Finding Ever After

by Pepper Basham

  A faint trail of stars made themselves known just above the tree line.

  “I appreciate your muse.” The woman nodded to the castle on the hill, her lips held in such a way he couldn’t tell whether she teased or found him ridiculous. “But may I make a suggestion for your next discovery?”

  He raised a brow.

  “Swimming lessons.”

  He released his held air on a laugh. “For me and Alice, I should think.” His little sister responded to his wink with a trembling grin. “She’ll be determined to learn now that she’s seen you do such a fine job of it.”

  “Be sure he follows through, Alice.” The woman’s gaze met his, almost dancing, her chin tipped to challenge his declaration. Yes, she was definitely a fairy. “I shouldn’t wish to have to rescue him next time.”

  Alice’s giggle gave welcome proof of her state. “He can be forgetful sometimes.”

  “My one fault, you understand.”

  Alice’s giggle increased in volume, contradicting his statement as he’d expected, and inspired the stranger’s smile to take a broader turn. Somehow, in her hesitant motion, he read a loneliness in her expression, but also, he had the strange feeling that smiles were hard-won, which made the reward even greater.

  “And you snore,” Alice added, barely getting out the words for her laughter, her dark hair curled in wet ringlets around her round face. Ah, sometimes she looked too much like their mother.

  “I snore?” The conversation worked as a wonderful distraction from almost losing her.

  She nodded, hair bouncing. “And your handwriting is atrocious.” Her lips twisted into a mock frown, imitating their stepmother.

  A quiet chuckle came from the stranger—soft, and deeper than he’d expected.

  “I see any attempts at impressing you are defeated.” He pushed the oar through the water and shrugged a shoulder. “I’m an absentminded snorer who cannot swim and has atrocious”—he exaggerated the word just like their opinionated stepmother—“handwriting.”

  “At least with the swimming lessons you can reduce the number of your many vices.” The expression on the stranger’s face remained unmoved except for the twinkle in her eyes.

  His grin, however, proved less tame, especially with such an intriguing inducement. “Excellent point.”

  Quiet settled over the conversation—weighed by the gravity, perhaps, of recent events. The oar created a gentle rhythm against the water, frogs croaked their evening song, and all fell into peaceful slumber, as if the pond wished to offer amends for almost claiming his sister. A few geese scuttled out of their path as the boat neared the shoreline.

  James chanced a look at the stranger. She stared up at the house, the merriment on her face only a few seconds before replaced with a tightness in her features. She had a delicate, soft profile, except for those pronounced cheekbones, but the hints of sharpness softened into a petite nose and gently sloping brow. She raised long, slender fingers to push back a pale, wet ringlet from her face, and a sliver of gold dangled from her arm.

  “You have a beautiful bracelet.” Alice’s voice broke into the silence. “But I’ve never seen a shoe charm before.”

  The simple chain held about a dozen charms, barely visible where they sat beneath the cuff of James’s shirt. The woman lowered her hands to her lap and ran a finger over the shoe charm, a light returning to her eyes. “It’s a very special shoe. A glass slipper.”

  A glass slipper? He peered closer, trying to make out a few more charms. A crown? A heart? Was that a castle? Certainly, she wasn’t wearing a bracelet about—

  “A glass slipper?” Alice repeated. “I’ve never heard of a slipper made of glass.”

  At this, the stranger pinned him with her golden gaze, as if ascertaining the truth before looking back up to Alice. “You’ve never heard the story of Cinderella?”

  “Our stepmother isn’t keen on filling Alice’s head with fairytales.” Jamie rubbed at the heat rising over the back of his neck, then returned to paddling. Why did he feel he should apologize? Of course, if that were the case, he’d end up apologizing more often than not, especially in regard to his highly opinionated stepmother, though her heart was in the right place…most of the time. “She has the idea that people’s minds should stick to the here and now instead of getting distracted by once upon a time.”

