A loud screeching sound cuts through the air, and Amina’s crow wings into the ballroom from the open side door. It lands on her shoulder.
“I hate that creature,” Manford says.
Amina leans toward Manford and draws my dagger from his belt. “Oh stop. He’s never done a single thing to you.”
They carry on this conversation like Constance and I aren’t standing right here.
“You stayed in the woods because you wanted to,” Constance says. “Not because you felt bad about what you’d done.”
“That’s only partially true,” Amina says, turning her attention back to Constance. “I do feel a twinge of guilt about Cinderella, but it’s nothing that can’t be stifled with a full pipe and a stiff drink.” She twists the dagger between her fingers. “I told you I was no fairy godmother, that I’d done things you couldn’t fathom. You asked me to lay down that burden. But you had no idea what that would mean.”
I can’t understand. “You knew he was killing people, and that it was how he was extending his own life?”
“Now, Sophia,” Manford says, speaking to me as if I were a child. “I have managed to keep some things to myself.”
Amina looks down at the floor. “I’ve never actually seen him do it. I didn’t want to know the details. It was better that way. The first time was—when was it?”
“When that beggar woman came to our door in the first months after you’d risen me from the ground,” says Manford. “When I realized what I could do, that I could maintain myself indefinitely, well, that was a secret worth keeping even from you, Mother.”
“You haven’t managed to keep it a secret from everyone,” Amina says. “Constance is in possession of a book that has a very interesting illustration in it.”
“Is that right?” Manford asks. “We’ll have to look into that.” He turns to Constance. “Will you give me the book willingly or must I use more … persuasive measures?”
“If you take a single step toward me, I will make you regret it,” Constance says, her voice unwavering. “Please try it. I’d very much like to kill you.”
The king’s mouth turns down, and he shakes his head. “A cozy cell might humble you. Make you change your mind.”
I think of the girl in the cell next to mine. Did Amina know about her and the others? “Have you spared a thought for anyone else?” I ask, staring at Amina. I cannot believe she has betrayed my trust this way. “Not just the people here in Lille but in the whole of Mersailles, all the lives that have been ruined because of him?” I can’t stop the tears from running down my face. “I thought you cared about me. How could you do this?”
The king laughs. “Mother, perhaps your talent for lying is better than I thought. This fool actually thinks you care for her.”
Amina draws her mouth into a straight line as she approaches me, her eyes steely. She raises Cinderella’s dagger up and gently taps the handle where the pink stone is anchored.
“Just like I saw it,” says Amina. “Forgive me.” She draws a deep breath and lunges toward me.
I raise my arms in defense, and there is a flurry of footsteps. Amina jerks forward like she’s been struck in the back. The look on her face puzzles me. It’s pain.
She pushes the handle of Cinderella’s knife into my hand and stumbles forward. The crow screeches, beating its wings as it flies up and circles over our heads. A sound, like the roar of a river, shatters the silence. The terrible noise is coming from the king.
The tip of Constance’s dagger sticks out of Amina’s chest as Constance grips the hilt behind Amina’s right shoulder, heaving, her eyes blazing. She has run Amina straight through.
Amina heaves a long, slow sigh as she collapses onto the floor.
“No!” Manford shrieks.
Amina closes her eyes as a luminous cloud engulfs Manford. A sallow light erupts from him. The pulse knocks Constance and me backward with such force it sends us flying in opposite directions. Constance tumbles through a set of double doors on the other side of the room.
Manford, still surrounded by the blinding light, staggers toward me. I scramble through the door closest to me. The bodies of several unconscious palace guards litter the hall like fallen trees. Clutching Cinderella’s dagger, gasping for air, my insides twisting around, I stand and run. Glancing behind me, I see Manford picking up his pace.
Careening through the halls, the clatter of swords and guards echoes from somewhere behind me. I find the staircase leading to the dungeon and race down. I can escape to the courtyard and circle back to get Constance.
The cells are empty now, and my heart races as I move to the end of the hallway and open the door.
