Cinderella Necromancer

by F. M. Boughan

  I should have realized. Since Charlotte and Victoria were some kind of unearthly creature themselves, of course the demons could not hurt them. For all I knew, my stepsisters shared in their likeness.

  And so by my actions, Victoria had remained for William’s affections, and undoubtedly Celia had used her influence and powers of persuasion on the King’s son.

  On the one I loved.

  My heart seized at the thought. I did love him, after all.

  He couldn’t marry Victoria, not today, not ever. Let him choose another woman, let him choose a princess from the most foreign land, but not her. Not my stepsister.

  “Bid her my congratulations,” I offered, for I could think of no other words to say. “And many happy returns on the day.”

  And with that, Celia swept from the room, leaving me with a broken heart, a life nearly gone, and but one choice to make … how would I stop the wedding without use of The Book?

  I took the passages down to my father’s study, trying to recall if I had seen something—anything—on his shelves that might offer a hint of protection, or perhaps a force of destruction that wouldn’t harm any but the one intended. Or, if need be, the intended and myself.

  However, when I entered the study, I took no more than three steps before being stopped by the disastrous sight before me. No longer was the room the pristine, orderly sanctum my father had treasured. No, someone had seen to that, and left no corner undefiled by their touch.

  Books and papers lay strewn about the room, collected in haphazard piles as though the one who’d taken them from their places had searched through each and every page before tossing them aside in a furious rage.

  And not only were his precious books forever destroyed, but all his trinkets and treasures from his many travels, far and wide … smashed upon the ground, thrown across the room, or simply dumped from their resting places onto the floor. Whoever had done this must have been looking for something, and I began to suspect I knew both who and what. And with Father’s implements in my possession, I had beaten her to it.

  Celia wanted to know if Father had contacted me. She needed us. She knew something of Father’s work, that much was clear—work that I now realize fell easily under the guise of a merchant’s dealings and travels—and she likely believed he had called the spirits.

  She thought he had returned and fallen out from under her spell.

  I smiled, despite the direness of all that had befallen us, for in that instant I thought of a plan. A poor, untested, and dangerous plan to be sure, but a plan nonetheless and one which relied on my task-birthed strength. With a plan came hope.

  Leaving the disaster, I retrieved the dagger I’d found in the study and strapped it to the inside of my wrist. Then I dressed in a pale, rose-colored gown—my dress, from my wardrobe—and took a cloth sack from the kitchen. In the sack, I placed three things: The Book of Conjuring, my father’s leather satchel, and my bundle of the Prince’s belongings, both coat and ring.

  Then, with much quiet and care that I might not disturb Celia’s own preparations for the wedding, I crept to the stable and saddled a horse. I would not ride a spirit horse today, not when our own were available and while Edward’s life lay forfeit. I also cannot deny that I hoped a lack of a second horse might cause some delay in Celia’s leaving, for our carriage required two to easily pull its weight.

  I rode to the palace, perhaps unthinking in exactly what I intended, but I couldn’t sit by and sweep ash from the hearth while William fell under the same spell as that which trapped my father. To that end, I would sweep ash no more after this day—not for Celia, and not for myself.

  In a way, I felt grateful for the loss of the bone key. No risk for temptation, and no longer had I to worry about demons and spirits and my own eternal soul. I resolved, from this day forward, to win the battle through my own strength.

  So I rode and rode, and in a grove of trees before reaching the palace, I hid my horse and my bundle. On foot, I did exactly what William had instructed me to do—I followed the path around the stables until I came to a large oak door, the service entrance to the kitchens.

  Guards stood on either side of the door, which must be a sorry post for a palace guard. What would one have to do to be relegated to such a dull position? Yet, seeing them there bolstered my resolve. If a king would see to the safety of those who worked in even the humblest places, how could I allow his son to come to harm when I might have the strength to prevent it?

  “I’ve come for a service post,” I told the guards, who stared straight ahead as though I didn’t exist. “I’ve heard there’s need.”

  They said nothing, but one knocked on the door with such force I feared it might fall off its hinges. Moments later, the door opened to reveal a kindly-looking woman with apple cheeks and crinkles around her eyes.

  “Eh?” She peered at the guards, and then noticed me. “Who are you?”

  I curtsied for the sake of respect, and wondered for a moment if I should have worn my tattered shift after all. The rose-colored dress would stain easily, and I would have no opportunity to change my clothes.

  “I’m here about a service post,” I repeated, “as I heard a rumor the kitchens have need.”

  Without another word, she waved me inside, pointed at a nearby stool, and thrust a paring knife and a potato in my hands. “Go on then,” she said, and wandered away.

  Bewildered, I peeled the potato. What else could I do? At least it afforded me the opportunity to survey the room, where at least twenty other women both old and young worked on one task or another. The kitchen wasn’t as large as I’d expected, but there appeared to be no wanting for space regardless.

  Still, the ladies stayed a distance away from me, taking long routes around rather than walk across my aisle. I wish I could have reassured them somehow, but I imagine they saw me as an intruder, come to take their wages when I could already afford a dress lovelier than their finest piece. I don’t know that for a fact, of course, and from William’s comment to me I am certain the palace workers are paid well for their positions, but I looked suitably ridiculous seated among the vegetables and I didn’t blame them for their whispers and stares.