  “Once upon a time teaches a great deal about the here and now, as far as I can tell,” the woman rushed to the defense. “Courage, right and wrong, honesty, goodness.” Her voice became almost too soft for him to hear, but then she swung her attention back to him. “I’ve always found fairytales inspire my creativity and imagination.”

  The shoreline closed in. Was that an easel ahead? He studied her, trying to sort her out. A painter-swimmer-fairy? “I think our stepmother would frown on imagination as much as fairytales, unfortunately.”

  “Frown on imagination?” The woman’s attention shot to him. “That’s horrible. How can she understand heaven or miracles without an imagination?”

  James struggled for a reply to such a novel question. Of course, he loved the concept of imagination as much as the next fiction-loving fellow, but placing imagination in the same sentence as heaven and miracles? He’d never paired them, but the idea took surprising root to rightness. “I…I don’t believe our stepmother is worried too much by heaven, I’m afraid.”

  “Oh.” She searched his face, allowing a few seconds to pass. “What about you?”

  He allowed the question to sink into her previous admittance. There was something excellent about speaking of heaven and imagination with this unusual stranger. “I find faith and heaven both thoughts that inspire a great deal of hope, especially in times of grief or fear.” His grin tipped with the realization. “Similar to fairytales, I suppose?”

  Her smile beamed, lighting her entire face, warming him all the way through. “Only real.”

  “Yes. Exactly.” He nodded. “Imagination and hope. Excellent comrades on the journey of life.”

  “Necessary comrades.”

  “Without a doubt,” he whispered, rather lost to the moment.

  “Did Cinderella have a glass slipper?” Alice asked, her voice shaking into the conversation. James placed the paddle at his side as the boat neared shore, and turned to rub the sides of his sister’s shoulders. “Not long now, tot.”

  Her pale lips upturned with a tremble, and he tugged her into a hug. She pressed into him, likely trying to find some heat.

  He needed to get her to the house.

  “She did.” The stranger looked from Alice to James, communicating an unvoiced awareness of Alice’s need for continued distraction. “In fact, that one shoe led to her marrying a prince.”

  Alice’s large blue eyes widened as she peered around James’s shoulder to the stranger. “I’ve never heard of people falling in love over shoes.”

  “Clearly you are not considering stepmother’s vast number, Alice. She’s been romanced by footwear for years.”

  The stranger’s chuckle resurfaced just as James jumped from the boat into the shallows. The chilled water nearly took his breath as he guided the skiff to shore.

  “Perhaps.” The woman leaned close, tugging the coat more closely around Alice’s shoulders. “They were given to her by a fairy godmother.”

  Oh yes, Alice sat positively entranced. A perfect distraction. “A fairy godmother? I have a godmother, but I don’t think she’s a fairy. She’s a Republican.”

  This time the stranger gave an un-fairylike snort.

  James cleared his throat and reached for his sister. “Come, Alice. The last thing our new friend is likely interested in is our godmother’s undying affection for Teddy Roosevelt.”

  With careful steps, he kept Alice above the water line and set her feet onto dry land. Welcome dry land. He turned to the woman, who was attempting to exit the boat on her own with one lean, pale leg over the side already.

  Heat closed off his throat, but he rushed ahead. “Here,
allow me.” He offered his hand, his attention trained on her face. “I’m James, and I think you’ve already met Alice.” He gestured back toward his sister with his chin.

  The stranger hesitated, pushed another handful of wet ringlets back from her face, and placed her cold hand within his warm one, her gaze grazing his chin. “Call me Faye.”

  Faye. The name whispered through him…and did nothing to disprove his fairy theory.

  She caught him staring. He covered his embarrassment with a grin. “Faye?” He hesitated before sweeping her into his arm, her body shivered against his with a gasp. He cleared the heat from his constricted throat as he sloshed through the water to deposit her on shore. Her body remained as stiff as a He led to her to the shore. “As in fairy?”

  One golden brow angled higher. “My mother chose it.”

