I had always heard the streets of Wyndyr were quite clean compared to other cities, and maybe this was true, but I’m not sure any city seemed clean when you didn’t have shoes on. I carefully navigated around piles of horse manure and suspicious puddles. Beautiful elf women cast me quick glances. Children pointed.
As I rounded a corner, I heard some murmuring behind me. I glanced back. Two city guards were picking up their pace, heading toward me.
Were they chasing me as a vagrant? Or were they looking for the prince’s goblin girl?
I hoped it was the second option. I couldn’t have fought them.
“Hey! Girl!” one of them said.
I stopped and held out my hands to them to show I was unarmed and then I took my horns from my pocket and put them against the nubs that remained, to demonstrate that I was a goblin. It was the first time I had touched the nubs, and it gave me a tremble of anger.
“Goblin? Wasn’t the crown prince looking for a goblin?”
“It couldn’t be this goblin. Look at her!”
“Well…someone’s beaten her up good, but she’s not ugly, for a goblin.”
Although it was neither here nor there, I really hated how elves spoke of goblins. “The prince is looking for me!” I said. “Please—I’m Ellara.”
“Oh, sure. You’ve seen the signs around, I suppose. You’re not Ellara. Where did you escape from? The women’s prison? You know you won’t trick anyone. The prince has a glass slipper that will only fit Ellara’s dainty foot. Your feet won’t do.”
“What? No—I am Ellara! These are Ellara’s dainty feet!” One of the crows fluttered onto my shoulder. I was a little startled by this.
“Is she a witch?” one of the guards asked, suspicious of my crows, as—in all fairness—any sensible city guard probably would be.
“You escaped from somewhere, all right,” the other one said. “Come here.”
No, I couldn’t trust them. They might take me to the prince, or they might take me straight to prison. I bolted. The crows rushed at the guards, providing me cover to dash away, although I put my foot right in a pile of horse manure in my mad dash for the nearest side street. I heard the ominous sound of crows cawing and squawking and beating their wings behind me.
I kept running, despite the manure smeared between my toes—really, could I have been any more of a mess? I came out on a busy street of food markets. I had never been here before. I couldn’t even see the palace over the crowded buildings and tents. Everything smelled of fish. I turned every which way, trying to get my bearings.
“Shove off, only paying customers,” snapped a woman behind me, and I realized I had almost bumped into a stall of apples.
I pressed on, unsure if I was going the right way anymore. Frustration, hunger, and thirst were starting to edge in on my perseverance.
I turned down another alley stacked with boxes full of rotting fruit. Some of the apples still had an unblemished half. Maybe I could—
For a moment, I had forgotten that I couldn’t use my mouth if I wanted to. There was a big, juicy apple right in front of me. Half was brown mush, but the other half still had a crisp skin. I was so hungry…
And I couldn’t eat.
I put my face in my hands.
The crows fluttered into the alley, their wings briefly blotting out the sun above me. They settled around me. One of them fluttered toward the other end of the alley, then hopped back like it wanted me to follow.
“Do you know the way? Why are you sticking with me?”
I followed them. Nothing I could do now but trust this curious circumstance.
When I emerged onto the next street, I saw a poster plastered on a building.
Missing From Last Night’s Ball: A girl, age approx. 18, named Ellara. She has elf and goblin blood, dark horns and fangs, black hair and golden eyes, and her foot must fit into a glass slipper as proof. Please come to the Palace of Waterfalls with any information. Reward Offered.
I hoped my stepsisters had seen these signs.
This gave me the strength to go on.
The crows led me to my own home. I was relieved to see it, despite trepidation. It seemed abandoned. I jostled the door handle, but it was locked. Cook was either gone or left unconscious inside. I felt something brush my foot and saw my little friends gathered at my feet. I crouched, stroking the heads of the little mice. If only you could turn into horses now…
Still, I had come this far. I went to the well and drew up a bucket of water, washing my feet, hands, and face. I was careful, thanks to all my bruises.
Then I checked the bush where I had tossed the glass slipper last night.
It was still there. This would prove I was the girl Prince Ithrin had chosen.
I only hoped he wouldn’t change his mind when he saw me in this state. I imagined him going to sleep, laying awake, thinking about the love spell and my goblin blood, questioning his decision. And then—my poor bedraggled self approaching the palace, confirming all his fears that I wasn’t suitable to be a princess.
I’ve had enough of being humiliated. Maybe I can’t turn rags into ball gowns, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to present myself to Prince Ithrin barefoot and bedraggled.
I knew my stepmother and stepsisters hadn’t taken all their many, many clothes and accessories with them when they left. At the risk of one of the neighbors alerting the guards, I picked up a brick used to edge one of the garden beds, and threw it through the window of my house.
It was time to raid the place.
Chapter Twenty
Ithrin
Wrindel entered the hall with an older, dark-skinned man in disheveled but fine robes leaning on his arm. “Look what I found!” he called, looking as proud as a cat marching in with a mouse.
“Who is this?” I asked, as Kayska and my father gathered closer.
“Ebo Hassari, your grace,” the man said. He sounded weak.
“Mr. Hassari! Ellara told me about you. Are you all right?”