A monstrous shout erupts from behind me. “Stop!”
I can run. I can go find Constance and get the hell out of here, but that’s not what I came to do. If I run now, I’ll be running forever. Amina is dead, and I hope that means that the spell she cast on Manford is broken. If there’s any chance he’ll be vulnerable now, I have to end him.
I close the door and turn to face Manford. He stands in the darkness at the far end of the tunnel. I take a step to the side. He mirrors my movements like a shadow.
“You are resourceful, if nothing else,” he says. His voice sounds different. It’s rough, and he gurgles in between breaths. “From the looks of things down here, it seems you’ve cost me quite a bit of money.”
“Only tyrants deal in the sale of human beings.” My fear has ebbed. Anger comes rushing back.
He takes two steps into the dancing light of the candles. I recoil as he moves closer. I grip Cinderella’s dagger so tightly my hand aches. Large swaths of skin have come away from the side of his neck; the white bone shines through a hole in his cheek. I stumble back. His skin, moldering and rotted, falls off in chunks as he lumbers forward.
“They are more of a commodity,” he says, his eyes glinting like the creatures that stalk the woods at night. “They fetched top dollar. I don’t expect you to understand.”
He’s a walking corpse with no stolen life holding the shell of his skin and bones together. Staggering as if his legs can’t support his weight, he catches himself and smiles as he watches the horror spread across my face, the skin peeling back from his lips.
“Now you cower at the sight of me? Where is that fire I saw in you earlier?” He’s taunting me.
“You are a monster. Cinderella knew it. She saw right through you.”
“How would you know what Cinderella thought of me?”
“You think you’re the only one who can come back from the dead?”
His face changes. Behind the decaying flesh, there is confusion. “Mother.” He shakes his head, and another chunk of his neck falls away. “So it seems she was playing both sides. I wonder whose side she was on in the end?”
He closes the gap between us in the blink of an eye, and I scream as he wraps me in a grip that is stronger than it should be. I raise my hand to stab him with the dagger, but he grasps my wrist, folding my arm and the dagger between us. The smell wafting off him hits the back of my throat. Rotted flesh and human waste. I fight to keep myself from gagging as he glowers down at me.
He releases me for a moment to run his hand over the side of my face. I slap it away as hard as I can. A piece of his index finger splinters off like a twig and lands on the floor.
“I didn’t say you could touch me,” I say.
“The spell is broken,” he says. “But make no mistake. I am taking you with me.”
He grips my face between his decaying hands, pressing his putrid mouth over mine once again. Pain erupts in my chest, and the light smolders between us. It grows brighter as I close my eyes. This is exactly what I’d seen in my vision. It’s coming to pass, and I can’t stop it. Is that what it was? Not a warning but a revelation, a glimpse of what would happen no matter what I did? I fall back into a dark, desolate place.
I’m dying. My thoughts ring out as if I’d spoken aloud. Constance’s face appears in front of me, an
d I want to tell her how much she means to me. I see Erin, her face bruised and broken, Amina’s lifeless body on the floor of the ballroom, and Luke’s skeletal frame. I hear Constance’s voice in my head pleading with me to come back to her. I don’t want to fall into the void. Suddenly bells begin to toll somewhere in the distance. It is midnight. And then, my own voice echoes in my head again, I am not ready to die.
My eyes snap open, and I see the king, his eyes closed into slits, only the bloodshot whites showing. The bells toll, loud and clear. I focus on the translucent tunnel of light between us. This has to be the channel Cinderella spoke of in her journal. It snakes down his open throat and into his chest where a white-hot ball of light sits pulsing, flickering on and off as if it is struggling to stay alight. This is what Amina’s spell has been protecting, the source of his power.
He squeezes me tighter, desperately trying to feed the light in his chest, but it’s futile. He’ll die, but I will too if I can’t find a way to stop him. I grip Cinderella’s dagger, feeling the outline of the stone in the handle. The crystal suddenly grows bright, and I’m awash in a pale pink haze that surrounds only me, severing the tunnel of light between us. I step back, still clutching the dagger, as the king falls to his knees.
