Black Forest: Kingdoms Fall (Black Forest Trilogy) Read online

  "What?!?" Esteban cried, pushing past the others to Big Papa. "You said it yourself. You said she would betray us when the tall folk came, and look it, Big Papa, she is a traitor already. And that one is scary." He gaped wild-eyed in Cinderella's direction. "Don't let her stay here."

  At the nudge to her ribs, Cinderella glanced at Rapunzel, who tilted her head toward Esteban in a manner that advised Cinderella to make amends.

  "All right," Cinderella took a calming breath. "Perhaps, we could start over. Esteban, is it? You keep your hands to yourself, and I will keep my feet to myself."

  "Agreed, Esteban?" Big Papa asked when Esteban stared at Cinderella with burning eyes, a light growl rumbling through his chest.

  "I still think she is scary," Esteban uttered.

  "Just one night." Big Papa took Esteban's reply as acceptance. "Now, feed my face."

  The matter closed, the rest of the dwarves followed Big Papa back to the table, but Esteban lingered to point two curved fingers at Cinderella as if he was putting the hex to her, which succeeded only in making Cinderella smile, though she did think to wait until he was at the table to let it materialize.

  "Thank you," Rapunzel breathed, clasping Snow White's hand gratefully.

  "You did save my life," Snow White responded.

  "Yes, thank you," Cinderella declared. "I feel I owe you a great debt."

  Eyes drawn by the movement over Snow White's shoulder, she looked to find Esteban throwing an obscene gesture her way.

  "And I do seem to have made a true enemy," she added. "Do you think he will kill me in my sleep?"

  "Oh, do not worry about that," Snow White said with a small laugh. "You will not sleep."

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Bucking Tradition

  Cinderella and Rapunzel did not leave the dwarves' cabin the following morning, though, as dawn broke over the horizon, Esteban stood at the bottom of the ladder yelling, "All right, all right. You've had your night. Now get up and get gone," and motioned with his thumb over his shoulder.

  Watching Rapunzel lift her head exhausted and bewildered, to blink down at him, Cinderella simply rolled over and pulled the covers above her ear.

  When the dwarves at last made their departure, Esteban did so with the heaviest stomps his small body would produce, and Cinderella went through all the effort to raise her arm in one of the crude gestures Esteban had been sending her all night, only to have Rapunzel reach up and pull it down before the dwarves could see.

  It would be a few hours more before either of them stirred again, the grueling expedition of the previous day taking its toll. Despite Snow White's assurance that they would not, they did, in fact, sleep, even with the dwarves' chorus of unpleasant noises. For, along with their thunderous snoring, the dwarves did everything in sleep that they laughed about while they were awake.

  Coming into consciousness with a dormant weight draped across her upper half, Cinderella glanced at the tousled flaxen tresses beneath her chin, recognizing at once how blessed they were to be waking in such a sheltered state when the day before had looked so bleak. The loft was exceedingly cozy in comparison to sleeping conditions Cinderella had known and those that could have been. Aside from Rapunzel's tower, it was the most comfort she had known in many years, and she would have liked it for eternity, but, chest tingling where Rapunzel was heavy atop it and stomach starting to growl, she knew the feeling could not last.

  Reluctantly lifting Rapunzel off to resettle her against one of the pillows, Cinderella watched light eyes unsheathe, fixing her with a miffed, confused look.

  "Sorry," she whispered, as Rapunzel's expression melted back into a sleepy smile, a warm hand closing around Cinderella's wrist as her eyes fell closed again.

  Heart clenching at the small, unconscious gesture, Cinderella studied Rapunzel in sleep, unable to fathom what she had done to be worthy of such a kind, beautiful soul constantly reaching out for her.

  Reluctantly breaking the delicate hold, she rose to her knees to peer past the railing, but saw Snow White nowhere. Stepping carefully over Rapunzel's sleeping form, Cinderella discovered Snow White halfway down the ladder, sprawled next to the fire with a large sheet of parchment blank on the floor before her.

