Free The River's Gift by Mercedes Lackey

afternoon. Her
captors allowed her to have a little rest; supper arrived, though all Ariella
could really eat was the soup and some bread.
    She
had hardly finished that when the maidservants returned carrying a vast array
of cosmetic jars. They stripped her to the skin again, directed her to lie down
on a rug in front of the fire, and went to work, rubbing creams and unguents
into her skin, unbraiding her hair again and combing perfumes through it. With
one maid for each hand and one for each foot, her nails were filed to perfect
ovals and buffed until they achieved a pearllike gloss; every trace of a
callus had been removed, and her skin was as soft as a rose-petal.
    All
this would have been very pleasant if she hadn't felt exactly like a pagan
sacrifice being prepared for the knife.
    While
the maids worked, they chattered in high, breathy voices, like the twittering
of little birds. Ariella would rather they'd been silent, for all they could talk
about was the wedding celebration of the morrow and the feast still going on
somewhere below.
    "There's
a fountain of silver that will be pouring wine for everyone," sighed one.
"I watched them setting it up—"
    "Well,
I've seen the cages of bears for baiting, and you should have heard them
roar!" The girl shivered pleasurably. "They are monstrously fierce,
and they'll make a fine showing against the dogs!"
    "Pooh,
who cares for such things when there will be dancing?" asked a third,
industriously polishing the nails of Ariella's right hand. "I've heard the
hired minstrels, and they are wonderful!"
    "Well,
I've got a surprise for you all, for I was at the feast tonight, and there's a
magician come! Lord Lyon agreed to let him work some splendid magics at the wedding
ceremony itself!" crowed the one at Ariella's left hand in triumph.
    "What?" "A magician?" "But Lord Lyon doesn't
care for magicians—" All the rest spoke at once, and the knowing one waved
them to silence.
    "He
will, I tell you, for I was there!" she declared. "He asked to be
admitted to the feast and presented himself to Lord Lyon—and oh! I swear to you
that I have never seen a handsomer man except the Lord himself! Hair as long as
my arm and so black! Face like a pagan god, with such green eyes! Dressed all
in black velvet he was, too; it was clear to see that he was not only a
magician, but a man of noble birth." She sighed, and the others twittered
to each other. "He made his compliments to the Lord, said he was from some
outlandish foreign land, and begged that he might have the honor of performing
magic for the wedding to make it the talk of the land. Lord Lyon was suspicious,
but the fellow kissed a cross and held a sword, so he wasn't one of— them —so it was all
right. Lord Lyon asked what he planned to do, and the man said that he would
give the Lord a smaller entertainment right then!"
    "Well?" "Then what?"
    The
maid laughed. "Oh, I wish you had seen it! First he made a fog rise up in
the middle of the floor, then a tree grew up through
the fog, all bare branches, but shining like gold. Then the branches suddenly
burst out in emerald leaves and rosy flowers, then the flowers turned to
scarlet fruit, then the fruit burst open to release a flock of birds all in
yellow and red and green that flew up to the ceiling and disappeared! Then the
leaves on the tree turned red and gold and fell to the floor, and the branches
of the tree shot fountains of fire, and then the whole thing vanished into thin
air!"
    Ariella
thought with an aching heart of the beautiful visions that Merod had conjured,
and wondered how anything so tawdry as the girl had described could compare to
the glimpse she'd had of the Great Ones dancing. Some
southern mountebank, likely, with cheap illusions that passed for real magic
among those who had never seen the genuine article.
    The
maids, however, were more than impressed with their fellow servant's
description and voiced their envy while speculating on what the foreign magician
might