“THEY BOTH want to be Mrs. Sir Peter, so they’d know if the position was already filled.”
Sir Peter was certainly a rogue who wouldn’t want a chambermaid unless she had something else he desired. He’d flattered an ogre to save his life, but he might truly love the beautiful and worthy Lady Eleanor.
Once, she whispered to me, “You’re my second favorite being in the castle.”
For the first two nights, both Trunk and I bedded down in the kitchen, along with my patients. Somehow I remembered, even in sleep, not to snuggle against anyone.
For the convalescents, I had Trunk brew recovery tea, which contained my secret ingredient: cat saliva tempered by cinnamon and honey. (Luckily, the many castle cats could be induced to contribute.) When I’d been human, I hadn’t minded drinking the tea myself. Now I couldn’t have choked it down—because of the cinnamon and the honey.
Whenever someone came to help, Trunk asked about Squire Jerrold’s doings. Then he’d interrupt the speaker’s narration to call, “Did you hear that, Mistress Ogre? Our squire’s a fine one, isn’t he?”
Yes, a fine one. Squire Jerrold dug graves, attended funerals, watched children who no longer had parents, even fed the pets of the stricken. And, every day, like clockwork, he visited us, though he never stayed long or said much.
Whenever he left, my excitement at the visit would take an hour to quiet.
I could have asked to speak privately with him and zEEned him into a proposal. But I didn’t. I reasoned I could wait until the last day and still do it if I had to.
Yes, I honored him. He deserved to be our acknowledged prince. But—tingle aside—he made me sleepy.
During our first week at the castle, while my remaining days diminished to eleven, the tide of new blight patients also dwindled, then ceased, but I still had my recovering people to care for.
On the third night I bedded down with the castle pigs, who were as willing to accommodate me as the master’s had been. Here, too, I bathed in the morning before going indoors.
By the end of the week King Imbert, through a servant, invited Trunk to continue as royal chef until a replacement could be found. Though he yearned to return to the master, he considered it his duty to stay.
Since the servant had no message for me, I decided to remain at the castle until I was expelled. I wrote to Mother.
My fingers are awkward with a pen, but I’m well. You are not to worry about me. I didn’t mention Sir Peter or the king’s distrust or my lack of marriage prospects. Instead I told her about the blight and using up the purpline. People realize I cured them, and they’re grateful. When I’m established, I hope you’ll come. But not yet, if you please. Though I longed for her.
Not much of a letter, so I added details about my cases, as I would have if we’d been talking at home. After they’d recovered from the blight, I dosed a boy out of his stutter and cured a woman’s catarrh. She said, “I’m throwing away my handkerchiefs, Mistress Ogre.” Mistress Ogre is what they call me. I’m learning not to mind.
Trunk, who was as good as a gazette, said he’d be able to post the letter, because the BB sign had been taken down. Traffic had begun to enter Frell again. He added in a whisper, “They found those ogre heads on the ground. I’m sorry, Mistress Ogre, but they’re back on the pikes.”
Whenever SSahlOO had bested EEnth, he’d told me, exulting made his victory tastier. My gorge rose. When humans gloated, we were no better.
He went on. “Folks guess it was you who took them down.”
This marked the beginning of the general mistrust of me, now that I wasn’t saving people from death every few minutes. Whenever I left the apothecary, castle folk looked away and even flattened themselves against the walls as I passed by.
Twice a day, I braved the corridors to bring recovery tea and fortifying meals (including ginger sheep’s milk) to King Imbert. I wanted the king not merely well, but improved—stronger, plumper, more youthful.
I would have sent someone else if not for Lady Eleanor, who urged me to go. “Let the king grow accustomed to you. Let his subjects see you entering and leaving his chamber with no harm to anyone.”
I was almost grateful to Lucinda for having changed me, because otherwise I wouldn’t have found such a friend.
Not that King Imbert did get used to me. Servants rushed to open windows as soon as I entered, and the king himself wrinkled his nose.
I supposed good manners didn’t apply to a king’s dealings with ogres.
Whenever I visited him, there at his side was Sir Peter, whose manners were all one would wish for from an honorable person—and exactly what one would expect from a scoundrel. He bowed, he smiled, and he never wrinkled his nose.
My mind would groan, but my heart would warble.
King Imbert hung on his every word, every gesture. When Sir Peter stood up or crossed the room, the king’s eyes followed him.
