know your family, your friends are trapped and there's nothing you can do about the curse."
"That's the worst part of it. Crystal warned us as soon as Branwell brought that twitterheaded Princess Talithia across the border. She can sense curses a league away, and she's especially sensitive to all the warping and complications when you don't obey the rules. We warned Branwell and we warned our father, but they wouldn't listen to us. They didn't think Crystal was trustworthy because she asked us to keep her a secret all these years. That put Branwell in a bad mood, and he took it out on Talithia. She was in a temper because the curse was trying to drag her back to her father's kingdom, where everything was supposed to play out in due order and ..." He sighed and shrugged. "Crystal felt the trap ready to snap closed and warned us. We barely got out in time."
"Nobody would listen when you told them to run?" Merrigan guessed.
"We've dedicated our lives since then to defending others. And defending a certain princess, whose name you know, even though it's a sacred vow between us never to reveal it to anyone." Bryan sat up and leaned toward her. "There's quite a lot that's mysterious about you, Princess Mara. Including that intriguing magical box. Crystal senses it is capable of holding this entire warehouse. If we could figure out how to get it through the opening," he added with a grin.
Merrigan felt a little queasy. Afraid yet elated. She wanted to be included in some new mischief he was about to make, all hinted at in the glitter in his eyes. For just a moment she slid back in her memory to their childhood adventures, when his eyes held that same spark.
"Tell me the rest of your story, and when those two are finished catching up, the four of us need to talk. There's a great deal of magic still in play, and danger we need to untangle."
"Uh huh." His eyes narrowed and his grin grew sly.
Belinda's suspicions were proven true, when Bryan related what he and his brother had discovered. Crystal had been able to deduce much from scrying the magic every time they got close to the band of good-for-nothing princes. Bythia and Barbarina had woven the spell to trap their older sister, and put her into the clutches of the least worthy prince of the bunch. The magic held a nasty core. The enchantresses wanted Belinda dead, to take her throne, but their father also had a searching spell at work. He would not only know when Belinda was found, but also who hurt her. Both sisters would be disinherited if they directly harmed their sister. A curse was tangled around the hunting princes themselves. It would cause a series of embarrassing miss-steps and accidents, so the princes and Belinda would end up dead. Only someone made from magic, like Crystal, could see through the weaving to the malicious intent. Anyone else examining the aftermath would conclude Belinda had been killed through stupidity colliding from multiple directions.
"So tell me the truth," Bryan said, after they went to the kitchen to make tea and bring it back to the sewing room, with leftover biscuits from breakfast. "She's here, isn't she? Hiding among the orphans?" He waggled his eyebrows at her. "I thought you might be her, in disguise, but Crystal says you're an entirely different kind of magic."
"She does, does she?"
"You two are a pair of ninnies," Crystal announced, when Bryan and Merrigan just sat and smiled at each other.
"Oh, definitely a pair," Bib said, his pages riffling in a whispery chuckle.
"What sort of consensus have you two come up with?" Merrigan asked. "Are we safe enough from the enemies to take off some masks?"
"Bib is a wonder when it comes to diagnosing magic, but he hasn't had the experience with the whole nasty tangle that I've had over the years," Crystal announced. "As much as I hate to admit it, things could get much grimmer before they get better."
"The sisters?" Bryan asked, pausing with his mug of tea nearly to his lips.
"They've had time to seethe and add to their spells. By now, it's a matter of honor to them to wipe out—our friend," Bib said, after a slight pause. Merrigan guessed that Crystal had warned him that the brothers didn't dare to even speak Belinda's name. "She's frustrated their plans and efforts for too long. Despite all Crystal has done, there are a few threads of magic attached to Bayl she hasn't been able to loosen. Her sisters will know when he's found and unmasked her. They have several contingency spells watching from far off, ready to snap into action and separate the two sweethearts."
"Oh, now that's not fair at all," Merrigan said.
Bryan muttered some curses into his tea, then tipped the steaming mug back and emptied most of it down his throat.
"Do we make things more treacherous if we tell your brother our mutual friend is here?" Bib continued after several moments of unhappy silence. "While it might make things more pleasant for him, can we trust him not to confront her? Or try to identify her?"