  After some time, a girl of about twelve made her way across the room toward me, onions piled high in her arms. “Fancy dress you got there.”

  She dropped the onions on the counter next to me, and pulled a long knife from her soiled apron. Her limbs were thick and her face full, and her cadence reminded me of Gretel.

  Oh, Gretel. Would that I could have saved you from such a monstrous fate.

  “Yes,” I said to the girl, feeling perhaps a bit too light-hearted for the occasion. “I stole it back from someone who’d stolen it from me.”

  The girl snorted. “What, you a thief?”

  “Not exactly. It’s more like the one who took it from me was the thief, and I simply returned it to its rightful owner.”

  The girl nodded as though she understood completely. “An’ so when I take this potato home in my pocket t’feed me sisters, it ain’t stealin’ either ’cause them royals already stole me money in taxes!”

  Although I doubted very much a young girl like her had yet paid a cent of tax, several women nearby erupted in laughter, and with it the mood lightened. Finally, I felt I could ask what I’d come here to learn.

  “Is it true, then, that the Prince is to be married this evening?”

  I held my breath.

  The woman who had allowed me into the kitchen and given me the paring knife slapped my shoulder. “If he weren’t, you’d still be outside the door. We have need of many hands today to prepare for the wedding feast, and the more help the better, no questions asked. I’ll pay you a fair wage for the day, don’t you worry.”

  I hadn’t considered wages, but at least it would give me a paltry sum to present to the doctor as a lean against his care for Edward. “They certainly didn’t give you much time to prepare.”

&
nbsp; “No, but it ain’t just the wedding that’s bringing a hurry.” She scooped up a handful of flour and tossed it into a wooden bowl. “I heard there’s more to it.”

  “I told ya that,” said the younger girl. “They be settin’ a trap to stop them terrors for good.”

  My focus snapped away from the potato. “What? Stop the terrors? How?”

  The girl threw an onion peel in my direction, though it floated rather than flew through the air and landed only a step from where she’d tossed it. “They find some kinda demon-bringin’ stone after everybody ran away. They gonna catch him tonight.”

  My heart beat faster in my chest. “Catch who? What kind of stone?”

  Rolling her eyes at me, the girl learned from her mistake and tossed a whole slice of onion that landed on the hem of my dress.

  “Watch yourself, we need all we have,” someone scolded.

  “Aww, shove it!” said the girl. “Why you so curious? Fancy ladies ain’t supposed to care about them things. It’s that one who caused the terrors they’re gonna catch.”

  “But who?”

  She shrugged. “I ain’t seen him. But they’re sure convinced he’ll be at the wedding, after what happened last night.”

  I leaned forward too far on my stool, and it wobbled. “How do you know this? Who told you?”

  She snorted again and tapped the side of her dirt-encrusted forehead. “People talk around me. Don’t think I listen.”

  I laughed at that, for recently I had come to know what it meant to be taken for weak and slow.

  “An’ what’s more,” she added, “the messenger boy, he likes me, so I give him tarts for kisses.”

  My employer sighed and tossed a grimy cheese cloth at the girl. “Ain’t that the truth.”

  “I ain’t finished, y’old hag.”

  The two smiled at each other, and the tenderness which they shared brought back to mind the vision of my mother. My throat closed and I swallowed hard, bidding the memory to leave me be. I couldn’t be distracted in this moment, for a suspicion nagged at my thoughts. What else could they have found but the lost bone key? Of course, it could do no more good than to open The Book, but they didn’t know that.

  And I no longer needed it, so it meant time wasted to think on it further. I had other, more pressing matters to ponder.

  “Please, go ahead,” I told the girl.

  “I said, the messenger boy, he said he delivered a message t’day, straight from the border—”

  “The border! That’s a long way off,” I mumbled, for I was more distracted by the thought of how I might slip into the chapel unnoticed … and how I might end this day’s kitchen tasks without a gown so stained I’d be thrown out in an instant.

  “—saw the man they suspected fer them terrors all along,” she said as I glanced up, slipping out of thought.

  My little paring knife froze against the potato’s skin. “Excuse me, what do you mean? Did you say something about a man?”

  “Yep.” She grinned like a mouse with a piece of cheese. “They say he be headin’ back to town, and they gonna trap him good at the wedding.”

  The knife and potato fell from my hands.

  I knew who that man was, and I didn’t doubt it for an instant. If they had found the bone key and suspected someone, who else could it be? Who else might return from far off and be suspected, if not someone under suspicion already? Someone who, perhaps, might have had to leave town to protect his family.

  The man who returned, who they plotted to trap, was my father.

  35

  The Wedding

  I finished out my tasks in the kitchen, for the work came easily to me now and I had offered my services for the day. It would have been an injustice to leave them shorthanded after their generosity in allowing me there. Truly, I admired those women who worked their fingers to the bone and would never see the inside of a fancy ballroom or receive an invitation to a royal wedding—but who still seemed content and proud of their hard work, all the same.

