Charming, Volume 1

by Jack Heckel

  She frowned in the darkness. “How long have you been in the Lady Rapunzel’s ser­vice, Mr. Collins?”

  There was an inordinately long pause, and at first Liz was afraid he might not answer at all, but in time he rasped out, “Long-­enough-­Your-­Ladyship.”

  Interesting, thought Liz, perhaps he is not the happy servant Elle made him out to be. She would try something else to break his maddening formality. “Please, Mr. Collins, you do not have to be so proper with me, call me Elizabeth or Liz.”

  She waited for him to extend the same courtesy, but instead he looked back and regarded her silently from beneath his hooded cloak, his face a formless void. Without comment, he turned his gaze back to the road ahead. Liz clucked her tongue against her teeth. The man was a boor. Any thought of further conversation vanished, and Liz fell into a petulant silence. She would have words with Elle when next she saw her.

  The horses plodded on in the quiet air, and, after a time, Liz found her eyes drooping. Yawning, she spoke up again, hoping for a better result. “Mr. Collins, it is getting late. How much further do you intend us to go tonight?”

  The man moved implacably forward for a few breaths until Liz thought she might have to repeat herself, but as she opened her mouth, he responded, “Not-­far-­Your-­Ladyship-­we-­turn-­off-­just-­ahead.”

  Liz sat up at this. “Then we are leaving the road, Mr. Collins?”

  If she had expected a treatise on his plan, she was sorely disappointed, because he responded in that same terse and stilted manner. “Yes-­Your-­Ladyship.”

  “Is there an inn ahead, then?”

  “No-­Your-­Ladyship.”

  “Then we will be camping in—­in the woods tonight?”

  “Yes-­Your-­Ladyship.”

  This was a change of plans, and normally she would have questioned him further, but she was growing tired, and besides she had no desire to talk to the man anymore. She thought she might scream if he said Yes-­Your-­Ladyship or No-­Your-­Ladyship one more time.

  The riders settled back into an uneasy silence and then the horse in front of her stopped. Collins abruptly thrust his lantern toward the left side of the road and pointed into a shadowy gap in the trees. “Here-­Your-­Ladyship.”

  Liz stared into the wooded maw, and saw . . . nothing. The path, if it could be called that, was barely wide enough for a single horse and dark as pitch. It took her eyes a full minute to discern anything beyond the opening, and then all she could make out were the shadowy outlines of the trees that marked the edges of the trail and the reflecting eyes of invisible night-­creatures blinking on and off as they stared back from the darkness beyond. Collins began moving into the gap. Liz watched the forest swallow him and shuddered.

  “Is this really necessary, Mr. Collins?” Liz called after him weakly. “Can’t we just press on along the road a bit further?” She knew her voice sounded small and scared, and she cursed her fear but could not master it.

  His muted voice reached back to her from inside the forest tunnel. “Yes-­Your-­Ladyship. No-­Your-­Ladyship. We-­must-­not-­be-­found-­on-­the-­road-­Your-­Ladyship.”

  Liz supposed there was sense in that, but a seed of fear had set root in her mind. This had not been part of the plan, and it did not feel like something Elle would have her do.

  As she hesitated on the brink of the dark trail, Collins continued forward; and as he did, the glow of the lantern also moved into the dense woods, leaving Liz in growing shadow. She took a last, longing look at the broad paved road and spurred her horse after the rapidly fading light, cursing, as she did, this man and Elle, who had lent him to her, and the Princess, who had made her flight necessary, and her brother, who had been so sure that being in a fairy tale would be easy, and the dragon, and her father, and her father’s father, and so on, until the path twisted and she was well and truly in the arms of the night.

  The trees crowded in around her, their branches reaching greedily out from the edge of the trail to pull at her cloak. Liz focused her whole being on the comforting will-­o’-­the-­wisp glow of the lantern as it bobbed and weaved its way along the path. At times the trail would make a sharp turn and the comforting little light would momentarily disappear. It was at these times that Liz’s curses turned to prayers, and she regretted her regular blasphemies.

