SQUIRE JERROLD ASKED to speak privately with me. Lady Eleanor raised her eyebrows.
Heart fluttering, I followed the squire out of the kitchen. Was this about the rumors, or something else? Had his noble heart been touched by my plight? Did he want to offer me the protection of marriage to a human? Had that occurred to him? Might his goodness go that far?
When we entered the corridor, a manservant coming toward us turned and ran the other way.
Sensibly for anyone who didn’t enjoy ogre odor, he led me through the castle entrance into the outer ward. Sleet slanted down. Except for guards at either side of the doors, no one was out. Squire Jerrold had a hooded cloak, but I had nothing. Kind as he was, the squire seemed not to know that an ogre could shiver and be cold. I didn’t complain.
Wormy would have realized. Wherever he was, he was certainly indoors, likely near a roaring fire.
Might he have returned to Jenn without saying good-bye?
Squire Jerrold began to circle the castle, taking long steps. “You were right about Sir Peter’s threat.”
“I made him afraid of me.”
“I’m ashamed to be a human when an ogre behaves better than we do.”
I sighed. He had enough information to work out the truth.
He stopped between the granary and the stables, faced me—and half stepped back. “I’m going to follow your example. I have an audience with King Imbert on the hour. I’m resolved to tell him how the ogres really died.”
No!
He went on. “They say he hardly cares for anyone but Sir Peter. The scoundrel’s influence must be stopped.”
“You won’t be believed.” My teeth chattered. Wet plastered my hair, my gown. “Don’t do it. You weren’t there. You have no proof, and you won’t be believed.”
“I may not be believed, but I still have to speak.”
The king’s true son, noble from skin to heart. And as headstrong as both his parents.
I argued. King Imbert had done nothing to me yet. Squire Jerrold could wait and speak up later. “A better opportunity may present itself. Your grandfather would urge caution.”
“He’d be proud.” Squire Jerrold resumed walking.
If only zEEn lasted, I’d make him stay silent.
He added, “For king and Kyrria.”
“Sir Peter will find out. He may even be there. If he’s there, you mustn’t! He’s ruthless.”
Squire Jerrold’s face might have been stone for all I was convincing him.
My voice rose. “Did I cure you of the blight just to have you risk yourself now?”
“I understand why Grandfather admires you.” He bowed and, unpersuaded, turned back toward the castle.
A fresh terror struck me. “Stop!” I cried.
He did.
“Say I killed all the ogres. Don’t mention Udaak, I beg of you.” She’d be in danger, too.
Had Sir Peter already harmed her? I doubted his specks of goodness would extend to a giant.
Squire Jerrold objected. “But she’s the only one who was there.”
“That won’t matter. If she lives to testify, Sir Peter will say she was persuaded by an ogre’s spell to think I saved her. The king will believe him.”
He looked dubious. “Mistress Evie—”
I cut him off. “If you mention her, I’ll say I lied to you about killing any ogres myself. It will mean the end of me, but Udaak will be safe, and you will be, too. The king will think you my dupe, rather than a slanderer.”
That threat succeeded. Squire Jerrold agreed, though resentfully. He went in to his audience.
I returned to the kitchen and steamed dry in front of the fire—dry, but not warm. A chill had entered my bones.
That evening, after Lady Eleanor left, a horrified Trunk had unsurprising news: Squire Jerrold hadn’t been believed.
“What’s wrong with the king? Why couldn’t he tell that Squire Jerrold would never lie?”
“Was Sir Peter there at the audience?”
Trunk nodded. “And other courtiers and Squire Jerrold’s knight. The laundress says Sir Peter just smiled. She says he’s above such accusations, but I say he’s below them.”
“Was King Imbert angry at Squire Jerrold?”
“The laundress didn’t mention him being angry. She did say Squire Jerrold”—Trunk switched to what he or the laundress considered proper speech to a king—“bespoke himself thusly: ‘The coward shall reveal his poltroonery. I shall not rest until the lie manifest is made.’”
