“I’m fine,” she said, and reached back to touch Amie’s hand. “Keep braiding. Tell me more about the sprites.”
At breakfast she decided to pay more attention to the conversation. She watched as the queen, who insisted Cinderella address her as Marion, settled herself in her chair. She was rounded, like a plump sugar bun. The embroidered material of her clothes stretched around her rolled waist, the high neck of her dress unable to slenderize her figure. Her heavy breasts were shoved into a corset Cinderella couldn’t imagine lacing shut.
She was magnificently grand.
“Good morning, Christina,” she said in a deep voice. It was a voice everyone listened to. “Did you sleep well?”
She nodded a short curtsey with her head instead of her body. She had learned quickly that it was the best way to show respect to her in-laws who still ruled over her, now in more ways than one. “Yes, Marion, thank you.”
A grin pushed Marion’s fat cheeks upward. “Good. You sound more comfortable using my name, darling. As it should be.” She waved her hand and servants began filling her plate with food. Her husband had not yet arrived.
Rowland cleared his throat. “Mother, I would like to sit on the council today. I—”
“No, Rowland.” She broke an eggshell with her knife. The crack sent a shudder down Cinderella’s spine. “You want to give out more freedom, and no one is ready for that yet. Let them ransack. There is a natural order to these things.”
“That is hardly fair.”
Her eyes lifted. A line of grease from her food glistened on her chin. “Since when have we been fair?”
Straightening in her chair, Cinderella looked at her empty plate. The morning sun from the windows heightened its emptiness. She and Rowland would not eat until the king arrived.
He finally entered, his pudgy form relaxed and his mustache neatly trimmed. His cheeks, always red from heat or wine, were chubby around his long, straight nose. This gave him a jovial appearance, although he rarely laughed.
He had told Cinderella to call him William. Not many people had that privilege, so it surprised Cinderella when she discovered that Isabel, a servant standing behind his empty chair, called him William to his face, not King or Majesty. Isabel was an exception to everything.
Sitting in his chair, he smiled at Cinderella as servants filled his plate, and then Rowland’s and Cinderella’s. She sipped at a warm meat broth placed before her. She recognized the addition of pepper she had suggested to Fortune, the head cook.
She looked up at Isabel, now standing next to William’s chair. The fairhaired woman stood straight, her shoulders thrust back to emphasize her tiny waist beneath the apron secured by a perfect bow at the small of her back. William was staring at that tiny waist. His fingers tore at a piece of bread, and Isabel smiled.
That night, alone, Cinderella shivered in her bed. She held on to the blankets pulled up to her chin. One of them was fur. It smelled of death. She pushed it aside and sat up. The cold air wrapped around her and squeezed. Her mind was dark. She thought of her old bed at home, the bugs scurrying across her toes in the middle of the night, the pigeons cooing in the straw roof above her, the constant emptiness deep inside her being. It had been a cold night like this one when Eolande had come to her. She had called herself a godmother. She had been beautiful and light, like sun in a meadow—until in the daylight she became an old woman, cheery and round with spun-silver hair. So much of her seemed like an illusion.
She got out of bed and lit a candle before opening a long, cold wardrobe. The door creaked. She needed something she could get into without help, and she finally found a long-sleeved overdress lined with fur. In the candlelight it looked as ornate as any gown, fastened in front with silver leaf-shaped clasps. She set down her candle and quickly put on the overdress.
In the dark hallways, her candle flame cast flickering shadows all around her. She had an idea of where Eolande might be, but she didn’t know how to get there or if she was allowed. The prison was rumored to be the darkest place in the kingdom.
2
Favors
The next morning the kitchen smelled of blood. It was splattered on the wood countertops and splashed across the floor. Cinderella watched thin red streams trickle between the stones.
