Desperately Ever After: Book One: Desperately Ever After Trilogy

by Laura Kenyon

  Oh, wait. This is Marestam. If you believe him, you need more therapy.

  AH, the privilege of having rich friends. Those 1,500 people lucky (or loaded) enough to hold invites to Queen Letitia of Riverfell’s anniversary extravaganza just got another reason to attend. I have it on good authority that Cascade Magalie, the renowned jeweler who creates gemstones simply by speaking, will be assembling the royal goody bags. If there’s one thing we can count on Letitia for, it’s opulence. That, and the longest reign in Marestam history.

  Speaking of people anxious for Letitia to hurry up and pass down the throne already, word reaches me that Princess Penelopea has been tasked with organizing her mother-in-law’s celebration. Penelopea, one of several dozen daughters born to one of several dozen wives of the Sultan of faraway Vashia, came to Marestam on a scholarship to Braddax University … and ended up marrying the son of the biggest control freak in the kingdom. From the frying pan into the fire, as they say.

  It’ll be a miracle if they both make it to the party alive.

  *Official title still pending

  Chapter Five

  PENELOPEA

  Penny dove between the narrowing doors of the subway train, cursing and pulling a tweed fedora over her eyes. Few things in the world flustered her more than taking mass transportation, with its suffocating crowds, tiny aisles, miniscule windows and wardrobe requirements (Letitia had requested she dress “inconspicuously” while on it). The whole ordeal reminded her too much of her past.

  Her body temperature already spiking, Penny pressed her purse against her metallic jacquard pants (well, relatively inconspicuously) and made a beeline for a trio of empty seats. But by the time the swarm of comers and goers cleared, only one spot remained—smack between a man clutching a trembling pack of cigarettes, and pointy-eared woman half the size of her suitcase.

  Panicked, Penny glanced from the sandwiched seat to the balance bar running along the ceiling. She wasn’t sure which was worse—squeezing between these strangers or wrapping her fingers around a metal rod groped by thousands of filthy hands every day. She did a quick calculation. It was two o’clock—long past the morning rush and on the tail end of lunch. She didn’t want to imagine all the germs, smears of solidified sugar paste, bodily—

  The driver’s sudden lead foot tossed her into the orange plastic slab pre-molded to fit the average Marestam derrière. Well, that settled that.

  As the melding aromas of tobacco and pizza and White Rabbit No. 5 tugged at the contents of her stomach, Penny pulled her elbows against her ribs and panned for a distraction. She settled on a glossy advertisement for “Dr. Donovan Darling, Couples Counselor to the Stars,” and let her eyes lose focus.

  She’d become quite good at this—feigning interest in nothing in particular so as to avoid engaging any strangers. It seemed to be one of Marestam’s unwritten social rules, but she still thought it was odd. Where she came from, the United Kingdoms of Marestam was the forbidden land of freedom and opportunity. It was where people of all origins—those with fairy blood, dwarf lineage, even the occasional giant—lived and worked without killing each other. It was where women could study law, marry (or not) whomsoever they chose, and wear whatever color and style they could imagine. Back home in Vashia, her wardrobe had rotated between black ankle-length dress, navy ankle-length dress, and a charcoal blouse with matching ankle-length skirt. Back in Vashia, she wasn’t even supposed to know how to spell “international diplomacy.”

  Initially, she couldn’t understand why the Marestamers didn’t jump for joy every day over their good fortune at being born here. She still didn’t exactly understand it. But like everyone else, she’d just stopped wondering.

  A deep voice rumbled over a crackling speaker. “This is your Q train with express service to Riverfell, Carpale, and Braddax. If you’re looking for Regian, hop off now and head for the L.” Penny gazed into the swirls of grime on the windows and listened as the voice rumbled off the list of upcoming stops. Thornbush and Seventh. Barclays Square. Union Center. Hall of Curiosities. Four stops to go. Four stops until she came face-to-face with the cursed apple that nearly killed Snow, the spinning wheel that took Dawn three hundred years out of her element, the glass slipper that gave Cindy the best life of them all, and the so-called magical peas that rerouted Penny’s whole life.

