Cinderella Dressed in Ashes tgd-2

by Cameron Jace

  Loki sniffed her while positioning her. She could tell he liked her scent. She elbowed him in the rib so he’d back off a little.

  “How about we fist fight in the mud instead of using swords?” Loki said playfully, walking backward, still facing her. “This way we could get to know each other better.”

  “You wish, Huntsman!” Shew sneered, unable to escape his piercing look.

  Foolishly, again, Shew waited for a signal to start the sword fight. What was she expecting, a blast of a horn?

  Loki surprised her and made the first move. He took a swift step back, pulled out his sword, and slashed at her as if he were an elegant painter with a long brush, putting his final touch on his portrait.

  Shew shrieked, eyes closed, waiting for the pain to seep through her body as she realized where he’d cut her. The wind that swooshed with the sword’s swinging almost cut through her neck, but nothing really hurt.

  Eyes still closed, she heard him whistle. He was a good whistler.

  Shew opened her eyes, and saw he’d only slashed at her dress, leaving her with a bare shoulder.

  “I like this cut better. Gives me something to look at,” he winked with his chin up. “Now, shall we?” he took his position, parting his legs, one to the front and one to back.

  In her anger, Shew swung at him without even aiming. The sword barely touched his face, and a thin drop of blood trickled down his cheek.

  Loki brushed the blood from his face and gazed back at her, amused, “this is going to be fun,” he said and then…

  He swung his sword at her. Shew’s reflexes weren’t bad. She swung back at him, both their swords clinking in the forest. Cerené’s glass sword was just as strong as Loki’s metal. Their movements were fast, and she remembered her father’s training. They worked their arms and legs like dancing on coal.

  “You’re a jerk.” Shew attacked, forcing him to retreat.

  “And what is it about jerks you like so much, princess?” Loki smirked again, swinging with care and enthusiasm. He watched her move as if watching a ballerina dancing her final swan song.

  She didn’t comment. She preferred to hurt him as a response to his answer.

  “Impressive for a bratty princess,” Loki considered, his eyes shining like a kid with a new toy.

  Shew wondered if he wasn’t giving her his best shot, just toying with her. She knew he was a much better fighter—one of the best. She attacked him again, and he responded smoothly. Her moves became more stiffened, like that of a panther on the prowl.

  This should be my chance, Shew thought. I better wound him badly and run.

  Don’t chicken out this time princess.

  Loki jumped backward, somersaulting in the air, showing off. He landed on his feet. “Can’t do that, can you?” he teased then swung at her instantly.

  Shew swung continuously with great force. Her anger and frustration fueled her moves. Loki found himself withdrawing.

  He used his somersault technique again, but not to show off this time. He had to evade her nerve. He landed on a tree branch, a couple of feet high. The branch moved like an elephant’s trunk, curving and lifting him even higher as if it were enchanted. He stood there with hands on his waist, laughing at her.

  “That’s cheating,” Shew shouted, looking up.

  “Sue me!” Loki said, teasing her, looking more like Robin Hood than a dark Huntsman.

  “How did you do that?” Shew asked.

  “Jealous?”

  Shew sighed at how childish Loki seemed in this dream. Was this the Huntsman she just saw torturing children in Furry Tell, or was her personality having an impact on him?

  Shew decided to replicate his move and jumped onto a tree branch nearby. Surprisingly it lifted her up to him. The trees were tangled like a huge nest over the forest.

  Loki didn’t wait for her to adjust to her new elevated surroundings. He just attacked.

  Shew responded, careful she wouldn’t fall.

  “Show me some fangs!” he demanded.

  “Are you trying to provoke me,” Shew swung back.

  “No,” Loki said. “I’m trying to kill you, princess.”

  “Don’t push your luck, Queen’s bastard,” Shew said, still swinging. She slashed at a lock of his beautiful hair.

  “The last girl who called me that got what she deserved,” Loki took a step back and stopped. He snatched his lock of hair from mid air, looking upset. He even tucked it in his pocket, “bastard or jerk?” he gazed back at her, playfully. “Make up your mind.”

