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HAZEL sits alone at the table of the Enchantress, staring out the window in the direction where she knows her mother and the other children crowd into a house shaped like a shoe, though she cannot see it. How she misses them. The Enchantress ignores her mostly, going about her business, studying her books, tending to flowers. Watching her reminds Hazel of Mercy, who always loved to tend flowers. She was always helping Garron, the village gardener, tend the most colorful parts of Fairendale, while he saw to the parts that would feed and nourish the people. She does not know why the Enchantess keeps her here, away from the children and her mother.
Today, the Enchantress stands at the window, staring in the same direction Hazel is looking. Her voice is startling when she speaks. “Do you miss them?” A note of longing turns Hazel’s eyes toward the beautiful, mysterious woman.
“Yes,” Hazel says. “More than anything.”
The Enchantress turns toward Hazel. She is dressed in a rich green gown that puffs out around the waist and all the way to her feet. The neck is high and trimmed with gold. Hazel has not seen her wear the same dress yet, though she has not lived here for so very long. She tears her eyes from the woman and glances about the house. It is old and musty, as if it has been here for a very long time.
“Would you like to see them?” the Enchantress says.
“Yes,” Hazel says, her gaze returning to the milky white face. “Very much.”
“Perhaps we shall arrange it,” the Enchantress says. She looks away. “When it is safer.”
“Yes,” Hazel says, for she knows not what else to say. “When it is safer.”
“Would you like a bit of bread?” The Enchantress says. She is already reaching for a plate, for Hazel has taken every offering the Enchantress has held out to her.
“That would be wonderful,” Hazel says. Her voice is soft and sad, though the light in her eyes has not dimmed completely, for Hazel is a child who hopes even in the most dire of circumstances. She hopes that she will be reunited with her mother, Maude, and her father, Arthur, and her twin brother Theo. She hopes that the Enchantress will tell her soon why it is she is here. She hopes that they might one day, sooner rather than later, return to their home, for she never wanted to leave Fairendale in the first place.
The Enchantress slips the plate in front of her, and Hazel eats slowly, as if her stomach does not long for the bread. “Your magic,” the Enchantress says. “Has it grown stronger since you have been here?”
Hazel swallows a bite and considers this question for a moment. Her magic has not grown stronger, but it has also not grown weaker. That means Theo must still be alive, somewhere. “Perhaps,” she says. “I do not have much opportunity to practice it.”
“Perhaps we should provide some opportunities,” the Enchantress says. Hazel drops the bread. It clicks against her plate. The Enchantress tilts her head. “What is it?”
Hazel shakes her head. “Nothing,” she says, for she cannot tell this woman, who is unknown, and, perhaps, untrustworthy, why it is that she cannot practice magic but must conserve what little power still remains. Every bit of magic one twin does outside of the presence of the other twin weakens their power considerably. Until Theo is back with Hazel, she must not perform any magic.
“Would you like an opportunity?” the Enchantress says. She watches Hazel closely.
“Perhaps,” Hazel says.
“Your powers must not grow weaker,” the Enchantress says. She hands Hazel another slice of bread. “You must not forget.”
“I could not forget what I have learned,” Hazel says.
“What your father taught you?” the Enchantress says.
“Yes,” Hazel says.
“Tell me, how is it that he knew magic so well?” the Enchantress says.
“My mother had the gift,” Hazel says. “He always wanted to learn.”
“And you are sure he had none?” the Enchantress says.
No. Hazel has never been sure her father did not have the gift of magic. It is true that Maude and Arthur told her that her father did not have a bit of magic in his bones, but how is it that they could have produced two magical children? Was it not only the most powerful magic, combined together, that could produce twins? She had never entirely believed her mother and father, truth be told.
“I see that you have wondered as well,” the Enchantress says.
“They would not tell stories,” Hazel says. “Not to Theo and—” She realizes her error nearly as soon as the words are out.
The Enchantress does not blink but merely smiles. “Your brother,” she says. “Of course I knew of your brother. It is why I asked.” The Enchantress leans closer. “Twins do not come to just anyone.”
Hazel notices, for perhaps the first time, that the woman’s eyes are kind and soft. They are familiar eyes, yet she cannot place them. The Enchantress reaches across the table and touches Hazel’s hand. Her skin is smooth and lovely. “You can trust me, Hazel,” she says, and for a moment, Hazel is shaken by the voice, as if memory lives in it, waiting to be unlocked. But the moment is gone, and the Enchantress rises from her place. She returns to the window.
“Your mother is very brave,” she says.
“Yes,” Hazel says. “She is braver than she knows.”
“And your father?” the Enchantress says. Is it her imagination, or does Hazel hear a catch in the woman’s throat? “He lives?”
