Nineteen

THE FINAL BATTLE

I saw them first on her hands, lying flat atop the blanket. Four pink eruptions, each no wider than a mole. Hardly cause for alarm to one who did not know what they portended.

Had Rose noticed? Given her lethargy, I did not think so. But her stupor and disinterest in food took on an ominous weight. I had thought her distressed more in mind than body. I had missed the signs of the illness overtaking her, draining her strength in preparation for its onslaught.

For a moment I sank against the bed and grieved her fate. All the king’s precautions, all my care, had been for nothing. Helpless and overcome, I could barely keep myself from sobbing in anguish that the person I loved most in the world was to be taken from me. Then, suddenly, my mind recoiled from the thought. With the same stubborn determination that had led me away from the farm, I vowed that Rose would not die. I would cling to her and cling to life. The pox had taken my mother and my brothers. Mrs. Tewkes. Queen Lenore. I would not relinquish Rose.

I reached into the bag of supplies I had brought from my room and pulled out a small wooden box from the bottom. Opening it, I surveyed Flora’s arsenal of herbs and tonics. There was no cure for the pox, but I refused to fall back in helpless surrender. I would weaken my deadly foe by attacking the disease on all fronts. Already Rose’s skin was heating up from fever, so I must start by cooling her down. I grabbed a clean cloth from a table and soaked it in water, then laid the wet fabric over Rose’s brow.

“You’re flushed,” I said. “This will make you more comfortable.”

Taking one action, no matter how inconsequential, was enough to raise my spirits. I scooped up a bowlful of oats and boiled them in a pot over the fire; when they had softened into mush, I insisted Rose have a few spoonfuls for nourishment. I brought her a clean shift and told her it was time to wash the one she was wearing. Watching her strip off her gown would allow me a glimpse of how far the pox had progressed.

Rising slowly from the bed, Rose loosened the ties in front, and the garment slid down off her shoulders. I wanted to weep at what I saw: an army of pink pustules invading her tender, helpless skin, migrating from her shoulders and forearms down the small of her back and stomach. Even in her dazed state, Rose must know what such a sight signified.

“Are these the signs?” she asked, her voice devoid of curiosity.

“It’s early to say. . . .” I fumbled.

“It is the pox,” Rose said simply. Was she so dulled by grief that she did not care whether she lived or died?

I knelt before her and clutched her wrists, twisting them slightly to draw her attention toward me. My hands pressed against her skin, as if my strength could pass into her very bones. “It began this way with me, and I lived. As will you.”

Rose wrenched herself from my clutches and reached for the clean shift I had laid out on the bed. She pulled it over her head, turning from me, avoiding my eyes, and climbed back into the bed.

“Go, Elise,” she said softly. “Save yourself.”

“I am not the one who needs saving.” I felt unreasonably furious, so much so that I had to walk to the other side of the room and busy myself with cleaning out the soup pot. Did my feelings mean so little to her that she would disregard them completely? How could a young, beautiful girl go so easily to her death? No. I would not allow the thought to linger in my mind. If it could not be imagined, it would not happen.

Through the rest of that endless day and the one that followed, I tried to summon Flora’s voice in my mind, guiding me toward the ways I could ease Rose’s suffering. When the spots turned an angry red and bulged up from Rose’s arms and chest, I soaked strips of cloth in boiling water and pressed them against the pustules until they burst. I rubbed a salve over the resulting sores to lessen their sting and dabbed essence of mint across her chest to ease her breathing. When Rose’s cheeks burned with fever, I brought a bucket of cold water sprinkled with dried lilac to her bedside and bathed her from brow to feet. As soon as I had finished, I pulled off her sweat-dampened sheet and covered her gently with my own.

“Elise.” Rose’s fingers reached out to clutch my hand.

“Yes, my darling?” Her voice was little more than a croak, but I rejoiced to hear it. She had not spoken for close to two days.

“Do you remember my dreams? The witch?”

I remembered them well, those nightmares that had shaken Rose from sleep with desperate screams. On those nights so long ago, I had cradled her in my arms until she stopped crying, feeling her body slowly go limp as she drifted off. If only it were as simple to console her now. If only the pox would release her from its clutches long enough to grant her an evening—an hour!—of sleep.