  She’d never wanted to set foot in the hypocritical tourist trap. She’d always thought it absurd that a government so heavy-fisted towards magic didn’t mind raking in a few million dollars a year at its expense. But she’d just have to suck it up. After all, what was an “ode to Letitia” tent without her devilish, life-altering peas?

  Thankfully, she was meeting Cindy for lunch first and had time to dull her jitters. The Golden Goose made an exceptional spiked cider.

  The train squealed bloody murder as it pulled into her station and flung itself open. Shuffling past people hawking roses and jewelry, Penny bounced up the stairs and gobbled the air like it was infused with chocolate. It still got her—coming up from below ground, seeing Carpale’s jewel-toned towers rising into the sky, feeling the whoosh of cabs and commuters rushing by on their own personal adrenaline. Had she not fallen in love with Logan, a prince tethered to Riverfell, this is where Penny would have lived. This was the Marestam outsiders dreamed about. Riverfell, with its quaint brownstones and the stroller-pushers of Prospect Slope, was just a stone’s throw away from bustling Carpale—but it was a whole other world.

  She was three steps from the Golden Bird when someone in a paint-splattered tank top grabbed her elbow and jerked her back into the rushing river of pedestrians. Penny’s heart instantly skipped three beats. Without the slightest pause, she planted her feet, thrust her hand into her purse and raised her pepper spray.

  “Wait!” Cindy yelled, blocking her face with her hands. She was clasping a cup of the Golden Bird’s famous cider and a gift-wrapped peach turnover. She held out the treats in surrender.

  Penny’s heartbeat screeched to a halt and then returned to normal. “Crap, Cin. I almost blinded you!”

  “I know.” Her tone was accusatory; it said no one needs a weapon in culturally enlightened Marestam. But she and Cindy came from completely different worlds—and old habits died hard. “Why do you even have that? It’s broad daylight.”

  Penny shrugged and put the steely canister away. “Never mind,” she said. “What’s with the takeout? I thought we were going to have lunch.”

  “How about a snack for now and celebratory treat later? I have a fantastic idea.”

  Penny scanned her friend’s outfit. It was highly unlike the illustrious Cinderella to have frizzy hair in public, or to be wearing a skintight camisole. A filthy camisole at that, streaked with paint, mud and—was that blood? “Is that blood?”

  Cindy followed her eyes and then knocked her head back in a “Where is my brain?” sort of way. She drew a thin lilac blouse out from her bucket bag, floated over to a bank window, and fixed herself in the reflection. “Sorry. I got so excited about the website, I completely forgot to change! And yes, that’s blood but not mine. I’m fine.”

  Penny leaned back to accommodate the weight of all her questions. Why in the world did she have someone else’s blood on her? What website? What could possibly have gotten her distracted enough to look un-perfect outside her bedroom?

  “Come on,” Cindy said, striking out behind two men in designer suits. “Let’s walk and talk. We’re wasting time.”

  As they shuffled along, Cindy explained that the blood was from a boy who ran into a gym wall at the Murray School, the dye was from a paintball workshop she’d been taking, and the mud was from a PETTA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Talking Animals) rally she’d spoken at in Capitol Park.

  “You did all that this morning?” Penny was shocked. When did she find the time to sleep? Or eat? Or spend any quality time with her family?

  “Yup. Only got a handful of days left in my twenties, so I better use the energy before it’s gone.
”

  “So what are we doing now?”

  Cindy smirked and powered off again. As they turned onto Sixth Avenue, the sidewalk opened up before the massive Hall of Curiosities. A giant cube spun at the foot of the steps, media screens shouting messages on all six sides. Two-for-One Mondays! Live Your Happily Ever After! Special Exhibition: King Midas’s Bedroom!

  Penny stopped as everyone else curved around her. She felt her insides clench. She was supposed to come here after lunch. Alone. “What are we doing here?” she called, but Cindy was already at the door.

  “Hurry up!” she yelled, waving her arms. “The sooner you get your peas, the sooner I can jump!”

  “Jump?”