  "Good morning," she called softly, springing from the second rung to the dirt floor, but Snow White did not answer. "Good morning," she raised her voice a notch, but Snow White continued to stare into the fire without so much as a blink.

  Watching her back rise and fall, Cinderella decided she was more alive than the night before and drifted about the cabin, taking in its piles of things. Among the food supply, she found a hefty late-season tomato and rubbed it against her borrowed nightgown, the fabric too soft not to have been stolen from someone of substantial financial means.

  "May I eat this?" she asked, but again Snow White failed to respond. Stepping over her, Cinderella bent to stare into Snow White's eyes, which looked right through her, as if they did not see her at all. "Hello," she prodded, hand waving before Snow White's face. When she continued to stare unflinchingly, Cinderella knew whatever Snow White was looking at was not in front of her at all, but somewhere inside her head.

  With a sigh, she left the girl to her meditation, placing the tomato on the table, hungry enough for her stomach to give another low growl, but not hungry enough to eat something apportioned for the night's meal and give the dwarves another reason to throw her out into the storm that had howled late into the night.

  As she pressed back the wood tie that held the window shut, the shutter fell open, and Cinderella peered out at the forest. "Wow!" she exclaimed with enough surprise that Rapunzel groaned and shifted in the loft.

  A blanket of snow, so thick it nearly reached the bottom pane, met her vision, and any belief Cinderella held that they could have survived the night without shelter disappeared as she watched a gust of wind pick up the upper layers of snow and blow it across the land.

  "Quite a snowstorm, is it not?"

  The question invaded the silent cabin so suddenly Cinderella startled into the window, cracking her head against the sturdy wood pane, wondering how many head knocks she could withstand before she went completely simple.

  "Oh, I am sorry," Snow White said. "I always seem to hurt people lately when I fall deep into thought."

  "Who else have you hurt?" Cinderella questioned, rubbing her eye with the ball of her hand as she turned from the window.

  "Well," Snow White said, pushing to her knees, "a few nights ago when the dwarves returned home, they had been trying to clap me out of my state for quite some time. When I did come to, I frightened Esteban so greatly he stumbled into the fire."

  Pain and faintness dissipating instantly at the thought of Esteban running around with his pants ablaze, Cinderella laughed. "I cannot believe the dwarves go out in such weather," she said, glancing back to the window. "Do they not sink right to the bottom?"

  "Snow shoes," Snow White grinned. "They traipse right over it. I am sure today they will do some of their finest work with the explorers certain to be trapped by the weather."

  "Ah," Cinderella returned. "I knew the little ones were not on the up and up." Moving back to the table, she snatched the tomato from its edge. "May I eat this?"

  "Yes, of course," Snow White replied, but Cinderella heard only the first word before sinking her teeth into the generous fruit's side.

  "What are you drawing?" she asked around a most satisfying bite.

  "Nothing," Snow White sighed heavily.

  "Then, what are you thinking so hard about drawing?" Cinderella questioned, chew slowing in concern as she watched Snow White withdraw into herself.

  For a time, Snow White said nothing. She only stared at the parchment, as if willing her image to draw itself. "My mother," she finally replied, and Cinderella heard the nearly imperceptible catch in her voice, the same catch she always felt in her own throat each time she spoke those words.

  "She is dead," Cinderella uttered.

  "
Since I was very little," Snow White returned quietly. "I had forgotten what she looked like... until the night I came here. I was alone in the forest. Scared. Death, it was chasing me. Then, my mother appeared, like an angel, and led me here. I hoped to sketch her before I forgot what she looked like again, but I seem to have already forgotten."

  Pulling the nearest chair from the table, Cinderella's knees felt weak as she sunk down onto it, setting the tomato on the table's edge. Opening her mouth to speak, she closed it again, not sure what she wanted to say. She had never been good at telling people the truth of her life, until Rapunzel, and, even with Rapunzel, it was not always easy.

  "My mother died when I was young too," she finally said.

  "Oh," Snow White breathed, eyes finding Cinderella's. "What happened to her?"