The clock begins its final toll, and the enchanted dress Amina had provided melts away in a wash of silver and starlight. The soft slippers disappear from my feet, my hair hangs around my face, and I am left in the tunic and trousers Constance had given me. I am left just as I am, and after all this time, I know it is enough.
I gather myself as Manford sputters, swiping at me, and lift my arm to bring Cinderella’s dagger, my dagger, straight down into his chest, right where I imagine the light is sitting. I lean on it with all my weight and look directly into his wild, searching eyes.
“For Liv,” I say. “For Lille. For Cinderella.”
Bright, hot, and crimson like a heatless flame, the light in his chest erupts out of his mouth and engulfs the king’s entire head as he rears back, his hands clutching wildly at the air. A sound escapes his throat, the cries of a dying animal. What is left of his skin begins to shrivel and crack like burned paper. The crimson cloud dims, and the king’s body shrinks down until it resembles a human-shaped cocoon of white ash.
I feel like I’m floating, like my head is no longer sitting properly on my shoulders. I steady myself and take the torch from its holder on the wall. I plunge it into the pile of dust that had once been the king of Mersailles.
The flames render the ash weightless, and it floats on the air as the fire spreads to the wooden chair the guard had been sitting in. The flames climb up until they engulf the wooden beams running across the ceiling. The embers from the burning structure find the piles of straw in the cells and set them alight. I run up the short flight of stairs and out into the rear courtyard, panting, my vision still blurred, my heart still racing.
The girls in the other cells, the ones on the upper floor.
A rush of panic washes over me. I drag my heavy limbs through the now-abandoned courtyard to the side of the castle where the cells are hidden. The flames from the fire paint the darkened sky orange. It’s burning quickly and spreading fast.
They will burn to death if I don’t get them out.
I run to the little door I’d escaped from during the ball. My head begins to clear, and I remember I had the keys in the folds of my dress before the enchantment wore off. I frantically search my pockets and find them safely tucked away. I pull them out and fumble with the lock. None of the dozens of keys seem to fit.
Constance, where are you?
My hands are unsteady, and the sky grows brighter with each wasted second. I pause for a moment and then back up enough to get a running start. I have to knock the damn thing down.
I rush forward, shoving my shoulder into the wooden door. It breaks from the frame, and I kick it the rest of the way in. Inside the passageway, I can smell smoke, though the flames have not yet reached the hall. I bang on each of the cell doors.
“Hello! Just hang on! I’m going to get you out!”
Coughs and pleas for help ring out as a thick black haze penetrates the confines of the hallway. I’m running out of time. They are running out of time. I go to the cell next to the one I’d been held in and try each key until finally one fits, and the lock pops open. I push the door in to find a woman standing in the far corner. Her long brown hair hangs around her face, two streaks of white at her temples. She comes forward, sputtering as the smoke fills the cell. I put my arm around her waist, and we hobble out into the hallway.
“Where is the king?” she asks, searching the hall frantically.
“He’s dead,” I say. Even in the haze of smoke, I can see the astonishment in her eyes.
“You’ve done it?” she asks, tears filling her eyes. “You’ve done it!”
“You need to get out of here.” I still need to unlock the other doors, and smoke is starting to stream into the hallway. I guide her to the door, and she falls onto the snow-covered ground. I take a swallow of fresh air and duck back inside to open the other doors.
Excitement begins to mount. The king is dead, I can free his prisoners, and maybe things can be different in Lille. One by one, the girls emerge, and I rush them outside. My head swims as I approach the last door. I can no longer see the lock in my hands, so thick is the smoke. I fit the key in by feeling where the opening is, and as the last girl stumbles out, the smoke overtakes me.
I fall to the floor of the servants’ passage; a thick cloud of black smoke lies over me like a blanket. My lungs burn, and my eyes water. I can’t move, so I close my eyes. All I can think of is Constance. I see her face in the darkness as I give in to the falling, sinking feeling. Manford is dead. The people will be free, but there will be no escape for me.
