Bella just leaned back and soaked, feeling the heat penetrate all the way to the chill core she had thought she would never get warm. A touch on her arm made her jump, and she flailed for a moment, her eyes snapping open to see a tray of food being set down on the rim of the bathtub.
It was full of little bite-size things: bits of baked squash, chunks of sausage, pickles, slices of beef, cubes of cheese. For a moment, her stomach churned with nausea, but then the nausea turned to hunger and she reached out and took a bit of cheese. And then a pickle. Then some rare beef…and before long the tray was empty and Sapphire was pressing a small glass filled with an amber liquid into her hand.
She tasted it; it was like sweet fire. She’d had brandy before, but this was different. It went down as smooth as honey, and ended up like a comforting coal in the middle of her, thawing the last of the cold in her center. Warmth spread, and with it, a light and fuzzy feeling.
Sapphire helped her out of the tub; her legs felt a little wavery, as if the bones weren’t quite solid, and she realized that she was just a little drunk. The Spirit Elemental wrapped her in a soft robe, sat her down beside the fire and brushed out her hair, then loosely braided it again as she stared at the flames.
She wondered if she ought to be crying again. After all, two men had died today, and she had been partly responsible.
But she couldn’t make her mind wrap around that, and she felt at once too tired and too drained to care.
When Sapphire was done with her hair, she tugged at Bella’s arm, and Bella rose and let the servant lead her to the bed. She climbed in and lay down, closing her eyes; she felt the featherlight touch of something on her face, and dimly realized that Sapphire was putting some sort of ointment on her wounds, but at that point, the only thing that mattered was sleep, and she let it take her.
She was very glad that the mirror was one-way. Her father would have been horrified if he had seen her face. It looked as if someone had been whipping her, although Sapphire assured her that everything would heal without leaving a mark. She had only told him in this morning’s letter that she had been out on a long ride into the mining country with Eric’s escort, and that it had been interesting to see the hills she had only glimpsed from the city. She knew that since her father was widely traveled, he would have a lot to say on the subject, and that seemed safer than giving him an opening to ask too many questions.
She hadn’t gone down to breakfast. She had written a note for the servants to take to Sebastian, explaining what had happened. A note had come back from him, assuring her that Eric had already told him in detail about the ambush and her part in it, and that she should rest if she thought she needed to. But he added in his note that if she didn’t think she required rest, he would welcome her company in his workroom this afternoon for another lesson. She had expected the former, but not the latter, and she felt a rush of unanticipated affection for him. He wasn’t coddling her, or treating her like a fragile little child. He also wasn’t taking her for granted, assuming that she would simply turn up as expected for her lesson in magic, simply because he was Duke Sebastian and she should be grateful for his tutelage.
Not that she wasn’t grateful…she was. He was a very good teacher; she had to wonder, now, who had taught him, because in her experience, it took a good teacher to make a good teacher.
She watched her father mime his farewell kiss, as he did when it came time that he had to get back to work, and the image of his study faded from the mirror. She was about to get up and see about a better ointment for her stripes, when the mirror suddenly chimed.
The Godmother appeared immediately in the depths, as soon as she picked it up. Elena stared at her for a moment, dumbfounded, as she took in the state of Bella’s poor face.
“By all that is holy! Your face! If either of those men — ” the Godmother began, her face twisting into a mask of outrage.
“No! I mean, yes, but not in the way you think!” Bella said hastily, and explained what had happened. Elena listened without interrupting, her anger calming as quickly as it had arisen, then pursed her lips thoughtfully.
“Well,” she said. “This is — unexpected. I hope it doesn’t hurt too much.”
Bella grimaced, which, of course, made her face hurt. “Oh, it does. But not as much as being bitten on the foot.”
Elena gave an unladylike snort. “Well. On the one hand, you were not nearly in as much danger as Eric would have liked you to think,” the Godmother said, cautiously. “Even if the poachers took you for a young man, you were extremely well dressed, and they probably thought you were a noble at the least and Sebastian at the best. One doesn’t kill a rich prize like that. In either case, they were not going to spoil what would have been a very lucrative kidnapping by slitting your throat.”
Bella was taken a little aback. “Oh…” she said, feeling deflated, and now, guilty. Because if she had not been in danger of her life, then those two men had been killed over nothing —
“Eric, however, was completely expendable, and they’d have gutted him without a moment of hesitation, then sent his body back on his horse as a token that they were in earnest,” the Godmother continued, as calmly as if she was discussing whether fish or soup would be a better first course at dinner. “So I must say, you did well in keeping your wits about you.” She leaned over and said something to someone who was out of sight of the mirror. “As soon as my assistant returns with it, I’ll push a pot of one of my salves through the mirror to your side. By tomorrow you won’t have so much as a pink mark.”
“You’ll — what? Push something through the mirror? You can do that?” Bella tried not to gape with surprise.
“And travel through mirrors, as well, yes, when I need to.” The Godmother made a dismissive motion. “Godmothers can. That’s another subject. You can see magic?”
“Well, this is an unexpected development, I must say,” the Godmother told her with a sigh. “Not entirely unwelcome but…it does complicate things. The Granny of your woods and I had thought you were going to be a very late bloomer and come into your power with your gray hair, but it seems your story just took a different
