Lora of Two Worlds

Brendan hadn’t looked for his little sister to leave him not one inch of face.

Leon was a baron and no more — and look how warm she kept her manner with him: cousin this way, cousin that. Ambrose was a proper prince of the blood, and him she served with the cold shoulder. What went through that head of hers, heaven could hardly say.

Ambrose took no offense at all; he turned it round on Brendan instead: ”There — didn’t I tell you? Come at it that blunt way, and of course the little cousin says no. What’s capital worth, anyway? The little cousin is beauty past compare; her words are pearls on a string — that’s what’s worth money.”

Seeing Lora silent, he shifted his ground:

”Tomorrow’s the King’s Birth-Feast — the little cousin’s first time inside the palace, isn’t it? Between the formal greetings and the banquet there’ll be games in plenty. What do you like to play, in the ordinary way? Tomorrow your cousin will take you round.”

”I’ve got eyes. Can’t I see for myself?” Lora said, out of all patience.

”Then let me make you known to a few of my sisters — the ones not yet promised. They lodge with the Queen Mother and the Dowager Ladies at the Serene Palace, and they’ll be up at the palace tomorrow for the birthday. Claire and Ramsey are near your own age — you could do with a few companions.”

That was a thing not easily refused to a man’s face. Lora could hardly say she had no wish to make the acquaintance of grand princesses. She settled for glaring at her brother.

Ambrose, reading it as consent, took his leave well pleased:

So long as the King and the Queen Mother caught sight of him and Lora together tomorrow, they were sure to call the pair over and ask questions. He would push with the current — declare his admiration, beg the Queen Mother’s grant of marriage — with his lawful mother the Dowager Lady Elena chiming in at his side — and the thing was done.

That the little cousin was beautiful came second. That Grand Strategy of the Realms of hers was worth the marrying all by itself.

It wanted doing fast. Let his royal brother once wake to it — never mind carrying off the girl, a thing he was equal to — if he simply bade the Odenheims hand over the Book, then all Ambrose’s water-hauling in a wicker basket would come to exactly nothing.

When Lucy saw the fourth lord go trailing out after Prince Ambrose, she let one ”hmph” out through her nose:

”The fourth lord’s elbow surely bends outward! Doesn’t he know there’s a man in your heart already? And then to go bringing Prince Ambrose into our house!”

Lilac looked all round her, then dropped her voice: ”You little wretch — no guard on that mouth at all. A prince of the blood — is that a thing to bandy about? Let it travel, and it’s trouble for our young lady and the young lord both.”

”When trouble means to find you, you choke on plain water. As I see it, this Ambrose came with his mind made up. I’d wager he’s got his eye on our wine recipe — and without the fourth lord he’d have found some other road in. We’d best be making ready early.”

Lora rose to receive the house physician as he carried the decoction in himself. He smiled:

”Done to the young lady’s orders — boiled, then held a slow fire for a quarter-hour after. The lees strained off as well. Carry it to Prince Jasper’s, tip it into warm water, and the soak’s ready.”

”Thank you, Physician Shenley. This first time we’ll brew it here; after this, let Prince Jasper’s people brew it themselves — and spare you the trouble.”

Physician Shenley waved both hands: ”No trouble, no trouble — I want to see what this prescription will do. My junior brother is the third lord’s good friend; it was he commended me to this house, and he told me beforehand: the young lady knows a power of folk remedies. I come to learn from the young lady as much as to serve.”

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”Your junior brother?”

”Osler — Osler’s the one. I was a student of the elder Master Osler; my craft never came to much, and I ended up in the Royal College of Physicians scrambling for my bread.” Physician Shenley bowed and withdrew.

”Osler planted a spy in the house, just like that?”

Lora couldn’t help laughing. No wonder — Leon called that Osler, a man with his eyes set in the top of his head, ”Master.” Father’s side, mother’s side: two and three generations of royal physicians, and who knew how many students of theirs scattered through the academy.

