done.'
Lilac laughed. 'You needn't worry! You'd need a real hairdresser for the kind of thing you mean. Trivelda was wearing a menagerie, the last time she was here-birds and deer and gods know what all-these little statues, worked into this net thing she was wearing on her head. It was quite extraordinary. It's become a sort of legend.
The joke was that it was as near as she ever got to real animals . . . you can't count her lap-dogs. No one has ever seen one walk on its own, and she has them bathed every day, and they wear her perfume.
'Veeery simple,' she said after a moment. 'All I have to do is decide what color ribbons.' She opened the little bag she'd arrived wearing round her neck; a visual cacophony of ribbons poured out: ribbons thin as a thread, as wide as the thickness of three fingers, ribbons of all colors, ribbons woven of other ribbons, ribbons of silk and velvet, ribbons with tiny embroidered figures and patterns, ribbons with straight edges, ribbons with scalloped edges, ribbons of lace.
'Mercy!' said Lissar, sitting up.
'Oh, Marigold let me borrow these. I'll take back what we don't want. Now, your dress is silver, is it not? Burgundy in your hair, then, and black like your eyes, and ...
let's see ... maybe the palest pink, to set off your complexion. The palest pink. If it weren't for your hair I'd say your skin was white.... Now hold still.' Her hands began braiding. 'Everyone thinks this is it, you see. That's why everyone is so excited about this particular ball. I don't think anyone will come barefoot to this one.'
'This is it?' said Lissar, finding herself enjoying having her hair brushed, like one of the dogs on a grooming table, lulled by the motion and the contact. She ran her fingers down the smooth midline of Ash's skull, Ash's head being on her knee.
'How do you mean?' she asked, only half attending.
'Oh, that Ossin will offer for Trivelda. It's no secret that the king and queen are impatient to marry him off; he's gone twenty-five, you know, and they want the ordinary sort of grandchildren, not the kind that bark and have four legs, and besides, there's Camilla, who will turn seventeen in the spring, and there's this very tiresome tradition that the royal heir is supposed to marry first.
'There's an even more tiresome tradition that all noble families are supposed to marry off their children in chronological order, but it's really only the heirs that anyone pays much attention to. Ossin knows this of course-so does Camilla. Cofta and Clem are afraid she's getting too fond of that pretty count, he knows so well how to be charming and she's so young, and if they sent him away it might just make it all worse. But they can't really do much about pushing her elsewhere till Ossin is officially done with. And Ossin's fond of his sister, and likes Dorl even less than his parents do.'
Lissar found herself strangely dismayed by this news, and the long gentle strokes of the hairbrush, and smaller busyness of fingers plaiting, suddenly annoyed her.
'But he doesn't like Trivelda.'
Lilac chuckled. 'How much do you think that has to do with it?'
'They don't want Camilla to marry Dorl.'
'That's different. Dorl really isn't much except charm-and old blood-and neither of those, even, is laid very thick. There are very few real princesses around, or even wealthy farmers' daughters, and most of them have gotten married while the prince has been out hunting his dogs.'
'Chasing the Moonwoman,' murmured Lissar.
'Eh?'
'Nothing.'
'It won't be so bad because they'll have nothing to do with one another. It would be much worse if she wanted to ride and hunt; she's an appalling rider, hates horses, and her idea of a dog ... well, those things of hers look like breakfast-rolls with hair.
And they all bark, if you want to call it barking. Anyway, she'll stay out of the barns-and kennels-and he'll stay out of the drawing-rooms. Knowing Ossin, he'll be glad of the excuse, come to that.'
'It doesn't sound ... very satisfying,' said Lissar.
Lilac laughed. Ash pricked her ears. 'Deerskin, I've caught you out at last; you're a romantic. I would never have guessed. Do you know, I think I want a shade a little rosier than the palest pink after all. I have a brooch, I'll loan it to you, it will look perfect right here,' and she stabbed a finger at the side of Lissar's head.
'You're a wealthy farmer's daughter,' said Lissar, still distressed that Ossin should be thrown away on a princess with hairy breakfastrolls for dogs.
'Hmm? What?' said Lilac, fingers busy. 'Who, me? Marry Ossin? In the first place, he wouldn't have me. In the second place his parents wouldn't have me. My parents aren't that wealthy, and I'm still a stable- girl. And third, I wouldn't have him. I know he's admirable in every way and the country is lucky to have him to look forward to as their next king. But he's so admirable he's boring. I don't think he's ever been drunk in his life, or broken a window when he was a boy playing hurlfast, or spoken an unmerited harsh word. He's so responsible. Ugly, too.'
Lissar, stung, said, 'He's not ugly.'
Lilac, now working from the front, paused and looked into Lissar's face. There was a tight little pause, while Lissar remembered the nights together in the puppies'
pen, guessing that that story would have been heard in the stables. Had she ever told Lilac herself? She couldn't remember.
Lilac, irrepressible, started to smile. 'You marry him,' she said.
TWENTY- NINE
NOT ONLY SHOES AND GLOVES ARRIVED IN THE FINAL PACKAGE
