At the end of the banquet, the birthday cake was brought out on a silver cart, a towering white edifice intricately carved to look exactly like the castle, on a green marzipan lawn surrounded by pink marzipan rose gardens. The royal family on the balcony were represented by chocolate figurines, and there was glass for the river, covered in choux pastry swans.

Pip remembered Granny Bennett describing making royal cakes - apparently this was the classic design for them. This time, in front of the castle was a cavalcade of white horses ridden by raven-haired ballerinas in spangled white tutus. Pip blushed to see that the gossip about he and Bernard had spread to the kitchens.

Everyone sang For He's a Jolly Good Crown Prince, Bernard blew out twenty-three pink and green candles, and then the cake was served. Even after the meringues, profiteroles, tarts, and iced cream, Pip thought it was delicious. At last the footmen took away their final round of dirty plates, for what Pip knew meant an absolute mountain of washing up, which he wasn't helping with. He fiddled with his pearls guiltily.

Princess Alice led the other ladies and Pip out of the Banqueting Hall so they could tidy up. Princess Dorothea disappeared somewhere, presumably to her own room.

Pip started walking towards one of the public bathrooms in the gallery, but Alice said, "There's no need for that, Raven. Let's just go up to my bedroom to powder our noses." She gave a meaningful look to a cluster of hovering girls that Pip took to be her ladies-in-waiting, as if telling them she wished to be alone with her guest.

"What do the men do while we're making ourselves pretty for the ball?" Pip asked Alice.

"Drink port, smoke cigarillos, and tell dirty stories," laughed Alice. "Except I'm sure Father, Bernard, and Hugo won't do the last one."

Princess Alice's bedroom turned out to be in the east tower; she and Pip were allowed through by a palace guard to climb the stairs. The bedroom was all in dainty shades of blue, and a middle-aged woman in a black dress doing embroidery looked up when they came in.

Alice spoke to her deferentially in Castilian, and the woman gave a short answer, putting away her embroidery and shooting a suspicious glance at Pip as she left. Pip thought she must be a very superior upper servant of some kind.

Pip exclaimed at the view from the window, for he could see boats lit by lanterns in the river, all the way out to the mouth of the sea.

"You're a real life princess in a tower!" he said with a giggle.

"I've given my maid the rest of the night off," said Alice, "so we'll have to take care of ourselves, if you don't mind."

"Not at all," said Pip. "I'm used to that, and I can help you if you wish."

Pip looked at himself in Alice's full length mirror, admiring the effect of the white rosebuds in his dark hair, and the way the dress made him look slender, rather than skinny. The paint on his face was more subtle than the last time, not so much changing his appearance as enhancing it – his skin smoother, his cheekbones highlighted, his eyes given more depth, his lips reddened.

He was surprised how much ... himself ... he looked. Not like a girl, and not like a boy pretending to be a girl. He looked like Pip, just dressed up for the night. After all, were there not several Pips? There was Pip who worked in a kitchen, Pip who rode horses, Pip who drew pictures, Pip who made clothes, Pip who read poetry, Pip who talked to animals.

Was not the Pip in the mirror just as much him as all the others?

His reverie was broken into by Alice, who had been tugging at her hair while sitting at her dressing table.

"Ugh, my hair keeps coming loose from this awful diamond barrette," she complained. "It's been digging into me all night."

Pip offered to redo it, but Alice said she was changing into a tiara for the ball. Pip brushed her hair, patted a little scent into it, and helped her to affix the tiara.

"Thank you so much, Raven," said Alice. "I adore your frock, by the way. It's so simple, with such clean lines, and the pearls are darling."

Pip thanked her, then said, "You look absolutely beautiful. I've always thought you were the prettiest girl I'd ever seen. Even when we were children."

"You saw me when I was small?" frowned Alice. "Where?"

"At a Spring Festival tea party at the palace," Pip said.

"I'm afraid I don't recall you," said Alice. "Which is strange, because I have a good memory for faces as a general rule."

"I've ... I've changed a lot since then," Pip stammered.

"Raven, please don't be offended at what I have to say," Alice began, as she picked up a pot of rouge. "I like you very much. You're a sweet girl, and quite unpretending. But I know my brother has a great ... has taken a great fancy to you. I'm afraid that ... you're going to hurt him."

Pip shook his head mutely, his blue eyes wide open.

"When our mother died, I became Bernard's closest confidant," Alice continued. "You may think he keeps his heart well protected, but it is covered by the thinnest of shells. Break through that brittle shell, and you would find the softest, most tender heart inside. He doesn't love easily, but when he does, he makes himself very vulnerable, and ... I am concerned for him."

"It is I who will be hurt, princess," said Pip sadly.

"If you return his feelings, then I am afraid that will be the case," said Alice worriedly. "Can you not see what you would have to become to be with my brother, what people would call you?"

"And what would they call me?" Pip asked, lifting his chin a little.

"They would call you the Crown Prince's ... woman, or harsher words," said Alice, dropping her eyes. "I know it is unfair, but for your own sake, wouldn't it be better to step away before you both become ... entangled?"

"Princess, I promise that the girl you see in front of you now will be gone by tomorrow," said Pip solemnly. "Please let Bernard and I have one night together before that happens."

"My poor Raven," said Alice kindly. "I'm sorry it has to be this way. I know people see our lives, and think we have everything we could ever desire. Indeed, we know ourselves to be greatly privileged. Yet royalty cannot always marry as it would wish."

"Are you marrying as you would wish?" Pip asked boldly.

"I'm one of the lucky ones," said Alice. "Hugo and I were formally introduced when I was twelve and he was sixteen, and there was a rapprochement between us almost from the beginning."

"And if there hadn't been?"

"Oh, Daddy would have found someone else for me, he wouldn't have forced me into anything," said Alice. "But luckily, I've grown even fonder of Hugo during our betrothal, and am very much looking forward to our wedding day next year. The only sad part will be leaving Daddy and Bernard behind, but one day I will be the Queen Consort of Spain, and must live among my people."

Pip thought that Alice was certainly getting a happy ending by marrying a handsome prince that she was fond of. The fact that it was a marriage to her cousin, arranged when she was a child, and that she would have to leave her family to live in a foreign country forever, seemed to make it rather less like a fairy tale than it at first sounded.