  “Faye,” he repeated, pairing the name with the stranger, then realized he still held her hand.

  With a chuckle, he released her cold fingers, searching the shore for anything that might belong to the woman—unless she’d merely appeared from the woods in the same spirit as her name suggested. “Do you…have dry things?” He waved toward her body.

  She pinched his shirt together, her lips twisting ever so slightly. “Yes, there, by my easel, well away from the shoreline. I hadn’t intended on an evening swim.”

  He steadied her with a hand to her back until she made it up the small bank. “You’re really doing nothing to help my conscience, Miss Faye.”

  Her eyes softened again. “You did provide your sister an excellent story to regale her friends with.”

  “Softening the blow, I see. A great quality in a friend.” He lowered himself to Alice and rubbed her shoulders again. “I have two light blankets in my saddle bags just around the bend there.” James pointed toward a crop of trees where he’d left Hercules. “Let me go and retrieve one so you’ll be sufficiently covered—”

  “Oh, that won’t be necessary. I can…” Faye looked down at her bare feet and her long fingers spread across the shirt she still wore. “Well, I suppose you want your shirt back.”

  “I have others.”

  “A whole closet full,” Alice added, much to James’s dismay.

  He shot his sister a powerless glare and then offered Faye an apologetic look. “It’s a small closet.”

  Faye’s full smile bloomed with such suddenness that James had no choice but to respond in kind.

  “I have my things here. They’re dry.”

  She stared at him, waiting…and then began unbuttoning his shirt. With a quick turn, he diverted his gaze and led Alice to Hercules. The black steed stood where James had left him, seemingly unimpressed by all the near-drowning and fairy antics. James, on the other hand, was still trying to calm the stampede in his chest. Had it all really happened? Didn’t his mother used to say that twilight was the most magical time of the day? For good or ill? Mother would have told Alice of Cinderella, if she’d still been alive.

  James pushed off the thought and turned to Alice, who leaned close. “Have you heard of magical shoes before?”

  He lifted her onto Hercules’ back. “I have. Glass slippers and dancing shoes that never wear out.”

  “And you never told me?”

  James took one of the blankets from the saddle bag and tucked it around her legs. “I used to read you fairytales when you were small.” Before father remarried.

  “I think you should start it again.”

  “I think we need to get you home.” He led Hercules and Alice back toward the shore, where Faye met them, fully dressed in a simple skirt and shirtwaist, hair still in loose ringlets around her face.

  James’s attention pulled to the canvas of a half-painted Biltmore, the watercolors so rich and earthy that he nearly reached out to touch it. “This…this is yours?”

  She knelt to gather up her clothes. “It is.”

  “It’s excellent.”

  “It’s not finished.”

  “But the skill is evident.” He turned back to her. “You’re…you’re an artist?”

  She shrugged a shoulder and pulled her hair around, her fingers working the locks into a braid. “Of sorts.”

  His gaze fell to her work as she twisted one piece through another, like a little puzzle. He stretched his fingers out at his sides, answering more to himself than her. “Well, that’s better than what I thought you were.”

  Her golden brows rose.

  “I thought you might have been a wood sprite or something, sent specifically to rescue me from my foolish decision to go out on the water.”

  “And to educate your sister about fairytales, it seems.”

  Alice giggled from atop the horse. “I do so want to hear the story of Cinderella and her glass slipper. If I come back here, will you tell it to me?”

  “Alice.” James patted his sister’s knee, but he wouldn’t mind getting another opportunity to see Faye either.

  Faye’s gaze lifted to his, a glimmer of mischief curling the right corner of her lips. “I wouldn’t want to go against the wishes of anyone’s stepmother. I’ve heard how stepmothers can be.”

  “She’s not the sort to go locking innocent girls into towers or offering poisonous apples.”

  “Poisonous apples?” Alice squeaked.

  “Clearly, I’ll have a lot of explaining to do on the way home.”

  Faye offered him his shirt. “Perhaps your brother wishes to read you the story first?”

