Cinderella: Ninja Warrior

by Maureen McGowan

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  HOW THIS BOOK WORKS

  Section 1 - Home Not-so-sweet Home

  Section 2 - CRYSTAL CLARITY

  Section 3 - HARD WORK REWARDED

  Section 4 - UNEXPECTED ASSISTANCE

  Section 5 - FIRESTORM

  Section 6 - BALANCING ACT

  Section 7 - THE SHOE FITS

  Section 8 - FALL FROM GRACE

  Section 9 - AND SO IT ENDS

  Copyright Page

  For Bev Katz Rosenbaum, who gave me the chance, and for Catherine Grace, who’s as strong and beautiful as any fairy tale princess.

  HOW THIS BOOK WORKS

  Welcome to Cinderella: Ninja Warrior, a different sort of fairy tale that’s twisted two ways. First, it’s full of adventure, loaded with danger, heaped with action, and sprinkled with magic. Second, you get to control what happens.

  At three points during the story, you can put on Cinderella’s slippers and decide—if you were her—what you’d do next. By making these choices, you get to determine how her adventure unfolds.

  But don’t worry—there are no right or wrong decisions, just different ones. As you’ll soon discover, Cinderella’s a pretty special girl. She’s strong and smart and brave, and if she can learn how to believe in herself, she’ll figure out how to reach her happy ending, no matter what challenges you throw in her path.

  Each time you reach a decision point, you’ll be given two choices. Once you make your choice, all you need to do is flip to the next section in the story. When you reach the end of each section, there will be a guide to tell you where to go next.

  Have you figured out the best part yet? That’s right—you can read this book over and over! In total, there are eight different routes that Cinderella can take to reach the end of her adventure. Eight stories in one! Can you figure out all the possible routes?

  Enjoy!

  Section 1

  Home Not-so-sweet Home

  1

  Cinderella’s shoulders quivered with fatigue as she tipped the twenty-seventh wooden bucket of fresh water into her stepmother’s bath. The water, laced with sweet-smelling oils, sloshed up the tub’s sides, threatening to spill over the edges and onto the pristine floor that she’d have to mop again if the hot water escaped.

  She brushed stray blonde hairs off her lightly freckled face, and then crouched to stoke the fire, which crackled as it heated the tub. Stretching her aching fingers toward the warmth, she rubbed the calluses on her palms and fingers. Along with her many other chores, the countless trips from the cellar to the upstairs bathrooms to fill three tubs twice a day had taken their toll on her body.

  Cinderella had just turned eighteen, but her hands looked much older. Her real mother, one of the most powerful wizards in the kingdom, had died at her birth, and five years later her father died too, only days after he remarried. Her stepmother, also a wizard, treated Cinderella more like a servant than a daughter.

  Cinderella often wished she were a ninja warrior—no, make that a ninja and a wizard. A wizard could break her stepmother’s entrapment spells, and a ninja, well, a ninja could give her stepmother what she deserved.

  But hard work and determination carried more power than if-onlys and wishes. Her stepmother’s magic was powerful, and it seemed as if she’d thought of everything to keep Cinderella trapped. That was no excuse for Cinderella to sit back and do nothing, though. It was better to practice the few innate magic skills she had inherited from her mother, and to develop her self-taught ninja training. Sometimes the best offense was a good defense.

  Enough of this whining, thought Cinderella. There would be no time for training if she lazed about staring at the fire and daydreaming. If captured, real ninja warriors didn’t sit around thinking about escaping—they took action. She sprang to her feet and grabbed the empty buckets, ready to make the much easier trip down the three long flights of stairs to her cellar room. Her stepmother had used black magic to cast entrapment spells that kept her confined to the cellar, except to do chores during the day and to garden at night.

  Twisting sideways, she squeezed through the tiny entrance at the top of the servants’ stairs that were dark and narrow in places.

