Hidden Charm

by Kristine Grayson

  She braced herself, thinking he would ask her to lower her plaited hair. But she would refuse. No ladder, not for him. Not for them. She didn’t want him to touch her hair.

  She didn’t want him to die.

  To her surprise, he didn’t say a word. Instead, he reached up, touched some of the stones, and then wrapped his hands around them. Slowly, carefully, he started to climb.

  Her breath caught in her throat. She had no idea people could climb stone towers. She hadn’t really thought about climbing at all.

  But the night she met him, Sonny had climbed that tree, and hidden in its branches. He had said the tree was tall, even though it wasn’t as tall as the tower, because she was looking down at the tree.

  He moved slowly, and purposely. He would find fingerholds and test them before moving any other part of his body. His feet would do the same, his toes clinging to the wall as if they were fingers.

  What would he do when he got here? Would he make her climb down?

  She couldn’t climb like that. She didn’t have clothes like his. Hers were all skirt and material (another of her few pleasures, making her clothes voluminous and pretty). Her toes were short and stubby and she only saw them when she had to change her socks, because the floor was cold up here.

  And she had never climbed anything in her life.

  She leaned against the window and surveyed her room. She had nothing to help him. She thought of tying a blanket off on one of the posts, and then pulling him up, but even if she had the strength, what if she whacked him with the blanket accidentally, destroying his balance? What if she made him fall?

  A small gurgle escaped her, a gurgle that sounded suspiciously like a sob. He was going to die coming to rescue her.

  He had practiced for six months, but she hadn’t. And she would weigh him down.

  Literally.

  Still, because she needed something to do rather than obsessively check his progress out that window, she spread a thin blanket on her bed, and put a few favorite shirts, a pair of pants an attendant had smuggled to her, and another skirt inside. She added a shift, and several pairs of warm socks, then she folded the blanket and tied it on the ends, so that she could carry it if need be.

  She had no idea how to attach any of it to her back.

  Then she peered out the window again, and was startled to see the crown of Sonny’s head within touching distance.

  “You want me to help you up?” she asked.

  “No, thank you,” he said as formally as if she had offered him dinner.

  He levered himself upward even more, his right hand grabbing the edge of the window sill. An ice-cold breeze accompanied him, but he didn’t look cold.

  His left hand joined the right, and, with a grunt, he pulled himself onto the long, wide sill.

  He flopped, half on it and half off, the odd pack on his back a little sideways. The sword glimmered with a light of its own. The hilt nearly hit the stone to his right.

  “Now, I can use some help,” he said.

  She grabbed his upper arms—the first place she ever touched him (anyone!)—braced her knees against the wall, and pulled.

  For a moment he didn’t budge, and she had the mental image of both of them sliding forward, and then tumbling out that window, falling, falling, falling like the poor attendant had.

  Then he seemed to shake loose, and she tumbled backwards, landing on the hard floor. Sonny landed on top of her.

  He was bigger than she expected. Heavier too. He had long limbs and a smooth nose and skin that was much browner than any she had ever seen. His eyes were brown too. They met hers, then crinkled into a smile.

  He kissed her forehead, then wrapped his arms around her and rolled to the side.

  He squeezed her so hard, the air nearly left her body.

  Then he let go, and stood, quickly, easily, extending a hand to help her up.

  She felt bruised on her backside, but okay everywhere else. No one had ever held her like that, although she had read about it in books.

  She put her hand in his. He helped her to her feet, and hugged her again.

  “I’ve wanted to do that for a long, long time,” he said.

  She put her arms around him. Hugs were nice. Comforting. Weirdly calming.

  She had had no idea.

  Finally, he stood back. “Well,” he said, “say good-bye to this room. You’re about to have an adventure.”

  “I can’t climb down,” she said.

  “You’re not going to.” He scanned the room. “Your whole life in this place?”

  She nodded. They had discussed that a million times.

  “And never outside that door,” he said, as if confirming the rest of what she had told him.

  She nodded again.

  “But there is a circular staircase,” he said that more to himself than to her, as he looked at the solid door. Then he grinned at her again.

  She had known his grin had power, but she had never seen it up close. He said he was one of the Charmings, whatever that was, and it helped a lot.

  “We can use that,” he said, and for a moment, she thought he meant they could use his Charming moniker. Then his grin widened. He must have seen her confusion. “The stairs. I’ll be above whoever comes up. Oh, I’m ready for this.”

  He unhooked the pack from his back, and removed the sword. It glowed when he touched it. Then he grabbed something that looked like a large metal plate, and attached it to his chest. He pulled some metallic ringed sleeves up his arms, then held the pack open.

  “Put your stuff in there,” he said. “You’re going to have to wear the pack on the way down.”

  Down. Down the stairs, and outside.

  “Then what?” she asked.

  “Then what what?” he asked in return.

  “After we get out?” she asked, realizing he hadn’t heard the thoughts in her head. (Of course, he hadn’t heard the thoughts in her head. Magic didn’t work that way, not that she had any magic anyway. If she’d had magic, she could have spelled her way out of this prison long ago.)

