Princess Juniper of the Hourglass
Page 1
PHILOMEL BOOKS
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Copyright © 2015 by Ammi-Joan Paquette.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Paquette, Ammi-Joan, author.
Princess Juniper of the Hourglass / Ammi-Joan Paquette.
pages cm.—(Princess Juniper)
Summary: Tired of all the rules of comportment at court, Princess Juniper asks for, and receives, a very small country of her own for her thirteenth Nameday, one she can set up and rule with less formality and more simple friendship—but there is trouble at home and she has to find a way to thwart her distant cousin’s ambitions.
1. Princesses—Juvenile fiction. 2. Kings and rulers—Juvenile fiction. 3. Cousins—Juvenile fiction. 4. Friendship—Juvenile fiction. 5. Conspiracies—Juvenile fiction. [1. Princesses—Fiction. 2. Kings, queens, rulers, etc.—Fiction. 3. Cousins—Fiction. 4. Friendship—Fiction. 5. Conspiracies—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.P2119Pr 2015
[Fic]—dc23
2014030626
ISBN 978-0-698-19091-7.
Version_1
For Lauren:
Let’s have lots more of those coffee shop days, shall we?
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Map
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
The Official Daily Schedule of
Princess Juniper
5:00
Rise
5:10
Bathe
5:25
Dress
5:40
Morning Grooming
6:15
Harpsichord Practice
7:15
Breakfast
8:00
Political Discourse
9:00
Studies
10:30
Outdoor Constitutional
11:00
Studies
12:30
Luncheon
1:30
Midi Rest
2:30
Croquet / Fencing / Polo
3:30
Equestrials / Dance / Comportment
4:30
Tea
5:15
Needlework
6:30
Supervised Reading and Devoirs
8:00
Dinner
9:00
Leisure (unless required in state matters)
10:00
Nightly Grooming
10:30
Retire
PRINCESS JUNIPER WAS RUNNING LATE. THIS was not only unusual, but quite nearly unforgivable.
In her own mind, anyway.
Oh, she knew there was no servant following her with a timepiece and a lecture, but today’s croquet lesson had gone so abominably long! Now it was six minutes past the start of her riding lesson, and she was still in her chambers getting ready.
Juniper kicked aside her croquet tunic and crushed her riding cap onto her windswept curls.
It would have to do.
She dashed out of her bedchamber, through the vaulted midroom, past the dressing room—no time, no time!—skidded across her parlor, and yanked open her suite doors.
Where she ran directly into her maid.
Elly toppled onto her backside, still managing an apologetic half curtsey. Juniper only just kept her balance, grabbing hold of the door frame at the last moment. “Oh, filch—I’m sorry, Elly!” Juniper reached out a hand, but her maid ducked and leaped back to her feet, scrabbling for the fallen silver tray, her face sunset red.
Juniper snatched her hand back, hoping she hadn’t shamed the girl by her forwardness. How many times had her Comportment Master lectured on this very thing? Your royal gratitude is best expressed by your silence. A ruler can make no error, and to suggest that one has been made only heaps confusion and shame onto the listener. She knew this, but always seemed to forget it on the fling of the moment. No matter how many lectures she sat through or notes she took or resolutions she made, Juniper could never seem to act quite regal enough.
For a girl who had been a princess her whole life, this was a problem.
Composing herself, Juniper motioned to her maid. “What is it, Elly?”
“Your Highness, I have brought a message from His Majesty,” said Elly. She raised the silver tray, upon which rested a sealed parchment letter. Juniper sighed. Her father had been in meetings all day, right through breakfast and luncheon. Was he really too busy to come tell her this news in person, whatever it might be?
“Thank you, Elly,” she said, then winced as she realized she’d boggled propriety yet again. She jammed the note into the pocket of her fluted overdress, clapped a hand to her riding cap, and took off down the hallway.
Juniper reached the stables panting and disheveled. The white gravel courtyard surrounding the Equestrian Gate gleamed in the midafternoon sun, and the stable boy awaited her arrival with one hand ready on the latch. On the other side of the fence, the horses stomped and whinnied in anticipation. To her relief, the timepiece mounted on the outer stable cornice showed that she was barely fifteen minutes late, which seemed a fair exchange for the sacrifice in appearance.
Nevertheless, she paused to fluff her curls and crisp her collar as she neared the gate. When she looked up, the stable boy was studying her with interest. “What do you think? Do I look presentable?” she asked, tilting her head to each side. She paused a moment. “You’re Toby,
right?”