  "She just got sick," Cinderella shrugged, glancing away, fearing the questions that always seemed to follow the announcement. When Snow White did not ask any, Cinderella knew it was because she already knew their answers. "So, how long is winter in this kingdom?"

  "What do you mean?" Snow White's brow furrowed slightly, and Cinderella felt a sliver of anxiety as she realized she may have said too much. "You are not from this kingdom?"

  "No," Cinderella replied carefully.

  "You are from Fitzburg, then?" Snow White asked, and Cinderella thought to borrow the lie. Looking to the loft, she wondered if Fitzburg was a good place to be from to keep Rapunzel safe.

  "Jaxtonia?" Snow White tried again when Cinderella took too long in answering.

  Returning her gaze to Snow White's expectant expression, Cinderella imagined how false life would feel if she had to lie her way through the rest of it. "I have heard of neither of those places," she confessed.

  "Then, where do you come from?" Snow White looked at her with simple curiosity, and Cinderella weighed the potential consequences of telling the truth, before deciding, without truth, there was no reason to have run from Naxos, or from Troyale for that matter, where untruths were in ample supply.

  "I come from a kingdom called Troyale," she replied, wanting nothing more than to trust Snow White. "And Rapunzel, she is from a kingdom called Naxos."

  Staring at her as if she spoke gibberish, Snow White gave a sudden, spurting laugh. "Are you making that up?" she questioned.

  "No," Cinderella assured her.

  "But I have not heard of either of your kingdoms either," Snow White returned, and Cinderella knew she must tread lightly, for there were many things people feared, but none so much as those things they did not understand.

  "I know," she uttered. "Rapunzel and I... we did not arrive in this kingdom in what one might call a usual way."

  "Then, how did you arrive?" Snow White questioned at once, and Cinderella tried to swallow past the vines that formed inside her throat.

  "The season after my mother died," she started, deciding the entryway of the cow best saved for another time, "when blades of green pushed up through the earth, I planted a tree at my mother's grave. Recently, there was a festival in my kingdom, and my stepmother and stepsisters did not want me to go. When I went to my mother's grave, a dress descended for me and I was made clean and unblemished."

  "Like magic?" Snow White asked in awe.

  "Yes," Cinderella nodded. "like magic."

  "Once at the festival, the prince..." Cinderella searched for the words to explain. "He was drawn to me and refused to take other partners."

  "A prince?" Snow White enthusiastically asked.

  "Yes," Cinderella replied. "I do not know what he desired in me."

  "I do."

  Smile coming softly to Cinderella's lips, she glanced to where Rapunzel looked down from the top rung of the ladder. "How long have you been awake?"

  "Long enough," Rapunzel said, continuing down the ladder and sliding into the chair next to Cinderella to take up the eating of the tomato, her free hand warm on Cinderella's thigh through the fabric of the borrowed nightgown.

  "But the feeling was not mutual," Cinderella continued, as Snow White rose from her place by the fire to join them at the table. "I had a discordant feeling, like I should want to be caught by the prince, only I did not. A vision of our wedding filled my mind's eye, but it was in opposition with my heart. So, I fled."

  "You fled?" Snow White questioned in shock. "But he was a prince."

  "Yes," Cinderella nodded.

  "Why would you not want to marry a prince?" She looked truly confounded.

  "Because he was possessive and arrogant and thought Neptune was the god of the sky," Cinderella returned.

  "But..." Snow White only seemed more confused. "Every girl wants to marry a prince."

  "Does she?" Cinderella asked, fingers drumming tensely upon the table, as Rapunzel's hand turned to a comforting caress upon her leg. "And why is that?"

  "Because," Snow White said at once, before stopping to blink around the room, giving up her search for a real reason with an unconcerned shrug. "Because that is what is best. My father always did hope to match me to the kindest of princes."

  A derisive burst of laughter escaping her, Cinderella clamped down on it when Snow White looked wounded. Remembering they were from two different lands, it occurred to her a kind prince could well exist in Snow White's. "I do beg your pardon," she uttered. "Perhaps, one day you will meet your prince."