Rowland’s hunting party had done well; fifteen ducks, three pheasants, and eight rabbits hung on a long, thick wire in a corner. The red liquid dripped steadily from their limp bodies swaying back and forth in the cool breeze from an open door. The larger kills, which consisted of five deer and an elk, were being gutted and bled outside. Fortune seemed to find great joy in taking care of the smaller kills. She raised her cleaver and brought it down with one smooth movement of her muscular arm. Thwack!
“I am surprised at you, Christina,” she said with a deep laugh as she tossed the severed duck head into a basket near the counter where she worked. She had only recently started calling Cinderella by her first name at her constant requests. “His Highness came down here after one of his hunting parties. He wanted to see what we do to his kills. I think the boy went and threw up. Turned as pale as a leek!”
Cinderella leaned forward in her chair—an elegant padded one a servant had brought in from the dining hall, despite her protests. “I used to do this, Fortune. I used to chop heads off like that. I used to get blood all the way up my arms. Rose liked her meat extra fresh, so she hired a hunter to bring it in instead of buying it at the market. Who had to clean it and skin it and gut it? Me.”
Listening to herself, she laughed inside, mostly because she was not required to do those things anymore. Still, a part of her hated to let it go completely. She leaned back in her chair and lifted her feet to stretch her calves. She was tired from her night of wandering the castle.
She had found the prison, but only near dawn. The guard, his eyes widening at the sight of her, had told her she wasn’t allowed in that part of the castle. Only with permission from the king and queen could he allow anyone to enter, even her Royal Highness the Princess. His meaty fingers tightened around the hilt of his sword. His eyes glinted with what she could only guess was fear. She imagined Marion’s orders given to him in her deep voice and commanding, heavy-bodied presence. He would never go against those orders.
Thwack! Thwack!
Fortune tossed two duck feet into a shallow, water-filled bowl. The other cooks in the kitchen bustled behind her. Some came in and out of the doorway, either heading to market or coming back with armfuls of leafy greens and vegetables and sacks of soft, white flour only the rich could afford. Some of the food was grown on the castle grounds, but not in the winter when it was carted in from the warmer southern part of the continent. By the time they arrived, many of the vegetables had wilted, but the cooks revived them in bowls of cold water and vinegar. There were such bowls along one long counter, green leaves spilling over their sides.
Cinderella liked the order and familiarity, the smell of the vinegar and spices that reminded her of her mother, who had never needed to cook. In those days, the house was filled with servants and luxuries for the family—but, like Cinderella, she found pleasure in working with her hands, creating magic for the palate.
“There you go again,” Fortune said as she leaned across the counter, grinning. “You have that look on your face like you’re drifting in a dream.”
She smiled and remembered Fortune saying something about Rowland’s face the color of a leek. “I think he has a delicate heart,” she said, imagining his disgust at shooting an arrow through an animal, but doing it anyway because he was a man and a prince and it was expected. Whenever he held her close, there was tenderness in his touch that she guessed did not exist in most men. That had nothing to do with the magic, she hoped.
“Delicate heart, yes,” Fortune said, grinning as she picked up a smaller knife and slid it down the duck’s back. “He must have the most intelligent sort of heart to have picked you, my dear.”
“A lucky accident,” she laughed. She leaned
forward again, wishing she could step out of her heavy dress and put on the peasant clothing most of the servants in the kitchen wore—the simple earthy browns and creams, faded and threadbare on the edges from repeated washing. Fortune’s billowy white sleeves were pushed up her arms as she worked. She was large, like a man, but her rope of braided hair was as bright as a young girl’s.
“Accident, hah!” Fortune peered at her through milky-gray eyes and wagged her bloody knife in the air. “You have yet to tell me the story, Christina. You know the castle is still ablaze with gossip about you and your Prince Charming. You know that old woman in the prison keeps saying your name. Nobody knows what really happened.”
“I heard she practices dark magic,” one of the cooks said as she approached with a sack of barley in her arms. She stopped to lean close to Cinderella’s face. “I heard,” she said, lowering her voice, “that they tried to put her to death, but she lived. Only dark magic can do that, y’know.”
