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on her shoulder.
    "I thought you'd be happier to see me," she said.
    "I guess I'm—" he stammered. "I'm—in shock, I suppose. We all thought you were—well, you know."
    "Dead. Yes, I know."
    "Where have you been, then? Why didn't you come back sooner?" He wanted to withdraw his hands, but she had a vise grip on them. Involuntarily, he shivered.
    "I lost my memory from the trauma of falling in
the river. But evidently I washed downstream to a little village called Granolah where I lived until I recovered my memory. They called me Angelica."
    "
Angelica?
" Ed said. He couldn't help himself. "How on earth did they come up with that one?"
    "Who asked you?" she said, turning her glare onto him. "For your information, they thought I was very sweet and kind. As indeed I am."
    Ed stifled a snort.
    "You do remember," Olympia said to him, "what the dungeon looks like, don't you?"
    "It doesn't look like that anymore," Ed said. "It's a horse that's changed its spots. Now it's a storehouse."
    "A storehouse? Storing something besides prisoners?"
    "Storing my collections. I've been living here ever since Christian and Marigold got married and moved into my crystal cave in Zandelphia, turning it into their royal residence."
    She narrowed her eyes. "Is that so? So she
did
marry him. Well, no one can say I didn't try to stop her."
    "Nobody but you wanted that wedding stopped," Ed said. "Now Marigold is Queen of Zandelphia."
    "I don't find that the slightest bit credible," Olympia said. "What does Marigold know about being a queen? The very idea is ridiculous."
    "It's actually not," Swithbert said. "She's an excellent queen."
    "You can believe I'll be checking into that. Well, there's plenty to do here at Beaurivage, I can see, before I take on anything with Marigold. But I can do that. It'll be fun."
    Not for everybody,
both Edric and Swithbert thought as they escorted Olympia into the breakfast room.

8
    While Olympia, Ed, and Swithbert were out in the great hall at the top of the stairs, Christian had sat in the breakfast room, his head in his hands. In his misery, he had missed all the dramatics of Olympia's arrival. He'd also missed the departure of Ed and King Swithbert, so he'd kept talking to them, even when they were no longer there.
    "This is the worst I ever felt in my life," he moaned. "Even worse than when I got shot with that poisoned arrow on my wedding day. Maybe that was an omen. Wedded bliss—ha! Marriage has a lot in common with having a poisoned arrow in your guts."
    Then he raised his head and saw he'd been
addressing an empty room—and he was glad. Until that morning, being married to Marigold
had
been completely like bliss, and nothing at all like being skewered by a poisoned arrow. But now he felt so awful, the only thing he could think of that would make him feel worse would be if Olympia came back. Thank goodness there was no chance of that ever happening.

    M ARIGOLD FINALLY raised her head and stopped crying, though the dogs continued to bay. Baying was fun as well as a way of sympathizing with Marigold.
    Bawling and feeling sorry for myself is no way to solve a problem,
she thought. She and Chris had both been childish and unreasonable that morning. Because that was so unlike their usual way with each other, they needed to talk about what had happened, and
now,
before the black mood that had taken them over got any stronger. She missed him too much already.
    When a thorough search of the cave-castle didn't turn him up, one of the footmen remembered seeing him cross the bridge to Beaurivage Castle. Marigold ran to the bridge with the dogs on her heels.

    A S SHE CROSSED through the bailey in Beaurivage Castle, there seemed to be an unusual amount of commotion for Market Day. The noise level was higher and the tone was more agitated. But she didn't stop long enough to overhear any of it. She had to find Christian and fix things.
    She pushed through the crowd of marketers, entered the castle, and