“I found him being tended to by an old fishwife at the docks,” Wrindel said.
“What happened?” I asked.
“My goodness, let me have a moment to gather myself,” Mr. Hassari said. “I am not feeling well, but at least I’ll live, thanks to the kindness of that old woman. Mrs. Lumin—Ellara’s stepmother—came to see me and asked me about my holdings. Already, I did not trust the woman, but I didn’t suspect she would attempt murder. She must have put poison in my drink.” He coughed. “The next thing I knew, I was being tended to by a stranger. She said I had been found, barely breathing, in my room at the tavern when the maid came to clean.”
“It’s nice to know they do clean the rooms at the taverns,” Wrindel said. “That has always been a subject of speculation. Glad you’ve made it through, sir.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “But where is…Mrs. Lumin?”
“The ship that left is the one Mr. Hassari came on,” Wrindel said. “I’ve sent our fastest ship after them and the merfolk will attempt to hold them up.”
“Your ship would leave without you?”
“It was not my own ship,” Mr. Hassari said. “I have not traded here in many years. I booked passage on the North Wind simply to find Ellara. So I suppose it wasn’t hard for her to take the ticket for my cabin and make up a story…” He shook his head. “Although it certainly was shameless.”
“Well, maybe we can renegotiate trade here,” I said. “Saffron farms, is it?”
“Yes, sir. The best saffron in the world if I do say so. And half of the holdings belong to Ellara. They will only grow in the years to come.”
“Really.” I was trying not to sound too interested. I didn’t like the timing of this. If Ellara returned, I didn’t want her to think I was happy to see her because I’d learned she had an inheritance after all.
My father chuckled, like he had known all along that it would work out.
“Ellara’s father was a dear, dear friend of mine,” Mr. Hassari went on. “Back wh
en we bought the land, we didn’t know if it would ever become profitable, but I am pleased to say it has, and I have wanted to tell Ellara for these past few years, but I knew I had to come in person. A letter would not do. That woman who dug her claws into him…well, my concerns were proven true, weren’t they?”
“Tenfold, I would say…and when her stepmother returns to our soil, she will pay dearly for her crimes.” I tried to remind myself that I was a prince and I had to uphold the law. I couldn’t just punch out a middle-aged woman.
“We haven’t found Ellara yet. I’m starting to think I’d better look for her myself,” I said.
“Do you have any idea where to look?” my father asked. “We have every spare man in the entire city looking for her. Isn’t it better if you’re here for her the moment she returns?”
“I don’t know if I can stand waiting around. Saddle my horse,” I told the nearest servant. “I’m getting dressed into something more suitable for riding through town.” I had dressed in an elegant gold-trimmed surcoat in the hopes of greeting Ellara in style, but to ride into the city I would rather stick to my nondescript black.
I went to my room, flinging open my wardrobe and grabbing a sturdy jacket and cloak. Then, I thought of Ellara herself, what state she could be in. She might be cold.
I am not sure what possessed me, but I left my room and turned down the corridor in a direction I never traveled. The room down the hall from mine. I opened the door for the first time in…how many years? I came in here once to gather a few of my sister’s books. Never again. It caused me too much pain.
When she died, she was thirteen and I was six. She was so grown-up to me then. Now, she seemed to be only a girl. She had dolls on her bed. I opened the wardrobe to the clothes of a girl who was just beginning to wear the long, elegant gowns of a lady, but still had some short frocks for wading in the castle pools and running down to the shore as well. My sister had been tall for her age, I think. Ellara was small. The clothes were a little dated, but they seemed like the right size. I ran my hand down Seldana’s favorite cloak, a rich blue with silver claps.
For the first time in eighteen years, the cloak saw the light. It was the cloak of a princess, and soon, I would draw the hood over the face of my princess.
Chapter Twenty-One
Ellara
When I approached the palace gates, I could see the guards staring me down at a distance, but when I showed them the slipper, they hastened to change their tune. They brought out the other slipper and bade me to put them both on my feet. Once they fit, they led me into the hall, where Prince Wrindel and Aunt Kayska and Ravok and—Mr. Hassari!—and King Borel himself were gathered around, as if they had already been in the midst of discussion. It all stopped dead at the sight of me.
I knew how horrible I looked. I had glimpsed myself in the mirror. My glass slippers were the only part of me worthy of these halls. I had a black eye and one of my cheeks was red and swollen. My hair was cropped to nothing. And of course, the black leather trapping my jaw made me look especially frightful. I was wearing one of Gwyn’s old gowns and it didn’t quite fit me.
The crows wanted to follow me in, on top of that, but I insisted they stay outside. One stubborn crow followed me anyway.
I caught Wrindel’s appalled face before he masked it, and my eyes plunged downward with shame.
Aunt Kayska rushed toward me and threw her arms around me. “My child! What happened? Where have you been? How do we get this thing off of you?” Her voice was getting angrier with every sentence. “Who did this to you? And when can I kill them?”
The crow fluttered onto her shoulder, and she gave it a little smile like they were old friends.
The king ordered servants to find something to cut the muzzle with. Someone brought a pair of sharp clippers and cut me free from the horrible muzzle, and I was very glad to see Mr. Hassari alive, so I was starting to feel better.
