“I’m joking,” said Lavaliere with a laugh that sounded just like her mother’s. Chemise sucked in a breath of relief.
“Why don’t you sit with the servants, Cinderella?” said Dimity with a smirk. “Give them a hand with their knitting.”
Ella tensed at the nickname. The scribes had called her that because of her dad’s Cinder Stoppers, and when Dimity realized she didn’t like it, she had made sure it stuck. But working with the maids wasn’t a bad idea. It would make the time go faster than just sitting around and being useless. She went to the corner table and sat herself down.
Behind her, Dimity giggled nastily. “She’s really doing it,” she whispered, quite loudly enough to be heard.
The servants stiffened when Ella sat among them. She tried to smile at Dimity’s maid, whom she recognized from C-Prep, but the girl would give her only a polite nod.
“Where’s Tiffany?” asked Chemise. “I hope she isn’t ill.”
“I hope she is,” said Dimity. “She honestly thinks she might catch Dash for herself. It’s so pathetic. She’ll see tonight, won’t she, Lavaliere?”
“She’s on his dance card,” Lavaliere replied. “He has the fourth with her.”
“But your mother’s arranging his partners! Can’t she fix it?”
“Let her dance with him,” said Loom dispassionately. “Nothing could put him off more.”
Lavaliere laughed.
“Dash is strange now, though,” mused Dimity. “He was positively dull at breakfast yesterday. He used to be such fun.”
“Will he be quiet all the time now, do you think?” asked Chemise.
“He’ll come around,” Lavaliere replied.
Ella watched the hands of the servant sitting across from her. He picked up five small circles of cut white silk, stacked them, and used a small pair of scissors to make small slits all the way around the outside. When he was finished, he pinched one of the circles with tweezers and held it over a candle flame until the “petals” began to curl up. When all five circles were done, he artfully restacked them, gave them a twist at the bottom, and put a few stitches through the twist to keep it strong. Then he fluffed out the curled petals and inserted a sparkling pin into their middle.
“Lovely,” said Ella admiringly, and she took a stack of blue silk circles from the table.
“Please don’t trouble yourself, Miss,” said the young maid who sat beside her. The Jacquard J was embroidered into her apron. She smiled too brightly at Ella. “We’ll do the work.”
“I don’t mind helping.”
The maid’s smile became strained. “Miss, please. If the flowers aren’t perfect —”
“It’s your hide,” said Ella. “I get it. I promise I’ll make them right.”
The maid watched anxiously as Ella copied what she’d seen — little slits, curling petals, a twist and a few stitches, and finally a pretty pin.
“There,” she said, holding up the finished flower. “Does it pass?”
The maid smiled — a real smile. “It’s good, hey?” she said, nudging Dimity’s maid on the other side of her.
Dimity’s maid glanced at Ella’s handiwork and then at Ella herself. “It’s good,” she said, and she smiled a bit too.
Gratified by their acceptance, Ella buckled down to work, making one flower after another until she had the rhythm of it.
“You’re quick, Miss,” said the servant across from her. “You’ve done this before?”
Ella shrugged. “I’ve done work like it.”
“I don’t see why I can’t be on his dance card,” said Loom with a great sigh. “It’s so unfair.”
“Dash doesn’t court men,” said Paisley, who had just come in from the balcony with Garb.
“He doesn’t court you either,” said Loom. “But you get to dance with him.”
“And you get to dance with Mercer Garrick,” said Dimity. “Who is besotted with you, by the way, if you haven’t noticed.”
“I know.” Loom’s voice was sour. “He wrote me a poem.”
“You could do much worse than the son of the Exalted Nexus,” said Paisley.
“Are the Garricks actually going to show their faces tonight?” Garb demanded. “I didn’t think they’d be invited after — you know.”
“The king’s affair with Mercer’s mother?” said Paisley.
“He’s had a million affairs,” said Dimity. “What makes this one any different?”
“This one made the queen disappear,” said Garb. “Where do you think she went?”
“My father says Lilac,” said Paisley.
