"Thank you, child, that would be lovely." Merrigan reflected that it was easy to be gracious to a sweet girl with lovely manners. With the proper clothes, her hair in a more becoming fashion, she would make an enchanting little handmaiden. Merrigan sighed as she held out the large earthenware cup to be filled. By the time she regained her kingdom, Fern might be married, with children, and no longer a delightful, pretty little creature.
Fern paused in putting the teapot back on the stove. She frowned, glancing toward the door into the tailor shop at the front of the house. "Who is Father talking to?"
"Little pitchers have big ears," Mistress Twilby murmured, her hands shaking. She never looked up from her sewing, as if suddenly her life depended on finishing the hem.
Chapter Three
Merrigan focused on listening. The other man's voice was deep and too hearty. He sounded like several members of her father's court who were entirely too certain of their value in the world, their power and influence, and their right to stomp on anyone who didn't give them their way. Such people had thought they could stomp on her, when she was a child. Merrigan had taught them a thing or two and enjoyed it.
"If there is any justice in this wretched, magic-sickened world," she whispered.
"Is something wrong, Mistress Mara?" Fern asked, coming back to the bench.
"Not if I can help it." Merrigan smiled, though the effort hurt her face. How she loathed having to hide her feelings, when there was no one to tremble in the face of her anger. She put down her sewing and got up to find Master Twilby.
A man stood on one side of the long sewing table, hands braced on it, leaning over the table and making Master Twilby cower back a step. He was exactly like those odious courtiers Merrigan remembered. Big—big shoulders, big hat, big voice, big nose, big triple chin, big belly. The tone of his clothes was big as well, the colors just a shade too bright, and too many colors together, for Merrigan's taste. His tall walking stick was ebony, with an ivory handle in the shape of a lion's head. Too ostentatious for this size of town. It lay on the table in front of his braced hands, like a dividing line between him and Master Twilby.
"I don't understand why you are so unreasonable. It's a perfectly sensible solution," the man said, his jolly smile entirely too big. How could anyone talk and smile at the same time? Maybe that was what made his voice so big?
"What you are asking, Judge—"
"Ah, so this is Judge Brimble?" Merrigan swept into the room as she used to sweep into one of Leffisand's meetings with the council of lords. He had always found great amusement in her ability to interrupt the meeting at the most crucial time, intimidating the nobles dimwitted enough to resist his plans for the country. She just wished she had her full skirts and long train. The simple black dress and widow's cap utterly ruined the effect.
Still, from the widening of the judge's eyes, the straightening of his shoulders, she hadn't quite lost her touch. Maybe he had no idea why, but he felt intimidated.
This will be fun.
"Master Twilby, have you told him our plan yet?" Merrigan held out her hand to the judge as she once used to do with ambassadors and visiting princes.
Judge Brimble was just provincial enough to frown at her hand for a moment before reluctantly, with the grip of a limp fish, bowing over it. She supposed she should be grateful he didn't kiss it. No one liked being kissed by a limp fish.
"What plan is that?" Brimble said, his voice only at half the previous volume.
"I assume you have come here to ask once again about Master Twilby fitting in your entirely necessary order for clothes to befit your station, despite the previous and honor-bound commitment to take care of the mayor's daughter's wedding clothes."
"Err ... yes, exactly." His piggy eyes—the only things about him that weren't big – narrowed, and he looked her over as he released her hand. "And you are?"
"Mistress Mara, formerly of the courts of Avylyn and Carlion. I sewed for the royal family in Avylyn and came to Carlion when Princess Merrigan married King Leffisand. With all the upheaval after the death of King Leffisand, well ... the wise flee before they can be caught up in turmoil they had no part in causing." She nodded her head once, in what she thought a sage manner.
"Sewed? For royalty?" Judge Brimble turned to Master Twilby. "And when were you going to tell me such a talented woman worked for you?"
"Did you give him time?" Merrigan asked, as Master Twilby's mouth flapped several times and no words came out. "I only arrived today. Such a pity you weren't informed. So depressing, the lack of the niceties in these provincial backwaters. But you, sir, I hear you aim for bigger and better things. Your wardrobe must reflect your potential. Master Twilby and I have been working out a plan for me to design your new wardrobe. All done as discretely as possible, so as not to incur the wrath of the mayor. Master Twilby didn't want to make promises to you, raise your hopes, before he had anything solid to offer. A man of your stature, after all, shouldn't be disappointed. Master Twilby had considered putting me in charge of the wedding clothes, but then he decided your new wardrobe had higher priority."
"Yes ... yes, of course." Judge Brimble's face brightened and he let out a satisfied chuckle that shook his massive girth. "Clever, Twilby. I appreciate you putting my feelings ahead of your profit. Shows you have more common sense than most people in this benighted town. No wonder you