But mainly, I noticed an absence. “Where is Ithrin?”
“He just went to change clothes, to go look for you,” the king said. “You had better go and see him.”
“Maybe we should clean her up with some healing potion first,” Wrindel said.
King Borel turned to his younger son, shaking his head. “You’re the one who kept going on to your brother about love at first sight. Well, love can’t just be about that, and now is the perfect time for him to see if his feelings are true.”
Maybe there was something to be said for this sentiment, but I said, “I—I might rather have the healing potion.”
“Nonsense,” the king said. “Go on. I believe you know where his room is.” He pointed toward the stairs.
I wasn’t about to defy the orders of the king, so I headed that way, but I was growing more nervous with every step. It was glaringly clear to me now that I didn’t know Ithrin well enough to trust him with my true self. He had seen the perfect version of me my goblin godmother had created for the dance. Now I was as broken as I’d ever been. The crow settled on my shoulder and nipped my ear when I tried to shoo it away. My skirt and draping sleeves dragged on the ground because I wasn’t tall enough for Gwyn's dress.
I peered in Ithrin’s room, but it was empty. It was the next room where I heard footsteps, and a cabinet opening.
The door was open. It was a darling room, girlish, with the stone walls painted white and hung with bright tapestries. It looked airy, but smelled stuffy. I stopped in the door.
I was struck again by just how beautiful he was. Tall and graceful, broad shoulders and slim waist in a black jacket tailored to perfection. It was hard to believe that he had been making love to me, just last night. I felt like a different person now. Stronger than before, but I would bear the scars of it forever. I was no longer the same girl he had loved last night.
“Prince Ithrin,” I said.
He turned, and I saw a glimpse of joy and relief on his face before it shifted to horror. “Ellara—Ellara, what happened?” He rushed toward me and put his beautiful hands on my bruised face. I shut my eyes. His lips brushed my forehead, and his thumb traced the line of my lower lip.
“I should never have gone home last night,” I said. “My dress was going to turn back to rags at midnight. I was afraid for you to see me like that. I always disdained my stepsisters for their vanity and in the end, I was vain too. I should have stayed and let you see the real me.” I hung my head. “And now it’s far worse. When I went home…my stepmother was waiting. She took me to a work house where the girls are basically prisoners…they cut off my horns…and my stepmother took your priceless ring.” I bit my lip. “I’m so, so sorry.”
“Sorry?” His hands slid to my shoulders. “You should not be sorry. Look what they’ve done to you! You tell me the name of this work house, and I will make sure every last person responsible for its existence is punished. And if we find your stepmother, well, I curse that I am a prince and my actions are under scrutiny, but we have proof that she attempted murder on Mr. Hassari—and the strong suspicion that she did murder your father and steal your inheritance, and by the law of the realm, that is a crime for which she should be locked in the dungeons for the rest of her life.”
I looked at him, hardly breathing.
He paused, loosening his grip on my shoulder—I had not realized how tight he was holding me. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I got heated. Maybe that isn’t what you want to hear. Maybe you think I should go easier on her—“
I saw my stepmother in my memories, insulting me at every turn, telling me I was an ugly goblin, gloating when I was left to eat food left behind on her plate, and when the slightest error in housekeeping was an excuse for a beating. And her satisfaction at selling me to the work house—wishing for me to suffer until the last.
“No,” I said. “You are the prince. Uphold the law. That is all I ask.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ellara
Ithrin was holding a beautiful blue cloak. He wrapped it around my shoulders. “You look terrible
,” he said.
“Oh.” I bristled.
“I mean your condition. Not you.”
“Well, I know that. Prince Wrindel said I should take healing potion before I saw you.”
“No. I’m glad you waited. I want to see what we’re up against.” He took my hand and started leading me to the door. He paused before he left. “This is my sister’s room,” he said. “It has been empty since her death. But when our first daughter is born, it will belong to her.”
“Princes shouldn’t wish for daughters; isn’t that what they say?” I said. Sons were more valued as heirs.
He smiled with a hint of dismissal. “I very much hope for as many daughters as sons. Our family has been nothing but men.”
“Well, my family has been nothing but women. Horrid women.”
“We are already starting to correct the balance, then.”
A servant was waiting in the hall. Ithrin said, “Bring me the healing balm for the lady’s skin. Knock on the door and let me know only if her stepfamily is found, but tell my father and brother I will do nothing until I have well tended to her wounds.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Wait,” I said. “There is something else, too. A wolfkin girl named Fersa helped me escape the work house. She’s waiting in an alley. She lost her clothes transforming so she had to stay in wolf form, and she’s trapped because she’s afraid of frightening people as a wolf and maybe being attacked for it. I told her I’d send for her as soon as I could.”
“Where is she?” Ithrin asked.
“Near the work house. The Home for Industrious Ladies. In an alley right off the road that leads to the place.”
“Tell the city guard to take some ladies clothes, find the wolfkin girl, and while they’re at it, seize the owners of the Home for Industrious Ladies.”
“Yes, sir. Right away.” The servant bowed and rushed off.
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