The Surrender of Sleeping Beauty

by Lidiya Foxglove

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Interlude

  “The poor girl, she must truly be barren,” Jeanne said, mixing simple healing potions while the witch handled the heaviest load of magic. She was making the spell for the queen, once the request came from the palace via secretive channels, as the witch knew it would. “Will this truly help her?”

  Jeanne didn’t ask because she actually cared. But pretending to care had its own satisfaction.

  “I hope so,” the witch said. “It’s too bad she must have a child with that man. When the palace has been ground to dust, I will find her a good humble young man who will give her a stock of good healthy children of the woods from here on out.”

  Jeanne shook her head. That nonsense again. The witch was always going on about children of the woods. Children of the woods! More like dirty, naked children without any manners. Well, Jeanne would never have children anyway so she just listened and nodded to stay on the witch’s good side.

  Someone knocked on the door, and Jeanne rose to answer it since the witch was concentrating. It was a mother looking for a simple healing spell for a sick child. Jeanne gave her the bottle and the woman clasped Jeanne’s hand in both of hers. “Thank you, thank you so very much, Madame.”

  “I hope your boy feels better,” Jeanne said.

  The truth was, Jeanne was starting to like working for the witch. Certainly it was not as glamorous as being the lover to a king, but on the other hand, she was picking up bits of magic and…of all things, she realized she was helping people. She was doing good. Poor women leaned on the witch, but Jeanne was starting to get a reputation for being kind to whores with unwanted pregnancies, diseases, and injuries from beatings. Jeanne saw herself in those poor souls.

  “It will take quite a lot to strip the corruption from Rose by now,” the Cobblestone Witch continued. “But there is still a spark of fire in her, to be sure, or she would not take a lover. Someday, she will be mine, and I will teach her then…”

  “You think that’s true?” Jeanne wrinkled her nose. “That he’s really her lover? She seemed like such a useless, naive little thing to me, hunting aside…and even that was Augustus’ idea. Why do you want her to be ‘yours’ in the first place?” Jeanne stood at the window, a hand parting the curtains, watching three skinny young women walk by with baskets of flowers. They’re selling flowers now, Jeanne thought, but before long they’ll be selling themselves, that’s their lot and it’s too bad.

  The witch was beginning to get to her. She was beginning to hate the idea of the palace, and the Queen Who Bowed, and all the women there suffering in their tight laces and flimsy shoes, kept as carefully as the flowers they wore on their gowns.

  She was beginning to feel a bit jealous of Rose. The girl was a product of the corrupt palace now. Why did the witch need to save Rose when she already had Jeanne?

  “I want her because her ruin is my own fault,” the witch said. “And she is so beautiful that she will be useful. In the end, it hardly matters what state she is in right now. They all think Rose bound Count Farren to her for her own pleasure. They all think she begged Augustus to make him Sword of the King. And they will believe that she would use the king as she uses the elf. That will be the end of the King of the Sun Palace, or at least, the beginning of the end.”

  “Oh, if only she were really so interesting,” Jeanne said. “I might have liked her more.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Rose

  Lily placed a small bottle in my hand.

  “The witch told me that you must give this to Augustus, and follow the instructions on the bottle,” she said.

  I looked at the paper glued to the bottle, and the letters written in a hand like the footprints of the tiniest of birds. Give this potion to the man who is unable to conceive, and say these words to him: ‘If your heart is mine, now your cock is mine. Obey my will to have a child of thine.’ The spell shall last for eight hours time; try to keep him stirred without releasing his seed as long as possible. This shall make the seed potent enough to produce a child.

  “I—I can’t give him such a thing!”

  “I understand,” Lily said. “She said the trouble is that the king—well, I would not repeat the slanderous words she supposedly had said, but the sum of her advice was that the king’s seed lacks vigor and he needs to be encouraged.”

  “What slanderous words did she say, Lily?” I demanded.

  “She repeats the worst of the gossip of the streets. She said he is weak. She said he has trouble reaching full arousal unless he is at your mercy, and this spell means he can only release at your word. I should probably not have asked her; I didn’t know she would say such things, but I leave it up to you.”

  I swallowed. “Thank you… I appreciate your kindness to try. But I’m sure she is wrong.”

  Lily left and I went to gaze out the window, but I clutched the little bottle.

  This sounded like it may be similar to the spell she gave to Axel. The witch wanted me to control both of these men. This was the one thing I was most forbidden to do. I knew she was trying to ruin me anyway, and the spell was probably a trick.

  I thought of Augustus telling me he didn’t want to bring up a child to be a crown prince.

  What if the witch was right? She had been witness to Augustus’ confession after all, which was something none of the healers or midwifes had known. What if she had diagnosed a problem? Was that possible? Could men not conceive if they weren’t fully satisfied? I wished I could ask other women for advice, but I had already gotten in trouble every time I made inquiries about our sex life. My naïveté could be ruinous, but so might our lack of heirs. Augustus wasn’t taking the problem seriously enough.

