The Garden
Meanwhile
Sophie reached the end of the path, then turned to watch Maeve finish following in her footsteps. A faint flutter of glow receded into the hedges, and Sophie sent another silent thanks to her tiny allies. As much as she hated to admit it, it was rather nice to not have to do everything for herself. But was it cheating to get help?
No, she decided. Fairy tales were full of stories about people who succeeded because they got help like that. Maybe that was even the test. One had to prove worthiness to rule by admitting one couldn’t do it all and by recognizing the contributions of the tiniest and ugliest members of the Realm. Besides, it wasn’t as though she was trying for the throne. She was merely making it look like she was helping Maeve while still blocking her.
Maeve came to the end of the path. “Isn’t there supposed to be a maze?” she asked, staring at the unbroken wall of hedge that created a dead end.
“Yes, and the song gives instructions on getting through the maze,” Sophie replied.
“But how do we enter the maze? The hedges must have grown up. There has to be an entry in here somewhere.” Maeve stuck her hands into the hedges and tried to push the branches apart. It would have been lovely if the hedges had bit her arms off at the elbows, thought Sophie, but all they did was snag on Maeve’s sleeves.
“The song tells how,” Sophie said.
The others caught up to them. “Why are you helping her, Sophie?” Emily asked. Sophie resolutely avoided looking at her sister.
Maeve answered for her. “If she wants to take you back home, she has to help me.”
“Sophie, it’s not worth it!” Sophie caught the faint trace of amusement in Emily’s voice. Now Sophie really had to avoid looking at Emily, lest the two of them break down in giggles the moment they made eye contact.
The only problem was, Sophie wasn’t sure what she could do to keep Maeve from winning the throne while also saving Emily and the others. Her allies may have helped by wetting Maeve’s feet and putting a few shells in her path, but was that really enough to disqualify her, or was that just poetic license to make a better song?
“Sing the next verse,” Maeve ordered.
“To reach my side, tell her to find a perfect rose to offer me. The petals fall and pave the way to open wide the door to my heart,” Sophie sang.
Maeve stared with dismay at the walls of rosebushes surrounding them. “Which one is perfect?” she asked. “There must be some trickery here.” Gesturing at her people, she demanded, “Help me search. Look for a perfect bloom.” Sophie suspected that wasn’t the way to go. The only thing picking a perfect rose got anyone in a fairy tale was captivity in the home of a hideous beast. But what would the perfect rose be in this situation?
She saw one full-headed bloom lying on the ground. As she knelt to study it, she heard Jen call out, “This one looks perfect!” Whatever she’d found, it couldn’t be as perfect as the one Sophie had noticed. This rose had opened fully, and the velvety red petals had darkened almost to black. It was a rose that had lived a full life.
She cupped it gently in both hands and stood. Maeve and her people were severing a bloom from a bush at the head of the path. Maeve grabbed it as soon as it was free from the bush, then waved it at the hedge that dead-ended the path. “Open for your queen!” she shouted.
At the same time, Sophie opened her hands and let her rose fall in a shower of petals. They lingered in the air, drifting slowly to the ground, as the branches of the hedge parted to form a doorway.
Maeve shouted in triumph and grabbed Sophie by the elbow. Her other hand still held the rose by the stem. “Guide us through the maze,” she ordered.
“To reach my side, tell her to turn always looking to the right,” Sophie sang. She moved into the maze and took the first right turn, and then each right that came up after that. Maeve, Emily, and the rest followed. It was a complex maze that could easily befuddle anyone who didn’t have directions. Sophie didn’t notice any skeletons lying along the pathways, and she wondered if anyone had ever made it this far. Instead of leading to the center, this maze took travelers to the other side. When she could see only one wall of hedges remaining, she sang, “One last left turn will bring her home, where she will find the way to my heart.” She turned to the left there, and they were out of the maze.
They came out in front of a wall whose veil of thorny vines was even denser than that of the outer keep. “This is so Sleeping Beauty,” Emily remarked. “What we need now is a prince with a magic sword.”
Maeve released Sophie’s arm and shoved the rose into her hand. Sophie winced as a thorn dug into her skin. “There has to be a way inside,” Maeve said, moving forward to study the wall. “What does the song say?”
Sophie hummed it to herself, then said, “It doesn’t say anything about this.”
“There’s a door here,” Maeve said. A glittering knife appeared in her gloved hand, and she hacked at the vines until the doorway was clear. The door opened easily, without the slightest squeak or creak of hinges even though the door most likely hadn’t moved in centuries. Maeve reached back and grabbed Sophie’s arm to pull her through the doorway with her. It was such a jolt that Sophie momentarily lost her balance and put out a hand to steady herself on the door jamb as she passed. She left a slight smear of blood from the prick of the rose’s thorn, and she sent a quick mental apology to whomever was maintaining this place.
As soon as she was over the threshold, the door slammed shut behind her. Both she and Maeve whirled at the sound, and Maeve tried to open the door again, but it refused to budge. She turned back to Sophie with an evil glint in her eyes. “All the better. When you win my throne for me, no one will be the wiser.”
“I’m telling you how to win the throne for yourself,” Sophie said, refusing to back away from Maeve’s menace. “I’d think you’d want witnesses for that.”
Maeve laughed madly. “You do not know, do you? You have no idea what you are. Do you think I wouldn’t have seized the throne the moment I heard your silly little song if that had been all it took?”
“I know it takes blood,” Sophie said, glancing at the smear she’d left on the door jamb.
“The key is whose blood it is. Now, come. We must go through yet another garden if we’re ever to find the palace.”
Sophie barely managed to stop a double take. As far as she could tell, they were in a palace. There were marble floors and gilded walls in a corridor that seemed to go on forever. There wasn’t a garden in sight. As she followed Maeve, their footsteps echoed, and all Sophie could think of was what the requirement of blood might mean for her.