Hazel’s eyes fill now. “We do not know,” she says, as evenly as she can manage. Her father disappeared in the dragon lands. He might very well be among the men whose bodies were strewn about the desert for all of an afternoon and an evening before disappearing completely.
“It is as I feared,” the Enchantress says, so softly that perhaps Hazel was not meant to hear the words, for they are puzzling words from a woman she has never known.
They lapse into a comfortable silence, one in which Hazel considers all the people she has lost. Theo. Arthur. Mercy.
Oh, Mercy. Her best friend. It was Mercy who saved them from the underground portal, when a soldier found a shoe and broke the only link they had to the outside world. Mercy performed the most daring of spells: vanishing. The rules of magic are complicated. Mercy might return, but she would look nothing like she’d looked before—older or younger or lovelier or homelier or taller or shorter or less human-like and more animal-like. Or she might return and look every bit like she did before.
Or she might never return.
One could never know when magic took control, as it did so willingly in a vanishing spell. It was said that magic kept its hold over a sorcerer so that no one would vanish lightly. Magic demands a price, you see.
“Where did you lose sight of your father?” the Enchantress says when the silence has stretched between them for too long.
“In the dragon lands,” Hazel says. “Many died there.”
“And you believe he did as well?” the Enchantress says.
“No,” Hazel says, but the word comes out in a rush of tears. “No,” she says again, before burying her face in her hands. Somewhere in the middle of her weeping a hand touches her shoulder and then wraps all the way around her. The Enchantress holds her tight.
Hazel did not expect such warmth. She lifts her face, caught by the eyes of the woman before her. “All will be well,” the Enchantress says. “You shall see.”
Hazel nods, for she cannot speak.
The Enchantress rises again. Hazel stares at the wet spot on her sleeve. Does it belong to Hazel’s tears or to those of the Enchantress?
“When might I see my mother?” Hazel says.
“Soon,” the Enchantress says. “You shall see her soon. And the other children as well.”
“Are they well?” Hazel says.
The Enchantress smiles. Her red lips stretch across straight white teeth. “Of course,” she says. “They have more than they could ever need.”
“Thank you,” Hazel says, for this is enough for today. She does not ask what the Enchantress wants of her. She does not know the woman well enough yet. She will save that question for later. For now, Hazel returns the plate to a washing basin and gazes out the window.
“You miss your brother,” the Enchantress says.
“Yes,” Hazel says. “We have never been separated from one another.”
“Perhaps we shall see him again someday,” the Enchantress says. “Your father and your brother.”
“Do you think so?” Hazel says. She dares not look at the Enchantress.
“Yes,” the Enchantress says. “Yes, I believe we will.”
Hazel turns toward the Enchantress, emboldened by her words. “And you will help me?” she says.
The Enchantress studies her for a moment. Hazel is terrified that she has said precisely the wrong thing at precisely the wrong time, but what was she to do with the kindness the Enchantress has shown today?
But then the woman’s red lips pull once more into a smile, making her face beautifully young, and she says, “Of course.” She floats away from the window, so very graceful she does not make a single bounce, and then she turns back to Hazel. “But you must stay here. You must not leave the house. There are dangers in these woods.” She looks at Hazel one last time, and then she floats all the way out of the room. Hazel watches her go and then turns back to the window, where she studies the torched trees that surround this invisible house in the woods and the green ones that remain behind a concealment spell more powerful than any she could ever conjure. Her eye is caught by the flowers, by the promise of a shoe-shaped house on the other side of the clearing. She knows the Enchantress is correct in urging her to stay within the walls of the house, but she longs for her freedom nonetheless. If only there were a way to be free and safe at the same time.
She is startled by the Enchantress, returning to the room. The Enchantress carries a glowing ball and sets it on the table.
“What is this?” Hazel says, drawing nearer.
“A looking ball,” the Enchantress says.
“I have never seen one,” Hazel says. “Where did you get it?”
The Enchantress lifts a shoulder. “It was here in the house when I discovered it.”
“So you have not always lived here?” Hazel says.
“Of course not,” the Enchantress says. “I have only just come.”
Hazel longs to ask more, such as why the Enchantress has come now and what it is she plans to do and who might have lived here before, but the Enchantress speaks again before she can summon the courage. “Your brother,” the Enchantress says. “I cannot see him.”
An ache begins in Hazel’s chest and moves out toward her fingers. “He is dead?”
The Enchantress shakes her head. “No,” she says. “We do not know for sure. Just because I cannot see him does not mean he does not live.” She looks at Hazel and smiles, but it is not the same smile that she has turned on Hazel before. “It means that he is very good at hiding.”
Hazel tries to steady her voice. “And my father?”
