She smiled quizzically.
“Um, well, Connie, I personally gave you a shield and even if you lost it or it doesn’t go with your outfit or something, you should have it on when outside. The palace shield won’t stop someone from attacking you out here and a lot of people are going to be here today.”
She chuckled and tried to wave him off but he shook his head and kept staring at her until she admitted that she’d left hers in her jewelry box. Slipping his own off, Tor gently put the hemp string around her neck, leaving the shield activated the whole time.
“Just, you know, tuck that in, because a piece of string really looks out of place with your clothes today. You look great by the way.” He added, realizing that, bad haircut or not, she really did. Her skin almost glowed. After a second he realized that her skin wasn’t glowing, it was the air around her. A pale green to match her dress. Ah. He wondered how she’d gotten one of those at all.
It turned out that Debbie, in an effort to make up for lost revenue probably, had taken to selling items during the last half of the King’s week festival and this one had trickled down, or floated up more like it, to her through a third party.
“I’m pretty sure it belonged to a prostitute originally, but it’s mine now. I won it playing cards with Mercy. Oh… you’re not still too angry over all that are you? I…” She clutched at her bodice, as if Tor was going to flip out over her talking to her sister.
“Nah. I’m pretty sure they didn’t do anything really. I’ve even mainly forgiven Trice. Life, no matter how long, is too short to carry grudges around. Heavy things, grudges. They wear at you. So, ready for your present?”
For some reason the Queen looked around and then wet her lips seductively.
“Hmm, do we need to be somewhere private for it?” She said meaningfully, her voice slightly purring in a way that he actually got now.
Tor swallowed.
“Um, Connie,” He whispered to her gently. “I’m… not really good with all this stuff, you know, the whole royal sleeping around thing and “the rules” and all that? But,” he said, before her face could fall too much. “But I really, honestly, like you. I even have feelings for you and stuff. You know, real ones? I’m not trying to play games with you or put you off or anything, but, well, I still don’t feel like I’m good enough for you. So, no, my present isn’t anything that we need to be alone for. Um, not this time? But, I wanted you to know that. Even if it’s incredibly improper of me to even say something like this. So, um, come with me over there? To that empty spot in the grass?”
Connie looked happy with what he’d said, for some reason.
“You do like me? I… well, I wondered for a time if you were just playing with me. You were nice and proper about it, but sometimes a little cool, given how close I thought we were getting. So, really just cultural differences? Good to know. Yes, I can’t wait to see what you’ve brought.”
She took his arm and led him gently over to the area he’d indicated. After a few seconds he started to assemble everything. He used some water from one of the ponds, which required going all the way around the palace and putting the copper bits in the water, then set the hand sized silver plate on the ground. He tapped the first sigil and waited for a second. Connie didn’t feel anything either he noticed, but her breath started steaming in the air. Smiling he hit the second sigil after everything had enough time to cool down enough.
White fluff started to appear over their heads and fell to the earth gently, a soft cascade of white.
“Tor… it’s snowing? My… This is, incredible!”
After a few moments Varley came over with Karina and tentatively walked into the hundred yards square of snow. Since pelting the Queen with snow balls wouldn’t be proper, especially on her birthday, the girls hit him with a half dozen. They stung too, since he wasn’t wearing a shield. Varley noticed, but Karina just ran over, carefully, and gave him a hug. The shoulder length hair in brown worked well on her.
“My birthdays in two months you know. June. Just saying.” The Princess giggled then as her sister kissed Tor warmly after turning her own shield off.
“No shields? The palace shields good enough then?” She asked succinctly.
“Heck no, I just lent mine to your mom, since she’s in a lot more danger than I am. Today you should all be covered the whole time. I know the Royal Guard is on duty, but… there’s stuff going on and I really don’t think that taking chances is a good idea right now.” There. He didn’t want to say too much, because tales of Austran spies and assassins was probably both ridiculous and wrong. While he slept it occurred to him that he probably had jumped about five points of logic to come to that conclusion about who Maria Ward was working with.
Even if she was pissed at Rolph, taking down a whole kingdom or even just the royal family seemed a bit excessive, didn’t it? Wouldn’t it be enough to just start some rumors about the heir? Like he has a small manhood or something? It wasn’t true, but it would probably annoy Rolph anyway.
The King walked over with a smile on his face, followed by two guards in black and purple. One of them was Rolph, but the other was one of the gate guards that had threatened to hurt Tor if he didn’t leave the gate area that one time. Well, Tor could let it go. He wouldn’t have wanted some stranger hanging around the front gate like that either, right?
Before the King could speak Connie gushed at him.
“Look Richard! Snow! Here in the Capital and its spring not even deep winter. I think I’ll call it the snow garden and keep it going all summer. Will that work?” She looked at Tor who smiled and shrugged.
“Yes. Kind of hard on the grass though. You can also turn it on whenever you want and here, on the plate? Size controls. This is as big as it gets, but it can go down to a twenty by twenty foot square too. Or a fifty by fifty, that way you can move it around as you wish.”
Richard laughed and slapped him on the back.
“This is most impressive Tor! I’m always amazed by what you bring to the party.”
The voice sounded genuine to Tor, even as he felt a flash of guilt having confessed even part of his feelings to the Queen. He managed to keep any strange looks from his face at least. Well, he hoped he did. Facial control wasn’t something he excelled at yet, Tor knew.
This party was far different from the others he’d been to at the palace. Held in the early part of the day, starting before luncheon even, and all outdoors. It was warm, but not that oppressive heat of the full summer yet, so people wore light clothing and carried fans, but otherwise looked comfortable enough. Most of the fans didn’t even get used, except to hide someone’s face every now and then, when they felt themselves unable to control an unwanted expression or laugh. Tor could relate. He could also relate with Rolph having called most of his mothers “high class” friends catty and a bit bitchy. They were.
Annoyingly so.
He’d made it snow on a warm spring day and held the snow on the ground without melting all over their shoes and they walked through every ten minutes complaining that it was too cold, that they weren’t dressed right for it and that Tor hadn’t presented it in a grand enough fashion for all to see. After he heard this for the third time he turned to Varley and smiled, knowing he was probably being a little sensitive and tried not to sound too pissy. Failed at it a bit too, he feared.