  Penny’s head spun in a million directions as she clopped through the marble hall listening to Cindy ramble on about her upcoming birthday, about some bucket list she wrote as a child, about how little she’d accomplished in her life, and about how throwing herself off the Prince Williams Bridge with nothing but a bungee cord was going to make all of that better. It didn’t matter that it was dangerous. It didn’t matter that she had four kids, a husband, and an entire kingdom depending on her. And it didn’t matter that Penny had never heard of a company licensed to throw people off the bridge connecting her kingdom to Cindy’s.

  “It’s not a company,” Cindy explained as they sped past case after case of gaudy artifacts loosely tied to past monarchs. “It’s a guy. But he’s done it a hundred times all over the world and accidents almost never happen. The website has all the facts. It’s perfectly safe.” She stumbled over a thought. “Safe,” she repeated. “But still dangerous and daring and scary, right?”

  An uncomfortable thickness loomed between them as Penny tried to suppress her urge to explode. If only she had the power to freeze everyone around her and scream at the top of her lungs. Instead, she said the only thing she could without launching into a lecture about what a wonderful life her friend had but didn’t seem to see. “Is it really worth the risk?”

  “I’m turning thirty.” Cindy whispered as they followed a group of kids into a room painted entirely blue. “I can’t fit into my ball gown. And I’ve done nothing adventurous in my entire life. I need this.”

  Penny felt the weight of her head fall back in surrender. “Fine. I’ll get the peas and then go watch you gamble with suicide if you insist. But if you survive, you have to promise to take a long, serious look at your life and realize how many blessings you have.”

  Cindy scanned the room before answering. The ceiling pulsated with teal lights and mounds of spongy plastic stretched along the walls to look like coral. For all the money Parliament poured into this tourist trap, it looked like a second grade art project. It smelled like a five-hundred-year-old time capsule had been uncorked and pumped through the ventilation system.

  “Deal,” she finally said. “Now let’s look around because I never want to come here again.”

  Penny browsed for a whole five minutes before deciding she’d rather watch her best friend leap off a bridge than remain at the Hall of Curiosities any longer. She found Cindy staring at a display case containing a crudely forged dagger on a red velvet cushion, a page girl dress, and a dozen golden seashells. On the back wall hovered the words “Princess Merill of the vast Aquatic Realm: This little mermaid sacrificed herself for her human love, forging the eternal bond between man and his fish-tailed brothers.” Penny recalled the stories she’d heard about a mermaid who traded her tongue for human legs in the hopes that it would win her true love. But when her prince married someone else instead, she killed herself rather than murder him—which would have set her free.

  “The little mermaid?” she asked, sidling up to Cindy, who nodded and uttered an affirmative squeak. Her lips were pressed into a tight line. Penny looked at the case again and placed her hand on her friend’s shoulder.

  “So sad,” said Cindy, her fingers hooking her elbow. “This is really all they have for her? A pillow he made her sleep on, like a dog, and the knife she used to martyr herself? She should have driven it right through his heart and never looked back.”

  Penny’s fingers flinched. Wow. Thirty really was doing something to her friend—something twisted. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you knew her.”

  “Knew her!” Cindy pulled away. Penny’s hand fell like an anchor. “Please don’t tell me I look that old already. She died decades ago! Come on. The brochure says the peas are two rooms over. And these lights are giving me a headache.”

  Penny shook her head and followed Cindy through a glowing alcove dedicated to the faraway realms, including Vashia. She gave the space one disgusted glance, dug her nails into her palms as they passed Aladdin’s “magical” lamp, and picked up her pace.

  “This looks like the place,” Penny exhaled as they crossed into a hall so jammed with color it looked like the inside of a comic book.

  “What makes you so sure?”

  Penny turned toward a giant rock holding a pulsating sword, a portrait of thirty people stuck to a flapping goose, and a tarnished mirror under a sign asking: Are You the Fairest?

  “Because this room is beyond absurd.”

  Cindy let out a loud laugh, then stabbed the air with her finger. “There!”

  Penny felt the world stop. In the corner, she saw five small mattresses stacked into a wobbly pile. Above them, neon letters worthy of a strip club or an all-night pharmacy begged the question: Can you feel them? Her chest thrummed. She wanted to run, cry, and laugh all at once. “It looks like a kiddie porno ride,” she said.