  “Oh no, no!” James’s palm came up as he took the shirt with his other hand. “This story is meant for you to tell, Faye. After all, you have the charm bracelet, the name, and, I feel rather certain, the magic too.”

  She pulled the strap of her satchel onto her shoulder and tucked the easel under her other arm.

  “Here, allow me to help you.” James reached for her things. “You’ve done so much for us, it’s the least I can—”

  “See to your sister.” She waved his hands away and nodded toward Alice. “I know my way.” She moved away from them, down the path toward the forest.

  “Thank you for saving Alice, Faye.”

  She turned back to look at them. “I usually come to this spot on Tuesdays and Thursdays.”

  Air burst from him in a laugh. He’d see her again. “But…but it’s Saturday.”

  “The muse hit.” She grinned and took a few more steps to the forest’s edge before stopping to turn back again. “Nice to meet you, James, Alice.”

  “Goodbye, Faye,” Alice called.

  “Thank you.” James added, hand in the air as the forest and the evening wrapped Faye in darkness.

  The surroundings hummed their evening serenade.

  “Alice, I have a question.” James kept his eyes on the place where Faye had disappeared. “You…you saw Faye too, didn’t you?”

  His sister’s laugh bubbled out, unhindered by the near-trauma that had taken place. “What are you talking about?”

  “I mean the lovely lady who paints and saved your life. You saw her? Right?”

  “Of course I saw her, silly.”

  James nodded and mounted behind his sister, pulling her close into the warmth of his chest. “Good. Just making sure.”

  2

  A Broken Heart

  Stella stared out the window of her fourth story room in the servants’ quarters—a safe haven in the grand Biltmore with a clear view of the pond in the distance. She’d requested these remote surroundings when she’d first arrived, far away from the foot traffic of the house guests.

  A hiding place.

  Residual tremors still coursed through her body at the memory of the pond water’s sluggish pull against her. Of almost being lost to it.

  But for James.

  She pressed a palm to her stomach. He’d been so…so kind. Charming, even. And he’d made her laugh. She’d not laughed in a long time.

  Perhaps she shouldn’t have misled him by using her middle name, but if the rumors from Boston reached Biltmore, the fewer who knew h
er, the better.

  At least, better for her. The very idea of him seeing her in the light the Collinses cast her in tempted a wince. How could she have been fooled by them when she knew the sort of people they were? Oh, soft heart! If she’d never gone to Mr. Collins’s townhouse that day—never entered his study during what appeared to be a simple conversation about Lorraine’s upcoming European trip—she’d not have this blight on her reputation.

  How could they have done this to her! She’d never do what Mr. Collins accused her of. How could Lorraine have supported her father’s odious claims? After four years as Lorraine’s companion, how could she?

  But there was no allegiance to servants in the Collins family. It was a miracle Stella had lasted as long as she did before Mr. Collins turned his roving eyes one her.

  She shuddered from the memory and tugged at the buttons of her shirtwaist. Oh, she hoped her benefactress’s connections were able to provide evidence of Stella’s innocence soon.

  Asheville offered a fresh start away from the city, and though she’d have preferred a different reason for returning to the Blue Ridge Mountains, she was glad to be back home.

  Home? Not the same home she’d once known.

  Stella cast another glance to the pond, almost smiling at the memory of James and Alice, but then she shook the thought away. She shouldn’t have given Alice hope she’d meet them. The more she kept to herself until this catastrophe passed over, the better.

  A knock at her door turned her from the morning-lit view of the distant Blue Ridges to take in the state of her room. Papers strewn across her bed, her paints readied on her desk, a few finished illustrations drying on her dresser and the surrounding floor, even her three finished Christmas ornaments waiting in the cushions of her reading chair.

  Oh, please don’t let it be Mrs. King.

  The no-nonsense housekeeper of Biltmore had already given Stella enough disapproving looks for one week, especially when she’d noted the abundance of paints in Stella’s possession.