When I neared the yacht, a lone worker called out. “You can’t go over there, miss. They’re preparing for a royal departure.”
I turned around, and he started. “My apologies, Your Highness. I didn’t recognise you.”
I approached him. “Have you seen my sister, sir?” I thought quickly. “She came to see the others off, but I have a message for her.”
He scratched his head. “I can’t say that I have, Your Highness. And I’ve been working here since this morning, save for a couple of short breaks.” He eyed me sideways, but I ignored him. His work habits were the farthest thing from my mind.
“That whole section has been off limits since first thing this morning. Except for those sailing on the yacht, of course.”
Many years ago my father had named the royal vessel Viktoria after his young bride, but the people seemed to feel it would be disrespectful to call it by name and invariably referred to it as the yacht.
I handed him my reins. “Could you watch my horse for me please? I won’t be long.” I hoped I was telling the truth, and that I would be returning with my sister by my side.
He didn’t question my request or even look surprised. No one in the city expected much sense from me. Instead they all shared a sort of sympathetic affection for their Sleeping Princess. As if I were a puppy or a small child.
I strode quickly towards the Viktoria trying to identify the figures on deck. A small handful of sailors moved around, preparing the ship to sail. Where had the rest of the crew and passengers gone? If I had been one of them, I would have been watching the action on deck.
I hesitated. Should I make my way up the gangplank and accost one of them? I bit my lip. I didn’t want to inform the sailors that my sister was missing. The fewer who knew the better. But the ship would have to be searched.
I still hoped to bring her back quietly and without a fuss. But if she wasn’t here, then my father would have to send out search parties. And Celine wouldn’t like the consequences when they found her. I had to at least attempt to shield her. I owed her that much.
I stepped forward, lifting my skirts in preparation for crossing onto the ship, when an odd flash of colour caught my eye. I let the material fall and turned in a slow circle, scanning the open dock.
There. I saw it again, behind a pile of barrels covered by an old net. The whole area reeked of fish, and I scrunched up my nose as I headed over to investigate.
I trod softly, hope filling my heart. Rounding the barrels, I gasped in relief.
She crouched behind the barrier, her eyes peering between a small gap.
“Celine!”
She jumped, losing her balance and falling onto her rear. “Celeste! What are you doing here?”
“Saving you from a lot of trouble.” I put my hands on my hips. “What were you thinking, Celine?”
She eyed me angrily. “How did you know I was here?”
I stared at her, the faint stirrings of a headache telling me I had been stupid. I should have thought of an answer on the ride over.
“I went to have another look at that new dress of yours. I wanted to compare its material to the one the seamstress made for me. I saw all the missing items and rushed straight here.”
Celine narrowed her eyes. “But how did you know to come here?”
I waved my hands around vaguely. “I didn’t. I just started riding. And then I thought maybe Rafe and William could help. And Marie. I thought one of them might have a good idea…”
I let myself trail off as if I hadn’t had a plan at all but had merely run to my brother. Apparently my performance had been convincing because the pain in my head faded away.
“Great,” she said. “The one time your irrational thought patterns actually lead you to the right place.”
My relief at finding her receded into confusion. “But Celine, what are you doing here? Behind the barrels, I mean.” I pinched my nose closed. “It smells terrible.”
She grimaced. “I left well before the others. I was supposed to arrive first and stowaway with plenty of time to spare. Only I forgot that I wouldn’t be able to bring a horse. And it took the longest time to get here on foot.”
“I thought you didn’t want to go, now that Mother and Uncle Horace are part of the voyage.”
“I didn’t want anyone guessing my plan. And it’s not entirely untrue. They do make the prospect less appealing. It’s still preferable to being left behind with you, though.” She glanced at me again. “No offense.”
“I’m sorry it didn’t work out.” I wasn’t. But it seemed better to try to lure her back to the palace with sympathy. “But don’t you think being at the palace with me would be preferable to hanging around with an old, fishy net?”
“I’m not going back.” Her eyes had returned to the ship. “I’ve been waiting for the rest of them to go below deck. Mother invited all the passengers and the officers to the state cabin for a celebratory drink to christen the voyage.”
“There are still sailors on deck, though.”
Celine still didn’t look at me. “Do you remember Tom?”
“Tom?”
“You know, the cabin boy from when Father used to take us on trips as children. We were the same age and the best of friends.”
“Oh yes, I do remember you and some partner-in-crime getting up to all sorts of mischief. Don’t tell me he’s still part of the crew.”
She nodded. “He’s a midshipman now. And he’s promised me that none of the sailors will try to stop me. That’s how I was going to get on board originally. And he’s the one who told me about the tradition of a christening drink. ‘Just in case,’ he said. I didn’t think I’d need the information, so it’s a good thing he’s more thorough than I am.”
“Celine…” I couldn’t help some uneasiness creeping into my voice. “Surely you realise I can’t let you stowaway on that ship.”
She stood up finally and faced me.
“Please, Celeste! Is it really too much to ask for a little adventure? Our mother will be there, for goodness sake.”