Cinderella stood up, half a foot taller than the young girl, who suddenly cowered.
“I-I’m sorry, Your Highness. I didn’t mean to be disrespectful.”
“What else have you heard?” she demanded. For the first time since becoming a princess, she stood tall and proud, keenly aware of the thin gold circlet on her head. She had sworn to herself that she would never hurt one of the servants, either emotionally or physically, with her power. But at that moment, she knew that if the girl did not answer her question, she would slap her. She already imagined the red handprint blossoming on that sun-browned cheek.
The girl whimpered as she said, “I promise that’s all I’ve heard, Your Highness. She was arrested for magic, and the king tried to have her put to death. It might be gossip.”
“It might be.” She stretched her fingers, surprised at the anger flowing through her. It left quickly, and she softened her expression and touched the girl’s shoulder. “Thank you for being honest. You may return to your work.”
The kitchen fell strangely silent, and Cinderella looked at Fortune, who was gutting the duck with more concentration than was needed. A child, five or six years old, looked up from her stool in the corner of the kitchen. A dead chicken lay in her lap, and she plucked out the feathers. They floated around her like snow, some of them swirling toward the open doorway, drifting to the blood-spattered floor. Later, after Cinderella was gone, she imagined the child on her hands and knees with a bucket of soapy water, scrubbing the stones until her fingers bled.
That evening, she dismissed Amie as soon as she helped her out of her dress. “But your hair, Your Highness....”
“I can handle it myself.”
When she was gone, Cinderella stood in front of her full-length mirror and studied the crown still on her head. The gold should have shone brightly in the last light of day filtering through the windows, but it didn’t. It looked dull. It felt heavy, even though she knew it was light in her hands.
She unpinned her hair and it tumbled down to her shoulders just as Rowland entered from the adjoining bedroom. He wore only his breeches. He put a hand to his chest and said, “I missed you last night.”
She took the crown from her head and turned to him. “Rowland, did you know there are children working in the kitchen?”
He slipped the crown from her hand and set it on the bed. “Of course there are children in the kitchen. They belong to the women.” He narrowed his eyes. “What were you doing in there?”
Clamping her mouth shut, she realized her mistake. She walked past him and climbed into bed. He followed her with his gaze. “Christina?”
“I like the kitchen,” she said, fluffing her hair across the pillows. “It reminds me of home.”
“I thought you hated that place.”
“I did, for the most part.” She turned on her side, away from him. She didn’t want to look at him when she spoke about her past. Somehow, if she didn’t look at him, she didn’t mind telling him things she could never tell anyone else. It might have been how carefully he listened, but it seemed deeper than that.
He climbed in next to her. Curling her knees to her chest, she hugged them tight as she said, “I hated being told what to do, when to talk, when to sleep. I hated not being able to get to my parents’ things in the trunk Rose kept in her room. I hated that my body hurt all the time, that I was always hungry, that Edith and Lucy did everything they could to make me uncomfortable. I had to gut and clean the animals just like Fortune did in the kitchen today.”
“You were in the kitchen when they butchered the meat?”
“I go down there all the time. My mother died when I was young, but not before she taught me how to cook and use spices. I love the kitchen.”
She felt Rowland’s hands on her shoulders. He gently nudged her to turn to him. “So you’ve seen children in the kitchen and you’re worried for them?”
“I’m afraid they’ll be worked too hard.”
“Did you see one of them overworked?”
“No, not exactly. She was only plucking a chicken.”
“Then what is there to worry about?”
She thought of the girl once more, picturing her on her hands and knees scrubbing blood off the floor. She imagined Eolande in the dark prison, wasting away from want, somehow unable to work her magic—because if she could, she would not still be in the prison.
Rowland was wrong.
“There’s everything to worry about,” she said softly, pulling away from him. “Just because you don’t see things doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”
“I know that.”