The boy’s eyes went wide. He looked over his shoulder toward the main corral, where Master Rolf sat astride his mount. Shaking his head ever so slightly, then casting his eyes down, Toby swung the gate wide. Juniper’s shoulders slumped. Master Rolf was every bit as strict as his beaky nose and high arched brows suggested. He made her Comportment Master seem mild, and that was saying something. She certainly didn’t want Toby to get punished on her account.
Dejectedly, Juniper lifted her riding skirts and swept into the exercise yard.
From high up on Timber, a magnificent silver stallion, Master Rolf bowed his head at her approach. “Your Highness,” he murmured, “at your pleasure.” He said nothing about her late arrival, of course—said nothing at all, in fact, outside the scripted greeting—and Juniper sighed. By the goshawk, she was tired of being treated like some unapproachable royal figurehead! Another Comportment gem popped to mind: A princess does not mingle, unless there is some opportunity for profit.
On its heels came a thought she’d curiously found herself thinking in recent days: Why? Did things really have to be that way?
Then Juniper’s fingers touched Butternut’s flank, and all other thoughts flew from her mind. She tugged off a riding glove and reached under his mane to scratch the length of his silken neck. Butternut stamped a hoof, dancing about in clear delight. Here was a creature who didn’t care a fig for position or rules of behavior, who loved her for herself alone. Juniper dug into her pocket and pulled out three hard lumps of sweetcrystal. Butternut whinnied with anticipation, eyes on her hand, nostrils flaring. Juniper held her flat palm out for him to nuzzle with his velvety lips and gravel-scratch tongue.
Looking up, Juniper saw Master Rolf was staring off into the distance—a touch impatiently, she thought with satisfaction. She glanced toward the gate. To her delight, Toby seemed to have noticed Master Rolf’s distraction, too. The boy caught her eye, lifted both thumbs up, and flashed her a huge smile. In a half second his correct posture was back—arms straight, chin lifted, face blank.
But it was enough. Juniper’s insides glowed warm. For once in her day, she’d been seen. Just as if I were a regular person.
Giving Butternut’s nose a final scratch, Juniper did a quick inspection of her tack to be sure all was in working order, then she replaced her riding glove and pulled herself up into the saddle.
As she did, something crinkled in her pocket. The note from her father! She’d almost forgotten it.
Ahead of her, Master Rolf led Timber into the warm-up pace they’d take around the exercise yard before beginning their ride. Butternut followed the familiar routine easily. Shifting the reins to her left hand, Juniper pulled out the parchment with her right and tugged until the purple wax seal gave way. She shook the letter open and ran her eyes over the ornate script, written in the royal scribe’s best hand.
My Darling Daughter:
I deeply regret missing you at breakfast and luncheon today. How fast time has flown, and it is your thirteenth Nameday already! I am sure to see you at teatime, and of course this evening at the ball in your honor. But I hope you have been giving thought to your Nameday gift. What can you give the princess who has everything? Ha, ha!
All my love,
Your father
Juniper smiled. That was her father all the way: a formally dictated and sealed parchment, with a goofy note inside. It was a side of the king only she ever saw, and she loved him for it. Butternut slipped into a canter, and Juniper shoved the letter back into her skirts, gripping the reins in both hands. With the warm-up finished, Toby the stable boy reopened the Equestrian Gate, and the two horses set off down the lane bordering the hedge maze.
In truth, today didn’t feel much like her Nameday. When she was younger, Juniper had looked forward to this day all year—a time filled with treats and surprises, gifts and goodies. Her mother had delighted in surprising her with a whole array of simple joys: releasing a cloud of ruby butterflies in the greenhouse, climbing to the top of a cherry tree with a spyglass and a storybook, teaching her how to bring her hands to her mouth and whistle such a loud, piercing note that the chandeliers trembled. Each adventure was a doorway out of Juniper’s formal, structured life, turning her—whether for minutes or hours—into someone completely different. Juniper knew that being a princess was a glamorous and privileged position. And she loved it, she did. She understood the responsibility and accepted the need for her every waking hour to be packed with training and skillswork and learning and refinement. But all that had been a lot easier to bear when she knew that just around the corner lurked that other Juniper, and she could slide into those carefree slippers every now and then.
