"You know this boy?" the head of the guards demanded, shoving Pip forward.

"Why, yes. This is Pip Lenoir, who's been missing all night after an accident," replied Mr Smedley in surprise. "Pip, what happened to you?"

Pip hung his head, and looked ashamed.

"I'll take things from here. Thank you for bringing Pip back safely," Mr Smedley said with a note of finality. "Pip, go and wait for me outside my office, please."

Mr Smedley let Pip have a good ten minutes sitting alone and fearful before he unlocked his office door, and ushered Pip through, gesturing for him to take the chair opposite.

"Now, Pip. You were sent out of the kitchen with an injury, so what happened when you reached the sanitorium?" Mr Smedley asked, sounding businesslike but not cross.

"I never got there," Pip mumbled. "I ... I ran into a strange man, and he healed me." He held up his finger to show there was no wound or scar on it.

"Really? How did he heal you?" asked Mr Smedley sceptically.

"I think it was by magic," Pip said. "I don't know what he did – my finger was just better."

"Really, that sounds like a cock and bull story, Pip," said Mr Smedley. "But let's leave that for now. After you'd supposedly been healed, why didn't you return to the kitchen?"

"I ... I ... wanted to see the grand people at the banquet," said Pip, "and I wanted ... wanted to hear the music and see the dancing at the ball."

"So on one of the busiest nights of the year, you abandoned your post simply to go skylarking about, peeping and prying upon your betters?" said Mr Smedley angrily.

"I'm very sorry, Mr Smedley. I knew it was wrong," Pip said.

"Pip, if you were a very young boy, just arrived at the palace and eager to see royalty, I could forgive this," said Mr Smedley. "If you were ten years old, I would have given you a little scolding, and explained why what you did was wrong. But you're a grown man, you're nearly eighteen. You've been working at the palace for years, and you did this deliberately, apparently on a whim."

"I promise I'll never do it again, Mr Smedley," Pip said.

"You shan't be given the opportunity," said Mr Smedley severely. "I can't possibly have people I don't trust in the kitchen, especially ones who shirk their tasks and use deception to get out of work. I'm giving you one week's notice, and then I want you gone. And for the week that you remain here, I hope that you'll apologise to the rest of the staff for your actions, and do what you can to make it up to them."

"Thank you for giving me one week to get myself sorted, Mr Smedley," said Pip in a tired, dead voice, and then he went up to bed.

 It was already dark in the dormitory, and nobody spoke to him, pretending they were asleep. Pip lay awake for a long time, wondering if this was the start of going to a bad end, because he'd kissed Bernard without being sure he was his true love.

**********************

Pip's fellow servants made the decision to completely ignore him for the week. They were furious and disgusted with him for sneaking out on a night when there was so much work, and for such a stupid, childish reason. Innogen was only twelve, and she would never dream of trying to peek at royal guests in the palace, she knew that was very wrong. And pretending to have cut his finger to get out of the kitchen was a low act.

The only person who stuck up for him was Viviane. She insisted she had actually seen the blood pouring out of his finger, and he hadn't made that part up. She said that perhaps he had been healed by some weird fellow roaming about, and she wouldn't be a bit surprised if he'd done something to Pip's mind as well, made him act in a completely mad and moonstruck way. She said Pip had always been a good friend to them all, and they had no reason not to believe him now.

The other servants told Viviane if she didn't shut up, they'd refuse to speak to her as well. She flounced off in a huff, but did shut up about it, and didn't speak to Pip. She wasn't stupid enough to commit social suicide for someone about to leave. But if anyone complained about Pip, her mouth got a dangerously closed look, as if it had been snapped shut upon the words she wanted to say.

It was a hard and lonely time for Pip. With everyone ignoring him, he had plenty of time to brood about Bernard, and sigh over their kiss. But he had to be practical and think about what to do next. He had ten gold coins saved, enough for a room at an inn, and to buy some art supplies.

He would have to spend all day drawing and painting, and sell everything he did, just to make enough to live. He wouldn't give up – he would wash dishes and sweep floors to pay for his room, he would sell clothes pegs dollies or bunches of wildflowers on street corners to get by.

The day after Bernard's birthday party, a proclamation went out from the palace, saying that they were urgently seeking a young woman named Raven LaMidnight, believed to be a circus performer, who had disappeared in baffling circumstances. 