“Like the—” She almost said, like the prisoners, and wanted to ask him if he could help her into the prison. She stopped herself. She wasn’t ready to tell him about Eolande. Not yet. He still thought chance had brought them together, when it was nothing so haphazard.
His voice came to her through the fear creeping into her heart. The way he said, “Christina,” and began to untie the ribbons on her chemise, made her think of vines and how good it felt when he touched her. He kissed her nose, and then both eyelids, and then reached over to grab her crown, which he had set on the bed earlier.
“You are royalty,” he said, holding the crown up to her face. The gold looked beautiful up close, the way he held it at an angle, his eyes reflecting the shimmer. “I don’t know how many times I have to remind you that all you must do is speak and anyone will help you. You have power, just like I do.”
His eyes burned through her, more serious than she had seen before. Yes, she had power. She had felt it for only a moment standing over the young girl in the kitchen. It had been foreign, like something hot when it should be cold.
“I understand this is all very new to you,” he said, lowering the crown. “I’ll try to help you more. You’ve adjusted to the castle, so now we’ll work on other things.” He quickly retied the ribbons on her chemise, closing the material over her skin.
She looked up, confused as to why he didn’t go farther. He always wanted her. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No.” He helped her lie down and smoothed her hair back from her face. “I can see you’re tired and troubled. There must be something I can do to help you.”
She thought of the river by her home. “I miss the water and the sky and trees,” she said. “I used to go for walks, but it’s too cold to do that now.”
He laughed and asked, “Do you need to get away from the castle? Maybe we could go for a ride tomorrow? Somewhere safe, of course.”
Her heart jumped and she sat up. His offer sounded wonderful. Although she felt protected inside the castle, she had been within its walls too long. The dark corners were becoming too dark, seeping into her thoughts. “Yes,” she said, and hugged him. “Yes, that would be lovely.”
He laughed and squeezed her. “You’re so innocent, Christina. Is that all it takes to get you excited? I thought you were still in love with the castle, otherwise I would have offered to take you riding weeks ago. You have your own horse. I name
d her Princess.”
“Silly.” She laughed and curled against him, hooking her ankle around his calf. She looked at the soft hair on his arms, how it overlapped in a perfect crisscross pattern, how it made her think of goose down and the way she missed such a simple act as sweeping feathers across a floor.
The meadow smelled fresh. Newly sprouted grass swayed back and forth in the afternoon breeze. Thawing snow glistened among the green.
Cinderella’s tattered shoes, almost worn through to the heels, left footprints in the snow. Her toes tingled in the cold.
Someone was following her.
She stopped near the river still frozen in spots, a glassy sheen across the top, crusty in the cold-warm air.
She heard her shallow breaths. She smelled the soil and the damp fur on the rabbits that had traveled by only moments ago. She smelled the ice and the water and the stones. She smelled him when he found her, when he touched her hand and she turned around to look into a pair of eyes that shifted color in the light. When he spoke to her, his mouth was a blossoming white flower.
She sat up, her chest covered in sweat. She waited until her breathing was steady again and then slipped out of Rowland’s limp arms. He stayed fast asleep as she crawled out of bed and put on her overdress. This time she took her crown that Rowland had put back in its box on the bedside table and placed it gently on her head.
Stepping into the hallway, she nodded to the guard outside her door.
“Would you like me to accompany you, Your Highness?”
“No.”
This time she knew exactly where to go. She held the candle high enough to light the dark halls. It made the tapestries flicker. She stopped at a painting of the royal family.
Lifting her candle, she focused the light on herself in the painting. It was huge, hung so high she could hardly touch the bottom of the frame. Her face looked proud, unlike she had ever seen herself before. She knew she hadn’t felt that way standing still for the portrait, and oddly, her crown looked grander than it was—the way it felt on her head right now.
Bonded: Three Fairy Tales, One Bond Page 2