“My mother’s for Orange,” said Loom.
They were both wrong, Ella thought. The queen was on a ship. There was no other reason for her to have gone to the docks yesterday morning.
She fluffed the petals with her fingertips, thinking of how compassionate the queen had been to her. It was sad, really, that the king had made someone so kind feel so miserable. She wondered what she ought to do about the royal wedding ring. She certainly couldn’t keep it.
“Let’s have a wager,” said Garb, pulling out his coin purse and throwing an obscene amount of money onto the table. “Where will Queen Maud be found? Who’s in?”
All but Lavaliere and Chemise added to the pot. “I say she’s still in the Blue Kingdom somewhere. Probably Port Urbane,” said Garb. “Loom’s for Orange, Pay’s for Lilac — Dimmy, what’s your bet?”
Dimity brushed her hair for the thousandth time and pursed her lips. “Grey,” she finally said. “Hiding at the Silver Citadel.”
Loom gave another gusty sigh. “How long is this little party supposed to last?” he complained. “I need to get ready for the ball.”
“There won’t be a ball if Mother doesn’t find a band to play the first hour,” said Lavaliere. She hissed and recoiled from the jewelry maid, who was now holding an enormous emerald earring next to one of Lavaliere’s ears. “Don’t touch my face,” she said coldly. The maid skittered away, and Lavaliere sank back into her throne.
“There might not be a ball?” asked Chemise in dismay.
“Pulse said they’d play — but only for the dancing,” said Lavaliere. “They’re so famous it’s an insult to ask them to play the first hour. Someone else has to play during arrivals.”
“But your mother will think of something, won’t she?”
Lavaliere shrugged. “It’s short notice.”
This was followed by a period of silence. The quiet was punctuated only by a shrill giggle and Chemise saying, “Oh, don’t …” Ella paid no attention to whatever they were doing. She held out her tweezers to poise a silk petal over the candle flame.
Something cold and slimy oozed down the back of her neck. She yelped and dropped the petal into the fire, where it smoked, and she reached back to slap the slimy thing off, but it only slipped down into her tunic. She jumped up from the table and shook out her clothing, and the offending thing dropped to the carpet. A snail. She picked it up and looked around at her classmates, who had clearly enjoyed the entertainment. Only Chemise looked unhappy.
“A real one this time,” gasped Garb, who was laughing so hard he’d nearly given himself fits. “Better than Ubiquitous.”
“So it was you who put that acorn in my bag yesterday, then?” Ella demanded. “You burned my knitting?”
“That pile of wool?” said Garb, grinning. “Who cares, Cinderella? You want more wool, I’ll get you some.”
Ella set her jaw. She walked out onto the balcony and deposited the snail in a plant, and then she went back to the maid’s table, but she did not sit. She didn’t want to stay here for one more minute.
“I need the privy,” she whispered to the maid in the Jacquard apron. “Where is it?”
The maid led her down the corridor to the privy chamber, and Ella dawdled within it, taking as much time as possible before she put her hand to the door — and stopped.
“How dare you mention that while there are guests in this house?”
The furious
whisper was Lady Jacquard’s.
“Forgive me, my lady, but she asked me to tell you. The pain —”
Ella heard the sound of a hard slap and the sharp cry of the maid.
“Shut up,” said Lady Jacquard while the maid sniffled. “You know what happens when you forget your place in this house. You lose it.”
“My lady —”
“You’ll spend the next month on Ragg Row,” said Lady Jacquard. “On a spinning mat. And while you are there, you’ll reflect on how fortunate you are to have a position in my home.”
“Please —”
“One more word and you will lose your position permanently.”
The maid’s footsteps pounded away down the corridor. Ella grabbed up her satchel and flung open the privy door, shocking Lady Jacquard, whose face lit with rage. In an instant, however, she appeared relaxed again; she laughed ruefully and pushed back her sharp, dark fringe of hair.
“Why, Ella.” Her voice was so sugary she could have iced a cake with it. “Haven’t you ever heard that you shouldn’t startle people?”
