“It is a good point though,” Onric whispered back. “It might even tempt him to try getting out of this room.”
“Give him some time. This is all very new and confusing,” Ashlin said. “We can start sewing some clothes immediately, though I am ashamed we did not think of it sooner.”
Aden cleared his throat, embarrassed but amused to be listening in to a conversation he was not privy to.
“I am here in secrecy, your highness,” Mistress Cedrice spoke for the first time, “because I have a trifling knowledge about the Majis and their ways.”
“You cannot tell father. Or anyone.” Onric stepped closer to the bed. “Not that he would disapprove, of course, but you know how he gets when he has to hide things from the Council. Swear to me that you will tell no one.”
“Just as I told no one about the spelled needle that you were testing on that tapestry in the eastern tower?”Aden wished that he could see the shock on his brother's face. He could almost hear Onric's heart speeding up, but his new hearing was not quite that good.
“What do you know about that?” Onric’s voice was guarded and angry.
“We are on the same side in this, Onric. No need to be so alarmed. I merely realized what you were doing from the start. You have done well, though you are not quite so secretive as you would like to think that you are.”
Onric leaned away from the bed, exhaling in relief.
Aden turned his eyes toward Mistress Cedrice. “Tell me what you know, seamstress.”
“Very little, I am afraid. I merely remember my grandmother, and her mother before her, singing the songs that have been passed down. Sometimes, we found that those songs can bring about a beautiful change in the objects around us. My only knowledge is what I have learned or experimented with in creating things of beauty or healing. I know nothing of curses or darker magic. But I am here now to see if anything I do know might be of use.”
Aden sat fully up, feeling intrigued for the first time in days. This might not go anywhere, but it was better than drinking herbal teas for the rest of his life. “Where do we go from here?”
“Well,” Mistress Cedrice replied, “these two have given me several accounts of what happened that night, but I should like to hear what you experienced.”
Aden felt at ease with the older woman. She was nothing like the physicians and surgeons that had bowed and scraped their way into his presence. He thought back to the events of that horrible night, as he had many times, but the specifics were as hazy as his eyesight. “When the room grew dark,” he said, “I saw Ian just standing there and I knew that the ball of light from the attacker was gathering power. So, I jumped forward to protect him. I do not remember anything else. I did not even feel the orb hit me. I just woke up, some hours later with a sharp pain in my head and . . . like this.”
“You heard the attacker chanting?”
“I suppose I did. I do not recall it as I was focused on getting to Ian in time.”
“What benefit would a Majis have for turning the crown prince into a beast?” Onric cut into the conversation, eager to be part of everything, as usual.
“The only guess I have,” Mistress Cedrice answered, “and this is merely a guess, is that the attacker did not intend for this to happen. He was likely attempting to kill his target, but something about Aden's interference fractured the power of the orb. The one thing I do know of magic is that it can be fragile. In my limited experience, magic is not nearly as frightening as we assume that it will be.”
“So, I might have actually stopped Ian from death?” Aden asked.
“It is entirely likely that you did.”
Aden let that knowledge wash over him. He had known that he was helping his older brother, but it had been difficult not to be bitter about the results of his selfless action.
“Of course,” Mistress Cedrice continued her earlier thoughts, “I have no idea how powerful this Lord Munney was. I have never experienced a magic that was entirely contained in itself. The only magic I have seen requires an object to interact with.”
“Like needing the shard of glass to create my shoes for the ball,” Ashlin said, her voice dawned with understanding.
“Precisely.”
“Why did the shoes not disappear, though, when everything else you spelled that night went back to its old form?” Ashlin asked. “Perhaps this curse has a time limit as well?”
Aden turned his unseeing but hopeful eyes back to the older woman.
“It is indeed possible, but after three days . . . I am afraid it is not likely. That kind of magic rarely lasts for an entire day. The broken piece of glass came from your mother, you said?”
“Yes, from a small figurine she treasured.”
“Perhaps the figurine was created with magic. Or perhaps it received some sort of magic from the love that was transmitted through it, or the love that it symbolized for you.”
“Magic works like that?” Ashlin swallowed, her voice thick with emotion. Aden did not know much about Ashlin yet, but his heart went out to her. He hoped that his brother's inviting her into their family would help to restore some of what she had lost.
