Fairy Godmother

It was certainly better than his brother Octavian's lot. Octavian got an empty stall and slept on what he could find. He hadn't sunk so low as to use dirty straw, but he wasn't allowed the new, clean stuff the horses got. No, the best he could manage was fusty stuff from last year, that had gotten a bit moldy, the thin heap of it covered over with rags. He slept under several moth-eaten blankets, arranged so that the holes at least didn't intersect.

Octavian would have regarded the clean little loft room with raw envy, and his reaction to the featherbed would have been disbelief.

She wondered what Alexander was thinking. She hoped he was grateful. She wanted him to be grateful; he hadn't been grateful for much of anything in his previous life, instead, he had accepted the good things that had come to him as his due. The more feelings of things like gratitude he could muster, the better off he would be.

Reluctantly she turned her eyes away from the window and back to her books.

Apparently there was some mechanism whereby Godmothers just got authority over Kingdoms as their experience, cleverness, and strength warranted. There was no formal announcement of the fact, it just happened. But there were unmistakable signs that one had gotten the Kingdom; the Witches and Hedge-Wizards would begin reporting information to one, and at some point, the Godmother would have the opportunity dropped in her lap to make some Grand Gesture at the Royal Court. A gesture like —

— like returning a lost Prince, a former failed Quester who has learned his lessons, to his parents —

There it was, unmistakable. And here was Arachnia's latest letter, brought by bat, lying open on the table next to her.

' — and I can't risk ruining my reputation as the Dark Lady by bringing Octavian back myself, Elena. That's the job of a Godmother. So you might want to think about how you want to do this, because I expect he'll be ready within the month, and unless he backslides, I really don't want to risk his health out there in that drafty stable in the winter. My stableman does fine, but he's a troll. No, really, a troll; a good enough fellow, but as stupid as a block of wood and as hard to hurt as a stone. The conditions he likes might kill a man.'

Elena chewed on the end of an ivory pen. Arachnia was right; she was much too useful as a stalking-horse, the faux Evil Queen who was actually in charge of a failed Quester's ordeals. She was far enough away from Kohlstania that someone would have to invoke 'All Forests Are One' to bring Octavian back. And ideally, in order to wake up Kohlstania to the fact that magic was very much alive and a force in the Kingdoms, as well as to cement King Henrick's change of heart as well as Octavian's changed ways, the return of the 'lost' Prince would have to be conducted with a great deal of fanfare.

Which meant —

Which means, I fear, that Kohlstania is now mine. She wasn't certain whether to be pleased or worried. Kohlstania was certainly an orderly place. Perhaps a little too orderly. When things were too orderly, The Tradition had the unsettling habit of stirring matters up by creating an opening for a Dark One to move in.

Well, all right; at least I'm forewarned. I'll have to have Karelina put me in touch with the Witches and Hedge- Wizards. I might be able to nip trouble early.

She made a note of that on the tablet she was filling, right underneath, Octavian? Make him my helmeted Knight-Escort until I reveal him to his father?

She glanced out the window again; the lamp was still burning over the stable. It looked as if Alexander was celebrating his first night as a man again by staying up a bit. She thought she recalled Lily asking for some of the duplicate copies of books in the Library. Had she put them up there? Well, where else would they go?

If so, she hoped he was something of a reader. The more he learned about magic and The Tradition, the sooner he would really come to understand the path that he had made for himself that had brought him here.

A bat flew in the open window and fluttered around for a few moments before catching itself on a beam and hanging upside down, staring warily at Alexander.

He had been startled when it flapped past his ear, but he wasn't the sort to think that bats were somehow evil, or to want to chase it out. The Palace gamekeeper had once had a bat with a broken wing that he'd rescued and nursed back to health before turning it loose, and he'd shown it to the two youngest Princes, explaining how bats ate all manner of insects and were very useful to have about. Alexander had found the tiny thing fascinating, with its delicate wings, soft fur, and miniature features. It was nothing at all like a flying mouse.

So Alexander watched the bat watching him without moving from his bed, and finally the bat had relaxed, dropped off the ceiling, and fluttered around the room for a bit, catching the moths that had been attracted by the lamplight.

The arrival of the bat had been a useful interruption, because at this point, Alexander's head was beginning to feel very full.

When the bat flew out again, having swept the room clean of moths, rather than returning to his reading he put the book aside, and turned over on his stomach to blow out the lamp. And when he had done so, he saw a square of light down below, and in it, the unmistakable silhouette of Elena.

He supposed that he ought to be thinking of her as 'Madame' Elena, but somehow the title really didn't fit her. It was like trying to put a collar on a wild doe; you could embellish it with gems and gold filigree all you wanted, but the doe was still a wild thing and would never be a pet. 'Godmother' suited her, but only when she was becoiffed and powdered and tripping about on her silver-heeled slippers in court garb. In her ordinary clothing, she seemed, to him at least, nothing more imposing than simply 'Elena.'

Of course, if he dared address her that way, Hob would probably lay him out on the ground.

He wondered what she was doing; it looked as if she was writing, or reading, or perhaps both. Well, so much for thinking she was an illiterate peasant.