They were concerned for Miss LaMidnight's welfare, and asked anyone who knew her whereabouts to contact the palace, with a rich reward for anyone able to produce Raven. Gossip said that the prince had fallen in love with the girl, but lost her. It was one of the most romantic and mysterious things to happen in Camden for many a year.

Only Pip knew that there was no point looking for her, because she didn't exist. She wasn't even a girl, and the prince had set his heart upon a phantom. That's what he told himself, anyway.

**********************

Four days after the banquet, Pip was helping to clean up after breakfast when Mr Smedley came to him, looking as if he'd seen a ghost.

"Pip, there's someone in my office to see you," he said nervously. "Stop what you're doing and go there straight away. Don't keep them waiting."

Pip stared, and wondered if Zarvic had come to see him. He almost ran to Mr Smedley's office, tapped on the door, and came in when a man called to him. He stood in the doorway, unable to believe it.

It was Bernard, looking extremely tall standing behind Mr Smedley's desk with one hand behind his back. He was wearing a pair of brown corduroy trousers, an old cream knitted jersey, and riding boots. His curly brown hair looked messy and windswept, as if he'd already been out on his horse.

"Your Highness," said Pip, giving a deep bow, and closing the door behind him.

"Smedley told me your name is Pip. Is that right?" Bernard asked, idly turning over pages on the desk.

"Yes, sir. Pip Lenoir, sir," Pip said.

"Nice name. Is that the name you've always had?"

"Yes, sir. My parents called me Pip, sir."

"I believe I have something of yours, Pip," said Bernard, producing a silver shoe from behind his back . "Do you recognise this?"

"How ... how did you find me?" Pip stammered.

"It was obvious, really. The head of the guards came back and told me they had only managed to find a boy from the kitchens wandering about barefoot, and returned him to Mr Smedley, none too tenderly."

Pip gave a rueful look at the memory.

"I asked him what the boy looked like. He said of middling height, thin, long-nosed, fair-haired, pale-skinned, with large blue eyes. I thought it had to be you, and came to see Smedley this morning, asking if he had any kitchen boys of that description. He said there was only one it could be – a boy named Pip Lenoir he had just sacked for prowling around at night, with a feeble story of being healed by a strange man, and wanting to see royalty at their banquet."

"I'm sorry, sir. I'm truly sorry," said Pip, feeling as if he was about to start crying.

"Your godfather knows magic, doesn't he?" Bernard asked casually.

"Yes, sir. He gave me potions to change my appearance."

"He changed you ... into a girl?"

"No, sir. I was a boy all along, sir," Pip said. "The potion only changed my hair colour, and the clothes I was wearing."

"Have you got the other shoe?"

"Kicked it under a hydrangea bush, sir."

"The story you told me about your grandmother leaving you money, only the lawyers took it all. That was true?"

"Yes, sir," said Pip, looking straight into Bernard's eyes.

"Then Pip, I am afraid my family has wronged you terribly," said Bernard sombrely. "Because it means that our lawyers took your money, and forced you to work in the palace kitchens."

"That wasn't your fault," Pip said.

"Pip, please believe me when I say my father had no knowledge of this," Bernard said earnestly. "Father was appalled when he was told about it, and he has got rid of that law firm. The palace uses Tolpuddle and Charter now. And Father has instructed me to offer you this."

Bernard unclipped a heavy leather purse from his belt, and tossed it onto the desk. Pip looked confused, and didn't pick it up.

"It's two thousand gold coins, Pip," said Bernard. "Enough for you to buy a house, and start a business. Or you might like to travel, or study. It's up to you what you do with it."

"But it was only two hundred gold coins, sir," said Pip, still not touching it. "That's too much money."

"Think of it as compensation for the theft of your childhood, and for the suffering you endured," Bernard said.

Pip eventually picked up the purse, but he didn't open it or look at the money.

"And there's something else, Pip," Bernard said, with the face of someone determined to do the right thing, no matter how distasteful it is. "You said that you fell in love at first sight a few years ago, but the man in question went abroad the next day."

Pip looked up sharply, but only nodded.

"I will send messengers through all the kingdoms and empires, searching for this man," Bernard said, as if reciting a lesson he had learned by rote. "I will not rest until you are reunited with him, and have your chance at true love."

"There's no need to do that," Pip said at last. "Really, there isn't."

"Only tell me the man's name, Pip, and I will have the messengers sent forth immediately," Bernard insisted.

"His name? He told me his name was Rue," said Pip, and gave Bernard an impudent little smile.