  “Try it out,” Cindy demanded, ushering her forward. “Don’t roll your eyes at me. I put my whole ball outfit on the other night.” Penny bit her lip. Like that was the same thing. “I’ve always wondered how you could feel three peas through all that stuffing and not squish them.”

  Keep wondering, Penny thought.

  “I’ve got to see it for myself.”

  Defeated, Penny boosted herself up and fell like a sack across the bed. With feet dangling over one end and the rib of the mattress border digging into her head, she stared into the fluorescent lights. The last time she felt this exposed, her heels were in stirrups.

  “There’s no way I could fall asleep here,” she said, not exactly lying. Cindy’s hands rushed together and, for a moment, Penny feared she was going to applaud. This was mortifying. She hopped off and motioned for her friend to climb. “Your turn,” she said.

  Cindy jumped up as if the bed was going to whisk her off to paradise. She then laced her fingers over her stomach in quintessential waiting-damsel pose. After a minute with her eyes shut, she let out an exaggerated yawn. “Do you think they have a blanket I can borrow?”

  Penny rolled her eyes. “Oh, get off. I need to ask the curator if we can borrow the peas for the party, and then I never want to come back here.”

  Cindy sat up and paused to look at the informational placard no one ever reads. “Hey Pen, did you see this?”

  Penny’s sneaker squeaked against the floor as she turned back around. “I don’t need to read about it. I lived it.”

  Cindy squinted. “No. I really think you should see this.”

  With a grunt, she followed Cindy’s finger to the paragraph titled “Princess Penelopea Proves Her Worth.” Blah blah blah. Magical peas. Fifty mattresses. By feeling them, Penelopea of Vashia proved she was a real princess worthy of becoming Prince Logan’s wife.

  Suddenly, her chin jerked back. An asterisk led her to a small line of text at the base of the placard.

  Please note, it read, the peas used for this exhibit are reproductions. The actual peas described in this historical account remain in the private collection of Queen Letitia of Riverfell.

  Penny felt her heart crunch. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  * * *

  Penny’s first reaction was to call Logan and demand he find out where his control freak of a mother was keeping the peas.

  “But don’t tell her what it’s for,” she commanded. “
I know she only put me in charge of this party to see me fail, and I don’t want to give her a head start.”

  Logan put her on hold for two whole minutes, and then returned with the news that his mother didn’t have the peas. “She says she donated them to the Hall of Curiosities the week before our wedding.”

  Her fist tightened. He couldn’t have asked that quickly and still been discreet. “Just out of curiosity, what reason did you give her for asking?” Logan’s stumbling, nonsensical response told her exactly what she didn’t want to hear. Her husband had a heart of gold. Truly. But there never existed a man more terrifyingly devoted to his mother.

  “Cheer up,” Cindy said two hours later, cradling her skim vanilla latte. They’d wasted the afternoon arguing with the Hall of Curiosities’ curator, manager, and three different custodians, and were now back at the Golden Bird. “The peas will turn up. And as far as Logan goes, it’s not so bad. They say a man will eventually treat his wife the way he treats his mother.”

  “So I’ll have him walking on eggshells forever and our children will live with us till we’re dead?”

  Cindy laughed and stared too intently at the apple tart in the center of the table. She’d only allowed herself one miniscule bite, then pushed her fork aside.

  Penny stabbed the tart, imagining it was Letitia. “Any chance that bungee cord can hold two?”

  “It’s too late now. He stops at sundown.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Cindy shrugged. “That’s okay. We can schedule a tandem jump next week, or maybe even skydive instead. There’s a place across the river that looks pretty good.” Penny sucked on the inside of her mouth but said nothing. “I’m free for the rest of the day though. Grace is watching the kids and Aaron—”

  “Does Aaron know you were planning on jumping off a bridge?”

  Cindy shook her head vehemently and explained that Aaron thought she was trying a new exercise class. “Why don’t you come over for dinner and a movie? I could use some idealist romanticized fluff.”