  Again, Shew doubted they said ‘jerk’ in the 19th century, but out of sheer silliness, Shew snarled at him. It didn’t scare him. He got closer and swung his sword again.

  “Nasty,” he said.

  —clink.

  “Bastard,” she swung at him.

  —clink.

  “Vulgar,” he swung back, both of them working their feet in the moving tree branches.

  —clink.

  “Arrogant,” she tried to swing harder.

  —clink.

  “Bratty princess,” he stopped her and pushed her back.

  Shew held onto a vine and swung with it through the air, landing far from him.

  Loki stood puzzled, amazed by her acrobatic endeavor. “Monkey!” he said, and grabbed another vine, following her move.

  She jumped back on the ground, and Loki followed.

  The swinging continued with swords clinking in the dead of the night.

  Loki slashed at her dress again, baring her other shoulder.

  “You like my dress, huh?” she sighed and hit harder.

  “Delay killing me for too long, and you’ll end up naked princess,” he raised an eyebrow.

  “But alive?” Shew pressed her sword against his with all her might, their faces close now. Loki was taken back by her words and stare. He looked puzzled, wondering why he liked her so much. Shew didn’t mind if the only way to outlive him was seducing him. She’d spared him once, and she’d expected him to spare her.

  “Nice try,” Loki pushed her back, changing his mind. “I eat girls like you for breakfast.”

  “Not if I slit your throat the night before,” Shew grit her teeth, and … again … she swung hard.

  “I’m just stalling,” he said. “I’m enjoying this tremendously. Did you know I could swing with both hands?” He winked at her.

  “You just can’t admit I’m stronger,” Shew said.

  Loki wasn’t provoked. He was really enjoying this, and Shew knew it, but it was going nowhere. She wasn’t going to spend all night bantering with him.

  “So tell me, princess,” he said, “if you could be anything you want to be, what would that be? And don’t say princess,” Loki spoke as he swung with one hand the other resting on his waist.

  “Not funny,” she said, as her arm began hurting. “When will you understand that Carmilla has you by the balls?”

  “Balls?” Loki was stuck with her face to face, sword to sword, each one pushing their sword against the other. Their faces reddened. “I don’t have balls.”

  “Of course, you do,” Shew omitted a laugh and pushed him away. “You’re just two centuries too old to realize you do.”

  In a swift and accurate move, Loki pushed her back and slashed at her lips.

  Shew stood paralyzed.

  She’d actually felt the tip of the sword on her lips, like a paper cut. If she’d doubted he was going to kill her for a moment, she had to reevaluate the situation. This was his first true warning.

  “Shhh,” Loki had his forefinger on his lips. His stare wasn’t funny anymore, filled with sinister mockery. He was just a charming mass murderer. It was at this very moment she sensed that he had enough of having fun with the feisty princess he’d admired briefly.

  Strike, Shew, strike! One more moment of hesitation and he’ll kill you.

  Shew slashed hard at Loki’s arm. When her sword met his flesh, she didn’t pull away. She cut hard through it like a cake. Her guts churn
ed from the inside, but she had to do it. She thought the wound would slow him down and allow her to escape on her unicorn.

  Loki held his arm and looked at it as if no one had ever dared to injure him before. He returned his gaze to her, and Shew feared his wrath even more. He had the same look in his eyes he had when he was at Furry Tell.

  Out of fear, she slashed at his other arm, forcing him to drop his sword.

  Loki glared at her with snake-yellow eyes now. A tight scream escaped him briefly, but then he swallowed it. He was not going to show he was in pain. Still, he sank to his knees from the pain.

  Shew did her best not to feel sorry for him, imagining he was someone else.

  In his pain, his veins surfaced on his neck and arms. As Shew looked closer she noticed that they weren’t his veins, but his Ariadne Fleece running through his body. Carmilla, wherever she was, must have pulled it harder, urging him to get up, and he did, empowered by the Fleece.

  For the first time, Shew realized she wasn’t only fighting Loki, but Carmilla Karnstein as well.

