by Kiki Leach
“Around the time you lost our first child, I presume,” he mumbled.
“Yes. We have tried to heal ourselves with intense love making and illusions that things have gotten so much better between us when in fact, they have only managed to worsen as time goes on.”
“I miss what we were prior to such intense love making. It sounds terrible of me given how much the very idea of it pleased every part of my body.”
“I understand.”
And as much as it pained me to admit, I did. I truly and most certainly did.
He walked toward me and kissed my forehead.
I placed my hands at the small of his back and squeezed a little. The pain I felt in that moment was unbearable. Perhaps not as much as John had hoped for, but enough for me to feel as useless as I often believed myself to be.
Someone began knocking then. It was an order from one of his men to meet his father in the east ballroom. Norvack never said another word to me before leaving and I didn’t know what to make of it. I glanced over at my bed and reached for a scarf, and traveled downstairs and out to the garden. I needed time alone to think and heal; to attempt to understand the truth of what was actually happening between us.
I roamed the garden for what felt like hours. When I heard footsteps approaching, I feared it was Eliza, and I couldn’t bring myself to even look at her face.
“The unfortunate Cinder girl, alone once more.”
It was John. Just as any snake, he slithered up alongside me and stood looking out on the field.
“You told him of my miscarriages,” I said. “Quite clever, yet foolish if you believed he was willing to discard me because of it as you would have.”
He smiled wide and in a manner that forced the tiny hairs on my neck to stand on end. I felt my heart literally punching against my ribs and felt the need in that very moment to stab him directly in he heart.
“Where is he at the moment?”
“With his father,” I said. “Perhaps discussing how to civilly remove you from the palace.”
“Norvack believes he has such power… he doesn’t.”
“That’s your fear,” I said, “which is why you are so determined to downplay the very notion that he could.”
“I am in no fear of your husband. But tell me, Cinder. What are your fears? Wait. Don’t inform me of it just yet. Perhaps I even know of one, the strongest fear of all.”
“You know nothing.”
“Is that a fact?” he asked, arching a brow. He began adjusting his sleeves and the cuffs of his jacket, feigning nonchalance. “Where is your handmaiden?”
“I’m not certain.”
“Perhaps Norvack is.”
“What are you going on of now?”
“Your husband and handmaiden seem to have gotten quite comfortable around one another. Dancing with her in the ballroom on the day of my arrival, escorting her to Hadenville for the cure to my serum. There are often times I will see them speaking with one another and she looks at him as if she were an innocent doe, and he a God amongst men.”
“You’re preposterous,” I snapped.
I turned to walk away from him as his only goal was to enrage me. I didn’t wish to provide him with such satisfaction, but he reached out for me, sliding his hands against either side of my waist and enfolding my arms over my stomach. He pulled me back against him, pressing me against his chest as hard as he could. I breathed out in surprise as his nose skimmed across the back of my neck and moved into my hair.
“You smell divine. Something of a flower.”
“Release me.
He moved his head aside, resting his chin on my shoulder. “No. Because I believe you must become aware that your husband may not love or lust for you as much as you wish to believe. Or, as much as he did prior.”
“Prior to what?”
“He spends so much spare time with the handmaiden --”
“Let me go or I shall retrieve your sword and slice you as I did the first born son of the king before dragging your carcass to the end of the forest and allowing every hawk within distance to have his way with what’s left of your flesh. I have threatened you many times. This shall be the finality.”
As he released me, I never looked back.
I reentered the palace and immediately asked a servant of Norvack’s whereabouts. When he informed me that he didn’t know, I then asked of Brigita, and was led down the corridor and told to go to the chapel, as she had been there praying for the family.
The walk felt more ominous than I would have liked.
I moved throughout gradually, passing many rooms prior to the chapel, including one in which a door had been left ajar.
I continued on, but stopped in my tracks the moment I heard Norvack’s voice coming from that very room. When I went back to peek in, I craned my neck and saw a woman standing on the other side, her back toward me as her face was focused on his. Norvack became louder, his voice booming as he spoke rather harshly of lies and deceit and betrayal. Of who’s, I wasn’t certain.
I pushed back on the door a little, trying as best as I could not to make a single sound, and when the woman turned around, I realized it was in fact Brigita. Her blond hair shined against the candlelight that covered the room, and smothered the walls. Her bright blue eyes were warm and welcoming to him.
I stiffened my back as she traipsed over and called him “Prince” in a light and breathy tone, as if she were calling for her lover in rapture. And when he turned to her with tears in his eyes, she touched his face with her delicate fingertips as if it had belonged to her, and not me.
My stomach sank to a pit so far deep inside of myself, to a place that I didn’t know existed.
And then he dropped to his knees before her and wrapped his arms around her waist, clutching her as tightly as he could. And she completely embraced him, bending forward a little and holding his head in her arms. She pat his head as he quietly wept against the fabric of her gown, staining it with his tears. When he stopped to look up at her, as if she were some kind of savior who had just rescued him from his own insanity, I couldn’t take anymore and turned away. I felt sick, certain I was going to vomit all over myself right there on the marble floors of the corridor. I raced from the room and ran as fast as I could upstairs to our chambers, slamming and locking the door behind me. I leaned back against it and looked down at my stomach. I placed my hand over it and breathed out.