  On that day, I put the bottle away, but my worries still dogged me. The pamphlets still circulated. Countless cruel mockeries were tossed in the fire. After a while I was numb to them. But in the Palace of the Sun I still had little sense of what was happening in the cities. Advisors still told Augustus he was popular for his cost saving measures.

  “If we’re so popular, then why do I keep catching this trash getting passed around?” he demanded, as we walked together toward our weekly blessing at the Altar of Seasons.

  “Your grace, perhaps we should consider pulling our armies back from the northern countries,” the advisor said hesitantly. “It’s expensive and there is some thought that you are showing favoritism to the elves.” It went without saying, but he meant Count Farren in particular.

  “I assured our friends to the north they would have our aid as long as the weather is poor,” Augustus insisted. “The storms have produced scarcities in the north as well, and the trolls are hungry. We can’t just abandon the northern elves. They’re the only thing that stands between the trolls and our northern border.”

  He was worrying over it all the time.

  “My lord, if it should reach a point that you must choose between your own kingdom and mine…,” Axel said, although clearly it pained him, as we played billiards in the Lady’s Treat. “I would only beg you to allow me to return north to protect my own family.”

  “I don’t want to hear anything like that,” Augustus said. “It’s very short sighted to pull back our army now. I can’t change winter into spring.” He got two balls into their pockets with one shot, with his perfect hunter’s aim. “Besides, after all the scandal to appoint you, I’m damn sure not going to dismiss you just as it’s all settled down. We both need you, Farren.”

  Axel shook his head with a slight laugh. “I certainly prefer to stay here and keep your armies there, but I hate that you’re being blamed for helping my people.”

  “It’s a little ridiculous,” I muttered. “I can’t tell if they hate me for the lack of bread, or for my fancy clothes, or for my plain clothes, or for not having an heir, or for—“

  “I’m sure they don’t really hate you,” Augustus said. “I’ve heard that we’re absolutely revered along the northern border where the trolls are a t
hreat. This will pass.”

  “That’s right,” Axel agreed, missing his own shot. “Damn.” He turned away from the table with aggravation and then put a hand on my head. “Your turn. Go ahead and show me up.”

  “Challenge accepted. Shall we make a bet?”

  “Naughty queen,” Augustus said. “I’m supposed to make the bets around here.”

  “Treat rules!” I said. “It’s just the three of us and I’m making a bet.” I crossed the table, seeing a perfect angle, and hit a ball of my own right into the pocket. I looked at him over my shoulder. “Why are you so bad at this, Axel?”

  “Maybe I’m just distracted.”

  “That’s not a very good excuse. I should be more distracted than either of you, with my two handsome men here…” I walked up to him. “I win.”

  “You never told me what the bet is.”

  I grabbed his coat and pushed him back against the billiards table, kissing his lips. “Now…get me another glass of wine.”

  “Is that your prize for winning?” He grinned. “You could ask for a lot more than that.”

  “Good. Because I intend to collect. Later.”

  I felt Augustus’ hands circle my waist as he came up behind me. “I’m still the best,” he said, kissing me next. “So don’t get too cocky.”

  “Mm…” I turned to Augustus now, letting him kiss my neck while Axel stood up and moved toward the door. I grabbed his sleeve. “No, not yet…”

  “You ordered me to get you wine, my lady.”

  “Well, now I say…not yet.” I glanced at him. “I’m so happy when it’s just the three of us. I wish we could be like this outside, under the stars…and not just behind closed doors.” I bit my lip. “I feel like in the end, I’m being punished for love and nothing more. For loving my friends…and you…and even my own dear husband. All I want are the people I love!”

  “Rose,” Augustus said. “I tell you, it isn’t personal. Things go wrong, and it’s easier to blame someone. Once upon a time, I suppose, the faeries were beset by war and King Enri was being blamed for that. Queen Marianna put on this show in order to appease them.”

  “Well, it doesn’t work anymore,” I said. “This show isn’t doing any good. And it’s making us miserable.”

  Augustus stopped kissing me and took a step back.

  “What if we refused to do it anymore?” I asked him. “What if we broke all the rules? Would you still be afraid to have a child?”

  “I didn’t say I was…afraid.” I could see on his face that I had said the wrong thing.

  The very wrong thing.

  “I am not afraid,” Augustus said, jabbing his finger on the table. “Fear is for the unknown. Fear is not knowing if the witch will find some way to take you away from me. Fear is wondering whether the harvests will ever improve. This isn’t fear, it’s—it’s—“ His shoulders trembled. “I know my first son will either die young, or he will suffer. He will grow to adulthood knowing his fate, and knowing that someday he will have a wife whose spirit he will break. He will grow up knowing that once, his ancestors were free, and now—what? We have built ourselves a prison. We all know it and yet—damned if I know what to do about it.”

  “You are doing something about it already, it seems to me,” Axel said.

  “Am I?”

  “You’re changing the rules, one step at a time. But it will take time. If you should have a son, he would finish the job.”