  When her father was alive, she’d been scared to even go near the cellar where she now lived. The few times he’d taken her down there to help fetch jars of pickles or retrieve her sled during the winter, she’d clung to his neck, burying her face in his srong chest. And they’d used the main stairs, which were not scary at all compared to the rickety back stairs that she was forced to climb. Still, she couldn’t suppress putting a slight skip into her step as she descended, jumping over the broken fourth step on the second flight and not even breaking her gait on the uneven rises.

  On reaching the bottom, she gripped her buckets and moved into a crane stance to prepare for a side kick. “Ha-ya!” she shouted, and then her bare foot struck cleanly against the heavy wooden door.

  The door swung open, hitting the stone wall with a bang, to reveal the cold room that doubled as a bedroom for her and storage space for everyone else in the house. She’d moved into the cellar at age five, right after her father died. The damp, chilly room no longer scared Cinderella; she had much scarier things to face every day—like her evil stepmother.

  In the opposite corner of the room, her fluffy gray cat lifted his head from the straw-filled burlap sack the two shared as a bed.

  “Hello, Max.” Cinderella walked toward the iron water pump on the far side of the fireplace and set the wooden pails next to it, ensuring they were lined up perfectly. She’d long ago discovered that the only way to avoid her stepmother’s punishments involved a combination of obedience and precision. Being compliant and faultless didn’t always work, but she aimed to stay on her stepmother’s good side, with hope that she might be released from this prison existence someday.

  Who was she kidding? Her stepmother didn’t have a good side. Yet Cinderella had to believe she’d gain her freedom someday—without this hope to cling to, she’d go insane.

  Max flicked his tail and it struck the corner of her most precious possession—her Way of the Warrior book. She dashed over and bent to tuck it back under the bed. It simply would not do if her contraband reading material were discovered. The only books she’d ever been allowed to read were the ones her stepmother selected for her lessons, and since age twelve, when she surpassed her older stepsisters in their studies, she’d been cut off from books altogether. She scratched Max’s favorite spot, right under his chin, and he purred and stretched. He was her only friend now; it didn’t matter that he wasn’t human. Sometimes, she was sure he could understand her words and even guide her actions.

  Not long after she’d first discovered him as a tiny stray kitten in the garden, he inexplicably pawed her ninja training book off the enchanted library’s bookshelves. Cinderella had dusted those shelves nearly every day, and never had one book even budged. How Max had swiped it off the shelf remained a mystery. At first she’d only read the book to counteract boredom—the exercises seemed too intimidating to try—but every time she’d taken it out, Max had pawed at the pages, drawing her attention to the illustrations. Eventually she tried some, mostly to shut him up.

  And it had paid off. The ninja training slowly improved her concentration, strength, and balance, and she soon found that she had other abilities—magical abilities—that required the same basic skills. While training in the garden one cold night a few months ago, she’d focused on the hoe throughout her meditation exercises. Finished, she flicked her hand, and the hoe moved. She and Max danced and skipped around the garden in glee. Well, she could only assume Max had bee
n happy for her.

  With practice, Cinderella could now move small objects over short distances with her mind—sometimes—and was thrilled she’d inherited even a small portion of her real mother’s powers. It was one thing to perform spells with a wand, but only the strongest wizards could perform magic using just their minds—wizards like her real mother. But even raw talent needed training, and with her mother gone, she had no one to teach her.

  Max pushed his paw against her leg and stretched while she scratched him.

  “You’re a clever cat, Maxie. Did you find any mice today?”

  He flicked his tail.

  “Maybe tomorrow Agatha or Gwendolyn will leave some milk in their porridge bowls and I can give you a treat.” He rubbed up against her side. “Speaking of treats, I’m dying of thirst.” Max twisted on the bed and pawed at the burlap sack. “Yes, I know I should practice.” She put her hands on her hips. “Is it too much to ask if I have a small sip of water first?”

  Max meowed and rubbed his back on the rough burlap.

  Turning to the cupboard on the wall opposite the fireplace, Cinderella reached a hand toward her pewter goblet on the top shelf, above the beautiful crystal and bone china dishes that were reserved for the rest of her family.