The Enchantress peers into the ball for some time. “He must be very good at hiding as well.” She lifts the ball from the table. “I shall have to summon more powerful magic. But I am weary now.” She takes the crystal ball and disappears into her room for quite some time.
Hazel is left alone at the table, to wonder at too many disturbing possibilities.
Though Sir Greyson has been charged with orders to find the missing prince, the first thing he does, instead, is visit his mother. He justifies this deviation from the king’s orders by reasoning that the village people have stolen the boy, and perhaps his mother knows something about it. He shall at least try, and, in the meantime, assure himself that his mother still lives.
Fear touches the whole of his backside as he walks closer and closer toward the village. It is as silent and still as the castle was when he first walked in. He hopes the people have not all deserted this land. What would a land be without its people? The sky, on his walk, has grown darker, if that is even possible in this already-dark day. It looks as though it might rain, and not the kind of rain that sprinkles thirsty ground and lifts the faces of wilting flowers. The kind that will beat and thrash and bruise those caught in its wake. He stares at the dying flowers and passes a garden that looks as if it tries hard to hold on but does not have much hope. He hopes that this dying land does not foreshadow its people, but it is with a sense of deep foreboding that he opens the door of his mother’s home.
She is not here. He searches every room, in and out and back again. His mother is not here. The room smells of sickness and medicine, and when he walks to the cabinets and opens them, not a single vial of healing tincture remains. He should not have left. He should never have left. Oh, what has he done?
Sir Greyson passes through the streets. He knocks on every door he passes. They all swing open, as if someone stands behind them, but there is no one here. At the door of the woman, Cora, he finds a note. It is written in code, as she used to write him when they were young.
Come to the fountain, it says.
Come to the fountain. Yes, he will come to the fountain.
It has been quite a long time since Sir Greyson has passed between the earth’s layers and entered the secret room beneath the village fountains. He does not even remember when he last entered. Will he remember how to fall? Will he be denied entrance? He closes his eyes and tilts his body forward so it is falling. But his hands do not hit the ground. They pass through.
He stumbles into the lamplit room, and every eye is on him.
And Sir Greyson is so very glad to see the people of this village alive and well that he nearly begins to cry in front of every one of them. But instead he turns away.
A hand touches his shoulder. Sir Greyson turns to see the piercing green eyes of the woman he loved so long ago. “Cora,” he says.
“Sir Greyson,” she says. “You cannot be here.” She looks behind her at the people who have begun to rise from their chairs, staring at him with twisted mouths and furrowed eyebrows and scowls that say he is anything but welcome here. “They all know you belong to the king.”
“I do not belong to the king,” Sir Greyson says, loud enough for all of them to hear. “I never belonged to the king.” He turns back to Cora. “Never.”
“But you became a king’s man,” Cora says.
“As my father did before me,” Sir Greyson says. “No more and no less.”
“The king tells you what to do,” Cora says. “And you do it.”
“No longer,” Sir Greyson says. His eyes search hers. I am on your side, his say.
“But you took our children,” Cora says. Her eyes narrow, full of so much hurt and anger and sadness that he cannot bear to see it. But he makes himself bear it, for it was his decisions that made these eyes.
“I did not take your children,” Sir Greyson says. “I never wanted to take your children. The king...” He lets the words trail off, unsure that they will trust him, no matter what he says. “I only came to find my mother.”
Cora tilts her head. Sir Greyson blinks. And then she nods, just once, and looks back at the people. “He only wants to see his mother,” Cora says. “We should permit him.”
“You are blind, Cora,” a man says in a corner of the room. Sir Greyson almost does not recognize him. Bertie, the town’s baker. “He belongs to the king, no matter what he says.”
“No,” Sir Greyson says. “I have left the king’s service.” It is untrue, as you will remember, but it is every bit of true in Sir Greyson’s heart. For when a man makes a decision to do something, it becomes true in his mind. And Sir Greyson has already decided to leave the king. In fact, he did not come here to retrieve the prince at all. He came here to retrieve his mother, so the two of them might escape this cursed land.
“He stole our children,” another woman says. Her blue eyes flash. Harsh. Angry. Dangerous. “We should kill him.”
Cora holds up her hand. “My good people,” she says. “He has only come to see his mother.”
Sir Greyson hangs his head. The people grow quiet. Someone shuffles forward, and Sir Greyson dares look back up. Garron stands before him. “My mother?” Sir Greyson says.
“First,” Garron says. “You say you have left the king’s service?”
“Yes,” Sir Greyson says. “She will get no more medicine.”
The people murmur around him. Perhaps they have come to understand what might drive a man like Sir Greyson, one of their own, to turn against them, if only for a moment in time.
Cora places her hand on Sir Greyson’s arm. “She will die without her medicine,” she says.