  I slipped an arm around Augustus’ back, giving him a soothing touch, and then circled Axel with my other arm. “You could never break my spirit, Augustus. Just so you know. No one would have married me but you and what is a princess without a marriage? As I am constantly reminded in those pamphlets, it doesn’t matter if I make cheese. I will never be permitted to be a cheesemaker, and believe me, my mother would never have stood for a moment of it.”

  “I’m getting you both some wine,” Axel said. “What a sad lot you are. At least you have bread.”

  “And who asked you to be the voice of reason?” Augustus said.

  “Well, really,” Axel said. “It’s no use lamenting one’s fate. The past is past. The future is unwritten. Plenty of couples don’t conceive right away, and if it should happen, it will be a happy day. In the end, you are two people who have supported each other through everything, and that is the best any child can hope for in their parents.”

  I squeezed myself against Axel. “Everyone says elves are beautiful and proud but you’re also very wise.”

  “Yes, that’s true,” Axel said. “It’s because I’m older and I’ll live longer than either of you.”

  “But not better at billiards,” Augustus retorted as Axel waved him off and went to fetch our wine.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Rose

  The next time we went to the royal opera, I was booed. I suppose Augustus was also booed, but the most vicious hand gestures and jeers seemed directed at me. I kept my head high and saw the performance through, despite my inner shock.

  Maybe it would be my eternal fate, as the Queen Who Bowed and a human, to bear all the ill will directed toward the crown. It made no sense to hate me more than their king, but they were hurting from the shortages, and no one could help that. Augustus is right, I told myself. We can’t change the weather. We simply have to survive.

  As we left, people outside tossed rotted cabbages and balled paper at us. “Bitch, wearing all your diamonds!”“Give us a prince!” “What’s wrong with you?”

  The guards had to step in. Axel put his body between us and them, his sword drawn.

  “Get back!” He pushed me in the carriage, my two men jumping in behind me.

  Augustus glared out the window at the crowd, rubbing his chin. I could see his temper rising, heat in his cheeks.

  “My lord…” I put a gentle hand on his knee. “It’s all right. Let’s just get past it all. Maybe I need to give even more to feed the poor.”

  He ignored me and threw open the window. “Perhaps she would have a child if you stopped hounding her, you fiends!”

  “Then stop taking an elf cock in your arse!” a man yelled, throwing a tomato toward Augustus.

  Axel rushed up to the man and threw a punch. The man tried to fight back as others grabbed him. “You’re just proving my point!” Other men rushed up to defend him as guards blocked the crowd.

  “Stop believing in lies,” Augustus growled back. Axel grabbed him and forced him back into the carriage before a rotten potato hit him in the head. Outside, some guards immediately hauled him out of the crowd. Skinny, hungry people lined the street, women too young to be missing so many teeth, children without shoes. Where had all of this poverty come from? Where once we might have seen a beggar child or two, now much of the crowd looked like they had crawled out of the slums.

  Augustus slammed the window as my stomach roiled.

  The three of us sat in a dreadful silence.

  I looked at the people through the glass, and I understood their anger. Of course they would hate us if their stomachs growled with hunger. I would surely hate me too.

  A part of me was angry, however. I was told I had to give everything of myself to the people because of my power over them. And I had. I did everything I was told. Any person in the kingdom could come to the palace any time, and I knew they expected to see me flushed and shamed. Even now the King’s Vine circled my waist and thighs, a reminder that at any moment, Augustus could force me to lose control.

  And their hungry eyes demanded it. Of him and of me.

  Now, they hated me anyway, because I had jewels and feasts while they starved.

  It was so absurd, and I had no idea what to do about it.

  Except to have an heir.

  I had kept the potion carefully hidden away, but I knew that despite all this, Augustus would never take the potion willingly, and it felt like such a betrayal to break his trust.

  The next day I came to Axel with the potion in hand. “I’ve come to collect on my debt,
” I said. “That is, I know you don’t trust the witch, and neither do I, but I’ve obtained this spell that she claims will give me a child.”

  “Rose…this is…” He read the instructions and then looked up at me. “First, we would certainly have to test it with a purity spell to see if it is what it claims to be, or if it is poison.”

  “Of course. But do you think it’s true, then? Do you think it would help? Even if her eventual motive is harmful to Augustus, not having a child is harmful to him too!”

  “I don’t know. But you’re right that something must be done.”

  My hands fidgeted. “I’ve never done such a thing without asking his permission.”

  His lips quirked. “Rose—he would enjoy it.”

  “I know…” We exchanged a conspiratorial look.

  “The witch claimed that she wanted you to have a child,” Axel said. “If she wants a revolution, maybe it’s true. I do know that…the situation keeps getting worse. I’ve been trying to tell you that I want to return home to save your reputation…but my heart won’t let me get the words out.” He tangled my hair in his fingers. “Rose, I know I will always be secondary to you and Augustus, but I love you.”

  “That’s not true at all,” I said. “You make us feel completed. If you feel secondary it’s only because we must be so discreet. I wish you could share our bed every night.”

  “I wish I could bring you both home with me.” He kissed my forehead. “I’ll take this to someone I know in town and have it looked at, and if it’s safe…”

  “Yes,” I said. “If it’s safe.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven