"You never complain about Stone Soup."
"I like Stone Soup," said the cow. "Stone Soup is an honest con. We get a meal, everyone thinks they've seen a little bit of magic, you sell the stone for a little bit of pocket money, you pick up another stone at the next town. Everyone gets something."
"And if I remember right, you were the one who suggested we steal the magic beans."
"That wasn't stealing, that was a legitimate trade."
"A legitimate trade for a talking cow that disappeared by morning?"
"He didn't even lock the barn! How is that my fault?" She huffed and laid her head onto her forelimbs. The stalk of grass in her lips wobbled with her scowl. "Old fool never knew what he had."
Jack hummed. He craned forward to get a better look into the tiny, cracked glass, pulled gently at the corner of his eye and delicately dabbed the makeup brush.
"My point is," said the cow, "this all seems rather - cruel."
Jack turned. One half of his face was magnificently painted in faerie shades of blues and violets. The other half was just confused. "What on earth are you talking about?"
"For gods' sake, Jack, this is a perfectly innocent girl who you plan on humiliating in front of the royal court."
"How would she be humiliated? As far as she'll know, she'll have a lovely time at a lovely ball in a lovely ballgown."
"You don't have a lovely ballgown!"
"Well I can't afford a ballgown, now can I?!"
"So you're going to make her waltz in her fucking underclothes?!"
He took a dramatic breath. "Look," he said, brandishing the makeup brush. "If it worked on the fucking emperor, it'll work on a fucking scullery maid. If she gets told by a fairy that she's wearing a fairy dress that can only be seen by intelligent people, she is going to believe like hell that she's wearing the very image of sartorial extravaganza."
The brush was masterfully twiddled. "And when everyone else finds out that she's wearing a fairy dress that can only be seen by intelligent people, there won't be a single person in that room who would dare to disagree."
The cow shook her head. "I don't know, Jack," she sighed. "I just don't know."
"It'll be fine," Jack said, turning back to the tiny glass and bringing a deft hand again on the canvas. "Trust me. How did you do finding the slippers?"
"Couldn't find crystal," said the cow. "Best I could get were a glass set from an elf down at the cobbler's."
Jack hummed. "Well, they shouldn't be that important. Nobody will look too closely at her shoes."
There were two guards at the palace gate, slabs of meat and muscle wrapped in candybright costumes. They looked every bit as solid as the iron gate between them, and looked like the kind of guard prepared for every kind of foolishness they'd see tonight.
They weren't prepared for the woman who stepped down from the cow-drawn wagon. Her slippers gleamed amber in the torchlight, and her dress was... It was...
Well, the fey who hung over her shoulder told them that her dress was a beautiful thing, spun from the glimmer of starlight, the sound of snowfall, and the colour of the moon. He said that any discerning gentleman could tell that this was true, and the guards agreed.
Neither of them had looked too closely at the dress. In fact, they had been trying to carefully, politely and inexplicably avert their gaze.