"I'm surprised he hasn't picked her out already," Merrigan said. "She looks like a much younger version of herself, that's all."
"That's easy to explain," Bryan said. "One spell on us decrees that until she reveals herself, neither of us will recognize her. Even if, as you said, she looked like a younger version of herself."
"A variation of the you-don't-see-me spell," Crystal said, "but woven in such a way it only reacts when the brothers and your friend are close enough to see or hear each other. Rather vicious, if you think about it."
"She thinks he hates her," Merrigan said. "She looked into his face, she talked with him, and he smiled at her and patted her head, treating her like a little girl. No wonder she's on the verge of tears half the time since the two of you arrived."
"It's to force her to confront him. Torture her until she breaks down and makes herself vulnerable." Bryan scowled into his mug. "You can't imagine how it tears him apart to know he probably looks her in the face a dozen times a day and he can't say anything, can't even speak her name, because it would put her at risk."
"Oh, I can imagine all too clearly," she whispered. Then she thought of something. "But she's told him her name. Several times. She isn't using a false name, which is rather reckless. He doesn't call any of the girls by name, now that I think of it."
"That's the really nasty part," Crystal said. "The spell makes him hear every girl say her name is hers. So when he does hear her name, he has no way of knowing it's really her."
"Until she drops her illusion. Oh, I would love to slap that sleeping cap on both of those nasty twits and lock them in a dungeon for the next hundred years or so."
"Sleeping cap?" The magic mirror wobbled from side to side, as if she were trying to sit up. "What are you talking about?"
"We've been busy discussing other things," Bib said. "Forgive me. That box contains some useful bits of minor magic. We used the cap to make our friend sleep during the invasion of the princes. We baited them with an enormous pot of pea soup, to activate the spell. She couldn't sneeze or heave while she was asleep."
"Clever." Bryan's face relaxed into the good humor that Merrigan thought made him so much more handsome.
"Hmm, a stopgap measure," she said. "We can't tell her he's unable to recognize her. It'd just make her more weepy than she already is. Would she risk her life to help him recognize her? How much temptation can she stand?"
"What if you made it clear that he was doing it to protect her?" Crystal suggested. "Let her know he is just as much tangled in enemy magic as she is."
"I would like to give her some hope, ease some of her hurt," Bib said, "but not if it just puts her in more danger."
"Why don't we ask my brother what he wants to do?" Bryan said.
When the others agreed that the older prince should have some say in what was told to Belinda, he got up to go look for Bayl. Merrigan sipped at her tea, watching him walk away, and wished ... she wasn't quite sure what she wished for.
"I was such an idiot when I was younger," she whispered.
"Indeed you were, Princess Merrigan," Crystal said.
"Bib!" Merrigan slammed her mug down on the table, fearful she would drop it.
"I didn't tell her, Mi'Lady," the book responded. "She's a magic mirror. She sees everything."
"Even into the past?" She clutched her hands in her lap to resist the urge to snatch up the mirror and slam her down onto the stone paving of the warehouse. Unfortunately, magic mirrors were impervious to such attempts at breaking them.
"I see you as you are now. I can see the magic strangling you, and how you truly are—the face of your soul and spirit and heart," Crystal said. "Pick me up, Princess. If you please?"
"Why? I know what I look like."
"You know what you've seen. I can show you what you can't see."
She hesitated. After all, how long would it take for Bryan to find his brother and bring him back here to talk? If she didn't comply, Merrigan suspected Crystal would take matters into her own metaphorical hands. She might even reveal the truth about Clara's curse, Merrigan's identity, even the travesty of her marriage to that charming but foolhardy schemer.
"Very well," she muttered, and reached over to pick up the mirror from where she lay against Bib. The silver and ivory hummed under her hands. Sparkles of blue and green and purple magic spun around the surface of the mirror, down the handle, then traveled up Merrigan's arm and enfolded her. For several seconds, she could see nothing but the sparkles. When she blinked them away, she saw her own, her real face.
Yet not her face. Her features were all sharp-edged and glossy, like jewels. She was young and beautiful and regal, but with an overall impression of coldness.
