Joanne set about nervously wiping bits of dust from Lady Edith’s sleeves until Lady Edith waved her back to her seat. Joanne was a large, middle-aged woman who was as silent as Lady Edith was talkative.
Lady Edith folded her hands across her lap and gave me last-minute instructions. “Smile coyly, flirt excessively, and you’llblend in with the other girls who’ve come to court. However, don’t speak too much or too long to any gentleman. You mustn’t encourage them.”
Alarm pinged around my chest, making my laces feel even tighter. Gwenyth had done them up with vigor this morning. “What if someone proposes to me?”
“Oh, they won’t.” Lady Edith reached over the distance between us and patted my knee reassuringly. “Not when they find you’ve no dowry.” Her patting stopped and she pointed a finger at me. “Although that doesn’t mean they won’t try to deprive you of your maidenly virtue.” She raised her eyebrows. “You do still have your maidenly virtue?”
A real mother wouldn’t ask those sorts of questions in front of others, especially while she was taking me to court to commit treason.
“Virtue fairly seeps from me, I have so much of it.”
“Good.” She leaned back into her seat. “You’re wise to keep your distance from the wrong sort of men.”
I was half-tempted to ask who the wrong sort were—thieves and assassins, perhaps? Instead, I peered outside and ruminated about the king’s wizards. My magic had its limits and taking five wizard marks in one night might overtax it. But if I didn’t manage to take them all in the same night, the remaining ones would be on guard. Who knew what type of protective charms they would then employ?
I fiddled with my skirt, twisting the material. “What if none but the king’s wizards are at court for the wedding?”
I needed visiting mages to deflect suspicion from me. If I gave any of the king’s men a reason to suspect me of having magic, they could discover my secret simply by searching me for a mark. I shrank from that thought, from the idea of soldiers ripping my clothes away.
“A few are sure to come,” Gwenyth reassured me.
Lady Edith snorted. “A few? A royal wedding doesn’t happen every day. All the mages in the land will have begged their lords to let them attend so as not to miss the feasting and a chance to impress the king with their devotion. I’ll be surprised if we see less than twenty.”
Twenty? I’d been hoping for half a dozen. With a total of forty-six wizards in Aerador, if twenty came, my chances of seeing Ronan were close to fifty percent.
I wanted to point out, shrilly, that someone should have informed me of these odds beforehand. Ronan’s presence at the castle could endanger the mission, but of course, none of the renegades knew about him or that he’d given me a mark.
Lady Edith smoothed out a wrinkle from her gown. “What need have you for a wizard?” Her eyes swerved to mine. She must have seen my worry, because she shook her head, making tsking sounds. “Never mind. It’s best I not know of such things.” She turned firmly to Joanne and began speaking to her.
To Gwenyth, I said, “Sixteen apprentices went through Docendum while I lived there.” Granted, some of those had been there when I was seven years old. They wouldn’t recall me. But others… “Some might recognize me. That type of attention…”
Gwenyth coughed out a laugh. “None of the apprentices will recognize you. They don’t see servants, let alone remember them. And dressed as you are in highborn finery…” She waved her hand over me. “Well, I’d bet you your new silk stockings that not a one of them recognizes you.”
Ronan would. At least he would if he got a close look at me. I might be able to keep my distance from him. The crowd would be large enough that we might never come in proximity of each other. The cathedral would be full for the wedding, and even if we were seated nearby, he’d likely only see the back of my head or I his. I could be on my way home before he chanced to spy me.And he might not even be there. Chances were, after all, greater that he would not be.
“What do I get if I win the bet?” I asked.
“My new silk stockings.” She hadn’t been given a wardrobe for our mission and had complained bitterly about this as we’d packed.
Another sickening thought occurred to me. “Will Wolfson be there?” I’d barely said his name in two years, and the word felt treacherous on my tongue. What would he do if he saw me?
It was all I could do to remind myself that I was a highborn lady now, someone of social standing. Even if Mage Wolfson recognized me, he couldn’t grab me and threaten me with a vicious death. I was a person of consequence. And more importantly, I had knowledge of counterspells. He wouldn’t be expecting that. I’d be able to protect myself.
“Who?” Lady Edith asked, returning to our conversation.
“Mage Wolfson. The one who teaches the apprentices.” I’d told her more than once that I’d lived at Docendum Castle before I was sold to Carendale Castle, but she was perpetually forgetting this fact. When asked about my background, she often told people I was raised with Lord Haddock at Carendale.
She nodded, remembering now. “I imagine Wolfson will be there. He always was a social climber at heart.”
She knew that sort of information about him?
Lady Edith leaned toward me. It was her habit to lower her voice when speaking ill of others as though a hushed tone made gossip less of a sin. “From what I’ve heard, when he was a young man, he used to brag to King Theobald about his magical aptitude to the point that everyone considered him a bore. He thought his boasts would convince the king to appoint him to his wizard council. Instead, the king made him teach the new apprentices. Not nearly the glamour of court life he’d hoped for. And that is why one should measure one’s boasting carefully.”
I’d known Wolfson to be bad-tempered and evil-hearted, someone who was as integral to the gloom surrounding Docendum Castle as the dark stones and dimmed skies. This detail—that he was a disappointed social climber—was odd to consider. He’d wanted to be surrounded by courtiers, not pupils.
The carriage neared the drawbridge. Lady Edith fussed with her headdress to make sure it was properly fastened. “You shouldn’t fret about encountering Wolfson. He’s no longer your master and must treat you with the respect of a lady. However, if you fear he may bring up the vulgarity of your past, you should avoid him.”
Oh, I definitely planned on avoiding him.