  “We ride into the sunset, sweetheart,” he said, with some joy in his voice.

  Her stomach clenched. “It’ll take all night and all day to get out of here?”

  The sun had just set, after all.

  His eyebrows went up, and his smile changed to something a little more amused. She had had no idea how mobile his face was. She had only seen it from a distance.

  And yet it felt so familiar. He felt so familiar.

  “That was just an expression, Zel,” he said.

  “Oh,” she said. There was so much she didn’t know. So much she could learn. If she could get out with him. Somehow.

  She put her tied blanket into the pack. She was about to pick it up and put it on her back, the way he had, when he put one hand on his hip. “You got something thinner to wear?”

  “What?” she asked.

  “That dress, that skirt. So much volume. It would be easier if you wore less.”

  She nodded. She should have thought of that. She actually had thought of that, but she had packed the pants. But she didn’t need the overskirt and the second overskirt and the third.

  She started to shuck off the top overskirt, then frowned at him. “Am I supposed to ask you to look away?”

  “Oh, probably,” he said, “but we’re about to escape from a tower in an evil witch’s lair. I think me seeing your legs is not one of the most important things that’s going to happen tonight.”

  He probably wasn’t going to see her legs anyway, because she needed at least one of the skirts.

  She shimmied out of the first overskirt and kicked it aside, then started on the second.

  “How many of those—?” He shook his head. “Never mind. Let me check out the door.”

  “It’s locked from the outside,” she said.

  “I know,” he said. “And probably has a metal or wood beam across it too.”

  He didn’t seem upset about that or surpri
sed by any of it.

  “You just get ready. And put on thick shoes that don’t hurt your feet. You’ll probably be wearing them for days.”

  She only had a few pairs of shoes, and none of them were thick. So the ones she had on would do.

  He walked to the door, put his hands around the edges, then reached into a pocket on the side of his tight pants. He pulled out something that looked like a thin wedge of paper, only it flared golden.

  And as it did, bright purple cobwebs appeared. They covered the door as if they were crocheted there.

  Zel let out an involuntary eep of surprise. She rarely touched that door, but others did, and ick—if there were cobwebs like that, what kind of spiders had she been living with?

  “What’s that?” she asked, holding onto the waist of the third skirt, which was almost to her knees.

  “Wards,” he said. “Magical protection. These are from your—that woman who imprisoned you.”

  He sounded serious now. He turned, started to ask something else, then said a word she had never heard before. Some kind of curse word, though, from the emphasis he had put on it.

  “You have them in your hair too,” he said.

  Her breath caught. No wonder cutting her hair drew Aite.

  “You have to go,” Zel said. “Back down the window, and the side of the building. If you touch any of that, she’ll show up, and she’ll kill you.”

  “I know,” he said, his voice calmer than it had been a moment before. “I figured we’d find something like that. It’s okay. I’m prepared. I’ve been practicing ward-disablement too. I just hadn’t expected to see any in your hair.”

  She twisted, trying to see the plaits. She did see the purple, now that she was looking for it.

  “Do you think it’s on the rest of me?” she asked.

  “You’ll have to look,” he said, and then turned his attention back to the door.

  She was going to have to take off all her clothes. She didn’t want to, but she was going to have to.

  She pulled off the shirt, removed the shift underneath it, and looked, lifting her final skirt, peering everywhere, seeing nothing.

  “It’s just the hair,” she said, and added, “on my head. You want to look?”

  “I trust you,” he said, still working his way around that door. He seemed preoccupied, as if he was trying to figure something out.

  She left off the shift, pulled on a heavier shirt, added one thick old skirt, and some stockings. Then she put on her favorite shoes, and finally grabbed his pack.

  Somehow he had turned around just as she did that last.

  “Don’t put it on until we remove the wards,” he said. “Just in case.”

  He reached toward her hair, and her mouth went dry.

  She said, “If you touch it—”

  “I know. But,” he said, “Rapunzel, my dear friend, you are going to have to let down your hair.”

  Chapter 3

  Zel made him step back, then slowly pulled all of the pins that held her mass of hair in place. Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pins, which she put in their glass bowl, followed by long lengths of purple ribbon, and bands and ties and everything she had used for years to keep her hair under control.

  She hated pulling it down. It filled half the room, and she had to be careful to keep it away from the fireplace. Her hair moved on its own, as if it were alive, and she hated that.

  But her neck felt better, and the vague headache she always had from the weight of her hair left like it always did when she brought her hair down.

  Her hair was weirdly purple, something she had never seen before. It had always been a whitish blond before. Her hair rippled like water in that faraway river, and the purple seemed to grow.

  Tendrils of her hair reached toward Sonny. He stepped back.

  “Guess we better start,” he said, setting his sword against the wall and climbing on a nearby chair.

  He didn’t ask her if she could control the hair, not like some of the attendants had or even like Aite had the few times she had seen it down.

  Which meant—what? That Aite wasn’t in control of Zel’s hair? Because if Aite had controlled it, if she had magicked it to follow her bidding, she wouldn’t have to ward it, right?

  Sonny held a packet of herbs in his hand. “You might want to close your eyes,” he said, “because I don’t know what’ll happen if some of this stuff blows into them.”

