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Archie had no answer for that. He had just assumed she would want whatever connection she had with him to be private, but maybe that was only because he had no idea how to have any sort of relationship with a princess, let alone a public one.
She still knew he was just a miller’s son, didn’t she?
She reached for his hand, giving it another squeeze. “I’ll convince him. Just keep practicing.”
* * *
With the princess’s words in his head like a royal decree, Archie practiced Anderdolf. Archery. Anything to have Ainsley smile at him like that again, the moment she returned. He kept sending coin and rabbits to the castle, inching his way closer to earning his charter—Leo still caught far more than Archie did, but Archie was slowly learning and doing more.
But after a few weeks, Archie started up the hill toward their normal hunting spot, and the cat turned in front of him. Archie tripped over Leo’s back and fell into the dirt.
Archie scowled up at the ornery feline. “Let me guess. I’m not going the right way.”
Leo looked heavenward like the answer should have been obvious.
Archie scrambled back to his feet. Between the cat and the princess, he could barely keep up, but he was finding fewer reasons to complain. “Well, all right. I’m coming. But you didn’t have to trip me just to get me to turn around. Maybe just point your tail or something?”
The irate tabby flicked his tail in an overexaggerated way like he was trying to flag down a galloping horse. Could a cat use sarcasm? Leo definitely did.
Oh well. The truth was, Archie wasn’t sure if he would have noticed a simple tail wag, even if the cat cared to implement it. Enough of their movements had become routine that some of his old daydreams were back—though now all of them centered on a certain fiery princess who would be due home in another week. And even if he had fallen on his face a few times, he was certain he was the happiest he had ever been.
Archie continued to follow the cat until they came to the home of an older plague widow. She was out in her garden pulling weeds, and Archie had no idea what he was supposed to say to her. “Hello. I’m—”
The woman gave his fur-lined boots and cloak a quick once-over before dismissing him with her eyes. “You’re a huntsman. You’re here about the gnome in the cellar.”
A gnome in the cellar?
Oh. The bounties. Of course. Archie tried to straighten his stance and look extra competent. Things always went better when he could wear some sort of mask; this woman didn’t seem to know he was a miller’s son, and here at least, he could play a different role instead. He was a huntsman—or at least, he would be soon. He had trained for this. And, if nothing else, he had a magic cat. “Yes, ma’am. I’m here about the gnome.”
The woman spat on the ground. “Bad enough when it was just after my radishes. Now it’s in there crashing around and cutting through all my good herbs. I’ll give you half a silver crown for its corpse.”
Half a silver? Archie rarely made that in a day—no matter how much Leo caught. He tried not to look too excited. All in a day’s work. He was a huntsman. “And it’s in the cellar?”
The woman nodded and pointed him the rest of the way. “I hear it in there chittering away in its foreign devil tongue.”
Archie stepped in front of the cat, pulling open the wide cellar doors. At least he and his muscles were useful for something. Both he and the cat descended into the black, the only light coming from the open door above them. Archie could barely see a thing. But cats had night vision, right? “All right, Leo. How do we catch a gnome?”
Leo pawed at the empty wheat sack Archie had tied to his belt, the one he had been expecting to fill with rabbits or quail or other small game.
Now it seemed it would hold a gnome instead.
“Right. I’ll just stand here and hold it open for you then? And you’ll chase the gnome out?”
Leo didn’t answer him, but when the cat slinked forward—only the white patches of his back paws showing up in the dark—Archie figured he had gotten the plan right.
If nothing else, he had gotten rather good at reading the silent cat.
Archie stood in the dark for several moments. He shifted his feet. Then there was a yowl, some angry chittering, and a flurry of movement. An ugly, bearded man with a bald head shaped like an angry potato came running to hide behind Archie’s boots.
“Oy! Giant! Out of the way! It’s every gnome for itself!”
Archie started, nearly dropping the sack. “You can speak?”
“Of course I can. All our chief-gathers can. And those fae-cursed beasts are after me! I’ll never touch a radish again if you can get rid of those monsters.”
Multiple monsters? Archie could understand why a gnome might call him a “giant” and Leo a “monster,” but there was only one cat. What other monster was down here lurking in the darkness?
Archie fumbled to get the sack open again, trying to keep his arms from shaking. This was not how things were supposed to go. The gnome wasn’t supposed to be able to speak—at least not in words Archie could understand. There wasn’t supposed to be anything else in the cellar.