  Concentrating, she focused on connecting her hand to the goblet. Come to me, goblet.

  Her fingers tingled and the goblet wobbled, but it didn’t move off the shelf. She dropped her arm in defeat.

  Who was she kidding? Her magic wasn’t that strong. To do something that purposeful, she needed a wand and instructions.

  She carried her stool from the side of the planked table to the cupboard and, after tucking the bottom hem of her torn skirt into the waistband of her pantaloons, climbed onto the stool’s scratched seat. Balancing barefoot on the wobbly stool, she stretched up to reach her goblet.

  She snagged it, the stool tipped, and she shot one leg and her arms to the sides to catch her balance. Still on one leg, she let the stool tip to one side, then the other, as her body stretched out in all directions.

  Striving to keep her balance, she found her center, brought her limbs in, leaped high into the air, tucked her knees into her chest, and executed a perfect somersault, landing on her toes without a sound.

  Max raised his head from the bed and meowed to her, his bright green eyes sparkling.

  “Why, thank you, Max.” She pulled the frayed fabric of her skirt from her pantaloons and curtsied. “It was an excellent one-footed backflip, wasn’t it?”

  She grinned. There I go again, talking to my cat. Clearly, she spent too much time alone.

  Max pawed at the burlap sack.

  “Okay, okay, I’ll practice. But it’s too dangerous to bring out the book during the day. You know that, Max.” Cinderella preferred to wait until everyone else in the house was asleep before trying anything. There was more room to train in the garden, where she worked alone at night. Besides, if her stepmother knew she’d inherited any of her real mother’s abilities, she’d make the entrapment spells even more restrictive.

  Holding the goblet in front of her, Cinderella bent her legs to lower herself into a crouch, and then spun and leaped, kicking and chopping at an imaginary foe as she crossed the room to reach the pump. Once there, she pushed down on the handle until fresh water flowed from its spout, and then eagerly set her goblet under the stream to catch the crisp, ice-cold water from deep in the well, her reward for the past twelve hours of grueling work.

  Not seeing her stepmother or her stepsisters for four hours had been a fine reward, too. It was unusual for them to leave her alone for so long. She glanced at the single window of thick glass that she’d long ago given up trying to break. The pane was too thick and probably enchanted to give it extra strength. Given the angle of the shadows on this long spring evening, she figured there was less than two hours before darkness set in, the back door opened, and the wolves came out.

  But what if something had happened to her stepmother? She had been gone a long time. Would the entrapment spells be broken if her stepmother was killed? Maybe one of the doors out of the house would open before nighttime arrived.

  Cinderella set down the goblet and dashed to the cellar door that led up the steep, damp stone staircase into the garden. Taking a deep breath, she pulled on the iron handle.

  It didn’t move an inch—not even a wiggle. The garden door was sealed as it always was when the sun was up, just like every other exit from the house. She slumped against the door. As impossible as it seemed, she believed that someday she’d find a way to escape.

  Balanced in a one-armed handstand, Cinderella slowly scissored her legs, concentrating on maintaining her balance. Suddenly, a cackling laugh shattered the peaceful silence of the house. Startled, Cinderella wobbled for a moment before catching her balance, and then stepped out of her handstand.

  Her stepsisters, Agatha and Gwendolyn, were home.

  She pulled her navy skirt back on over her pantaloons and draped her bibbed apron on top, wrapping the grayed ties twice around her waist before smoothing her hands down the coarsely woven fabric.

  The heels of her stepsisters’ shoes thumped a hard rhythm above her, making the floorboards groan.

  “My feet are killing me.” Gwendolyn’s shrill voice carried through the floor.

  “Mine, too,” Agatha said. “Cinderella! Oh, Cinderella!”

  Cinderella took a sip of her water.

  “Cinderella!” both sisters shouted at once, and the floorboards above her head shook again.