I winced. “If it were up to me, you know you could go on all the adventures you please. But Father will be so angry. I couldn’t possibly.”
Celine sighed. “I was afraid you would say that.”
Her hand swept out from behind her back, a blur of wood catching my eye. With anyone else, I would have blocked the move in time. But she was my baby sister, and she had taken me completely by surprise.
Darkness consumed me.
Chapter 15
An unpleasant pulling sensation and the sound of voices dragged me towards consciousness. But my head hurt so badly I didn’t dare open my eyes. I had experienced headaches like this before, during the first year of the curse, and I knew that light would make it worse.
I kept them tightly shut and tried to remember what I had done to bring on such a violent reaction. My sluggish mind refused to cooperate.
Eventually my body settled into stillness, and the sound faded. The light behind my eyelids had also dimmed, however, so I risked cracking them open. The dark of my surroundings gave no hint of my location. Was I in my bed?
No, the surface beneath me felt hard and…wet?
Sudden memory returned, and I tried to sit up fast. My head swirled and when two hands pressed me back down, I let them.
Slowly I reopened my eyes and focussed on the face above me. Celine. I groaned. “What have you done? Where are we?”
“We’re in the hold. But only for now. Once the ship is out to sea, the wind won’t make it easy for them to return. And you know Mother. She doesn’t approve of too much exertion. She’ll let us stay.”
So many thoughts began to rush through my mind that I knew I needed to keep my mouth shut or risk uttering the wrong thing. My head still ached too much to make thinking easy. Slowly I raised my hand to feel the spot where most of the pain seemed to emanate from. A round lump had already formed under my hair.
“Sorry, Lettie.” Celine sounded genuine
ly contrite. “I’ve never used a cudgel before. It made such a horrid sound, I thought I’d killed you!”
I groaned again. “Celine! I don’t want to go to sea. I need to go back to the palace. Why in the kingdoms did you bring me down here? How did you bring me down here?”
“It wasn’t easy. I had to drag you.”
That would explain the uncomfortable sensations before I returned to full consciousness.
“Tom wouldn’t help me either. He said he couldn’t possibly assist in the abduction of a princess.” I could hear the smile in her voice. “He did carry my bag for me, though.”
An overwhelming urge to hit her swept over me. I suppressed it. “But, why?”
“Well, I originally planned to leave you on the docks. Only then I thought I’d killed you. And after I worked out you were still alive, I realised I couldn’t just abandon you while you were unconscious. Anything could have happened to you.”
“I think anything did happen to me. It certainly feels like it.” The pain in my head had subsided enough for me to start registering all the other places that hurt. I imagined Celine dragging me up the gangplank and down the hold stairs all on her own and winced. It would take a long time for all the bruises to heal. “Celine, I insist you let me off this ship!”
“I’m really sorry, Lettie, I can’t do that.”
I took a breath to call for help, and she clapped a hand over my mouth. I bit it, and she yelped.
“Lettie!” She gave me a wounded look and cradled the hand against her chest. I narrowed my eyes at her.
Slowly I pushed myself up to a sitting position. She watched me warily but kept her distance. I tried to stand but fell to one side, off balance. I clenched my teeth, willing my body to return to functionality.
And then the ship tipped in the other direction. Oh. So it hadn’t been me. The ship had already sailed, and we had hit the first of the waves.
I didn’t bother trying to push myself back up this time. If it was already too late, I wanted to give my head more of a chance to settle first.
I tried to think through the consequences of Celine’s rash actions. I had made no provisions for leaving. My network would be leaderless. How long would it take them to realise I was missing? I didn’t contact each of them every night, so it might take them a while to realise no one had heard from me. Especially since most of them knew only one or two of the others.
I trusted them to continue with their assignments in my absence. But they would be concerned. They might even do something rash in an attempt to find me. And if they discovered anything new, who would they report it to?
I trembled with relief that I had possessed the forethought to send a copy of all my notes to the duchess. She would be at the palace soon enough and could finally inform my father of the rebellion. Hopefully my agents would know to go to her.
Of course, she would be equally concerned to discover me absent. And what of my father and brothers. What would they think when they discovered both Celine and I had disappeared?
I traced back over the events of the day and remembered my horse. Hopefully the dock worker would take him back to the palace and report our conversation. From there, it wouldn’t take much intelligence to work out both Celine and I were on the yacht.
Another horror reared its head. Princess Celeste and Aurora both mysteriously vanished on the same day. If even one person saw through the coincidence…
My head pulsed with a new surge of pain, and I didn’t know if it was the curse sending a warning or my fear heightening the pain from the bludgeoning. My only consolation was the continued absence of word on my aunt. If she escaped her prison, I felt sure the news would reach me.
As long as she stayed safely behind her wall of thorns, the kingdom remained safe for another day. Perhaps I would even have time to return before she found a way to escape.
I wiggled around until I found the most comfortable position, leaning against a bundle of unidentified material. I didn’t worry about staining my dress, I couldn’t examine it properly in the low light, but I felt fairly certain it would be unsalvageable.
