“That doesn’t even—” Janet started, then gave up. Gretsella had already swept out of the room.
With the election out of the way, there wasn’t much left to do but for Bradley to give a (very touching) concession speech (there was barely a dry eye under the balcony, no matter how fervently he beseeched Evermore not to cry for him). Bradley also insisted on hanging around for a few more days to assist in the peaceful transfer of power, as much as Gretsella would have preferred to let the formerly less-than-scrupulously-honest king-elect figure things out on her own.
On the day before they were due to leave, Bradley made a tour of the palace to personally thank and bid goodbye to all the employees, which set off more crying. Gretsella took the opportunity to get copies of Prune’s cake recipes. The woman really did make excellent cake. Then, that evening, they were invited to attend the party that Lady Cordelia had organized as a goodbye-King-Bradley-hello-King-Janet-isn’t-the-peaceful-transfer-of-power-nice-and-please-take-note-of-the-fact-that-no-one-has-literally-or-figuratively-lost-their-heads gala. It was the inaugural event of its kind, so everyone had been calling it “the inauguration,” which Gretsella thoughtsounded like exactly what a bunch of dreary, earnest democracy enjoyers would call a party.
Gretsella was extremely irritated when the party turned out to be one for the books. Maybe she shouldn’t have been surprised: Half of the guest list was made up of jesters, and they drank almost as much as journalists, who made up a good portion of the rest of the attendees. The merrymaking was at a fever pitch. Even Gretsella got into the spirit of things, drank three large glasses of punch—it was served in flames, which she found gratifyingly diabolical—and ended up leaning very heavily on the strong left arm of Herman. “You know,” she told him mushily, “you’re veryshenshible—for aman.”
“Thank you,” he said. “And you’re very sensible for anyone. And clever. And—beg your pardon, ma’am, and meaning you no disrespect—a very handsome woman. With piercing eyes full of intelligence and discernment, ma’am.” His face had gone very pink above his excellent mustache.
“Ooh!” Gretsella said, and waggled a finger at him. “Getting veryshmart! Getting—cheeky! Saying words with your very nice mustache!” She leaned in closer to him. “Itisavery goodmustache,” she said.
“Thank you,” he said, looking her in the eyes.
“None ofthat!” she said, and tried to spin on her heel 180 degrees. She overshot by about forty degrees, reoriented herself, and marched determinedly—if somewhat circuitously—toward the gardens for some badly needed fresh air.
Once outside, she got briefly lost in a hedge maze, andemerged into the rose garden just in time to see Sir George gallantly going down on one knee in front of her son. Gretsella, obviously, listened in.
“I don’t seewhy,” Bradley was saying, wetly. “I was a terrible king, and I’m not even the king anymore. I’m just a village hairdresser, and one day I’ll be old and wrinkled and have hair growing out of my nose.”
“I like your nose,” George said. “And I suppose that one day I’ll like the hairs too.”
“I just don’t understand,” Bradley said. “Maybe I’m just too slow.”
“I see,” George said. “Well—have you ever heard of a holly dragon?”
Bradley gave a damp laugh. “You’ve alreadyexplainedinflation to me.”
“I don’t want to explain inflation,” George said. “I meant that you’re…like the holly dragon.”
“I guard the door?”
“No,” George said. “You’reindispensable. Nothing else will do. And I’d pay any price if I had to. If it meant I didn’t have to go without you.”
“Oh,” Bradley said. “So are you. You’re the holly dragon who guards the door.”
“What?”
“That’s how you are,” Bradley said. “You hold back the winter. You keep everyone warm. The cold and the dark don’t get in, when there’s you.”
“Oh,” George said, now sounding almost as damp as Bradley. “So, does that mean yes?”
“Oh, I’m so sorry—I didn’t mean to keep you waiting,” Bradley said. He was always, even in emotional extremis, awfully polite. “Yes.”
Either or both of them may have, at this point, allowed their general dewiness to turn into the shedding of a knightly tear or two. There was also all sorts of embracing, fervent murmuring, et cetera. Gretsella, for once in her life, felt the faintest stirrings of conscience over peeping at them in such a tender moment, and tried to retreat. Instead, she walked backward into a particularly thorny hedge, shrieked, attempted to curse the hedge and all of its ancestors, misfired her curse on account of the three glasses of flaming punch, and accidentally turned the ornamental weeping cherry tree that Bradley and George were standing beside into a moose. The former cherry tree—which had spent its entire life as flora, didn’t know the first thing about fauna, and wasn’t enjoying anything about its new and alarming circumstances—began mournfully honking and attempting to flap the wings it didn’t have.
“Mother?” Bradley called out into the darkness. “Is that you?”
“No!” Gretsella called back.
“Oh, good,” Bradley said. “I thought I heard you in the hedge, cursing things.” Then he took a moment to move out of moose range before he went back to kissing his fiancé.
Gretsella and Bradley had plannedto depart bright and early the next morning. This plan did not come to fruition. Gretsella woke up in a sweaty, unhappy pile of herself past noon to the sound of a knock on the door. She flailed up into a sitting position just as her son came bursting into the room, all beaming smiles, followed a moment later by a distinctly uncomfortable-looking Sir George. “Mother, we’re engaged!” Bradley said.
“Ah!” Gretsella said, settling back down onto her pillows. “Another piece of surprising, but this time very agreeable, news! Please draw the curtains, Bradley.”
Bradley did so, then flung himself onto the bed next to her to babble happily about what sorts of flower arrangements they might have for a summer wedding. Gretsella closed her eyes and tried to pretend that the sound of his voice was the sound of seagulls squawking over the crash of ocean waves.
“So,” Sir George said when his betrothed took a second to breathe, “the news was surprising?”
