“You aren’t dowdy or forgettable,” he said without thinking. “Or a frump.”
She looked inordinately pleased at that, but didn’t interrupt her story. “It didn’t take me long to get their books straight, and yes, the innkeeper has been skimming, and yes, he stopped immediately when he knew I was there to check on him. So since I was there anyway, both the players and their other staff started coming to me for other little things. You know, the odd letter from home to be read or written, arranging with a goldsmith to put something away for a rainy day, that sort of thing. And King Norris would come sailing by now and again, vaguely note that I was there, and be off again—and whenever he came by, I always made sheep’s eyes at him, which is exactly what he expected. Women throw themselves at him all the time, and if I hadn’t acted infatuated, he might have suspected something. Well, that was how things stood, right up until last night, when we had an—interesting situation.”
“Oh?” Alberich prompted.
“They’d done a reduced-cast play for a private audience in the afternoon, and all the leads had to hurry back to the inn to do the main play that evening,” she said, her lenses gleaming. He didn’t have to see her eyes to know that there was great satisfaction in them. “So I’m sitting there in the office with folded hands, nothing much to do, and in comes Norris himself and for once, he’s looking for me. ’Can you make a fair copy of something without knowing the language?’ he asks. I gave him a look—”
She tilted her head slightly, and showed Alberich the expression of dazzled infatuation she must have given Norris.
“—and I said, ’Of course I can, I’m a clerk! If we stopped to actually read what we’re copying, we’d never get half the work done that we do! Eye to hand to paper, and no stopping at the brain, that’s us—’ And before I can say anything else, he dropped this in front of me.” She indicated the packet. “And some paper—if you can believe it—that’s even lighter than this is. ’I’m in a hurry,’ says he, ’and I haven’t time to do this myself. I need that transcribed in the smallest hand you can manage onto that paper, then burn the original. And I need it by the time I’m off the stage tonight.’ I looked at him like I didn’t care so long as the job was for him, and didn’t ask why. He didn’t tell me, he just rushed straight out, and I heard the wardrobe mistress screeching for him, so he must have been late for costuming. The rest is easy enough. I made his copy and tossed the original out the window to Aleirian, who carried it away.”
“Good God,” he breathed. “I wouldn’t have thought of that.”
“I didn’t,” she admitted. “Aleirian did. Anyway, then I kept an ear out to gauge the progress of the play, copied as many pages of the original again in the original size as I could fit in the time left, made them the top sheets in a stack of blanks, and when he got offstage and came for his papers, he saw that packet merrily burning away and assumed I’d burned the original the way I was told. He was damned careful, too; he stayed there until all the papers were burned, then broke up the ash until there wasn’t a fragment the size of the head of a nail. Then he went off. I assume that he must have gotten the originals at that private performance. And I guess that my copies must have gone out that night, because he just flew out the door with them. It wouldn’t have been hard. You could have rolled the lot up and hidden them practically anywhere.”
“I can probably find out who and where when we know what is in these,” he replied absently, unable to believe his good luck. “What did he do when you gave him the copy, besides watch the papers burn?”
“Well, he made an excuse for hanging about while he made sure the papers were gone by pouring charm all over me until I was practically gagging on it,” she replied, a chuckle in her voice. “And I gazed at him adoringly like he expected me to, and hung on his every word, and vowed that if I could ever do something for him again, he had only to ask. He went away never thinking twice about having entrusted me with papers in cipher.”
Surely they couldn’t be that lucky. “You’re sure it wasn’t some sort of trap—” he said warningly.
“Well, of course anything is possible,” she replied. “But he wasn’t expecting a Herald, or Aleirian, and, well—Alberich, I know that kind of man. I ran into them all the time when I was a girl and my best friend was the prettiest girl in our quarter.” She sighed, and for a moment, that good humor and sparkle faded. “The first time, and even the second and third, that a handsome boy came and poured that kind of charm and flattery all over me, I fell for it—but after three times of being fooled and finding out that they were only being nice to me because they wanted to meet my friend, I became immune to it.”
His mouth formed a silent “Oh.”
She shrugged. “It’s one of those things that plain girls learn, Alberich. You just get used to it after a while. Well, your lad Norris might be one of the best in Valdemar at charming people, but someone like me—” she shook her head. “Actually, he’s never encountered someone like me, I suspect, because we won’t throw ourselves at him; we know better. He’ll never even see the plain ones who are on to his little game—they might be at the performances, and they’ll certainly admire his acting ability, but so far as lingering on the off chance they’ll meet him, it will never happen. So he looked at me and saw a plain, frumpy little mouse with a little mouse’s job, who looked at him with eyes of adoration, and figured he knew exactly what I was and how he could use me. And best of all, he wouldn’t have to actually do more than give me a bit of attention, because someone like me would never, ever expect someone like him would want to romance me.” The cynical laugh she uttered at that moment made him wince, and he wondered then about the young girl in lenses who’d been tricked three times by manipulative boys. “Oh, no, a crumb of attention to cherish in the darkness of my little closet of a room, that’s all he needed to give. I’d be his slave forever, and never demand anything out of him.”
“Myste—” He swallowed. “I apologize.”
She started, and stared at him. “For what?” she asked.
“For people like him.” He shook his head. “I am sorry.”
She laughed again, but this time the humor was back in her voice. “Good gods, Alberich, don’t be. Trust me, the injuries to my heart, such as they were, scabbed over a long time ago, and the scar is a useful reminder. If I hadn’t been hurt and used by all those heartless boys back in the day, I’d never have been able to see right through your lad Norris, would I? So don’t think I’m living with a tragic past! Good gods, compared to at least half of the others that have gone through these walls, it’s a teacup tragedy at worst, and a farce at best.” She winked at him. “Besides, I saw my pretty best friend not long ago. She’s tripled in size, she’s had a baby a year, and her handsome husband chases tavern girls. Have pity for her, not me.”
“Ah.” He felt a good deal better. At least she wasn’t likely to reject him out of hand if—
“Besides,” she chuckled again, “it gives me an appreciation for men who blurt out ’you’re not a frump,’ and not some carefully rehearsed speech, who say it without even thinking about it, and who then go on to apologize for the vagaries of their sex.”