The physicians of both capitals answered to the Royal College of Physicians for their governance, and the house physicians of the great households were mostly the academy’s own appointees. They didn’t always lodge in the houses — but the moment a household fell sick, it was these men who were sent for.

They couldn’t be had entire; still, the physicians had a world of their own, and news ran in it a deal faster than it ran with common men.

I miss him so much, all of a sudden.

At Prince Jasper’s again, Lora allowed the old prince only two quarters of the soak — at his age, a soak overlong is more than the heart can bear. She took the cloth from the maid’s hand, wiping his feet as she asked:

”Great-great-grandfather — how does it feel?”

”Feels... feels as if every pore I own has opened wide. And the belly’s emptier than ever.” Prince Jasper patted his own stomach.

He was a great old child. Because the whole household forbade him everything, he wanted everything the more.

Not his stomach that was hungry — his mouth.

From the food box Lora brought out a covered bowl and passed it to the mansion’s physician standing by, for his inspection: one bowl of soured-milk curds, a few raisins scattered on top.

The physician looked it over, frowning: ”This... true, the curds mend the lungs and free the bowels — but the raisins are heavy in sugar. We cannot advise letting the old prince take them.”

Lora didn’t argue the point, only said: ”A few grains a day, no more — to change the taste in his mouth, that’s all. No harm comes of it to the body.”

”No harm, no harm — it’s just how I love to eat it! If the medical academy asks, say the prince demanded it himself, and it’s nothing to do with my great-great-granddaughter.” And never mind the sweet raisins — even the curds, Prince Jasper hadn’t been allowed a taste in years.

The physicians had said: no cow’s milk, no goat’s milk — and everyone took it for granted the curds must follow the milk over the side. They didn’t know that this long-fermented sour milk was the very best eating an old body could have.

Today the old prince had met this great-great-granddaughter for the first time — and she had soaked his feet, kneaded them with her own two hands, and brought him curds with raisins into the bargain...

She was so — so lovable!

The old prince’s delight ran over on every side. He kept her to dinner; he loaded her with silks and brocades, to take home and cut up into clothes; and more than either — he bade the mansion’s chief steward set a room in order, kept expressly for this great-great-granddaughter of his, to lodge in whenever she came.

The stir of it reached all the way back to the rear court — to the old Lady of the chambers, Lady Zinnia.

In the Princes’ Quarter, no mansion belongs to any man for good, and none of them can pass to a man’s heirs.

The Empire’s titles step down a rank at every generation. When Prince Jasper passed, the princely sign would come off the door and the mansion would go over into the Household’s keeping — and at the next creation and grant, the house would be the next man’s.

So it was that a prince’s children, once they came of age, all moved out to set up doors of their own — and the old prince had never once kept a room for any of them.

And Lora — an heir who didn’t even bear the princely surname — had taken the very first room.

Lora knew nothing of all this rule.

Her own great-great-grandfather on the Odenheim side had been years in his grave. This one on the mother’s side hadn’t held her for an outsider — had granted her a room — and she went over, pleased as anything, to learn the door of it.

The old woman who walked her there was all gentleness. She looked Lora up and down, again and yet again, before she let her praise out: ”And Lady Zinnia was only saying — however did a room come to be granted all of a sudden! One look, and there’s a quick little thing in you, right enough.”

”It’s only a room they’ve set by for me — is that so great a favor? Aunt, I’ve just come up from the Eastern Capital; I don’t know the capital’s ways. You must teach me.”

The aunt smiled:

”So you truly don’t know. When a prince grants a room, it must be reported up to the Household — it means this mansion has a new master in it. Your parentage, from this day on, is ’of a prince’s household’ — and that will count mightily for you when your time comes to choose a husband.”

”You mean — from now on, I’ve got Great-great-grandfather standing straight behind me!”

Lora’s face opened up like a flower.

It had been a long while since anyone in that mansion said anything so plain. Everyone else went about with lowered lids, mouthing courtesies and nothing else.

Lora, so quick and alive, had the old aunt laughing before she knew she’d begun.