  She gave Max one last scratch under his chin before starting up the rickety wooden stairs. Stepping into the parlor, she found Agatha and Gwendolyn sprawled on a pair of matching brocade chairs in front of the fireplace, the mantel of which—like every other surface in the room—was covered with her stepmother’s collection of glass animal figurines. Cinderella wasn’t entirely convinced that some hadn’t once been live animals, and hoped she wouldn’t one day find Max sitting on this shelf.

  “There you are.” Agatha, the younger of the two sisters, wrinkled her nose as she spoke. “Help me with my slippers. They’re pinching my dainty little feet.”

  “Certainly, Sister.” Cinderella tried hard not to laugh. Agatha’s lush red curls and smooth, peachy complexion were undoubtedly beautiful, but her feet were anything but dainty. Agatha’s feet matched the considerable height she’d inherited from her equally statuesque mother.

  Agatha’s dark red satin dress fit her perfectly, and the ivory ribbon at her bust complemented her pale skin nicely. But any pride Cinderella felt in her own skills as a seamstress was outweighed by resentment. How could she be fully proud of something she’d been forced to make? Especially when she didn’t possess one nice dress herself. The only clothes she had, she was wearing.

  She silently admonished herself. Envy wouldn’t get her anywhere.

  “ Take mine off first,” Gwendolyn said, lifting her silk-covered arms above her head.“You put the wrong size slippers on my poor feet today.” She tugged on one of the deep brown ringlets dropping down from the elaborate hairstyle Cinderella had spent an hour on that morning, and then stretched her long, lean limbs forward on the white rug to reveal her huge feet, bent and pinched into pink slippers two sizes too small. Both sets of her sisters’ shoes were coated in filth; Cinderella’s gaze followed a muddy trail across the room.

  More floor scrubbing would be one of her next chores, and it would take hours to clean the muck out of the rug—not to mention the shoes.

  She knelt down before Gwendolyn to tackle her first assignment. She searched in vain for one clean spot on the silk shoes that would take hours of meticulous work to turn back to their previous pink, but could find none. She tugged at the heel.

  “Careful.” Gwendolyn kicked her in the shoulder and Cinderella fell onto her bottom.

  “Do you think we’ll be invited to the royal ball?” Agatha asked her sister, ignoring Cinderella.

  Cinderella pulled herself off th
e floor and turned her back to Gwendolyn to gain the necessary leverage for prying the shoe from her stepsister’s foot. More dirt scattered onto the white rug.

  “Of course we will, silly.” Gwendolyn’s knee bumped Cinderella’s back. “Get out of the way, you stupid, ugly girl. Why aren’t my shoes off yet?”

  “I suppose you’re right,” Agatha said. “Prince Tiberius needs a wife. Any fine family with unmarried daughters is sure to be invited.”

  “Especially those families whose daughters are both unmarried and beautiful, such as us,” Gwendolyn said, and both girls giggled.

  Goosebumps rose on Cinderella’s arms. Yes, her stepsisters were beautiful, but what husband would want to live with their ugly laughs?

  Cinderella smiled at her own joke as she pulled Gwendolyn’s shoes off, and then removed Agatha’s. After bundling the shoes into her arms, she stood.

  “Cinderella, where’s my tonic?” Gwendolyn screeched. “You know if I don’t take my tonic soon after my evening meal, I suffer from indigestion.” She burped loudly. The strong stench of onions and gas made Cinderella feel faint. On the nights her family ate out, the lack of table scraps meant Cinderella didn’t eat a single morsel.

  She glanced to the carafe of tonic sitting on the side table not four feet from her stepsister. Would it kill Gwen to stand and pour herself a drink? “I’ll fetch your tonic as soon as I take these shoes to the cellar for cleaning.” Cinderella started for the door.

  “Get it now, you lazy girl!” Gwen stood and pulled Cinderella’s blonde hair, yanking her back.

  “Ow!” Cinderella dropped one of the shoes and more dirt scattered onto the carpet.

  “You clumsy thing.” Agatha kicked the shoe out of Cinderella’s reach just as she was about to retrieve it and looked up to Gwen, as if seeking approval.