“Yes,” Sir Greyson says. “I feared she was already dead.” He looks about the room, but it is dark here. “I could not do what the king asked me to do. I came here to say my goodbyes.” He came here, in truth, to take his mother with him, if she is strong enough.
Cora’s face softens. “She is well,” she says. “We raided the castle, and someone brought back some medicine. I have been tending her.”
It is hard to contain true joy, true relief, and so it is that Sir Greyson’s face, while breaking into a smile that is perhaps larger than what this dire situation might permit, also crumples into a grimace that ends in sobs so overwhelming that the man can only shake. The people turn away, preserving his dignity. Cora leads him toward his mother. She lies on a small cot set up in a cloaked corner of the room. She is smaller than he remembers. He hardly recognizes her. Sir Greyson kneels before her. He feels the eyes of every person in this room watching him, but he does not care. He kisses his mother’s wrinkled hand. “Mother,” he says.
Her eyes flutter open. She looks painfully tired, as if she has been working vigorously all day, though Sir Greyson knows that it is vigorous enough work to draw the next breath. “My son,” she says, her voice scratchy and weak. She reaches out a hand to pat his cheek. “I did not know if I would see you again.” She smiles, her cracked lips stretching tight. “Now I may die in peace.”
“No, Mother,” Sir Greyson says. “Please. Stay. I have only just gotten here.”
“I am old, son,” she says. “I am tired.”
“I know,” Sir Greyson says, and he feels all the grief of the last days and weeks climbing on his back, all the disappointments and the poor decisions and the pointless chases that kept him from his mother’s side. He can hardly lift his head beneath the weight of all those days he did not care for her. It pulls water from the deepest places in him. He shakes out cries and sobs and coughs as if he did not do this already. He tries to speak, but his mother cannot understand a single word.
“Hush, my dear,” she says. She strokes his hair, as she did when he was a boy. “All will be well. You will see.”
“I am sorry,” he says, but she does not hear.
“I am proud of you,” she says.
Sir Greyson pulls away then and looks at her with eyes that can hardly see her spotted skin. “I have done nothing,” he says. He is drowning in this sea of grief, in this water that is too deep and too strong and too demanding. He grips her hand. She is his mother, you see, and she is dying, and he will never see her again, and he wasted so much time on all the things that did not matter. What if he had been here? What if he had spent his days not chasing after children but enjoying his mother’s presence while he could?
It is strange what grief can do to a man. Some take it well, some rage, some cry, some close up tight, some ask questions. Sir Greyson is a man who asks questions. And the question that will not quiet is What if?
“You have done so much, my son,” his mother says. “You have done so very much to help the kingdom.” She breathes for a moment, as though she has forgotten how, and then she continues. “Now you must do something for yourself.” She pats his cheek again. Her eyes stare into his, and he understands completely what it is they ask of him.
“Yes,” he says. “I must do something for myself.”
She closes her eyes, and he fears she has just died in his arms, but do not worry, dear reader. She is merely sleeping. She will not, in fact, die for many more months. It is only that she can feel the end coming, and she wants to make sure she tells her son what it is she needs to say before words leave her completely.
Sir Greyson turns to the men who continue to watch him, some with tears in their own eyes. There are few things harder in life than losing a parent. They all know it, too. Death and sickness, in a quite tragic and ironic way, bring men together.
“I know where the children are,” Sir Greyson says.
A few of the people gasp. Cora takes a step forward. “Where are the children?” she says.
“In the dungeons beneath the dungeons,” Sir Greyson says.
“The dungeons beneath the dungeons?” Garron says. “Who has heard of such a thing?”
“No one,” Sir Greyson says. “That is why they have not been found.”
“All the children?” Cora says.
“No,” Sir Greyson says. “There are many missing. But perhaps we might at least reach the ones who can be reached.”
“And you know how to get there?” Cora says.
“Yes,” Sir Greyson says.
“You have a key?” Bertie calls out.
“No,” Sir Greyson says. “But that will not be so hard to find.”
Oh, dear reader. If only he knew.
“We must make a plan,” Cora says.
“I will help,” Sir Greyson says. “You need me.”
Cora lets the people speak for her. “Lead us to the children,” they say.
“First a plan,” Sir Greyson says. “We must tread carefully.”
“We need more food and supplies,” Cora says.
“I can bring them to you,” Sir Greyson says. “The castle is unguarded. There is no one to protect the king anymore.”
The people murmur around him. Cora holds up her hand, and the people grow quiet. Sir Greyson stares at this woman who can command an entire village. She is more beautiful than he ever remembered her. “Then we shall move,” she says.
“Yes,” Sir Greyson says. “We shall move.” Someone hands him a piece of parchment, and he bends before it, scratching out the map of the castle in ink.
Cora watches him, and as she watches, her face breaks into a smile.