  What seemed like an eternity later, the trail emerged into a circular glade about forty paces across. Overhead, a dome of dark green branches let a little glow of moonlight slip through to the grassy floor of the clearing. For Liz, it seemed like the dawn. She let out the breath she had not known she was holding, and relaxed. Perhaps the night would not be as unpleasant as she had feared. Liz had always enjoyed the woods, and in the daylight she imagined that this was quite a pleasant spot.

  Collins was at the far end of the clearing, the lantern set on the ground behind him as he hobbled the last of the pack animals for the night. Liz took off her riding gloves and laid them across the top of her saddle. “Will you attend to my horse also, Mr. Collins?”

  “As-­you-­wish-­Your-­Ladyship,” he said in a hissing exhale, and turned stiffly to look at her.

  Liz gasped and felt her heart take flight. Collins had lowered his hood as he worked with the animals, and now the flickering light of the lantern revealed his face, and across his face was etched a smile. It was a cunning smile, a dead, cold smile, and Liz had seen its twin only once before . . . over tea at Castle White. It was an expression she would never forget. She knew not how, but she was certain that she was not looking into the eyes of Elle’s valet, Collins, but those of Princess Gwendolyn Mostfair.

  While Liz battled to calm her nerves, Collins bent stiffly to retrieve the lantern and then began advancing erratically toward her, the light thrust forward in one hand and something bright and sharply tapered poorly concealed in the other. This was madness. It was Collins, it must be, and yet just as clearly it was not. Indeed, now that her suspicions had a focus, the strangeness of his mannerism was clearly revealed. It was as though the man’s body was at war with itself. Every movement was a battle, some won, some lost. But whatever the character of his struggle, its will seemed the stronger. She had to accept that whatever this thing was standing across from her, it was not Elle’s Collins, or at least it was not Mr. Collins in mind even if it was his body.

  A hundred thoughts struck her at once. She should turn the horse about and run. But she had no light to flee by, no weapon to fight with, nowhere to run that he could not follow. And then there he was at the head of her horse, grabbing at the reins.

  “You-­will-­need-­to-­dismount-­Your-­Ladyship.”

  Fearing her voice would crack if she attempted speech, Liz nodded mutely. Collins’s body smiled that ghastly, wicked smile again. A renewed surge of terror rushed through her body. Her hands began to shake. Despite everything, Liz had been holding out hope that her fear was just the mad invention of her imagination, but that depraved smirk was all the confirmation she needed. She took a deep breath and tried to replace the fear with cold resolve.

  I may be without hope, but I will not yield without a fight.

  Liz handed him the reins and at the same moment gave the horse a subtle nudge in the sides with her heeled boots. The animal tried to surge forward, forcing Collins to wrestle with the beast to calm it. Liz used the time to study her would-­be assassin. Collins stood a head taller, and outweighed her by five stone, all of which seemed to be muscle. A straight fight would be pointless, but maybe guile would win where strength could not. Her mind raced.

  Perhaps if I can get him to bend down a bit. . .

  She started to rise from the saddle to dismount, but then paused in midmovement and pretended to struggle with her riding skirts. She put as much helplessness as she could into her voice—­for once it was not difficult. “I am sorry, Mr. Collins, but my skirt seems to be stuck beneath the cinch, could you help me
with it?”

  “Of-­course-­Your-­Ladyship,” he said heavily and then began moving along the side of the horse toward her, one hand still holding the reins awkwardly behind him.

  Liz could feel the heat of his body against her dangling leg as he searched through the flowing fabric of the riding skirt for the tangle. And his smell, an overpowering smell of nutmeg clung to him so intense that she thought she would choke. She pointed vaguely below the stirrup, and in a breathy voice said, “There, Mr. Collins . . . I think . . . perhaps . . . a bit lower.”

  He dropped the reins, grabbed the cinch strap in one hand, and began tracing it along the horse’s underside. As soon as he bent down Liz turned and fumbled in her pack for anything she might use as a weapon. Her hand fell on a copy of the “Dragon’s Tale” she had appropriated from the castle. It was a heavy thing, beautifully bound with a thick wood cover front and back. Grabbing it with both hands, she stood in the stirrups and, lifting the book high above her, brought it down violently on the man’s unprotected head. There was a sickening crack, and Collins collapsed in a heap on the ground. His unconscious body rolled beneath the horse, and the nervy animal, already spooked, reared up and leapt forward.

