by Jenny Moss
Shadow
Jenny Moss
For The Table at St. Agnes Academy
Table of Contents
Cover Page
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Copyright
Chapter One
I stood at the queen’s tall arched window. A blast of cold wind chilled my face, but I kept looking. I wanted to be out there, not just in the green grass of the queen’s gardens, but out farther, beyond gray and stone, out into a land I had never set foot upon. We were up so high in our untouchable castle on the hill that the dark green treetops looked like branches strewn about the ground.
Behind me, the ladies-in-waiting dressed the young queen in rustling blue silk and brushed her long blond hair. I glanced back at their tight circle, wondering what it felt like to be a part of their shared secrets and whispered words.
But they looked at me with suspicion even now as they giggled and gossiped. Traitor, traitor, traitor, they seemed to say, eyes on me. Or perhaps, witch, witch, witch.
“Close the window, Shadow,” the queen scolded me from her warm place by the fire. If there was a witch amongst us, it would be she. She was the one with the strange visions, which she had learned to hide from the others. But I knew when one filled her mind. Fear always flashed in her eyes for just a moment, enough time to be noticed by one who watched for it. And how could I help but see it, when I was forced to stay by her side, always.
One of her hands encircled her neck as she gazed in the glass Lady Fay held before her. Her eyes said what her lips did not. She was perfect: wide slanting eyes, with just a touch of blue, like a clear sky at the peak of day, and cheeks naturally pink and plump, and skin like a white pearl.
I did not act as the queen bade me, savoring the moment of my disobedience. But I knew the rebuke would soon come.
I had lived out my almost-sixteen years in the queen’s room. A large room, but too small to be one’s whole world. We were not allowed out there often. For the queen’s life was in danger.
My head jerked back, and I felt a quick stab of pain at my scalp. Ingrid, the most gentle of the gentle ladies, was yanking my black hair. “Go rub Her Highness’s tender feet, you lazy girl.” She pushed me out of the way and shut the shutters against the cold, plunging us into an eerie dark, with the only light from flickering candles and the roaring fire.
The queen kicked off her shoe. It flew into the air and bumped against a tapestry covering the drab wall.
I did as I was ordered, sitting where I was told, on the rushes covering the cold, gritty stone. I was too close to the fire. The heat seared my back, and I began to sweat in my coarse red dress despite the coldness of the room. The smoke caught in my throat and made my eyes water.
I picked up the queen’s dainty white foot. I watched her looking at herself in the glass. She rested her fingers on her forehead and then swept back her hair. In that moment, she was oblivious to all of us. If I were she, I would detest all the hands fussing over me all the time, soaping up arms and hooking hooks and cleaning out ears.
She presented a hand to Hilda, the youngest lady, as if it were a gift. Hilda glanced at me as she used a silver file to clean the queen’s nails. “Stop staring,” she said, kicking me in the back.
I looked up to Queen Audrey’s smirk.
“She’s always staring at everyone, Your Majesty,” said Hilda. “It will not do.”
The other ladies laughed while the queen put down her jewel-encrusted mirror and fingered her blue silk dress.
Fay, the slyest of the ladies, brushed out the royal hair with a gleam in her eye. She was the one you had to watch out for. She tricked you into confidences and then whispered them to the other ladies behind your back. Of course, she didn’t trick me. Not anymore. I was rarely spoken to, except when I was told what to do.
I was the queen’s shadow. I could not remember a day when I was not at her side. The three old men in gray hooded capes, which strangled their wrinkled necks and flowed down to the floor, ordered me to stay with her at all times. I knew they hoped a flaming arrow flying her way would pierce and burn me, not her. As if I would not move aside to save myself instead.
My role was not completely clear to me, nor to anyone. It was established long ago and no one dared question it now. I wasn’t a servant, really. I had no list of daily chores. I was not lady, cook, maid, laundress, nor spinster.
But why try to riddle out my place here? I had long ago given that up. Who knew the aims of three old men?
They wanted me to be afraid of them, but I was not. They would watch me as if they didn’t trust me, especially the oldest one. Eldred was the one who told the others what to do. He was the one who would occasionally speak to me.
It was a lonely life, but I accepted it. I might not be a queen or a gentle lady or even a saucy servant girl who had a real cot to sleep on, but I knew none of that mattered.
So I would empty chamber pots, dig out grunge from under dirty toenails, and endure slapped cheeks and sharp words—but I knew what I wanted. I lived for a hope: One day I would leave the queen’s dreary castle and venture out into the world. Unlike before, I would successfully escape. Only, it was impossible at present. Especially now.
The wooden door swung open as if it were a leaf blown by the wind. The burly knight who guarded the queen’s room every morning tapped his spear and announced the arrival of a visitor. It was the boy knight. He lived at the castle and visited her daily.
On that particular day, he was dressed in sea green, from tunic to toe. He stared at her with eyes the color of morning. He looked more like her brother than one who wished to marry her.