He had never looked at me like that, the way he stared up at her. Not once. And I wasn’t sure if it was a good thing, or a bad one.
Norvack never came to me that night. And I never got a single second of sleep. My head was pressed firmly against the pillow, but I could never shut my eyes. The ceiling provided me much comfort as the night slinked away and dawn furiously approached.
The Conjecture
I helped the queen with her gown as we prepared for the anniversary banquet.
“I’m still baffled you never corrected the king. What if he is to realize that this day doesn’t belong to that of your wedding, but --”
She quickly placed her index finger to her lips, indicating I silence myself.
I nodded and stepped back as she went over to the mirror and tussled with the skirt of her gown. It was the color of pure gold, as beautiful as ever. She practically gleamed as it glided across the floor. Her long auburn locks flowed against the small of her back. I retrieved a brush from the dresser table and began stroking her hair.
“Tonight shall belong to us,” she said. “No matter if it did in the past, or night.”
“This is not just any night! This is meant to be the night in which you married a man you claim to love above all others, even your own son.”
“I never said such a thing, Cinder.”
“I didn’t mean it as it sounded. I apologize. I only meant that the king should have the common decency to, at the very least, acknowledge the woman he has been married to for nearly twenty-eight years.”
“He has acknowledged me many
times as the banquet grew closer, Cinderella.”
“In what way?”
She looked at me for only a second in the mirror and then turned away.
“Thank you for brushing my hair,” she said. “I don’t need anymore of it.”
I placed the brush aside and reached for her headdress.
“I don’t wish to wear it for tonight.”
I lifted my brows in surprise. “Are you certain?”
“I am. Belarus appreciates my hair and wishes to see it tonight.”
“Oh.” I took the headdress over to her dressing table, gently placing it in the seat of her chair.
“How is Norvack this evening?”
“I don’t know, I haven’t spoken to him all day.”
She sighed agitatedly. “What’s of the matter now?”
“I don’t wish to discuss it tonight. If you desire for this night to belong to you, I certainly don’t wish to steal it. Especially for such petty reasons.”
“You shall inform me later?”
I shrugged. “Perhaps.”
She nodded. “You shall indeed inform me later.”
As her handmaidens entered, they all greeted us both with curtsies. I noticed Esme standing in the back, appearing a bit panicked. As each maiden presented Eliza with a gift, I made my way to Esme. She smiled at me, weakly, as if she were attempting to hide the truth.
“You look wonderful tonight,” I said, admiring her sapphire gown.
“As do you, Princess.”
“You appear troubled.”
“I don’t mean to. I am only a bit tired, is all.”
“That’s all. For certain?”
“Yes,” she replied. “For certain.”
“Forgive me if I don’t believe a single word that comes from your mouth in this very moment.”
“I have no reason to lie, Cinderella.”
“You have every reason if the trouble is as I suspect.”
She crossed her arms over her chest and stared straight ahead.
“John wishes to no longer see me.”
“He shall see you,” I said. “He lives within these walls, he shall most certainly see you.”
“You’re not understanding.” She reached for her head. “He no longer wishes for us to be intimate. He’s decided that he must keep more focus as Norvack’s right hand and less upon me or us together. He claims I’m too much of a distraction.”
I was more suspicious than elated as I would have been had this news come much, much earlier instead of only mere weeks following my attempt on John’s life.
“When did he discuss this with you?”
“Last night. After we made love.”
“Quite the noble one,” I mocked.
“Please, don’t, Cinderella.”
She raced from Eliza’s room and hurried downstairs, carrying the edge of her gown all the way as she moved. I attempted to follow after despite her nearly being much too fast for me.
“Esmeralda!” I called after, but she never stopped.
Once I caught up with her in the corridor, she began sobbing almost uncontrollably.
“I believed we would marry.”
I cocked my head. “Did you truly believe such nonsense? I told you from the very beginning who he was. This isn’t a moment in which I plan to gloat as there is no reason in doing so. I never wanted you to feel such pain. I never wanted you to feel as I had felt once.”
I stopped and shut my eyes, realizing my choice of words.
She wiped her face with the back of her hand and made a face at me. “How you felt?”
“Men like John are all over Denmark,” I stated. “I know him so well because I know of men exactly like him.”
“You believed Norvack was much like him.”
“Oh, certainly! But Norvack is everything a man like John wished he could be. He is a man of dignity and loyalty and honor. John is much like Willem. He takes as often as he wishes but will never give back even half of it to anyone. Selfish, manipulative bastards are all the same.”
“I cared deeply for him,” she said.
I stroked her hair to her waist.