  Liz fell from the saddle. She put out her left hand to catch her fall. A terrible blinding pain raced from her wrist to her shoulder, and she cried out. The horse whinnied and danced away to join the tethered herd. She looked over to where Collins lay.

  The lantern had shattered on impact with the ground, and she watched as the exposed flame guttered in the breeze. In the dim light that remained, she could see the man’s eyes flutter. At least I didn’t kill him, she thought with relief. Then he groaned and his hands moved haltingly to his head. In an instant, her relief turned to a curse. Bloody hell, how thick is that man’s skull? She looked over at the book that had fallen beside him and got her answer—­thick enough to snap the solid wooden cover in half. She needed to find a way to restrain him.

  Looking about, she saw that her leather satchel had fallen with her. She picked up the bag with her good hand and slung it over her shoulder. Cradling her aching arm gingerly against her body, Liz rose and stumbled in the direction of the lantern. She had just reached it when Collins’s eyes snapped open. The wind rose and swirled. The flame winked out, and the deep, darkness of the woods returned, and with it so did Liz’s terror.

  She ran. She ran into the dark wall of trees that encircled them, and she kept running directionless. Even had she known where to go, in the dense woods there were no stars to guide her, only the dim shadows of tree and bush. At one point she thought she heard the man’s rough voice calling from the clearing, but there was no sound of pursuit, and in time his shouts were lost. Still, she ran on.

  Mostly blind, she ran without caution. Roots caught at her ankles, sending her more than once to the ground. Limbs slashed at her arms and face. Vines and thornbushes tore at her dress and skirt. If she fell, she rose again. If she was caught, she pulled herself free with brute force. Speed and distance were all she cared about now—­to put enough forest between her and Gwendolyn’s marionette that he could not hope to find her. And then, between one stride and the next, she stepped into empty space and fell. She landed on her back. Her head snapped back violently and struck something hard, and the world went black.

  IN HER HIDDEN chamber in the castle, Princess Gwendolyn Mostfair stared hard into the swirling black mist of the ball. “What is the meaning of this, Fairy? Why can I not see what is happening?”

  A smug, self-­satisfied voice seemed to drift down from somewhere near the ceiling. “I canst only show what is, not what thou wishest to see.”

  With a violent curse, she covered the sphere and the mist dissolved, leaving only the tiny otherworldly light burning within. “Do not play word games with me, little one. I demand to know what has happened.”

  There was a short pause, and then the voice returned. “There has been a struggle in the woods, Mistress, and Lady Elizabeth Pickett is lost.”

  Gwendolyn held the ball in one hand, and tapped at its glass surface with the long painted nail of her forefinger. “This is a true account? Rapunzel’s man . . . he—­she—­is gone?”

  “I can tell no lie, Mistress. The Lady Pickett struggled with your man, and now she is gone.”

  The Princess put the glass sphere in its holder and leaned back in her chair. A sudden chill had entered the room. She looked over at the fire that blazed in the grate and shivered. The shadows had taken up residence around it, and they seemed to suck all the heat from the flames.

  “I did not mean for it to happen.” Gwendolyn looked over at the fairy, expecting a reply. “I only asked him to hold her in the woods until I could ascend the throne. That was all he was instructed to do, not”—­she fluttered her hands in the air in frustration—­“not this.”

  The fairy flickered dimly and without comment. Gwen willed herself to look away. I will not seek absolution. She closed her eyes and a wave of fatigue washed over her body. She rubbed her eyelids to try and relieve the pressure in her head. The man’s resolve had been stronger than she had expected. His loyalty to Lady Rapunzel was commendable. He had fought her every moment, but she was stronger. Unconsciously, her mind began to review the last few minutes in the clearing. How had everything gone so wrong?

  It is done. I will not waste time on regret.