  The apology erasing the embarrassed expression from Snow White's face, the girl smiled once more. "How did you get from your kingdom?" she asked. "How did you meet Rapunzel? How did you end up here?"

  "I cannot explain," Cinderella shook her head, "if you cannot understand why I would run from a prince."

  "Maybe I can," Snow White replied, and, much to her surprise, Cinderella believed her. Watching her eyes cloud, as if cogs were working so hard inside her mind they began to smoke, she awaited Snow White's next thought. "You said you had the wrong feeling?" she questioned at last, and Cinderella nodded. "I never thought to feel," Snow White returned quietly. "I knew my marriage would be set for me. Wanting for anything else, wishing for anything more, was a senseless undertaking. So, I did not wish."

  After all she had seen and known, it was, perhaps, the saddest thing Cinderella had ever heard. For her stepmother and stepsisters had taken what they could from her, and it had been much, but they could not take her wishes.

  "What your mind felt was in discord with your heart?" Snow White went on to ask, and, swallowing thickly, Cinderella nodded once more. "How did you know your heart was right?"

  "I did not know," Cinderella whispered, for she had run mostly on instinct, as prey knew to flee a predator. "Not then. I knew only that I was in trouble. You cannot throw a shoe at a prince and not invite the wrath of a kingdom."

  "You didn't!" Snow White's face split into a wide smile.

  "I was desperate," Cinderella said with a strained laugh. "I wanted only to get away. Once it toppled him from his horse, though, I knew I could only stay and be caught or keep running. My mother, she told me to always trust my heart, and, that night, my heart said to run, and, when I did, my mother's tree, it opened to me, swallowed me up, and I was pulled from my kingdom. Then, I emerged into Rapunzel's. It was there that my heart said something else, and then I did know I was right to flee."

  Eyes going to Rapunzel's face, Cinderella raised her fingers to the soft skin of a warm cheek, and blue eyes regarded her with something she never thought to have directed her way. As awed by it as she was the first time she saw it, her heart kicked as Rapunzel pulled the hand from her cheek to press a lingering kiss against her knuckles.

  "Oh!" Snow White's exclamation drew Cinderella's eyes back to her. "Your hearts. That is how you knew. Your hearts... they are fitted."

  Glancing to Rapunzel again, Cinderella watched a smile play at her lips. "Yes," Cinderella replied. "They are fitted."

  When she returned her gaze to Snow White, though, the girl's smile warped instantly to a frown, and Cinderella felt sickness drop into her chest. "And that is bothersome to y
ou," she uttered.

  "No," Snow White assured her at once. "It is not. It is just..." She glanced toward the window and Cinderella could see the pain set in on her face, as clear as any expression. "My stepmother, she tried to have me killed."

  Remembering the threats of her own stepmother, Cinderella grimaced, for, despite the cruel punishments doled out at her hands, her stepmother had never actually attempted to take her life.

  "The laces," Rapunzel said.

  "I am certain," Snow White nodded. "Before that, though, she sent one of the huntsmen from the castle to slay me. It is how I ended up here." Eyes still on the snow beyond the window, she looked most bothered. "I know that in my head," she went on very softly, as if she was not quite sure of what she was saying. "But, when I fall into my thoughts, everything goes blank and my heart grows loud. And my heart, it will not believe it."

  "What does your heart say?" Rapunzel asked.

  "My stepmother has magic," Snow White replied. "She never used it much, but I have seen it. My heart says, if she wanted me dead, I would be dead, and all that she has done, she has done to protect me."

  "Protect you from what?" Again, it was Rapunzel who posed the question, but it was Cinderella who leaned across the table, anxiously awaiting Snow White's answer.

  "From herself," Snow White said at last.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Dreams

  The queen was in mourning.

  For days, the castle staff had watched the door of her chamber, waiting for it to fly open at any moment with a command or reprimand, but the queen had yet to emerge.

  When Lemi took her food, she refused to eat it. When people called upon her, she refused to see them. She was content, it seemed, to remain in her bed, the one she had made for times like this, when she did not want to share a bed with the king.