"Mother taught me to pay attention." Rosa managed a wan smile.
"So she did."
Lily had always known, when she had begun helping and aiding Celeste — among several other little girls — as a possible consort for Thurman, that the girl was special. Even as a youngster she had been a peacemaker and a problem solver among her peers. When she grew into lovely maidenhood, she had continued that among even the elders of her village. But she had never quite realized how deeply Celeste's craft went.
"Your mother was quite the manipulator, wasn't she," Lily observed without rancor.
Rosa considered that judiciously. "Well, she used to say that she was very well aware that shehad that power, so it was up to her to use it for good, to counter the ones who used it for bad." She shrugged, "I suppose I am, too, since she taught me how to use it wisely."
"I most fervently hope so," Lily replied with feeling. "You are going to need to, in order to handle the plague of princes about to descend on us."
She was interrupted by Jimson. "Lily, your fellow Godmothers have been informed, and offer as much help as you think you need. Even in setting up and executing the trials. Many of them are arranging for the Princes and other would-be suitors to get here by means of 'All Paths Are One,' and a few of the young men will be delivered by the Godmothers or magicians themselves. Oh, and the Brownies are finished with their task and would like you to let them through."
"Task?" Rosa said, but Lily had already gone to the mirror to usher through the parade of Brownies nearly invisible beneath piles and piles of clothing.
"I have gowns — " Rosa said hesitantly, looking at the heaps of fabric that the Brownies were setting down on every available surface. "More gowns than I generally wear, in fact."
"Not like these," Lily replied grimly. She picked up a lovely mourning gown and handed it to the Princess, who frowned at the weight and the thickness of the bodice.
"This isn't just stays..."
"Armored bodice," said Lily with a sigh. "Good against knives in the dark, and possibly even axes. You'll have to set a new fashion for high collars, I am afraid. An armored bodice isn't much good if it doesn't cover the chest. Your riding habits are further armored against arrows. But on the positive side, you won't need corsets when you wear these."
The Princess nodded, but she had gone a little white.
"There are also knives where the bodice busk would be, and slits in the skirts for you to reach through to get more weapons.Not the sort of thing your seamstresses would know how to make, nor would they do so as quickly as my Brownies." Lily picked up another gown, then put it down with a sigh. "And this should have been such a lovely time for you...suitors vying for your hand, you the fairest flower in the Court...Thurman and Celeste watching you dance at balls so full of pride and happiness they — " She found tears in her eyes. "If only — "
"It's not your fault!" Rosa said fiercely. "No Kingdom ever had a better Godmother than you! It's the blasted Tradition, that's what it is!"
Lily took a deep breath. "Thank you," she said, simply. "I hope you are right. But even if you are not, the fact remains that we must deal with what is on our plate as best we can." Then she smiled a little, taking in the Brownies, Rosa and Jimson, who had appeared to gaze anxiously out of his frame. "And no one could ask for better friends."
Siegfried had been a little overwhelmed at the luxury of the rooms he had been given. Actually, he had been a little overwhelmed from the moment he'd seen the Godmother turn the cart into a coach.
Yes, he had seen magic. After all, his mother and father were half god. He'd reforged his father's sword in a Dwarven forge. He'd fought and killed two dragons. He'd tasted Dragon's Blood, and getting the gift of tongues was certainly magic.
But...not magic like this. Not magic that casually turned one thing into something else. The bird had been kind enough to explain Godmothers to him. He wasn't sure his people had a Godmother. For that matter, he wasn't sure that his land counted as a Kingdom; there were no Kings, only Clan Chiefs. And the gods seemed to interfere much, much, much more there than they did in places that had Godmothers.
He was beginning to have suspicions about his gods. He was beginning to think they were just another kind of Fae Folk. Very, very powerful Fae Folk, but ones who were quite shortsighted and not particularly bright, with a penchant for meddling like a lot of old grannies. Why else would they act pretty much like thickheaded warriors without the common sense of a goose?
But at any rate, this new sort of magic had fair made his eyes bulge. And then, they got to the Princess's Palace.
Now...he'd spent most of his time, a good eight years of it, wandering in the wilderness of just about every Kingdom he'd been through. Leaving home that young was unusual, even for a Hero, but he hadn't had a lot of other options — and at least, wandering in the wilderness was relatively safe. On the whole, cities made him feel like a bumpkin, and on the rare occasion he'd done some hero business for a noble or a King, it was generally when he'd followed rumor to a war, or had encountered one of those nobles or Kings wandering on their own in the wilderness. Mostly, when he'd been entertained, it had been in remote stone castles that were not a great deal different in the sort of things you found inside them than the Clan houses he was used to.
So when he saw the sort of affair they were riding up to, he'd been taken a bit aback. He had to keep reminding himself that if you measured worth in terms of deeds, he was just as good as anyone who lived in a place like this.
And that had held him right until the servant brought him to his rooms and left him there. Rooms! In the plural!
He had spent most of his life before he had left his land sleeping out-of-doors, or in a cave, or at best in the sort of one-room Clan house shared by most of his people when they were gathered under the protection of a Clan Chief or a petty lord. Oh, they were big places, really big. Big enough to house a hundred or more. But it was all one big room, with a hearth fire in the center and a smoke hole above it. Impressive, if you were used to tiny cottages, yes, and large, definitely, but they were nothing like the buildings in these lands, and the idea of a bit of space carved out with walls for just one person was laughable.