Juniper had been young when her mother died—young enough that she hadn’t been allowed to attend the public mourning ceremonies. But not so young that she couldn’t remember these whispers of another, freer life all those many years ago. By now, her mother had been gone so long that the missing was nothing more than a quiet pulse deep in her chest. And truth be told, Juniper’s daily schedule kept her so busy that there was very little space for personal reflection, about her mother or elsewise. Which was, all in all, quite a good thing. But on days like this one, days when she felt the need to wish and dream and reach, days when the world opened up to offer her anything she wanted—anything at all within the power of King Regis of Torr—she couldn’t help but wonder.
If her mother had still been alive . . . what would she have thought Juniper should ask for?
NO SOONER HAD JUNIPER’S RIDING LESSON ended than her afternoon shifted into its own quick-step canter. Teatime was a rushed affair, her father doting but distracted, his mind clearly fixed on the night’s festivities. Next, Juniper was packed off to her grooming chamber, where six maids devoted the next hours to pampering, beautifying, and dressing her in the most gorgeous gown she had ever seen. Its pale pink bodice was crisscrossed with deep burgundy ribbons and swathed in leagues of creamy Gaulian lace. The skirt swept out in a lacy waterfall wide enough to keep all tedious diplomatic admirers at arm’s length. Juniper studied herself in the tall looking glass and grinned in delight. Then she frowned. Just behind her reflection, a little round head hovered reprovingly over her shoulder.
“Comportment Master,” she murmured, swinging around into a respectful half curtsey, as he came the rest of the way into her room.
He had a name, she knew: Master Tobbo—a name extraordinarily well suited to his perfectly symmetrical head and bulky sausage body. Still, he was only ever called by his title, as though he was more status than person. Which said a lot about him, actually.
“Your Highness,” the Comportment Master replied, his bow bringing his face to a perfectly correct knee level. “I know it is not the day for our lesson, but I came by for a final inspection and conduct check, in advance of your Nameday ball this evening.”
He paused, and in her mind, Juniper filled in the unspoken gaps. The importance of the ceremony! Transitioning to adulthood! Her uncertain ability to follow correct procedures, which required a last verification! She glanced toward the timepiece. “That is so generous of you,” she said demurely. “But I fear the time has all but run out. Perhaps we could speak . . . as I walk toward the ballroom?”
The little man puffed out his chest. “Your Royal Highness should never appear in public less than an hour behind schedule. A two- to three-hour delay is vastly preferable. Vastly! Anticipation, Your Highness—that is the stock and currency of monarchy. Anticipation breeds awe, and awe grants power, and power is strength.”
Juniper suppressed an eye-roll and—where were all those maids when she needed them?—opened her own door. She glided out of her suite and headed down the hallway in the direction of the ballroom. She kept her body tilted toward the still-prattling Comportment Master, but her mind was a million leagues away. This is me showing anticipation for the end of your lecture and awe that you have so much to say, sh
e thought. In truth, although she would never have told him so, this “be as late as possible” mandate was one she didn’t even try to keep. There was little Juniper loved more than time: knowing the time, having time, being on time. It was one of the few things in her world she could actually control—how she planned it, how she moved within it, where she chose to put her attention and when. She liked to keep busy, and she would be on time.
Whenever possible, anyway.
They swept along the hall, nearing the wide atrium that opened onto the palace library. Just ahead, a boy came out holding three fat leather-bound volumes, one open and the other two clutched to his chest.
“. . . your royal arm must always stay at a three-quarter angle from your waist, fingers evenly spaced—evenly spaced, that is so important—but the last finger should be slightly raised, like this—”
“Erick!” Juniper called, a little frantically. “Erick Dufrayne!” She had hardly spoken to the boy before, but she was desperate.
Now Erick jumped, blushed scarlet, and slammed shut the volume he’d been reading as he walked. A cloud of dust mushroomed over his face and he immediately began to cough, dropping the other two books and doubling over to catch his breath.
Juniper’s hand was halfway to picking up the nearest volume, which had fallen near the hem of her dress, when she caught her Comportment Master’s horrified look. She straightened, lifted her arm to the specified angle, and splayed her fingers out evenly. Just posing, that’s all I was doing, she thought angelically.
“Your Highness,” said Erick uncertainly, “my apologies for the interruption.”
“Nonsense, I called out to you,” said Juniper, then coughed and inclined her head. What was the correct response again? Her brain hurt. She turned suddenly, offering her Comportment Master a proper royal-student-to-respected-teacher curtsey. “Comportment Master, I sincerely regret that I must now absent myself. I have something I must discuss before the ball, for which I believe I am now very nearly properly late. I trust we may resume our lesson at a later time?”