supper.”
As the hours passed, we sewed and embroidered, and the ladies spoke softly among themselves. I started noticing how precious their handiwork was, these women who’d spent so much time at court. My own design was simple, a trellis of plump fruits and gourds lining the silk.
My fingers longed for the earth. Outside, the garden would be overflowing with spinach and cabbage, radishes and beets. I let the pang pass by me, and after a while excused myself alone to my room.
I arranged the herbs I’d brought from the forest into baskets. I moved a small table from my bedside into the closet, and placed a cloth over it. I cast a protection spell around this little workroom, to prevent unfriendly eyes from seeing it, and sent up a quick prayer to Artemis.
I walked back into the bedroom and stared into the mirror Mathena had given me, at this new self draped in fine fabrics and jewels.
I laughed, leaned in and whispered, “Mirror, mirror, on the wall. Who is the fairest of them all?”
“Rapunzel is the fairest,” it whispered.
It calmed me, that voice.
“What is Mathena doing now?”
The glass rippled and swirled, and an image appeared before me, of Mathena stalking through the forest with Brune on her wrist. My heart clenched. I closed my eyes, imagining the rattling of leaves around me, the scent of dirt and leaves.
I opened my eyes and asked one more question: “Will I survive here?”
I stared into the mirror, waiting, a sense of unease creeping over me as it refused to answer.
“Will I survive here?” I repeated, tapping the glass, but the mirror remained silent.
Later in the day, the king called for me. I was happy to set down my thread and little kerchief. My ladies seemed to share my excitement, immediately surrounding me and freshening the powder and paint on my face. Clareta combed violet-scented oil through my hair and then helped me put it up again. I was already getting used to the guilt and anxiety that marked her, that moved from her into me through the strands. It was much better than the barrage of judgment I felt from the others.
He was waiting for me in the great hall, surrounded by his advisors, who were drinking ale and relaxing after the long afternoon session.
“My queen,” he said, standing and rushing out to me.
Immediately I felt at ease, despite the gazes of the council. Father Martin was present, too, alongside Lord Aubert. I nodded to them, and then turned to my husband, who took me in his arms.
He was wearing a rich robe with a gleaming gem latching it together at his neck. It made him even more imposing, hanging down from his shoulders as if he were some magnificent beast.
“My king,” I said.
“You are a vision,” he said, stepping back to admire me. He ran his fingers along the neckline of my dress. “This finery suits you. I will send my jeweler and the head seamstress to you. It will give you much pleasure, I think, after all the time you’ve spent in less . . . civilized surroundings.” He laughed, and I saw he was not mocking me, that he took joy in my transformation.
“I’m glad you still like me as a civilized lady,” I said.
He took my hand. “Come, let’s walk a bit. I want to show you some things.”
He led me from the great hall, as if we were going on an adventure. Everything with him was like that. It was infectious, and I followed him happily.
“So how do you find my daughter?” he asked, as we stepped into one of the palace’s many hallways. His love for her was evident, even when he mentioned her casually as he did now.
I glanced back. Behind us, several guards and servants were following.
“She’s a charming child,” I said, turning back to him. “And so striking.”
He sighed. “Yes. She looks just like her mother.”
A flash of pain moved through me, and I tried to ignore it. Of course the child looked like her mother.
He stopped before a large window that looked out over the courtyard and pulled me in next to him. The glass bathed his face in a red light. On either side of the window, portraits lined the walls; they seemed to be everywhere, those faces from the past. “Her mother’s death is still so recent, and she has become more and more solitary of late. They were very close. Now she seems to have forgotten how to laugh, how to be a child. It’s one reason I wanted to marry right away, rather than wait. Everyone thought I should wait.”
“I’m glad you did not,” I said, and noticed an edge in my voice, a hint of desperation I did not like.
“As am I,” he said, turning to kiss me. I raised myself up on my toes to reach his mouth. Already I could feel the heat in my body. Conscious of the guards behind us, I lowered myself and cleared my throat.
We walked slowly down the hallway, with him occasionally pointing out one of the portraits and telling me who the subject was. “My father’s great-uncle Edvard,” he’d say, or something similar. It was spooky, being surrounded by the dead.
“Perhaps you and Snow White could take a walk together,” he said. “I think she would like that.”
“I would like that, too,” I said. “Very much.”
“You will be a good mother to her,” he said. He turned to me and stroked my cheek with his long fingers. Unlike me, he took no notice of all the eyes around us.
“I hope to be,” I said.
“And you, are you happy?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said, growing weak and wobbly on my feet. My hair pulsed with his touch, his passion was a physical thing moving through it. Below it, I could feel his love for his daughter, how much he wanted me to love her, make her better. It moved me, that he thought I had that power. “I love being here, being your wife. And I’ve never heard such music as there is here. Or seen such dances. It’s all so wonderful.” My eyes started to mist, as I tried to express how grateful I was, how full and happy. I didn’t care if anyone else in the court loved me, as long as he continued to love me as he did. I would love Snow White, I decided, as he did. For him.
“I want this to be the most dazzling court in the world,” he said. “Which is why I have the most dazzling queen.”
I smiled. “Is it not?”
He took my hand again, and we kept walking. Above us, chandeliers swayed and glittered. “Well,” he said. “This was once the greatest court in the world and the most powerful kingdom. We had land that stretched from ocean to ocean, a ferocious army, loyal allies. This court once produced the most magnificent poetry and art and theater. My family’s line, the Chauvins, we have fallen very far from what we once were.”
His voice shook as we spoke, his passion evident. It was impossible not to be swept up in it, and suddenly I, too, longed for a lost past, one greater than my own, with its ravenous mothers and magical plants.
“I think that’s what Mathena spoke about, when she said that many in the kingdom hope for that kind of greatness again.”
“Yes,” he said. “Many of us hope for that. I was raised hearing stories of that time. My tutors taught me all the history, made me read the great epics recounting the most famous battles. Did you not study these things?”
I shrugged. “Mathena told me many great stories and myths, but not often ones about the kingdom.”
“That’s all right. You can leave the past to me. I want you to think only of right now. Forget everything that came before.”
I studied him, wondering if he knew about the rapunzel, or anything else from my past, and then realized he was talking about a different one: the past in which he’d left me in the tower and married Teresa instead.
“All right,” I said. “There is a plant for that, you know. One that will make you forget everything.”
He laughed. “Well, then I will have to procure it for you.”
“It’s all so exciting,” I said, after a moment. “You have such ambition!”
“You will learn the truth of that statement,” he said. “This kingdom will be great again. Already I’m filling the palace with riches. By the time we die we’ll have surpassed anything that came before us.”
“I hope that will not be for a long time yet,” I said.
We stepped into a massive room filled with workers. The smell of plaster and pigment was
