A Princess for Hire Book

by Lindsey Leavitt

  4. Return: And if I did figure out who owned that magic, I had to return it without Façade knowing and somehow make that sub magical again.

  To put it optimistically, I was doomed.

  But Vanna’s tenacity had inspired me to take the risk. I could get in trouble. I could lose my job. I could be sub sanitized. And that’s if Façade was feeling kind. But that meeting was the last straw. I couldn’t know what I knew and pretend that I didn’t.

  First stop was the lobby, where Meredith said Ferdinand could somehow help with my injuries. It took forever to get there with my crutches. When I finally reached the front desk, I was out of breath. “Hi, Ferdinand!” I wheezed.

  He cleared his throat. “What happened to your ankle?”

  “Just another subbing escapade. Meredith said you might be able to help with that?”

  “Yes. And if there’s anything else, you’ll need to sign in since you’re here alone.”

  “Oh, really?” Man, that’s probably why Meredith wanted me to come down here first, so I wasn’t sneaking around Façade without documentation. I scribbled my name, fudging my entry time by a few minutes. There was a space asking my reason for visiting. Somehow, sabotage didn’t seem like a good thing to write down. Then I had a genius idea, something that might just solve the next glitch in my plan. I wrote Broken manual.

  Ferdinand took the clipboard from me and glanced up. “You’ll want to head over to Central Command to get that manual fixed. Do you know where to go?”

  I scratched my head. “Um, kind of? Do you have a map of Façade?” A map that would also have directions to the sub-sanitation room hidden somewhere deep in the belly of the agency.

  “A map? So anyone could waltz in and wander anywhere they like? No maps.”

  I twirled a piece a hair around my finger, hoping Ferdinand didn’t notice my hand shaking. “Oh. Sorry. I just get lost super easy.”

  He pointed to the hallway on the right. “Go down there. Central Command is on the left. And,” he lowered his voice. “If you really need a map, Hank would be the one to ask. But I didn’t tell you that.”

  “Tell me what?” I asked innocently.

  “As far as your injury goes.” Ferdinand opened a drawer and took out a jar of loose powder. “Let me see your ankle.”

  He walked around the receptionist desk and knelt down in front of me, his knees creaking. One shake of the sheer powder and I could physically feel the swelling in my ankle leave. “Oh, my gosh,” I said.

  “Anywhere else?” he asked.

  I motioned to my knee. Another shake and I was just like the Tin Man after a few drops of oil. I dropped the crutches and tested my foot. Fine. Better than fine. Man, I was so glad Ferdinand was the one working the reception desk and not one of Lilith’s drones—they might have swapped the powder with some wart potion.

  “They make makeup that can heal injuries,” I said.

  “In the testing stages. I hear it can cause rapid hair growth, so be careful with that.”

  “Ferdinand, they have the power to heal, and they’re not using it on non-royals, too?” My voice was almost shrill.

  He gave me a stern look. “I believe that the power was just used on you, and you’re not royalty. Now, didn’t you have a manual to fix?”

  “Oh, yeah.” I took a few more hesitant steps, in shock of my newfound mobility and the fact that Façade had another trick that should be mass-produced for the greater good. They probably only used that powder on princess hangnails. “Thank you, Ferdinand. Seriously, you’re the best.”

  He gave me a grandfatherly wink and waved me away.

  I pasted a smile on my face and skipped down the hall, doing my best to look like a carefree little sub with nothing wrong but a glitched manual. Everything had worked so far. The hard stuff was ahead.

  When I got to Central Command, I stood in the doorway and watched the activity for a minute. This was the mission control of Façade. One screen monitored magical activity; another, bubble-flight radars; and computers whirred with mysterious information. Lilith once described the folks here as “technomagical,” the science geeks of Façade.

  I spotted Hank, the hipster computer boy who had first given me my manual. He grinned when he noticed me. “Desi Bascomb. You just can’t get enough of me, can you?”