There, he was foolish. She would never be allowed to marry one below the rank of prince. And although Sir Kenway was the son of a once powerful lord, he was not royalty. He is barely a knight, I thought, smiling to myself. Usually, a squire doesn’t become a knight until the age of twenty-one. Sir Kenway was only sixteen.
Queen Audrey stood quickly, pushing us all away. I fell backward, dangerously close to the fire. My foot caught on the hem of Hilda’s gold gown, and she tumbled with me, her legs and arms flying. She pushed herself up and whacked me on the head with a fat hand, saying, “Stupid girl!”
I looked up into the eyes of Sir Kenway. His hand was out for me to take. I wanted to refuse it, for I did not like help, but I had a strong desire to feel his touch, my hand in his. I hid these feelings, or so I thought.
The queen fussed, “Kenway!”
He turned his
head. I stood on my own.
When he looked back at me, I raised my chin. Let him go run to her.
The queen smiled at him. He took her small hands into his. The ladies bustled around, trying not to look.
But I looked. I watched their shadowy forms. He reached forward for a strand of her hair and twisted it in his fingers. Their eyes locked.
I felt the sting of the slap on my cheek. Pain shot through my neck.
“Ingrid!” scolded Sir Kenway. He was beside me now, his hand gripping Ingrid’s wrist.
I stared into her furious eyes. I do not fear you. You cannot hurt me. And she stared right back at me.
“Not necessary to treat her so,” Sir Kenway said.
“It is just Shadow,” Ingrid said, tossing a confused look his way before glaring back at me.
“Yes,” he said, nodding. “But she’s done no harm.”
Just Shadow, he had agreed. He so easily dismissed those not of his rank. I leaned in and said very quietly so only he could hear, “But am I a witch, sir?”
His face paled. I had heard Sir Kenway was afraid of nothing—except for witches and spirits. I believed in neither, despite the whispers that a witch lived in the castle years ago. Sometimes I did feel as if something was watching me, something not seen. But if I could not see it, why worry? For what could be done?
“Kenway.” The queen’s pretty face was flushed red. “Why do you bother with my shadow?”
“The girl is as conniving and sneaky as a spy,” said Ingrid, her jaw set. “She cannot be trusted.”
And with those words, all concern slid from Sir Kenway’s face and doubt took its place. He too suspected me. And this brought me a pain I didn’t want to feel. Thus, I buried it.
Ingrid began pushing me out of the room.
The guard blocked our way. He said nothing and, indeed, wouldn’t even look at Ingrid, but he would not let me leave. She scrunched her eyes at him. Her huge chest moved up and down as she took a breath, but she acquiesced, as I knew she would. She clapped her hands, and all the ladies bustled out the door after her.
I was left with the queen and Sir Kenway. I went to the window and cracked open a shutter. But I couldn’t keep my eyes off of them, off of him.
The queen took her seat on her velvet-cushioned chair by the fire, and with a wave of her hand, gestured for Sir Kenway to sit opposite her. He sat on the backless bench, leaning forward with his elbows balanced on his knees and his hands clasped together. Such grace in his movements, tenderness in his eyes.
He treated her with a certain gentleness I didn’t understand. I attributed it to her beauty, which I conceded was…there.
Her hair was so smooth it was like the finest silk. I touched my own thick mass, trying to slide my fingers through it, only to find tangles and knots.
Was it only beauty they saw in each other? The perfection of their skin, the easy blueness of their eyes, the hair entwining his finger a moment ago the color of his own? Were they in love with beauty itself, or each other’s beauty, or even their own beauty, perhaps?
And me? Why would my eyes not leave them?
I knew their beauty might bind them to each other, but no beauty would bind me. Nothing could hold me in place.
The door burst open. Sir Kenway shot up as if he had been doing something wrong.
It was the oldest of the three old men. Eldred. The queen’s guard glanced at Sir Kenway, so I knew he’d reported that the two of them were alone. No one thought of me as a chaperone. I was just a shoe that always had to be on her foot.
Eldred was a formidable figure, tall and gaunt. He had served Queen Audrey’s father. He took in the room quickly: me by the window, the queen and Sir Kenway by the fire. He jerked his head. Sir Kenway left. The queen dropped her gaze. She always lost her haughtiness around Eldred.
The guard closed the door as Eldred left, leaving the queen and me alone. She smiled a little and turned a circle, sending her blue gown billowing out like a flower.
I peered through the cracked shutters of the side window and watched until Sir Kenway appeared below.
He glanced up, his eyes seeking…seeking…I stepped back into the shadows. It couldn’t be me he sought, and I wouldn’t let him see me looking.
The ladies flew back through the door, surrounding the queen and giggling with her.
“Old Eldred threw him out again,” said the queen.
“He is only concerned for your safety,” said Fay, with a strange smile. “Your birthday is soon, Your Majesty.”