  Loki stood up. There wasn’t the slightest sign of playfulness on his face.

  He was going to kill her mercilessly.

  Shew walked backwards, slowly, unable to take her eyes off him. Where would she go? There was no way she could outrun or escape him.

  Loki slashed at her hand, but she managed to hold on to her sword. She raised her hand against the pain and plunged the sword into his stomach.

  He bent forward and gripped the blade with both hands, glaring back at her as his hair fell over his eyes.

  “Not good enough, princess,” he smiled against the mild pain, but unable to raise his voice.

  Afraid he’d part her from her sword, Shew pulled it back, slitting his palms while he still clenched to it.

  Loki stretched his back, stretched his neck, and cracked his bleeding knuckles one by one. He took a deep breath as if the pain meant nothing to him. His strength was unimaginable, “feels much better now,” his said, bleeding from his stomach.

  Shew realized that killing him wasn’t going to be easy. She turned around and headed toward her unicorn, praying Loki’s wound would slow him down.

  It didn’t.

  “Going somewhere?” she heard him come after her.

  Shew continued toward her unicorn, not looking back, but her unicorn had started running away. For a moment, she didn’t understand, then she realized it must have been running from the huge silver light that was now shining in the sky.

  Shew, chasing the unicorn, thought the light might have been the moon, even though it wasn’t a white light. It was like the reflection of glass, as if the part of the sky had turned into an enormous mirror reflecting its light onto the forest. She had no time to look. Loki scared her more than the light.

  “Ahhh,” Loki screamed behind her. She heard him fall back on the ground, giving her a fraction of a second to look at the glaring light.

  She tilted her head and saw a dragon, a glass dragon.

  Shew stopped, afraid of it the same way the unicorn feared it. Looking sideways, she saw the floating glass dragon had knocked Loki down. The look of terror on Loki’s face was priceless. He had never seen anything like it—hell, she hadn’t seen anything like it either.

  The dragon was the size of Splash, Cerené’s water horse, and it was made from living glass. It was both beautiful and scary. Its eyes were diamonds, and it breathed orange fire at Loki who crawled on all fours away from it.

  A little lower, the dragon’s tail was attached to a blowpipe. Cerené’s blowpipe.

  There was nothing to doubt anymore, Cerené was what Charmwill Glimmer was to Loki. She used all of her breath, urging the dragon to fire at him.

  “What kind of witch are you?” Loki shouted at Shew, raising his sword to fight the glass dragon.

  “Cerené,” Shew yelled. “You’re going to die if you keep breathing. Let the dragon fade, and escape with me.”

  “I’m glad I found you,” Cerené panted, giving up on the pipe, the huge dragon dimming a little.

  “Did you follow me?” She wondered.

  “No,” Cerené said. “I followed the chalk marks on the trees and the Rapunzel plants all over the forest. It wasn’t the smartest of moves, Joy. Even though the Rapunzel plants helped slow down the Huntsmen, the chalk on the trees was how Loki must have tracked you.”

  “And my singing, too,” Shew added.

  “Now the Queen is sending other huntsmen for you.”

  “Why did you risk your life coming for me again?” Shew walked to her and grabbed her arm. Loki was fighting the diminishing dragon behind her. Soon it was going to die.

  “I had to give you this,” Cerené pulled out Loki’s necklace, and smiled.

  “I hope you didn’t hurt Alice,” Shew said, looking at the necklace one more time. She still couldn’t read it, but she put it back on.

  “I don’t care about her,” Cerené said vaguely. “Come on. We have to hide in the cottage,” she pointed behind her.

  Shew squinted harder, looking for it, “how did I miss it,” she wondered.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Cerené said. “It’s our only hope, although it’s not going to be as safe as I thought, now that Loki found you. The whole idea about the cottage was no one could find it. But we have no choice now.”

  They ran toward the cottage, holding hands; Cerené held her blowpipe with the other hand while Shew carried her newly tested sword.

  36

  The Cottage and the Wolf

  Shew and Cerené entered the cottage. Cerené turned to lock the door behind them while Shew hurried to lock the windows.