  I felt heat rise in my cheeks. Hank was a few years older than me, and although I knew he was only joking around, I still didn’t quite know how to respond to guys like that. Reed was really the only boy I’d ever been able to be myself around. And Karl. Who was really Reed subbing for Karl. “Hi, Hank. I have a little problem with my manual. I know you’re the one to fix it.”

  “Sure.” Another tech person whisked past us. The room was always in such a frenzy, I wondered how they didn’t leave every day with a huge headache. Or suffer a caffeine overdose—the coffee center was used more frequently than the computers. “What’s up?”

  “Sometimes the screen just dies on me.”

  Hank took my manual and started punching buttons. “Looks fine to me.”

  “Yeah, it usually is, but it doesn’t always work. Totally random.”

  “Did you try rebooting it?”

  “No.” I smiled at him. “See, I knew it was something little. Sorry to waste your time.”

  “Time well spent.” Hank handed back the manual. I turned as if to leave, then paused like I’d just had a thought. “Hey, since I’m here, can you make sure all the updates and applications are current and stuff?”

  “You want me to trick it out?” he asked, a glimmer of mischief in his eyes.

  “Sure. I don’t know if there are updates that need to be added now that I’m Level Three. And…” I paused, my heart pounding. “Another sub told me there is some key app? And I heard there was a map for Façade? I’m always losing my way around here, and I feel stupid every time I have to ask for help.”

  Hank motioned me over to his table of computers. He tapped on his keyboard at lightning speed. “So don’t tell anyone I’m doing this, but I figure with your quick advancements, the council is in love with you anyway and just hasn’t gotten around to getting you updated.”

  “Right,” I said, trying to hide the urgency in my voice. The flashing lights and loud noise around us was not calming my nerves. And maybe I was just being paranoid, but I swear everyone kept looking at me, almost like they knew what I was planning to do.

  “Map is on there. We don’t get GPS in the building, so it can’t show you where you are, just a general overview.”

  “Good. The map will still help.” Ugh, I was sweating.

  Sweating was so not stealth! “You know, in case I ever get lost.”

  “So for the door app, you just press the key button and locate the door you’re trying to access. A green light appears, and you cover the doorknob with the manual. It should unlock. And if you have another manual there, you’re more likely to get in. They combine power.”

  “Kind of like the muting application,” I said.

  Hank looked up at me appraisingly. “You know about that app?”

  Whoops. I licked my lips.

  He stood so that we were super close. I could just see his dark blue eyes under his free the people hat. “You’re manual wasn’t busted, was it?”

  I avoided his gaze, which I learned during my Vanna training was a sure sign of deceit, but I was lying, so…“It really was, you know, random.”

  Hank laughed. “Now I see how you moved up so fast.” Something on his computer beeped. He plugged a cord from his computer into my manual, then handed it back to me. “Updated. Be smart with it.”

  “Thanks.” I tried to keep the relief out of my voice. Two obstacles down. “I’ll see you around.”

  “Yeah, stop by again,” Hank said. “Don’t be one of those snobby magical types who won’t mix with the techno geeks.”

  “Never.”

  A red light flashed on the MP meter, the radar that detected magic, and Hank hurried over to the screen. “Ta
ke care, Desi!” he called.

  See? There were a lot of cool people working at Façade. Hopefully, I didn’t do something that brought the whole agency down and made someone like Hank lose his job. I had a feeling he wouldn’t be quite as content working the Genius Bar at the Apple store.

  Once outside of Central, I pulled up the map application. Not having a GPS actually worked to my advantage—if I couldn’t see where I was, Façade might not be able to, either. At least not from a satellite. There were, of course, security cameras all over. I knew that I was going to get caught on film, so I had to figure out a believable reason for being in sub-sanitation.

  The room didn’t appear on the map, but there was a “sub-questioning” room that was far removed from anything else in the building. This had to be it. I started down the twisty maze that made up Façade. I vaguely remembered some of the hallways I walked through during my last venture here, how the decor became more sparse, with only an occasional medieval tapestry to lend any cheer. Why waste time or money on decoration when most people who made it this far didn’t remember Façade five minutes later anyway?