I would have laughed if I hadn’t been horrified, too. Squire Jerrold wouldn’t express himself so ornately, but he probably did swear to expose Sir Peter.
Trunk pounded down his mound of risen dough. “When Jerro says a thing, he does it.”
How? Might he have a plan?
There could be no plan. Heads on pikes can’t talk.
“Was he imprisoned?”
“No.” Trunk explained that Sir Stephan had saved him from punishment for defaming Sir Peter by arguing that the ogre was the real source of the lie.
I didn’t flee Frell, because flight would be taken as an admission of guilt. I’d be pursued.
The next morning—the morning of Lady Eleanor’s ball to honor me—four guards entered the kitchen and stationed themselves in pairs on either side of the door.
Half an hour later, the guards and Trunk accompanied me, clutching a blanket against a biting wind, to Lady Eleanor’s mansion on Larkspur Street, where the ball would be held. I was to spend the day there, trying on gowns and getting ready. On the way, several people crossed the road to avoid me. A man yowled in fear, then recovered enough to beg me to spare him. “Not for me,” he cried, “for my family.”
I kept walking.
A few yards later, a woman curtsied to me. “You saved my happiness when you saved my daughter.”
I told myself that she made up for everyone else. I curtsied back and we continued on.
Trunk said, “I’ve heard news of your Master Warwick.”
“He isn’t mine.”
“Your friend is giving people money.”
“Lending.” That was what his family did.
“Giving, as I’ve heard it. He goes from house to house where the blight struck. If someone is too ill to work, or if someone who used to work”—Trunk whispered, “died,” then spoke normally again—“Master Warwick counts out KIs, as many as are needed.”
Oh, Wormy! How generous! As kind in his way as Squire Jerrold was in his.
But the squire had found time to visit the castle.
Trunk added, “Master Warwick is often accompanied by a young lady. Pretty, I hear. Very dainty Mistress Chloris is, the laundress says.”
Well, good. He was taking his healer’s advice to marry.
But why couldn’t he court her and still visit me?
And why wasn’t I happier for him?
How could I be happy for anyone, with the end of possibility for me looming in four days?
Lady Eleanor’s house took pride of place in the center of a row of limestone homes. The ogre didn’t care, but the girl in me noticed that the building rose three stories, with a frieze of dancing gnomes and elves separating the first from the ones above. The polished oak door was topped by a fanlight.
Trunk said, “There’s the knocker, Mistress Ogre. You lift it and let go. That’s how a knocker works.”
“Thank you.”
He bobbed his head and left me. The guards stayed.
Though a manservant hovered behind her, Lady Eleanor herself opened the door, her face a hurricane. But when she saw the guards, she wiped the clouds away and smiled. “Come in! This will be such fun.”
Was something wrong that she didn’t want the guards to know?
She addressed them. “I hope you like meat pies just out of the oven. Lamb and beef, I believe.” She turned to the manservant. “Vale, please conduct these gentlemen to the kitchen.”
A guard began, “Lady—”
“Mistress Evie is here for the ball. Tonight, Vale will let you know when she’s ready to leave.” Lady Eleanor swept away.
The guards followed Vale.
I trailed Lady Eleanor through two elegant drawing rooms. Then she wheeled on me. “You coward! If you had to slander him, why didn’t you slander him to me?”
Sir Peter must have related Squire Jerrold’s accusation to her.
She set off again.
Why hadn’t I realized?
I was surprised she hadn’t rescinded the invitation. How would I bear the loss of her friendship?
When we entered her bedchamber, she sat on her bed with a thump and tilted her head up at the ceiling, deliberately not looking at me. “Mandy has persuaded me to remain your friend, but know that my friendship is grudging.”
Was grudging friendship friendship at all?
Mandy? Oh, the family cook. Next to a mahogany fretwork screen stood a middle-aged woman with tight gray curls and a shape that reminded me of a stuffed chair.
The woman addressed me. “I do not approve of what was done to you, Mistress Evie.” She shook her head, making her double chin wag. “To change a maiden into an ogre!”