“Oh,” said the queen, waving her hand to dismiss the idea. “We won’t speak of that, Fay.”
Fay nodded, but her eyes showed she was thinking of it still.
It was prophesied the queen would die before her sixteenth birthday. Twenty days away.
Chapter Two
I slipped by the guard. He opened one eye and nodded. Crafty Sennick was rarely on duty because of his age, but Eldred allowed him to watch the queen’s door once every other full moon. More guards were posted farther down the hall and at the various entrances and exits, so Queen Audrey was quite safe. She actually liked the old guard, mostly because he looked the other way when Sir Kenway visited.
Sennick and I had a pact: He would, at times, let me pass and I would not reveal he dozed on duty. Of course, when he slept, I left without his permission.
But I could not go far. The private stairs to the left led to a secluded garden perched on a high cliff. My sole escape was over the edge, so not one I would ever use. But when the unkindness of those in the castle bore down too greatly upon me, I’d found that being outside, particularly if I was alone, lessened the pressure in my chest. I was grateful for my rare interludes in the night air.
The queen was afraid of heights and so never visited the small garden. And its unreachable position meant no guards were needed between her chamber and the outside door. Down the steps I went, eager to be out of the stuffy castle.
The garden was cold and quiet. I snuggled my cheek against the warmth of the fur-lined collar of the queen’s cape. It was a risk taking it from her wardrobe. The last time I had done so, she had worn the garment the next day. When her ladies had slipped the luxurious cloth over her royal shoulders, the queen had caught the scent of “some wild animal.” She’d flung it away from her, not realizing it was my unwashed smell from the night before still clinging to the fabric.
I breathed in the night, taking the air deep into my lungs. When I was a child, I’d pretend the air was healing magic. I would capture it with one big gulp and take it back in with me to the queen’s crowded chamber. That air trapped inside me would melt any cruel words before they reached me. That pretense helped me through many dark and lonely evenings.
I was strong, but others wearied me, especially the queen, with her changing moods and tantrums. I knew, probably more than anyone, the damage done to her by the visions haunting her day and night. I wondered what she saw that disturbed her so; the images seemed to be pushing her toward madness. Being closed up in the castle only worsened her condition, I thought.
Queen Audrey did not wander out much. An occasional festival or tournament was held, but those were infrequent. More common were her small picnics, held on the green yard inside the castle walls. I would lie on the grass with no blanket between me and the Earth, absorbing its peaceful spirit, and shut out the royal gaiety, which didn’t include me anyway.
I sat down on the stone rim of a large fountain in the garden. Very little water dwelled in its circular basin. I looked up at the statue in the middle, wondering, as I always did, who she was. Perhaps she was just the artist’s muse. He had been in love with her, I thought. That reverence could be seen in the graceful hands, the delicate arms, the beauty of the cold dress, its drapes lovingly etched out of stone.
Alas, she no longer wore a head. But her long thick hair still rippled down her gray back.
I had always thought it curious she was facing the valley, not the castle.
Her ar
ms were out, palms up, cupped, as if she were collecting the rain from the sky. An odd need swept my heart: I wanted to wrap my fingers around hers. I stood on the fountain’s edge and reached up. I felt a little shock at the ice-cold of the water pooled in the lady’s stone hand.
I stumbled and fell back. I knew not why it felt like such a loss.
I turned my back on the headless lady, looking out onto the moonlit valley. Ah, if I could only go out there. Or even just return to the garden whenever I wished.
Such a little thing, to be able to step outside to see the moon or the sun when one wanted. But I did not have that little thing, so it seemed very great.
Chapter Three
It was the afternoon. We sat at the window, with welcome sunlight pouring in upon us. I closed my eyes, feeling the warmth seep into me. I could not explain it, but I thought of my mother and began to write.
The tutor—a gangly man with small elflike ears and a giant’s nose—peered over the queen’s shoulder. Her page was marred by ugly ink blots.
I looked down at my own perfect letters. I enjoyed writing. Perhaps it was because I hardly heard the sound of my own voice. My written words were my voice, speaking, singing, living a life beyond thick stone walls and forced duty. I was there on the page.
I sprinkled powder across the parchment to dry the ink and then shook the paper.
A cool breeze picked up the powder and blew it into the queen’s pert little nose. Out came a dainty sneeze.
Queen Audrey grabbed the paper from my hand, crumpled it up, and threw it out the window.
The tutor gave me a grave look. After all, I had provoked Her Majesty by writing so well when she could not. I knew better. Still, I was disappointed. The words flying out the window were about my mother. It didn’t matter. I would find the paper later when—if—we were allowed out for a walk.
I had never known my mother. Her soul flew to the heavens the moment I fluttered my eyes open for the first time. The gentle ladies tittered to the queen that my mother’s breath had left her at the sight of me. With my eyes a strange blue and my hair as black as a pagan’s robes, they whispered I was touched by something not of this earthly world.