  And then I saw the door—white with an old-fashioned handle—and I knew I was in the right place. Although there was nothing right about what was behind that door.

  Nothing right at all.

  I was back to sweaty hands (and fingers) as I scrolled through the new manual apps, Someone could show up at any minute. When I pressed the key application button, the screen read input door. I typed in “sub-questioning” and the screen read door not recognized. I typed in “sub-sanitation” and the screen read door not recognized. I tweaked the name, thought of ten different variations, but the screen never registered. Most of these doors were electronic—this one required that old-fashioned key Meredith carried around her neck.

  Old-fashioned keys had old-fashioned locks. And locks could be picked. Just ask Vanna.

  My hair was twisted in front with a little bobby pin. I plucked the pin out of my hair and bent it straight. The lock was fairly easy to undo—just a little digging with the pin, and click! I tried the handle. The door opened to darkness.

  I didn’t step through right away. There could be a laser alarm or…motion-activated blow darts, or Genevieve. Her office was secretly hidden next door. I wadded my on a roll T-shirt into a ball, ignoring the chill in my thin tank top, and threw the shirt into the room. No sirens went off. Nothing happened. I took a hesitant step inside, and then another, closing the door behind me.

  The space was empty except for a few white lab tables on the spotless floor. I couldn’t remember which wall was magical, so I tiptoed around the perimeter of the room, tapping each wall twice. On the third wall, the white exterior rolled away, revealing rows and rows of built-in shelves holding hundreds of colorful jars. The magical storage vessels.

  Now. Which one should I take? Maybe I could find Fake McKenzie’s magic, the girl I’d watched in the Idaho beauty pageant during Level Two. She’d been a little too enthusiastic and done better in the pageant than instructed, leading to a quick memory wash in this very room. My experience as a Watcher for Fake McKenzie was the reason I’d started to doubt Façade in the first place. But I didn’t even know the girl’s first name. And the shelves were endless. So much magic.

  I analyzed the shelves more closely, and my heart sank. Each vial swirled with colors and a long label with names wrapped around the tube. Gretchen Uzuri Barbara Olga Soo Maria…Great. The magic was mixed. I couldn’t just grab a container and give one girl her magic back. Each vial held the potential of dozens.

  And not like it mattered, because each vial had a computerized security system. A code needed to be entered to remove the containers. No wonder it was so easy to get into this room—even if I knew about that hidden wall, I couldn’t touch anything there.

  My hope had been a façade, too.

  I slumped down on the ground and tucked my newly healed knee underneath me. The tears came so fast, I didn’t bother to wipe them away. I couldn’t give back magic. Why did I ever think I could? I thought I could just break down this wall and everything would be restored, like I was someone super-talented, like Vanna. I was one regular person. One person against a centuries-old institution.

  “Please tell me you aren’t having a pity party.”

  I looked up. Meredith leaned against one of the white lab tables.

  “Am I going to be in trouble?” I asked in a small, pitiful voice.

  “Not in trouble. But you most certainly are trouble. And please don’t take that as a compliment and go tattoo it on your arm or anything.” Meredith knelt down next to me, gently brushing a hair away from my face. “Are you trying to save the world again?”

  Another sob burst out of me, and I wiped away snot with the back of my hand. Having Meredith mad at me was easier than having her sympathy. Softness from her was such a rarity that I knew I must be completely hopeless if she was pulling that deep emotion out now.

  “I did the same thing, you know,” she whispered.

  “What, got snot all over yourself?”

  “No.” She handed me a tissue. “I came here.”

  I wiped my eyes. “To the sanitation room?”

  “No one ever saw me. I’ve never told anyone about my field trip.”

  My master plan seemed so optimistically foolish now. Maybe I’d been too confident, too full of myself.

