In Which Everything is Back to Normal

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay

Our guests from Marshweather have finally gone home for good, and for all the aggravation they have caused me I have to say I have learned a great deal. The most important thing I believe I learned was that I can never assume I know anything about anyone or what they’re thinking, since I am perfectly capable of being laughably wrong.

King Lucan sent the signed treaties three days ago and they were perfectly straightforward and entirely to our advantage, at which point it only remained for them to get their things together and leave. There are only the four principals (Prince Hugo, Lady Marta, and Captains Smoot and Hawley) along with Lady Marta’s escort and a few more men who had come along with the treaties. I have seen Mother mobilize three times as many people in less than a day and confidently expected them to be gone in the morning.

But of course it couldn’t be that simple. First there had to be a ceremony for signing the treaties – I don’t know why, but it seems that sort of thing is done. Father and Prince Hugo gave speeches, and our army gave an immense parade full of pageantry and flower petals, and there was a great feast in the courtyard for the entire city which will come expensive, considering we didn’t charge Marshweather anything but Rafe’s blood-price.

Then there was the packing. Hugo and the two captains had come with just their clothes for the battle, of course, not expecting to get captured, and we have had to lend them whatever they needed ever since. But Lady Marta came on purpose, with a wardrobe that occupied an entire wagon and needed its own room. It took her maids a day and a half to put it all away, with Lady Marta herself standing prettily in the middle of the scrimmage gesturing at trunks. Personally I have always thought packing to go home much easier than packing to go abroad – you have to take what you came with, after all, it isn’t like there are any decisions to be made – so I shudder to think how long it must have taken her to pack in the first place unless she just tipped all the clothes she owned into the wagon, which I would certainly believe.

The whole series of events wound up with a dance. We have had dancing here every night since I can remember without incident, but that wasn’t enough for Lady Marta – she had to have a masquerade dance, and of course unpacked at least a third of what her maids had so laboriously packed for her already in order to put together a suitable costume. She went as a butterfly, with immense silk wings stiffened with starch and wire, and everyone who came within three feet of her got one in the eye at some point. I wanted to dress as an assassin, but Winnie convinced me that nobody would know what it was so I just put one of the pages’ breastplates over my second-best gown and went as Victory. It was nice and patriotic and not too much trouble, which is all I can really say for it.

The morning after the dance, they left at last, with enough false starts that I was ready to explode with irritation by the time they got themselves off. There was not a single thing capable of being forgotten which Lady Marta did not forget, nor a single meaningless diplomatic phrase which Hugo did not intone laboriously, regardless of its appropriateness to the affair. He must just have gotten hold of a book of them because I believe I even heard him pledge abiding peace to Lynde and ask for Rafe’s hand in marriage.

I thought I would go thoroughly mad before they finally pulled away, but at last the trumpets blew and all their carts and horses rumbled into motion. We stood there like idiots watching them until their last flags disappeared in the direction of the town gates and Father ordered the portcullis closed.

“Well, that’s over at last,” he said as he turned away.

“Finally!” said Mother.

“What I’ll do now that I can hear myself think, I have no idea,” said Winnie.

“The quiet is nice, isn’t it?” Lynde agreed. “Listen, you can hear the birds again.”

I stared at them with my mouth agape and Winnie flushed a little.

“No, it isn’t polite to complain about your guests as soon as they’re out of sight,” she said, “but you must admit we’ve put up with a great deal.”

“I must admit?” I said incredulously. “Almost every day one or the other of those morons has made me want to slay them with my bare hands. You’re the one who took Lady Marta under your wing like a broody hen. You were so attached I’m surprised you didn’t go back to Marshweather with her.”

“Certainly I was,” Winnie retorted. “I’ve never seen anyone who needed it more.”

Lynde giggled, and I turned on her. “And you, with the eternal knitting. I could scarcely get your attention for a moment until I started making a martyr of myself in that damned practice ring. Are you going to tell me now that you’re not sorry to see her leave?”

Lynde drew herself up primly. “Lady Marta is a nice young lady with no malice in her. But knitting is just a pastime, you know. I won’t deny that she talks a great deal, and of course we could all see that she is rather silly.”

Father heaved a sigh. “Well, all I can say is that I’m happy to be able to call my soul my own again,” he said. “Not to mention my beard. I didn’t think I was old enough for charming young women to chuck me under the chin and I’m not sure I like it. Anyway, they’re gone, and she can go around kissing Lucan on his bald spot if that’s what she wants, and good riddance.”

I caught Mother’s eye and found her smiling at me in that irritating way she has when I have just learned a lesson.

“You mean none of you liked Lady Marta any more than I did?” I demanded. “I thought I was going crazy.”

“We certainly didn’t show it as much as you did, I’ll say that,” Winnie said dryly. “If the poor girl hadn’t been solid wood above the eyes she would have been mortally offended. We are certainly going to have to talk a little more about etiquette, you and me, before we consider your education complete.”

“I would add that not everyone with little in common with you is automatically to be despised,” murmured Mother, “but only time teaches that, I’m afraid.”

Just then the noon gong rang. “Oh, good,” said Father. “I’m absolutely starving for dinner. Thank goodness everything has finally gone back to normal.”