“Sure,” said Ella quietly, staring at her. “I hear lots of things.”
Lady Jacquard kept smiling, but her eyes turned as cold as her house.
“It’s my fault she was out here,” Ella said. “I asked her where the privy was — she was only showing me. Don’t send her to your workshop.”
Lady Jacquard’s pale cheeks flushed ever so slightly, and Ella realized that she’d just insinuated that the Jacquard workshop was a bad place to be. But it was a bad place. And Lady Jacquard knew it, or she wouldn’t send her maid there as a punishment. The maid couldn’t stand up for herself — she’d lose her living if she did — but Ella had no job to lose. She was not vulnerable like that maid was, or like her mum had been. As this realization struck her, so did the certainty that she had to do something about it, then. She had to act.
“She’ll catch roop if she goes there,” she said. “Please. Don’t send her.”
“My dear.” Lady Jacquard’s smile was awful. “Jacquard is perfectly safe.”
Ella could not accept this. “There was roop in Fulcrum two years back,” she said. “There’s roop up in Coldwater now.”
“You take such an interest in the welfare of my employees.” Lady Jacquard slipped an arm around Ella’s shoulders and gave her a hard little squeeze. “How kind.”
She steered Ella back to Lavaliere’s room, and Ella reentered the chamber, nauseated. The servants glanced at her, questioning, and she felt like a traitor to them — she should have been able to do something to save that maid’s position. But what? She was wealthy now, and she lived in the city, but that didn’t give her authority here. Lady Lariat Jacquard was Director of the Garment Guild and held the highest seat in the House of Mortals, in the Essential Assembly. She was nearly level with the king. To really stop her, it would take money. Power. It would take the Charmings themselves, or the Exalted Council.
Or the fairies.
Ella went back to making silk flowers, but her mind was elsewhere. When the work party was done, she returned to the carriage with Chemise, and by the time the Shantungs’ driver stopped the horses in front of Ella’s house, she was deep in thought.
Fairies had magic. That was power. If anyone could put a stop to Lady Jacquard and her workshops, they could.
THE ball was in eight hours.
Dash willed the hands of the clock to stop progressing, but seconds ticked by, and minutes, and soon the few hours that buffered him from humiliation would be gone, and he’d be standing at the foot of the grand staircase beside his father, facing the horde of glittering Quintessentialites who wanted to look at him and dance with him.
He was sitting in the reading corner of the king’s office, which was as far as he could get from his father’s desk without throwing himself out the window. Lady Jacquard stood at the desk beside his father’s chair, reviewing the arrangements for the ball.
“I’m sure it will surpass all expectations,” the king said when she was done. “Are things in Coldwater improving?”
Lady Jacquard made an irritated noise. “Those laborers are so irresponsible,” she said. “Refusing to stay home when they’re ill. They spread disease to everyone, and now scores of them are dead and the whole shop is infected. You’d think they’d look out for their own, but no — they come to work and poison each other.”
“Your managers ought to turn the sick ones around. Send them home.”
“Believe me, I’ve told them to — but it’s difficult to know who’s ill. People hide the sickness with Ubiquitous lozenges. The magic stops the coughing. It’s madness.”
Dash only half listened. He flipped through his Crier, looking for any news about his mother. There were several columns speculating about her disappearance and her whereabouts, but none of them came close to the truth. She was still safe.
“That’s Dash’s dance card there, is it?” Lady Jacquard turned her smile upon him. “I hope you’re pleased with the arrangements,” she said, extending the card as she approached. Dash could see that it was crammed with names. He took it from her fingers without touching her and laid it on the reading table before fixing his eyes once more on his Crier.
“Are you feeling well?” Lady Jacquard asked him.
Dash glanced at his father, but the king shrugged as if to tell him that he was on his own. Lady Jacquard was already speaking again.
“You’ve been missed,” she said. “Lavaliere has been sleepless with worry. Your encounter with the witch nearly frightened her to death.”
He doubted it.