  Shew’s first impression was like Déjà vu again. She had been there before, but she couldn’t remember the details. If Cerené met Charmwill here, then the cottage was part of her erased memory. She expected to come across clues to the Lost Seven.

  The cottage was small and separated into two levels. Three creaking wooden steps led to the higher level, which was occupied with seven beds. They were big beds, used by real people, not dwarves.

  The lower level was smaller, lit by pumpkin shaped lanterns, and mostly occupied with an oval-shaped dining table. It was an old table, its surface filled with cracks and engravings. She hurried to it, comparing the cracks to Loki’s necklace.

  Still, nothing made sense.

  Shew wondered again how such scribbled engravings could hold an important message. She could neither read the engravings on the front or the back of the pendant.

  Another thing that caught Shew’s attention was the absence of chairs. There was only one chair while the table that was big enough for eight people. She brushed the tips of her hands over the chair’s back, hoping she’d remember something, the way she remembered her father’s training.

  Again, nothing. It was just a chair.

  On the table, Shew saw five items: a knife, some scattered beans, breadcrumbs, an empty plate, and a fork. The image of each item gave her a momentary, but acute, migraine. With each item, an image flashed. She caught the image of a boy with a green hat, a girl in a red cloak, and a moon. The rest of the images were unclear. Shew was almost sure these were the Lost Seven, and that each item belonged to one of them.

  Why hadn’t she seen an image of Cerené, and what was her item?

  Shew altered her gaze between the items and chair for a while. Her gut feeling told her the chair was the sixth item—that’s why there were no other chairs in the house. “They belong to the others I told you about,” Cerené said, pointing at the items on the table. She had begun nailing logs on the windows as if preparing for a zombie attack. “I haven’t been lucky enough to meet them,” she added with a nail between her teeth.

  “Is one of the items yours?” Shew asked.

  “No,” Cerené said. “I have what I need here,” she lifted her dress, showing her the glass urn underneath. Shew wondered why Cerené hadn’t pointed at her blowpipe.

  “And where is the old man, Charmwill
?” Shew said.

  “Like I said, I only met him once. Funny man, and a funny parrot!” Cerené sucked the blood out of her finger. She’d hurt herself while hammering. “Come help me, and stop talking. We can’t let Loki get in.”

  “This doesn’t look like a safe place, Cerené,” Shew commented, rummaging through a box of nails and looking for a hammer.

  “I know,” Cerené considered. “But don’t worry. We’ll make it.”

  Shew found a hammer and started nailing. She wasn’t enthusiastic about it. Keeping Loki out wasn’t going to be that easy. She kept wondering why Cerené brought her to this cottage. It didn’t look safe. Her first hit with the hammer landed on her finger, too. She let out a scream.

  “You need to be tougher,” Cerené giggled.

  “You just hurt yourself a second ago,” Shew defended herself.

  “That’s true, but I’m not the Chosen One,” Cerené winked.

  “How do you know I’m the Chosen One,” Shew’s face tightened. “I never told you.”

  “Charmwill told me,” Cerené sighed. “Can you stop talking now and do some work?”

  “Why is everyone else telling you things all the time?” Shew wondered. “Is that why you keep coming rescuing me, because you think you should care for the Chosen One?” Shew said.

  “Yes!” Cerené snapped again. “Are you happy now? I am supposed to take care of you, the same way you will take care of me. Bianca told me so, and Charmwill told me so. Why is it so hard for you to accept that I am here for you?”

  Shew said nothing, and continued hammering. Cerené was right. They were two lost girls with no elder to take care of them. Both were damaged, yet blessed. The Chosen One took care of the Clue, and the Clue took care of the Chosen one. It was like nothing Shew had read in history books before. This was Shew’s and Cerené’s special journey, and they had to do it their own way. Love was not always the answer and friendship was just as important.

  The two girls nailed a board over every window for extra security. Cerené had pulled off planes from the beds and used them as logs, and then she blew out the candles and dimmed the cottage.