“Nearby or not, you are definitely not an ordinary girl. Ordinary girls do not know how to read.” She inhaled sharply and continued. “And mathematics? You know how to do simple sums?” Rose nodded. “Beyond simple sums?”

“A bit.”

“A bit of what?”

“Geometry?”

“Isosceles triangle, perhaps?”

“Two equal sides.” Rose’s eyes had fastened on the pendant at Elizabeth’s neck, the Tudor Rose locket that held her picture with her mom and her dad inside. It made her seethe.

“An equilateral triangle?” Elizabeth asked as she angled her chin somewhat defiantly.

“All sides equal,” Rose snapped.

Elizabeth narrowed her eyes.

The princess then unleashed a battery of questions, demanding that Rose give the definition of an obtuse and a right-angle triangle. Rose answered them all correctly. Geometry was her strong point in math. She hoped the princess wouldn’t venture into algebra too deeply.

“You see, Rose Ashley, I like clever people around me, not dwarfs for amusement, or idiots like Jane the Bald.”

“Is Jane an idiot? Really? She seems in her own way very clever.” Dared she use the word “autistic”? Better not.

“Well, yes, she can read and write, but that aside, my father the king does no favors by sending such . . . such . . . humans.” It seemed to pain the princess to say the word “human,” but Rose counted it as a small victory. “And the problem with Kat Ashley as a tutor is that I have outgrown her.” Rose said nothing. “She’s proficient in Latin and French, and a smattering of Italian.”

“I’m not!”

“Of course you’re not conversant in such languages. You are a complete commoner. So much of mathematics is—dare I say—common sense. But not in the coarse, vulgar way of your class.”

Oh great, thought Rose. That’s supposed to be a compliment, I guess.

“But . . .” The princess resumed scratching her chin lightly. “You might have a gift for alchemy.”

“Alchemy! You gotta be kidding!”

The princess now tapped the middle of her chin. “Not turning spots into gold—for heaven’s sake, no! You think I want a gold pustule on my skin? Making them go away with your magic lavender potion. That is certainly a kind of alchemy.”

“Oh, you mean chemistry.”

“Chemistry? Never heard of it. Is that a branch of science?” Elizabeth paused and now scratched her ear. “I suppose that makes sense. ‘Chemistry’ must derive from the Greek word ‘khemeia,’ which means a transmutation. You changed my pustule into normal-looking skin.”

I’m a chemist, Rose thought proudly.