  Of course, I didn’t have an invitation to a royal wedding either, and so while in the kitchens I had bided my time in hoping for some revelation of how I might enter the palace chapel without being turned away or worse, arrested.

  What I needed was the bold Aleidis of the nights prior. Surely she wouldn’t be denied entrance, but that would require use of The Book, which I could not use without the key. Nor would I, even if I had it.

  But neither lack of invitation nor unkempt appearance would keep me from entering the chapel to stop the wedding, not while so many lives rested in the balance. I had no doubt that the palace’s instructions were to strike down Father on sight, and who could blame them? They believed him responsible for not only disrupting last night’s festival celebrations, but for the terrors rumoured across the kingdom. How they could believe him responsible when he rode from afar to return to the kingdom this day was beyond my ken, but I doubted those in the palace knew much of the workings of spirits and conjuring. For all they knew, a conjuror could call up evil from across the seas. I couldn’t fault them for this, for even I had little understanding the truth of what I did until confirmed by the words of a letter and the assurances of a ghost.

  So if my suspicions proved correct, I decided, I would give myself in his place. I deserved the consequence. I couldn’t go unpunished for what I’d done.

  The kitchen staff, full of curiosity and gossip, believed me a lovesick girl who wished to simply sneak into the chapel and gaze adoringly upon the Prince and his blushing bride … though I doubted Victoria had ever blushed in her life.

  Before I left, they helped to wash beneath my fingernails, pinch my cheeks, and clean the spots of grime from the simple but elegant gown I wore. I didn’t look perfect, but it would have to do.

  As the sun slipped from its path across the sky and sank toward its resting place, I left the kitchens with kisses and embraces and a promise to return—though I suspect they appreciated an extra set of hands, more than anything—and made my way across the palace grounds.

  No one stopped me, for I walked as my father had taught a lady of the noble class to walk: head high, shoulders set, and striding with purpose. First, I made my way back to the horse and retrieved William’s coat and ring. The ring I placed safely in my bosom—where it would be most secure—and the coat, I folded and held in my arms.

  The palace chapel sat across the grounds from the kitchens, adjacent to the main building where I had ascended the steps for three nights prior. It rivalled the size of the Church of the Holy Paraclete, and I had often wondered whether the King’s donation to that other spired church sprung from a guilt that he might have caused God to choose only one place to inhabit on the Holy days. But then, I knew very little about theology or things of that sort, aside from the rather common tendency for kings to spend taxes where spending was perhaps undue.

  This palace chapel, to compare, had only one spire, though it reached taller and higher to heaven than I think necessary. Truly, I can’t say why they call it a chapel at all, but who am I to question the King and his wishes? The windows and doors and ornate decorations were all gilded, and in every window, a glass-pieced image of this saint or that.

  As for the outer walls of the chapel, they appeared nothing short of magnificent from near or afar. The whole of the building stood as purest white, like clouds in a clear, blue sky. The steps, inexplicably marble. I noted that once again, there were no rails to hold to for steadiness, though these steps were fewer and more easily traversed than those that had led to the palace balls.

  Guest upon guest arrived at the chapel, and though I wondered if it might fill to the brim before the bride took her first step across the threshold, the greater marvel remained in the sheer number of men and women who braved another royal event.

  Regardless of whether they attended out of curiosity, perceived obligation, or need, their fine attire—only mildly less elaborate than what most guests had wo
rn to the balls—could not disguise the strained smiles and consternation on many faces.

  At the sight, doubt did its best to worm its way into my skull, demanding that I turn from my folly, that I give up, that my plan was no plan at all and that I could not carry it through.

  Doubt made an excellent point. But what other choice did I have? I silenced these doubts and steeled my resolve, for I had to believe that by now, the doctor had arrived, taken Edward to safety, and cared for him.

  I touched the empty place around my neck and looked back toward where book and horse stayed hidden. I made another check of the ring’s safety and held William’s coat tighter in my arms. I had but one chance to gain entrance, and I could make no mistakes. With steady breaths, I drew myself up and strode with purpose toward the chapel’s wide, gilded doors.

  Within seconds, I regretted the attempt, for my plan was as flimsy as it was impetuous. Still, I couldn’t turn back, for the guards at the door had undoubtedly seen me and would wonder at the sight of a girl turning and fleeing across the palace grounds.

  No, I had to press on, and so I walked up the steps without so much as a sidelong glance from the guards. The moment my foot hit the threshold, a blue-coated gentleman with a funny low-crowned, tricorn hat appeared as if from nowhere. I felt mild disappointment that he wasn’t the same man who’d come to our—my—home with the festival announcement, but perhaps that was for the best. Undoubtedly he would have recognized me.

  He cleared his throat. “Miss? Do you have your invitation?”

  I very much doubted that formal, written invitations had been presented to anyone on such short notice.

  “Oh, I’m not a guest,” I said, rolling my eyes skyward in hopes to encourage his thinking that, of course, I belonged there. “I’m returning His Highness’s traveling coat.” I held the bundle aloft, that he might check the crest. “I was informed that His Highness might appreciate his favourite coat to wear after the formal ceremonies. For comfort’s sake, before the feast, you understand.”