corson was flushed and rather unsteady on her feet when she returned to The Crown and Peacock that evening. Nyctasia was at the table, reading by candlelight. “You look like you’ve had a good time,” she observed.
Corson sat down, leaning her head on her hand. “I’m not drunk.”
“No?”
“I don’t know what’s wrong with me these days,” Corson complained, shaking her head. “One moment I feel fine, then I’m dizzy and my head aches. I must be getting the grippe. I’m going to bed.” She sounded quite sober.
“Don’t you even want some supper?”
Corson pulled off her boots and climbed into the bed, drawing the covers over her. “I’m not hungry.”
“This sounds serious,” said Nyctasia. She sat on the bed and leaned over Corson.
“You do look feverish.”
Corson’s forehead was beaded with sweat. “I’m freezing. It’s too cold in here.”
Nyctasia frowned. If anything, the room was rather too warm. She went to the table and wrote out a list of simples, then summoned a servant. “Take this to an apothecary’s immediately,” she instructed, wrapping the paper around some coins,
“and bring me a pitcher of strong red wine when you return. Hurry.”
“I know an excellent remedy for fever,” she assured Corson.
“Does it have bloodroot in it?” Corson asked, suspicious.
“No, why?”
Corson mumbled something and turned away.
When the servant returned, Nyctasia measured out small amounts of the dried herbs and mixed them in a cup of wine which she held over the fire with tongs.
“Drink this,” she ordered, bringing Corson the hot, fragrant drink.
Corson sipped at it warily. “This is good!” She swallowed it greedily and handed the empty mug back to Nyctasia. “Give me some more.”
Corson slept through the evening and late into the following morning. When the tailors arrived to do a first fitting, she felt quite well again, as hungry as ever, and excited at the prospect of her new clothes. She’d never before had clothing made for her, nor had she possessed any of such fine quality. The garments provided by her employers had generally been plain, sturdy goods, which had already seen much use.
The tailors and apprentices flattered her and called her “madame.” She was draped in new lambskin and linen which they deftly pulled into place, snipping and stitching, as they turned Corson about and fussed with the materials. She twisted and laughed under their prodding, enjoying herself thoroughly. It took half the time to fit Nyctasia.
Though she fretted about the delay all the next day, at the final fitting Nyctasia had to admit that the results were worth the wait. She had commissioned a suit of plain traveling clothes of a serviceable grey stuff, as well as an elegant outfit of black velvet with silver trimmings. She admired her reflection in the tailors’ glass as they made a few final adjustments on the soft, svelte doublet. “Quite satisfactory,” she said, smiling. She was equally at home in fine clothes or in her shabby students’ garb, but the graceful tailored black was undeniably becoming.
But it was Corson who was really transformed. Instead of a bedraggled layabout, she seemed a young noblewoman dressed for the road. In clothing cut to her measure, her naturally proud carriage and statuesque beauty were set off to the fullest advantage. She wore a close-fitting tunic of fine lambskin over a russet linen shirt, open at the throat, with the full sleeves gathered at the wrist.
Her leggings were made of a soft, dark suede.
She stretched like a cat and turned before the mirror, trying to see herself from all sides. “Do I look all right?” she asked anxiously.
Nyctasia broke into astonished laughter.
Corson’s face fell. “What’s the matter?”
“Do you look all right? Are you blind? You look like sunrise over the rippling wheat! You look like a pillar of golden flame! You look like a fountain of topaz and amber! Corson-yes, you look all right.”