The image of herself reminded her of the Fae she had encountered before going into Smilpotz.
"That is the woman you used to be," Crystal said. "Here is the woman you are now."
The image softened. There were still hard planes, but no sharp edges, and the glitter and gloss of polished jewels had faded into warmth. The colors and tones were flesh and blood. Merrigan shivered when she saw she did look older—of course, how could she expect all the travel and working to support herself not to age her? Yet there was something regal and admirable about the woman who gazed somberly from the mirror. A sense of warmth and mischief, where the jeweled woman had been chill and her humor had a malicious edge to it.
"What will I be in the end?" Merrigan whispered.
"That depends on the choices you make. I thought you said your princess was clever."
"She is. But everyone is clever in different ways," Bib said. "They're coming. Wipe your eyes, Mi'Lady."
Merrigan nearly snapped that she hadn't been crying, but she blinked and realized that yes, there was dampness in her eyes. She put Crystal back where she had originally been.
"Does he—he doesn't mention me at all, does he?" slipped out before she could tuck that errant, totally ridiculous thought back into hiding.
"When he's tired and lonely and jealous of his brother's happiness," the mirror said.
"Happiness?" Merrigan flinched, thinking she heard footsteps.
"Men are silly sometimes, when they're being heroic. Bayl finds much of his strength in knowing that even though he can't be with his princess, he's serving her, and proving his love. He has the hope of winning her freedom and her love someday. He's clever enough to realize her sisters targeted him because she did feel something for him. If you want to hurt your enemy, use someone who has already touched her heart."
"I never gave him a bit of hope, did I?" she whispered. Yes, now she did hear footsteps.
"When you were young. You changed and he was gone too long, and what chance does he have, really, as the youngest prince of a kingdom that nobody will ever rule again?"
"Don't tell him, Crystal. Please. Promise me."
"Don't tell him what, exactly?"
"That it's me." She tapped her breastbone. "Inside this—this—old hag."
"Mi'Lady," Bib said, a touch of laughter in his voice. "You were more a hag when you were beautiful. Now, you're simply lovely. And you're not half as old as you think you are."
Then the two princes stepped into the sewing room. Merrigan watched Crystal from the corner of her eye the entire time they talked, terrified the mirror would reveal that Mistress Mara was Princess Merrigan of Avylyn. After all, she hadn't promised.
In the end, speaking in euphemisms so they wouldn't awaken the inimical magic wrapped around Bayl, they agreed on what Merrigan would tell Belinda. Bayl couldn't recognize her, and he begged her not to reveal herself to him until they could be sure both their curses had been entirely undone. Crystal and Bib believed Belinda would be comforted by the news. Bayl only cared about not hurting her, while Merrigan thought about what a featherhead she had turned into since her prince arrived.
To her surprise, Belinda was quiet and thoughtful when she gave her the news and explained the dangerous situation. Merrigan took her for a walk to have that discussion, despite the rain that fell in a cold mist all day. The two walked close together, gray enclosing them so it felt as if they were the only ones out on the streets as afternoon turned to evening. Every sound was muted with the hissing of rain and the gurgling of water in the gutters.
"Would it be ..." Belinda stopped and tugged her hood back a little to look up and down the nearly deserted, foggy street. Most shops had already closed. The ones still open were dim blots of golden warmth through watery air. "Would it be dangerous if I wrote him a letter? Would it awaken the magic if he wrote to me?" Her mouth trembled, and for a moment Merrigan feared she would burst into tears again. Then Belinda squeaked a laugh and threw her arms around Merrigan for a brief, wet hug. "He's been looking for me—he remembers me. Oh, I don't deserve him, not after all this time, all this work and suffering and ... but I'm a horribly selfish person. I want him!"
Merrigan made a point of repeating the conversation to Bayl when the five conspirators met again the next morning, while the clatter of the kitchen crew starting breakfast preparations covered their whispering conversation. The glow in the elder prince's face created a twisting, aching, almost weepy sensation in her middle.