37
“Get up.”
I’m floating. Drifting away. There isn’t any pain. I’m letting go.
“Sophia!”
I know that voice, but it’s so far away, and I can’t answer.
“Sophia! You open your eyes right now!”
I try, but I can’t. Then I realize they are already open, and I’m staring up at the blazing orange sky.
“Breathe,” says the voice. “Please, Sophia … please.”
Clean, crisp air fills my chest, but it only makes the pain worse. I gasp, taking in breath after breath. Someone is there. Her hair melds with the sky, and her hands clutch at my face.
Constance.
“That’s it, Sophia.”
I roll onto my side and suck in the cold air, my throat raw from the smoke. Constance leans in next to me as I cough until my ribs ache. I reach up and put my arm over her shoulder. We are far from the castle, which is ablaze on nearly every floor.
“How did I get out here?” I ask, still disoriented.
“I saw the girls coming out of the castle, and I went in to help. You were on the floor, just like the vision I had, and I thought—” Her voice catches, and she pulls me closer to her.
“You saved me,” I say. She has. And in more ways than I can count.
Thick black smoke billows out the windows. A crowd gathers. Girls from the cotillion stand in shock as more and more people arrive in carriages and on horseback. Everyone rushes around, unsure of what to do.
“Where’s the king?” someone shouts.
Constance helps me to my feet, and I scan the crowd. Even now, as the palace burns, some of the suitors hold tight to their newly won prizes. One young woman struggles in her partner’s grip as he looks around, wild-eyed. The king may be a pile of ash, but his ideas are still alive and well. I steady myself before marching through the parted crowd. I stand in front of the man and turn to the girl.
“Is this what you want?” I ask her. She stares at me, afraid.
“What do you think you’re doing, wretch?” the man yells.
“The king is dead!” I shout back, putting my face very close to his. A hush falls over the crowd, and the man
gawks at me as if I’ve struck him. Constance does a double take. This is news to her, too. “He is dead, and his disgusting laws and rules will die with him. This ends now.”
Everyone stares at me in confusion. The parents of many of the girls descend on the scene and find their daughters in the crowd. The flames crackle and snap behind me.
Much more than beams and timber are burning to the ground.
Determination swells inside me. I watch as the young woman in front of me pulls her arm from the man’s grip, scowling at him. He leans over her, and several of the other girls rush to stand in front of her. A murmur of voices ripples through the crowd.
“Cinderella’s story is a lie,” I say. “It was used to manipulate you. To make you feel as if your voice shouldn’t be heard. The king lied to us.” I pull out the journal and hold it up. “The words written here are in Cinderella’s own hand. It’s all right here.”
Constance stares at the little book. A man walks toward me, gritting his teeth and spewing obscenities. Before I can confront him, Constance steps between us. She pulls out her dagger and shoves it against his chest.
“If you dare touch her, I will end you. Is that in any way unclear?” Constance’s tone leaves no room for discussion. A young woman pushes through the crowd, sword in hand, and stands at Constance’s side. Constance seems shocked.
“Émile?” she asks.
It’s the young woman from the cell. They share wide smiles, and Émile glances back at me. “Leave it to Constance to find the girl who could bring all this to an end.”
The man backs away and disappears into the mass of bodies gathered in front of the castle. There is a shift in the crowd. Many of them have never seen a woman defend herself. This is how it will be from now on.
“Everything Sophia said is true,” Constance says. “My family is descended from Gabrielle, Cinderella’s sister, and she was not the monster the king made her out to be. None of them were. You’ve been lied to. But you have a chance to change things. Right here. Right now.”
I see fathers with tears in their eyes. “You can keep your girls from harm,” I say. “And more important, they can be allowed to keep themselves from harm. These girls don’t want to be here tonight. Look at your children, your friends, your wives, and your daughters. Don’t do what is right because they hold those titles. Do what is right because they are people. Make a choice to change things.”
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