My eyes fell on a large lump. Celine’s bag. Since this was all her fault, she would be splitting her dresses with me. Thank goodness she had already had her growth spurt. Of course, I would have to scavenge something suitable for Aurora.
The thought of abandoning my secondary persona for the length of the voyage didn’t even cross my mind. We would be sailing for weeks. I would go crazy if I was stuck as Celeste that whole time.
Of course William would be a problem. He could hardly avoid questioning Aurora’s presence on the ship.
Strangely enough, I didn’t consider avoiding him, any more than I had considered remaining Celeste. He had become such a fixture of my life as both Celeste and Aurora that I couldn’t imagine having him in only one.
“I’ll check if it’s down here. I’m sure I saw it carried on board.” Uncle Horace called the words upwards as he began to descend the ladder into the hold. We couldn’t hear the reply, if there was one, but we heard him muttering to himself as his feet found the floor.
Celine and I met each other’s eyes in shared horror. For a moment, all our differences were forgotten. Uncle Horace was the last person either of us would have chosen to discover our presence.
He turned around and peered into the gloom, still grumbling away. At first his eyes passed over us, and hope stirred. Perhaps he wouldn’t see us in the darkness. Neither of us had even taken a breath yet.
But then his gaze swung back towards us, his mutterings silenced. It had just taken his brain a moment to catch up with what his eyes had seen.
His whole body seemed to swell, and for a fascinated moment I forgot all my aches and pains and wondered if it was possible for a person to explode from rage. His eyes travelled back and forth between us and then settled on my sister.
“CELINE!”
She actually trembled and, despite my anger at her, I slid my arm around her shoulders. She was still my baby sister.
Uncle Horace opened and closed his mouth several times but seemed unable to think of the right words. Eventually he turned and climbed back up the ladder, leaving us quaking and giggling in equal measures.
That was how the rest of them found us, Rafe and William leading the group who piled down the ladder. My mother merely stuck her head over the opening to peer down at us and sigh.
I came out of the confused jumble of explanations intact, of course. Even if I hadn’t been so obviously a victim, no one believed me capable of masterminding such a plan. Or of having the desire to do so.
To maintain the charade, and with a distant hope that they might actually turn the ship around, I had a mild fit of hysterics when William helped me up on deck and I saw the ocean swells spread in a glittering carpet around the ship. Inside, however, my heart soared, and I drank in the salt scent on the breeze.
Celine’s predictions proved entirely true. Now that we were here, our mother decreed that we could stay. Celine wasn’t even to be punished. Mother promised all sorts of dire consequences upon our return but stopped short at enforcing any of them on board ship. I suspected it had something to do with her state cabin being the only place on the ship with room for me and Celine to sleep. Keeping Celine confined to her quarters would punish more than just my sister. I appreciated my mother’s restraint.
I ruthlessly raided Celine’s luggage and chose the nicer half of her gowns for myself. Celine, still reeling from the sternest lecture she’d ever received from her favourite brother, didn’t even attempt to protest. It probably helped that the lump on my head radiated pain which caused me to flinch whenever I made a sudden movement. And every time I flinched, she looked guilty.
Marie even volunteered some of her own dresses, and I took them gratefully. I had to spend my first full day on board taking up all the hems, but at least the curse considered sewing an unexceptional activity. When it came to clothes, I had full rein. I was even allowed to be grumpy
and authoritative and order my sisters around.
The chore of hemming didn’t feel in the least onerous when performed on the deck of such an immaculate sailing vessel. The elite sailors who crewed the royal yacht kept the wood scrubbed clean and the deck spick and span. The wind prevented the bright sun from becoming too hot, and I never tired of watching the foaming water race past.
Even the oldest veterans of the crew seemed to enjoy the clear weather, stopping often to admire the pod of dolphins using our bow wave for surf practice. I put the first completed dress down and leaned over the railing, stretching my hand out as far as it could go. My fingers hung in the air, a long way from touching the water, or the sleek, grey bodies, but I couldn’t help myself. A girl could dream.
A strong arm slipped around my waist and pulled me gently back. “Woah there, Princess. We wouldn’t want you going over the side.”
An unexpected shiver ran through me at William’s touch. His arm lingered after I tried to pull back, so I glanced up into his face. It was closer than I had expected, and I couldn’t read the expression in his eyes.
“I thought you were scared of the sea, Princess.” The softness of his voice maintained the illusion of a private moment, despite the sailors moving around us.
I couldn’t help the slightest of indrawn breaths. Was he testing me? I needed to think of a suitable answer, but my mind had scrambled. I tried to remind myself that the sun shone brightly, and I wore a dress. I was Celeste not Aurora in this moment, and I needed to fight to keep my eyes from matching the intensity in his.
Why hadn’t I noticed how tightly Celine’s borrowed dress squeezed my midriff? Was it a curse sensation, warning me not to allow any cracks in my performance? Or was William’s arm responsible for the effect all on its own?
“Dolphins.” I said the first word that came into my mind.
“Dolphins?” He let me go and stepped back, his voice returned to normal.
The Princess Game: A Reimagining of Sleeping Beauty (The Four Kingdoms Book 4) Page 12