  “Were you trying to…trying to…” I couldn’t say out loud what I had tried to do.

  Meredith ignored the question. “Did you know they used to bring the Watcher along when the sub hopeful was sanitized? I don’t know why—I think we were supposed to serve as witnesses. I had one hopeful that really got to me. Poor girl was on the ground, pleading for another chance. Then one makeup application and she was smiling at me like we’d never met.” She shook her head. “Her name was Caprice. She was from Florence, in Italy. She didn’t pass because she was too nice. Didn’t have an edge.”

  “She lost her power because she was nice?” I asked.

  “I think about her a lot,” Meredith continued. “She acts and waits tables in Los Angeles now. She’s a lousy actress, but she would have been a good sub. If she had the training. If she had some time. If the agency didn’t try to fit all these different-shaped pegs into their magical square holes. They sold her short, but they did value Caprice’s magic enough to remove and recycle.”

  I let out a humorless laugh. “I was hoping I could find Fake McKenzie’s magic, the girl I watched in Celeste’s beauty pageant. I wanted to see what would happen if she had magic back.”

  “That wouldn’t be good. Being here isn’t a good idea, either.” Meredith stared straight ahead. She chewed on her bottom lip, which was chapped underneath her carefully applied gloss. “The reason you came here is because you were trying to figure out the perimeters of your own magic. You thought these vials would be labeled with a specific power, and that information would help you, which would help Façade.”

  “No. I came because—”

  “You came because you wanted to be a better sub,” she said evenly.

  Oh. Okay. Meredith had just given me a much-needed alibi. So I wasn’t fired; just back to where I was when I’d first found out about this place. “Right. I want to be the best sub I can,” I said.

  There was a beat, a pause, and in that moment I had to let go of everything I’d just lost. This wasn’t the way to crack Façade, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t be done. It’d only been a few weeks since I’d even learned there was anything wrong. I’d told Vanna to take her time and finish her spy training. Maybe I needed to follow that same advice.

  “So. How did you know I was in here? Camera, satellite?”

  “Façade doesn’t film in the sub-sanitation room. They don’t want documentation of what happens in here. But I did see Ferdinand, and knew that if you were wandering around Façade, this is where you’d end up.”

  “Ferdinand! That reminds me, why didn’t you tell me about hea
ling makeup!” My voice echoed against the wall. Okay, so jumping from one hot topic to another wasn’t exactly slow-and-steady Desi. But how do these people work here knowing all this stuff?

  “It wasn’t time for you to know,” Meredith said. “That’s still in the developing stages, but healing makeup does prove that Façade is thinking about more possibilities than a stand-in for a princess birthday party, doesn’t it?”

  “Oh. I guess it does.”

  “See? There’re still plenty of wonderful things happening with this agency. And actually, I have some news for you.”

  My stomach dropped. “I’m not getting sanitized, am I?”

  “Of course not. No one knows you’re here yet. I only knew because I know you. And you have your story in place should anyone watch the security footage and ask questions about why you were roaming all over Façade.”

  “Okay.”

  Meredith rolled her eyes. “By the way, it was a royal buzzkill having to rush away from the biggest moment of my life to come find you.”

  “Sorry about that.” I wiped my eyes, trying to remove any trace of crying. “Was your first council meeting good? Are you, uh, happy?”

  Meredith flicked my question away with a wave of her hand. “This isn’t about happy. The meeting, like I said, was of special concern to you. I have some good and bad news. The good news is the agency has selected your Match.”

  “Yeah?” I knew this was a distraction, something to make me feel better about my epic magic failure, but I was still biting. I hadn’t thought much about my Match. There were only so many possibilities, being as I’d subbed for six princesses, and I definitely had a favorite in that group. If I had to wake up day in and day out as someone else, I would choose Elsa. Not because of Karl, either. Elsa was the princess I identified with the most, the girl I understood. And with understanding came empathy. And with empathy, magic. And with magic, well…I didn’t know what my magic really meant anymore. “Who is it?”