The first exchange of letters was carried out with all the stealth of spying in enemy territory among goblins and trolls. Bib and Crystal examined Belinda's letter for anything that might trigger the inimical, watchful spells on either side. If she wrote anything chancy, they had her rewrite it. Then they did the same for Bayl's response. That became the standard practice. Merrigan counted that necessity as another strike against the two vicious enchantresses: Belinda and her sweetheart couldn't even pour their hearts out to each other in writing. To ensure that Bayl had no chance to guess which girl among the orphans was his Belinda, Merrigan and Bryan acted as intermediaries. Belinda gave her letter to Merrigan, who passed it to Bryan several hours later. When Bayl wrote his letter, Bryan passed it to Merrigan, then kept his brother busy so he wouldn't see Merrigan give it to Belinda.
The job of intermediaries threw Bryan and Merrigan together. If she wasn't constantly watching for him, waiting for the signal that he had a letter to give her, he was watching for her signal in return. Then when the recipient was busy reading the latest letter, the sender wanted to be alone for a while. Merrigan thought it somewhat silly and melodramatic, and Bryan agreed when she mentioned it to him after three weeks of exchanging letters.
"Still, he's in a much better humor than he's been for years now."
Bryan leaned back against the support post of the pavilion where they had taken shelter from the rain-becoming-snow, on the edge of the festival grounds in the center of the city. He had offered to accompany her when she delivered a set of gowns for the christening of the twin daughters of Lady Geramia. Talking about their mutual concerns and friends was easier away from the orphanage, even if they still had to talk in euphemisms.
"To have hope ... it's painful, but it's a welcome pain. Compared to no hope whatsoever."
"Certainly a handsome young man such as you has some hope? One day soon, this whole ugly tangle will resolve and your brother and his sweetheart will be together, safe, settled—you aren't going to spend the rest of your life looking after them, are you?"
"Oh, yes, a favorite uncle, growing old by the fire." He shuddered with mock horror, and for a moment they paused, caught in each other's eyes.
Merrigan ached for something she couldn't put her finger on.
"I find it hard to believe there isn't a princess out there, pining for you," she said, and a moment later wished she had cut off her tongue before saying something so foolish.
"Once. Where she is now ... I hope she's happy and safe somewhere." He gestured out across the silvery sheen of sleet that threatened to cover the festival grounds in ice. "I am just selfish enough to hope she thinks of me, once in a while. Maybe even wonders where I am. And yes," he let out a single chuckle, "I'm selfish enough to hope that sometimes, no matter how happy she is, she wonders what would have happened if I had been brave enough to ask, and she had said yes."
"She would have been an idiot, a featherhead, to say no to you."
"It doesn't matter, does it? I didn't ask. I had nothing to offer her, even when Sylvanglade was free of enchantment. Now, who knows what her fate is? I feel as if I failed her. We were friends when we were children." He sighed. "Yes, I failed her."
"No, you didn't. She failed you." She wondered if the odd aching in her head and in her throat was what people meant when they talked about twisting a knife a little deeper.
"I wish I could fall in love with someone else, but I am doomed to be the loyal friend, sacrificing all for the sake of the hero." He tried to laugh. "Mara? Are you all right?"
"Of course. Why wouldn't I be?" She fought the urge to wipe at her face with her mittens, afraid to discover the hot ache in the back of her head had escaped in the form of tears.
"It must be the dying light. You look so pale." He offered her his bent arm. She accepted the silent suggestion that they continue their long walk back to the orphanage.
"You make me wish ..." She waited until they had come down the steps from the pavilion and started down the icy brick-paved pathway. "I think there must be some truth in the saying that it is better to have known true love and then lost it. The sweetness, however short-lived, makes up for the pain."
"If I ever thought she loved me, maybe I could agree with you."
"Oh, no matter how selfish and spoiled your princess might have been, somewhere deep inside, she did love you. As much as she was able. No one could be so utterly self-centered and stupid they wouldn't recognize your fine qualities and love you. Even if just a little bit," she vowed.
"Thank you." He caught up her hand where it was tucked into his elbow, and pressed a kiss in the gap between sleeve and mitten, before settling it firmly back in place. "Where were you when I was soothing my broken heart with plans to hunt dragons and gryphons and make a heroic name for myself?"
