Page 40 of The Discount Damsel

Spurred on by the uneasy thought that Master Excelsior would just appear out of nowhere to check on his apprentice, even though he had no history of doing so, Bradley kept his morning ablutions quick and efficient.

When he emerged from the steamy bathroom toweling his hair, he found the princess dressed in an outfit he didn’t recognize with her hair tamed by a headscarf, the previously missing hairpin now serving as a decorative brooch pin in her plaid skirt. She was still abed, this time sitting atop the quilt. She wasn’t alone, either.

Arrayed upon the bed were various items, presumably the contents of the carpet bag which lay open beside her on his pillow.

The offense to his bed compounded when he noted she wasn’t just sitting there with her pilfered possessions and admiring them. Oh no. She was polishing them. Which meant dust and grime and sand and probably lice and flesh-eating bacteria were making themselves quite cozy and snug in the fibers of his bedspread.

The horrors persisted. The princess was snacking as she polished! A napkin draped across her lap like a picnic blanket, half the snacks he’d given her yester-afternoon positioned in the valley of her crossed thighs. She’d just taken a bite of cheese when he’d open the bathroom door and hadn’t even bothered to stop chewing in the heat of his glare.

His mouth opened once, twice, but nothing but a strangled gargle emerged. He slammed one hand against the doorframe so it wouldn’t take a fistful of her long auburn hair and drag her down to the dungeon for this assault against his sacred harbor of repose. The doorframe, which was solid oak, creaked under his grip as he fought for calm.

“What, did you want me to faint again today? And you didn’t make us dinner yesterday.” She plopped a roasted almond into her mouth.

Bradley’s head snapped up, eyes flicking from the clutter on his bed back to the princess. “Tula,” he growled.

There was a knock at the door then, and the sorcerer apprentice’s stomach tightened like a fist around an orange desperate for fresh juice. Master Excelsior!

“Bradley?” came a muffled voice. “Wake up! I think Millie was right about you talking in your sleep and this is twice now I’ve heard you shouting about tiny pink octopuses. Also, my princess is missing again.”

The apprentice held up a finger at the princess—they were not done here—and crossed the room to open the door. Dirk swirled under Bradley’s arm and maintained a hover near the threshold, as it was rude to progress further into someone’s private abode without invitation. His golden gaze flicked to Millie snacking on the bed to Bradley’s flushed face and mist-speckled spectacles. “Oh my.”

His scales immediately rippled with soft white light. Luck, for an outcome that didn’t involve Millie draped over Bradley’s shoulder, kicking and screaming, and for Bradley’s eyes to remain in his head where they belonged if he tried to do such a thing. He’d seen Millie handle a hairpin. Savage.

The little dragon swirled over to the bed. “When did you find these little treasures?”

“When I got up to stretch my legs last night.”

Only Caelus knew what else she’d gotten up to unsupervised. Master Excelsior wasn’t going to kill him when he found out, no, his master was far too eccentric for that. The sorcerer had a reputation for creating the most harebrained assignments, the most outrageous exams, and the most ludicrous chores, so it only made sense that whatever torture he would inflict upon Bradley would be just as unique.

What a terrifying thought.

Bradley pressed a hand against his chest to slow his galloping heart and took deep breaths so has not to hyperventilate.

He’d never been so anxious in his entire life, not even when battling sea monsters or evading pirates, but the very thought that his master would strip him of everything he had worked so hard to achieve threatened to undo him. He had escaped the Cut and he was never going back.

“The bed’s too small, isn’t it?” Dirk was saying. “Sorry.”

“Don’t worry, Master Dirk, Mr. Donmarin here had plenty of room to share.”

“That really was very nice of you, Bradley,” Dirk told him.

The apprentice threw up his hands. “I d-d-didn’t⁠—”

“Ooo! I love that headscarf,” Dirk exclaimed.

Millie tossed the silken tails over her shoulders. “It’s all the rage with pirates, I’m told.”

Bradley rolled his eyes, a gesture that was slowly manifesting a headache from its frequency.

“And look at that compass!”

Millie tossed it up to him to get a closer look, and Dirk adjusted his altitude to angle the compass into one of the gentle shafts of sunlight filtering in from the shuttered windows. Like the little hoarder dragon he wanted to be, he withdrew a jeweler’s loupe from his satchel to determine the quality of treasure in his paw.

“Hmm,” he mused, “maybe I should dabble in antiques, too. They’re far more fascinating than copper pennies and unpolished gemstones. What else did you find?”

Millie rocked forward to touch a brass letter opener shaped like the triangular sword popular in the Italian court, the cinquedea. “I found this hidden beneath a lovely nightgown. Do you think maidens used to live here, and if so, were any in arranged marriages and nervous about their wedding nights?”

She didn’t wait for a reply from the menfolk, one of whom had a hand clamped over his eyes while the other looked innocently confused. “I found another shirt, this glorious cloak of black velvet, an opal ring that’s much too big for my ring finger but I think it’ll fit on my thumb, a book of poetry, some socks, and”—she plucked up a pair of black leather boots (mercifully) from the floor—these gorgeous boots!”