If Lady Eleanor came with me, Sir Peter’s smile for her was tender enough to soften stone. He’d leave the king to take her hands in his and murmur something in her ear that would make her laugh or nod emphatically.
His affection seemed sincere, but I’d been the victim of his false sincerity. Still, he had the sense to recognize Lady Eleanor’s worth. Might his heart have been captured? Might her goodness reform him?
I found out.
Five days after my arrival at the castle, when I left King Imbert, Sir Peter followed me into the corridor. Lady Eleanor wasn’t with me.
“Mistress Evie . . .”
I felt his rich voice from my scalp to my toes.
He smiled his charming smile. I sensed his fear and his attempt at courage.
He went on. “I have you to thank.”
“For supplying the heads that won you a title?”
He nodded. “That . . . and for educating me in the ways of ogres. Not in your ways. You’re still a mystery.”
There was the flattery.
“How did you get out of the Fens and take the heads, too?”
I sensed his pleasure. He was yearning to crow over the escapade.
“Your band was afraid to eat me in case you came back. They debated in Ogrese, but their gestures were eloquent. They let me live and took me with them when they went hunting. I knew it would be the end of me if you didn’t return, so when they started on the giant—”
“Did you even try to help her?”
He raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. “A human against six ogres? No. I slipped away and hadn’t gone far when I heard you rushing along. I tiptoed back—rash, but I trusted you.”
My mad mind whispered, Trust is a sign of love, isn’t it?
“When you and the giant had killed the ogres, I hastened away again. That was the most dangerous time. Luckily, the other bands were off hunting.”
He’d known I was alive all along.
“I didn’t want to waste the heads”—he grinned, proud of his cleverness—“so I returned with a party of gnomes, whom I met on the road.”
The only creatures other than dragons that were too tough to eat.
“They helped me in exchange for the dragon fang. With their mining tools, severing heads is quick.”
Ugh!
“I may soon be able to be useful to you.”
“I need your services?”
“You will. Some still trust you, but many don’t, and the favorable memories of those who do will fade.”
I’d continue to heal them! They’d have new memories.
“Some healers and physicians must have survived.” He had thought this through. “More will come. I hate to cause you pain, but people will prefer them.”
I felt him enjoying himself.
“My fortunes seem to be on the rise. You’ll do well to ally yourself with me.”
“And not well if I don’t? I could have let you die of the blight!”
“I’m also grateful you didn’t. Lady Eleanor thinks that you would make an excellent court physician. If you were—”
“Do you really care for her?”
“She’s beautiful, isn’t she?”
“But do you care for her?” Using zEEn, I added, “Of all creatures, you can be frank with me.”
He relaxed. “I became a merchant for the sake of beauty—and to become rich. I adore Lady Eleanor’s outer perfection, which I’d love even if she were as unintelligent as a worm and as unpleasant as a wasp. I’m fond of her family’s position and their money. I don’t care about anyone’s goodness. I made her love me.” He smiled. “As I made you.”
I curled my toes to stop myself from springing on him.
He held up a hand. “It’s pleasant to speculate like this. I believe your nature, meaning your toughness and loyalty, if they could be inserted into her beauty, might bring me to the brink of love and over the edge. We’ll never know.”
My jaw hung loose. He couldn’t lie while he was zEEned.
“But since she can’t be an amalgam of both of you, I’m glad her nature is sweet and her brain excellent—they’re likely to be helpful, too.”
How far would he go? “Would you kill her or have her killed, if that served you?”
He thought about the question as if it were a puzzle. “I surprise myself. I wouldn’t kill a person or cause a person to be killed. I don’t even enjoy using my kind of persuasion to deprive people—like the king and Eleanor—of their ability to choose.”
Ogres, too, robbed thinking creatures of choice.
“I do so only to advance myself.” He laughed. “There seem to be specks of goodness in my heart. But not enough to extend to an ogre. If you happen to die and I happen to have a hand in it, I won’t be troubled.”
I abandoned zEEn. “I can dine on you anytime, regardless of how much His Majesty likes you.”
“You won’t. You’re too virtuous.”
I raised my eyebrows and my hairy forehead. And made my mistake. “I’m very virtuous, so believe that I’ll eat you if you’re going to hurt Kyrria.”
His fear blew back in. He bowed and returned to the king.
I felt a moment of satisfaction, followed by alarm. I’d made him my enemy.
And he was right that I’d never kill him.