"Making mistakes of my own." Merrigan laughed with him as they trudged down the pathway to the main street.
"All of youth must seem foolish and selfish, looking backwards, I suppose." He sighed, and they walked along for several minutes in companionable quiet. "What was he like, the man you loved and lost?"
"I didn't know how to love. Truly love. Before ..." She gestured at her face. Let him assume she meant when she was young, rather than before the curse hit her. "I was married, for a short time. We ... understood each other, as much as two nasty children could. We thought it was the two of us against the whole misguided world. Suddenly he was gone. He was so viciously clever that he became inexcusably stupid."
"You started to love him. Enough to hurt for him."
"That was a lifetime ago, when I was a very different person."
"He was a fool for not loving you completely," he said, resting his hand over hers in the crook of his elbow and squeezing it.
"You, Prince Bryan, are gallant and flattering and I don't know whether to laugh or cry."
"If only ..."
"Yes." She turned enough to see past the sagging sides of her deep hood, and found him smiling a little sadly at her. "If only."
~~~~~
THE DAYS PASSED, BECOMING another week, and Merrigan scolded herself for being a sentimental, selfish twit. She fell into more and more situations where she and Bryan were together, walking somewhere in the increasingly wet, cold weather. Running errands for the orphanage. Escorting children to lessons or visits with possible adoptive parents, or simply needing to stretch their legs and get some fresh air.
As the weather grew increasingly unfriendly, the children spent more time indoors. The noise of children seeking new entertainment irritated Merrigan more than she liked to admit. She swore she could hear them chattering and shrieking and laughing, knocking over building blocks or singing their nonsense songs and chanting puzzle rhymes at each other even in her sleep. She longed for some place she could go for solitude, and some peace and quiet.
Nearly every time she escaped the orphanage, just for a short walk, hungry for some solitude, she usually found Bryan ahead of her on the street. Or she turned, with the sensation of being watched, and found him following her. He waited for her, or she waited for him, and they talked and walked, sometimes for an hour, or two. Many conversations drifted to their regrets, wondering where that "someone" in their pasts might be right that moment. She admitted to Bryan that she had come near to loving a boy, but had let herself be persuaded that he had nothing to offer her. She remembered aloud for him those few short, sweet times they had spent together as children, yet with as few details as possible, so he wouldn't guess. When he remarked on how similar her memories were to the ones he had of his princess, she fought not to laugh because she feared she might weep. Her only consolation was that he smiled when he talked about the girl she used to be. If he had cursed her for her cold heart, Merrigan didn't know what she would have done.
Once, she managed to follow him into the city without him noticing her. They ended up in a small chapel, warm and softly bright with hundreds of candles. Bryan bought five candles, the expensive, bright green ones. He found a spot where previous candles had burned down and out in the long rows of shelves. Merrigan was touched that he took the time to clear out the expended candles and put the pieces in the barrel for that purpose, instead of just brushing them onto the floor as so many people seemed to do. Bryan set up the candles, then took his time to get a spill and light it from the central flame of the chapel. He lit each of the candles in turn, and let out a deep sigh as he waved the spill to extinguish it.
"Merrigan ..." He took a step back, gazing at the flames. "Be happy."
She fled before the sobs escaped her aching throat. If she made a sound, Merrigan was sure she would collapse in the slush and sleet and still be there when he left the chapel.
The only person more miserable than herself, she realized one day, was Bayl. She followed Bryan when she delivered the latest letter from Belinda, who was busy helping to bathe the babies that afternoon. The squeals and giggles and splashing sounds could barely penetrate the chatter and clatter and laughter of the children at play, and the shouts and sharper clatter of the ones who were arguing. The weather was having a negative effect on some of them, so that the foster parents prayed for clearer weather, just so the children could go outside to play. Merrigan intended to keep going once she saw the letter safely delivered to Bayl, and had her cloak in her hands. She didn't think to stop when she saw Bayl tuck the letter into his shirt with one hand, snatch up his coat with the other, and nearly run to the main door out of the warehouse.