How could she say the words when no one else could, when even I couldn’t? How had Lady Eleanor been able to tell her about me?
“May I introduce Mandy, my fairy godmother?” Lady Eleanor asked the ceiling.
Really? Might she help me, despite what Lucinda said about other fairies?
Lady Eleanor lowered her chin but still didn’t meet my eyes. “She said you could know she’s a fairy, though no one else outside my family does. She also said I mustn’t blame you for anything. I’m finding that difficult.”
This cook looked ordinary, nothing like Lucinda, who was every inch the fairy. And Mandy’s inner state was calm.
“Would you—” Turn me back? But I still couldn’t say it.
Mandy understood. “I never know what could result if I step in. Lucinda is the foolhardy one.”
She could but she wouldn’t? My rage surged. How might fairy taste?
Could I zEEn her? I sensed no fear for me to diminish, but I had to persuade her for only a moment. I sweetened my voice. “You want the best for me. No harm can come from such a merciful act. I’ll heal more people if you help me.”
Lady Eleanor was persuaded. “Mandy, won’t you? She deserves big magic if anyone does.”
ZEEning had no effect on the fairy, but I felt her relent—and then unrelent. “Sweet, I mustn’t. Mistress Evie, would you give your patients medicine that would cure them today and might sicken them tomorrow?”
“If the patient would die today, I would.” But I probably wouldn’t die today.
Mandy went on. “Being an ogre may save more than you.”
It already had. My band would have killed Grellon and others, if I hadn’t stolen meat sticks—and then murdered two of them. As an ogre forever, I might save more creatures.
I asked a question I’d wondered about. “How did Lady Eleanor guess the truth?”
Mandy said, “Lucinda turned her uncle into a squirrel years ago. Squirrel transformations are her particular favorite.”
“As soon as I mentioned an ogre healer, Mandy realized what had been done to you, just as I had.” She turned to the fairy. “Why does Lucinda do it?”
Mandy smoothed her apron. “She loves occasions—births, proposals, weddings, even funerals—and believes she can improve them with her dreadful gifts. Luckily, even a fairy can’t be in more than one place at a time, so she misses many. Mistress Evie, you were unfortunate.”
“What if I never—” Never become myself again. Please say that won’t happen. Please say Lucinda sometimes takes pity on her victims. Please say I’ll find someone I can love in time.
She said nothing. I felt her sadness.
I had an idea. “Do I have a fairy godmother, too?”
“Certainly. But many fairies—not I—aren’t interested in humans. They keep to the company of other fairies.”
“Can I find her?” Appeal to her.
“No one but Lucinda does big magic. None of us would lift your spell, and your particular fairy tends to be acerbic. She’d say there are worse things than being an ogre.”
Being a helpless squirrel, I supposed. I pulled back my shoulders and remembered that I was still a healer. “Can you spare a unicorn hair?”
“My only one vanished six months ago. I think someone took it.” Mandy looked pointedly at Lady Eleanor. “I hope to have another soon. You can borrow it when I do.”
“Please take it entirely,” Lady Eleanor said. “It’s foul—how pale it is, the way it drifts along in soup”—she shuddered—“like the tail of a dead mouse. I’d rather be sick.”
My anger surfaced. “Healers hate your sort.”
She glared at me. “Loyal people hate defamers.”
We were back to that.
I should have told her as soon as I knew about Squire Jerrold’s audience with King Imbert, but I’d been too worried about the squire, Trunk, Wormy, and me to think of it. I apologized profusely. “I didn’t defame Sir Peter. I killed the ogres.” (Just two, really.)
She twisted her hands in her lap. “I wondered. I could hardly sleep.” She finally met my eyes. “I accept your apology. Not grudgingly. Last night, after hours of thinking, I decided you did lie, because I know your character and his. Sir Peter is a brave, honest, and kindly ordinary human. Ordinary humans kill ogres if we can. You are extraordinary. You’d never kill anyone, not even an ogre.”