“And you know what gossip is,” Lady Jacquard went on. “Everyone has a theory about what it must be like for you now that the curse is broken.” She gave his shoulder a motherly pat that made him stiffen. “Is there anything you would like me to make known to the public before your appearance this evening? Of course, if I’m being too forward —”
“You are.”
A frost settled over the king’s office. Lady Jacquard was silent, and the flush that rose in her pale cheeks was somehow frightening.
“I mean,” said Dash, realizing at the look on his father’s face that he might have gone just a step too far. “I just —” He stammered to a halt. He’d meant what he said, and he had no idea how to cover it.
“My apologies, Your Highness,” said Lady Jacquard. She went to his father. “Your Majesty,” she said, and curtsied, but the king took her by the elbow and whispered to her.
“I see,” said Lady Jacquard. She gave Dash a look that was one part false pity, two parts real calculation, and then the king kissed her hand and she departed.
King Clement didn’t speak until Lariat’s footsteps receded.
“That was unwise,” he said, his countenance more serious and kingly than Dash was used to seeing it. “I thought you were old enough to understand that our position relies upon keeping our friends. You’ve never insulted her before — the curse wouldn’t let you, I’m sure — but now that you’re free to say what you like, I order you to hold your tongue with Lady Jacquard.”
Dash said nothing. His father advanced on him and stood before his chair.
“Answer. Now.”
“Yes, sir,” Dash muttered.
The king gave him a long, hard look, and then his serious manner vanished. He plucked Dash’s dance card from the table and swung it back and forth by its ribbon, like bait.
“Curious, son? Want to see who’s first?” He flipped the dance card over. “Chemise Shantung! Well, that ought to get the night going for you. Delightful women in that family.”
Dash tried not to listen, but his father’s voice and choice of topic were difficult to ignore.
“Paisley Pannier, Dimity Gusset … Ah, now for some fun. Your fourth partner is the fragile Miss Farthingale — still in love with you, I imagine. And number five is lovely Lavaliere.” He smiled. “Very clever, Lady Jacquard, very clever. Two dull dance partners followed by an uncomfortable
one, and then she schedules in her daughter, knowing that Lavaliere will dazzle you by comparison.”
Dash recognized his father’s insight as accurate.
“Numbers six through nine don’t have Lavaliere’s looks,” the king continued, pacing away to his desk. He thumped the dance card. “The Shantung girl is first because she’s the only one who’s equally attractive, and the first dance is always a bit stiff. This schedule is deliberately arranged to make Lavaliere the brightest star of your night.” The king looked both amused and unsettled. “That child does whatever her mother tells her. And her mother certainly wants her on the throne.”
Dash snorted.
“You don’t like her?” said his father, watching him now with narrowed eyes. “The Assembly expects the match, you know. So do your friends.”
Dash tried to picture Lavaliere in a wedding gown and found it was easy. Picturing himself beside her, however, was more difficult.
“In any case,” said King Clement, “the two of you are already together.”
Dash couldn’t deny that Lavaliere was essentially his girlfriend. Or at least it seemed like she was, because she’d positioned herself beside him at every social occasion since the curse had first seized him, and Dash had flattered her lavishly because he could not help himself. But for all their proximity, there had always been distance between them. They had barely even kissed, except when it was publicly appropriate.
Still, as irritating as it was to have the world assume he was destined to marry Lavaliere, he preferred her cool aloofness to Tiffany Farthingale’s clinging. He hoped Tiffany wouldn’t cry tonight.
“The tenth dance is Prince’s Preference,” the king said, returning his attention to the dance card. “Choose Lavaliere for that one. It will erase your little misstep with her mother just now.” He tossed the dance card onto his desk. “I think I’ll have a walk,” he said. “I’m looking forward to this evening. If your mother can have her fun, then so can I.” He raised an eyebrow at Dash. “Unless you want to tell me where she is — or just give a strong hint if you want to be virtuous. There’s still time to cancel the ball.”
Dash pretended to return his attention to the Criers.
Disenchanted: The Trials of Cinderella Page 9