As they broke their fast the following morning, another messenger arrived in the king's livery.
He bowed low to George and said, "His most illustrious majesty King Boleslas invites you to the castle for a feast to celebrate your victory over the dragon. There, before all his court, he will give you all the honours he has promised. You will be named a lord of half the kingdom."
"We will be there," George replied.
The messenger glanced at Melitta. He seemed lost for words for a moment, then added smoothly, "Of course, a seat will be found at one of the lower tables for your squire. I will see to it." The man hurried off.
Melitta burst out laughing. "I know the light is dim in here…but did he really think I was a boy?"
George smiled fondly. "How many maidens kill dragons? I'm sure in the light of day, he could not fail to recognise your beauty." He frowned. "But you should be at my side, not at one of the lower tables. You earned this as much as I have, if not more."
"I've spent a lifetime sitting at the high table, beside the queen. While a knight may wear what he will, a lady does not sit there without a fine gown. If I sat beside you like this, I would shame you," she told him. What she didn't tell him was that she'd tasted the thoughts of everyone in town last night, and they all believed he was the hero who had slayed their dragon, and that he had somehow saved her from the beast. Changing their minds and enlightening them with the truth would be harder than slaying the beast in the first place. A task Melitta would never be equal to, she feared. Let George receive the rewards and adulation. She would share them with him soon enough. "I am content. I will attend the feast as your squire. No fine gown required. And afterward, we will keep our promises to one another."
George rose. "My first feast at court. My father would not believe it." He took a seat beside the fire. "It's a good thing I have you here to tell me how to behave, or I fear I would make some grave mistake."
"I am sure you won't," Melitta said, sinking down by the fire. "I remember my first feast. I must have been five or six. Mother and Queen…no, she was just Lady Margareta then, had gone without me, and left me in the care of two of the sisters from the priory. I screamed that I wanted to go, and because the sisters were to attend the Harvest Feast, they brought me along to the shuttered balcony where they could share the celebration apart from the revellers.
"I could scarcely sit still. All I wanted was to peer through the shutters at everyone. There was the Harvest Queen, dressed all in gold, though she was a farm girl who only got to be queen for one night. I thought she was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen, and I wanted to be her, though my mother said I was too high-born for that.
"Then Lady Margareta stood up with King Erik, who was only a prince then, but no less handsome, and joined the dance. Then I forgot the Harvest Queen and dinner and everything…all I wanted was to be a beautiful dancing lady with a prince of her own. I was a lady, the same as she, or so I thought, and that was what my future held.
"I dreamed of dancing and princes and romance for many nights after that. Oh, the dreams of a little girl. Like something out of a fairytale. Where all princes are heroic and handsome and terribly in love with the lady of their dreams."
Melitta peered into her empty cup, then tossed the dregs into the fire, where they hissed and spat.
"It wasn't until a much later feast, where I was wearing as much silk as my mother, that I realised maybe I didn't want a prince, or a husband at all."
George drank drained his cup without looking at her. "So it's not true what you told me in the forest? The real reason why you ran away from home? Because your father was going to force you to marry a prince?"
Melitta laughed so hard she nearly choked. "No, my father is dead. A saint, or so they tell me. And my mother will never force me into a marriage I do not want. She did want me to pick a husband, though."
"But you did run away."
Melitta frowned. "You make it sound like I sneaked away in the dead of night, instead of in the morning light with my mother there to say farewell. I left the life I had because it dawned on me that I wanted to be my own hero, instead of waiting for some knight to save me and fall at my feet. And tonight, I will feel like it is my first feast all over again. You will sit at the high table, and I will watch in anonymity from the lower tables. But this time, I won't envy the ladies sitting up there with you."
He bowed his head. "Very well, my lady. I find it difficult to believe that someone like you who was promised a prince could possibly choose a lowly shoemaker like me. If I were you, I would take the promised prince, for who can refuse royalty?"
Melitta just smiled. There was no point telling him that when you could see in the minds of everyone, there was very little difference between a prince and a peasant. All men had hopes and dreams and desires, and she wanted the man who shared hers, no matter what his title.
And tonight they would share…everything.