“If I could advise you on a single thing,” I began, “and you are not obligated to this. But I wish for you to know that you are worth more than whatever John was willing to give, which didn’t seem as if it were much at all. And a man like that will never deserve someone as yourself. Never, ever believe that because a man of power shows a bit of interest it means more than only that. Be wise in your actions from here on, and you shall be rewarded in time.”
A thin line formed between her brows. And then she smiled. “I never imagined you saying those words to me. They seemed more gracious than normal.”
“There are moments in which I find myself more vulnerable than others,” I said. “That moment is now.”
“I don’t know whether to feel appreciated or in the manner of a charity case.”
She laughed, as did I.
Brigita approached us then and I wanted to run off into the other direction. I hadn’t seen her since last night. And since she never knew I was there, watching with a keen eye as she embraced my husband as he embraced her, she would have no idea why my reactions to her would be so aloof.
But in the moment, I didn’t care.
“Mistress,” she said with a bow. “Esmeralda. The queen is requesting your presence back in her chambers.”
We watched as she excused herself. Brigita moved in closer then.
“The Sheriff is asking for you,” she whispered.
“At this very moment? Isn’t he aware of tonight’s banquet?”
She nodded. “He is. All the more reason he has insisted upon seeing you.”
“Wonderful. Alright, I shall see to him, I suppose.” I began shuffling past her and then stopped. “Have you seen Norvack? He never joined me in our chambers last night and I’ve yet to see him today.”
She looked aside, her eyes suspiciously roaming about. It made me more angry than nervous at her possible answer.
“I have not seen him. I overheard the servants speaking of him earlier. Apparently he mentioned something of riding.”
“That is quite interesting as his horse is still within the confines of the stables as far as I am aware. Perhaps he shall show soon, in time for the banquet.”
I hurried off in the other direction, fuming.
When I reached the Sheriff’s room, he was resting in a chair that sat in the corner, holding what appeared to be an apple in his hand.
I slammed the door shut, which forced him to jump up in absolute terror. His eyes had enlarged, his skin colored. I snickered if only to keep from rolling my eyes too hard.
He exhaled harshly when he realized it was only me who had come in.
“What do you wish for? The banquet is soon to begin!”
“Where is your husband?” he asked.
“I don’t know. He’s still not aware of your presence. If you wish to change that --”
He waved a hand at me and bit into his piece of fruit. “I visited Willem’s grave again.”
“When?”
“As the guests arrived.”
I picked up my gown and traipsed over to him. “My God, are you completely mad? I told you to remain out of sight! What if you had been seen by someone of importance? What if the king or queen came about once the guards noticed you lurking again?”
“I kept myself well in disguise, pretending as if I were a stable man.”
“A stable man?” I pressed my hand against my forehead and slowly counted to ten to calm my now rattling nerves. “Given your current actions, I would beg to differ on such a phrase.”
“I could turn you in at any moment.” He pointed. “Remember that this is why you’re keeping me, Cinder girl.”
“What do you wish for?” I snapped. “I don’t have all evening to spend in here with you.”
“There is something wrong with Willem’s grave.”
“He is buried inside of it. I s
ee no issue there. Is that all?”
“No. The stone isn’t solid. The ground is soft and it moves around a bit. The slightest tapping forces it to wobble.”
“It’s winter,” I said, annoyed. “What on earth do you expect?”
“I expect it to be as stable and solid as the few others surrounding. This was Belarus’ first born -- the grave should be treated as such.”
“The weather has changed, the ground will no longer be as solid as it is in later months. If Willem’s stone is moving, perhaps it wasn’t placed properly by the king’s men.”
He tapped his finger against his lip and thought for a moment. “Or perhaps, it was a diversion.”
“What are you getting at old man?”
“I don’t believe Willem is in that grave,” he said defiantly.
“If the man is not buried six feet under or a tomb in Rome, where in God’s name do you believe he is?”
“Someplace… alive.”
I stood frozen, confused at his words. Had he said them with a snicker, as if he himself could not believe them either? Or was he genuine? Either way, I began to believe that his time away should have been spent within the same walls of those who often vowed to harm themselves, instead of roaming the streets of England.
“Are you joking?” I asked with a laugh. “Please tell me that you are in fact not as serious as the look in your eyes at this very moment.”
“I am quite serious, Cinder. I do believe the prince may still be alive.”
“On what grounds?” I stopped and thought a moment. “Never mind. Please refrain from answering that.”
“It is beginning to make much sense to me.”
“Not to me. Not in the slightest -- you sound mad!”
“It would make much sense to you as well if you were to listen to my reasoning’s behind such a theory.”
“I don’t wish to listen to your reasoning’s!” I rattled my head, still baffled by his words. “Do you realize how deeply insane you’re becoming? Positively insane! This room must be filled with the voices of the dead and you’ve succumbed to such delusions! I killed that man myself! I stabbed him straight through the heart with Norvack’s sword and I watched him die. I heard you say quite clearly that you needed to retrieve his body from the river, and you did. You placed him in the square and he was found. Dead, and remained, dead!”