  Still, she could not get the girl’s face out of her mind. The fairy light pulsed on without changing, and the silent judgment of the creature was too much. Her anger boiled to a fine rage, and she stood so that she towered above the delicate little sphere. “I DID NOT MEAN TO KILL HER!” she shouted.

  The fairy’s bone-­dry answer came straightaway. “For someone that does not mean to kill, it would seem that you manage it with some regularity, Mistress.”

  Gwendolyn’s hands shook with fury. She wanted to smash the smug little sprite. She wanted it to die, to—­

  The shadows sprung from their place to crowd around her, whispering and giggling. Briefly, from among the voices, she thought she could hear Rosslyn screaming in terror. She swung her arms up to ward them off; the room spun dangerously, and Gwendolyn fell back into her chair. She put a hand to her throbbing temple. It was no use spending her energy fighting with the winged demon or these visions. There was still so much to do. She had to find some way of dealing with Rapunzel, and there was the matter of working up a good charm to ensnare Will when he returned. Yes, there was much to do, but now she needed rest. She would be clearheaded in the morning, and the shadows and Liz and her guilt would be forgotten.

  JAMES COLLINS, VALET of Lady Rapunzel and former mindless puppet of Princess Gwendolyn Mostfair, was gasping for air on the ground, listening to the receding clamor of Lady Elizabeth as she fled. Through sheer will, he rose to his feet and tried, once more, to follow. This time he made it three full steps before the world tilted violently and he dropped to the ground retching. There was no use. He didn’t even have the strength or breath to try calling out again, not that he had any reason to believe she would listen to his pleas. He would have to wait until morning to begin his pursuit.

  James rolled onto his back and stared up through the opening in the forest canopy at the twinkling night. A terrible, helpless fatigue fell over him. Marshaling his remaining wits, he tried to recall everything that had happened over the last two days. The last thing he could remember clearly was an audience with the Princess, kneeling before her, an orb of swirling light in her hand, and then a blinding pain as Lady Elizabeth smashed that bloody book over his head.

  What happened? What have I done? His eyes drifted closed. What has been done to me? His breathing evened and grew steady. Is Lady Rapunzel safe, or does the Princess have a plot for her as well? It was with this last troubled thought swirling in his battered skull that he slipped gratefully into the oblivion of sleep.

  Chapter 12

  Goodbye, ­Couplet


  CHARMING SPENT THE night lying awake on his bed, twisting the silver coin, standing and pacing, lying down again, waiting, and all the time indulging and rejecting all the excuses he had for betraying Will, Elizabeth, and himself. In time, dawn worked its way through the spaces in the wooden wall. He watched the dirty light crawl across the floor and then a ray fell across his eyes and he blinked, as though waking from a dream. He whispered the one inescapable thought that had echoed in his mind the whole night: “I may have never been a hero, but I am not yet a villain.”

  He glanced over at the other cots. Will and the squire hadn’t made it back to the room last night. He sighed deeply. It was time to wake the hero and withdraw to the castle. Charming put the silver coin into his pouch, grunted and stood. His head felt wrong where the troll had smashed it, and the world kept trying to roll over. He blinked his vision clear and staggered through the hall and down the steps.

  Reaching the common room of the inn, he was overwhelmed by a terrible stench. Men and women were passed out on, and in some cases, under almost every table; and the plank floor was coated in a terrifying mixture of spilled ale and sick. The only person upright and conscious in the whole place was a lazy-­eyed crone who was halfheartedly wiping a filthy cloth across the surface of the bar. Charming had a whole new appreciation for the term “unwashed masses.” He gagged and, vainly trying to filter the smell with his sleeve, began his search for the two men.

  In due course, he found them both. The squire sat slumped in a chair, while Will was laid out on one of the tables. Charming leaned close, cleared his throat, and said, “Lord Protector.”

  After an extended groan Will’s eyes fluttered open. “Char—­Charming, what are you doing up?”

  “It’s actually rather late in the morning,” Charming replied dryly.

  “Is it?” Will burped and a terrible noxious odor issued forth. He smacked his lips and gave Charming an appraising glance. “You . . . my friend . . . are a complete mess. I’m sure no one would believe that I had been the one drinking all night and you had been the one to take to your bed early.”