  Her hair was gathering around the base of his chair, as if it was contemplating reaching for him.

  “Just do what you’re going to do,” she said. She kept her eyes open, thinking about her hair, mentally asking it to pull away from him. One strand reached upwards, then retreated.

  All of her hair retreated and fell about the back part of the room, as far from Sonny as possible.

  Zel frowned. She had control of her hair? How had she not known that? Had Aite deliberately kept her from figuring it out? Or had Zel been so frightened of her own fast-growing hair that she wouldn’t let herself think about it?

  Sonny tossed the herbs at Zel’s hair, muttering some words she didn’t recognize. The herbs flared white, and floated toward the purple laced through the strands of her hair.

  Wherever the white touched, the purple turned gray, and then it dissolved. The gray streamed through the purple in her hair, a contagion, like the dead branches growing in the trees below. Only that gray contagion moved so much faster than the brown moved through the trees.

  Everywhere the gray fell off, the strands of Zel’s hair rose and shook, as if happy to get that stuff off.

  And her head felt lighter. Her hair didn’t weigh as much.

  “Turn around,” Sonny said. “Let me get the back.”

  She turned and her hair flowed with her, like skirts usually did. Her hair never flowed, not like that. Her hair had always lumped along, as if it was made of extra heavy wool.

  But not now. Now it was light and pretty and gleaming.

  “Okay,” Sonny said. “Turn one last time. Slowly.”

  She did. Her hair was so bright that it lit the entire room.

  “Wow,” Sonny said. The brightness illuminated his face, making him shine. “Wow. She really kept you under control.”

  Zel felt stunned. And terrified.

  “Will she know that the wards are gone?” Zel asked.

  “I don’t know,” Sonny said. “This isn’t my magic. I got trained in it, but I don’t know how it works. So we better move fast.”

  “Okay,” Zel said. “I’ll put my hair back up.”

  That always took a lot of time, but even as she spoke the words, her hair started plaiting itself. Then it rose around her in tiny braids. The braids wound around each other and then quickly created a bun on the top of her head.

  She couldn’t see that, but she could feel it, and it didn’t feel heavy at all. All those pins, all those ribbons, all those tools—they weren’t necessary. Her hair did this all on its own.

  She almost said something to Sonny, but then she realized that he wasn’t looking at all. He was muttering and throwing more herbs at the purple wards on the door.

  She grabbed the pack and slung it on her back, without asking him, because she didn’t want to interrupt him.

  The wards were turning gray and falling off. When they hit the floor, they dissolved completely. Zel moved toward the door.

  Sonny looked over at her, and smiled. “You look ready for battle.”

  Battle? She had never battled anyone in her life. But she nodded, knowing she was committed now. If she didn’t leave with him, then she was going to subject herself—and maybe him—to such punishment that neither of them would survive.

  “Let’s go,” he said. He grabbed his sword in his right hand. With his left, he pushed on the door.

  “It’s locked,” she said.

  “Figured I’d try first,” he said. “Because some people think magic is enough and—”

  The door creaked open and he glanced at her in sur
prise.

  “I didn’t think that would work,” he said.

  But it had. The door opened to reveal the only other part of the tower that Zel had ever seen. The landing at the top of the stairs.

  No one stood there, guarding the door, like Aite always said someone did. The area was empty. The only light came from the tower room. If they let the door close, they wouldn’t be able to see anything.

  “Light,” Sonny muttered, and his sword started to glow. It wasn’t a blinding light, but it banished darkness in a circle all around him. Some more magic, magic that Zel didn’t understand.

  He turned toward her.

  “You have to stay behind me,” he said, “but if someone comes up, you’ll have to move far enough back that I can easily swing my sword.”

  “Okay,” she whispered.

  Her heart was pounding. She had never done anything like this. She had never ventured outside that room. She wasn’t even sure what she would find.

  The air here smelled damp, like the stone in her window sill. Only it didn’t rain in here, so the damp had to come from something else.

  And, as she stepped outside of the tower room, a chill grew around her. She was cold, which she hadn’t expected.

  She couldn’t remember ever being cold all over.

  She was shivering, but she couldn’t tell if it was with the cold or with fear.

  The stairs curved downward into darkness. Sonny kept his back to the stone wall, going down slowly, his sword up slightly. He didn’t quite lead with it, but it was solidly in his hands, so that he could use it if he needed to.

  She wasn’t sure who he would use it on. Those attendants who did their best to care for her? Who brought her things that she knew Aite hadn’t approved of, things like flowers or a cup of cocoa or some pretty hair ribbons? Those attendants?

  She didn’t want anything to happen to them.

  The stairs curved around and around inside this part of the tower. There were no windows, just narrow darkness with stones jutting out of the wall, as if whoever had built the tower had done so haphazardly, not caring if the stones and the mortar fit together at all.

  Zel was both grateful for the jutting stones and irritated at them. Many of them were at head height, so she had to be careful not to bump into any of them. But some were a bit lower, and she could use those as handholds, bracing herself, as she carefully made her way down the stairs behind Sonny.