Rose’s lips parted slightly in a weak attempt at a smile. “You were the only one who could calm me. You made me feel safe.”

“You are safe with me, Rose. Always.”

“Mother. Father.”

What heartbreak can be conveyed with two simple words! I ached for her loss as if it were my own.

“If they are dead, I am queen.”

I told her to shush, that such matters could wait, but the thought had troubled me as well. Rose was now the ruler of this ruined land, the person St. Elsip’s survivors would look to as they struggled to remake their lives and their town. How could Rose take on such a burden, even in the best of health? Who was left to help her? Would our enfeebled kingdom fall to invaders who knew we could not fend them off?

“I never told you . . .” Rose’s voice trailed off, and I urged her not to tire herself, but she gathered her strength and continued. “I used to imagine you were my older sister, watching over me.”

I remembered leaning down to grab her tiny body by the waist, swinging her around in a flurry of skirts and giggles. Rubbing my nose against her pudgy cheeks as Queen Lenore’s other attendants looked on with narrowed, disapproving eyes.

“I have always loved you as if you were my own flesh and blood,” I said.

I knelt by the bed and gently ran my fingers over her forehead. The heat from her fever brought a flush to my own skin.

“There is something I must tell you.”

I had never intended to confess the truth of my parentage to Rose, and perhaps it was wrong to trouble her mind with such revelations in her weakened state. The only defense for my actions is the truth. In that moment I told Rose what I thought she needed to hear: that her parents might be dead but her family was not destroyed. There was still one person at the castle who would be forever bound to her by blood.

“The man who raised me was not my father,” I said. “My mother was seduced before she was married. By Prince Bowen.”

Rose had strength for only a slight gasp. “Why did you not tell me?”

“I did not wish to dishonor my mother’s memory. The only reason I speak of it now is to tell you we are truly family. I will not leave you.”

Rose slipped her hand over mine; her palms were sticky with sweat.

“We are cousins, then,” she whispered.

I nodded. “Yes, my darling. And sisters in spirit.”

“I am so glad.” Rose’s voice was barely louder than a breath. Her hand fell away from mine, but her eyes remained open, staring upward, burning with exhaustion. My own memories of the pox were faint and jumbled, but I could recall all too well the torment of wakefulness. Without sleep Rose would have no escape from her anguish. She would suffer through a never-ending twilight of pain.

With relentless determination the illness advanced through Rose’s body. By the following day, her breathing was ragged, her skin inflamed. The only sound she made was an occasional moan, and I winced with every cry, feeling her suffering as my own. When her tongue began to swell and she choked, panicked, on the food I offered, I poured water drop by drop into the corner of her mouth. Like the mother birds I had seen feed their young, I chewed tiny morsels of bread to soften them before gently nudging the pieces past her lips.

That afternoon, when the fading sunlight reflected my inner foreboding, I wondered how much longer Rose could endure such suffering. My own experience of the pox was no guide: I did not know how many days I had been sick or how my symptoms varied from hers. Rose’s face had been spared the worst of the swelling, and I considered her resilient beauty a beacon of hope until I remembered her mother’s similarly smooth face, unaltered yet dead nonetheless. If my ministrations were prolonging Rose’s pain, all my efforts amounted to nothing more than cruelty.

If she could but rest. The thought haunted me, for I knew it was in my power to grant her the relief, if I would but dare. Among the many formulas listed in Flora’s ledgers was one for a sleeping potion, one I had never made and that she herself had cautioned me against. I remembered Flora’s voice, warning me that every body accepted its properties in different measure; the same amount that lulled one person into slumber might kill another. Rose’s debilitated condition would put her at even greater risk. If I had sensed any improvement, any slight lessening of her agony, I would not have taken such a terrible risk. But she had grown worse by the day, by the hour, until she was clinging to life solely by chains of pain. If she were to die—and I could barely acknowledge the thought—would it not be the ultimate act of love to grant her peace in her final moments?

I knelt beside her and whispered her name. “If it has become too much to bear . . .”

I could not finish. In any case Rose showed no sign that she had heard me. Her eyes stared into mine blankly, unseeing, so inflamed that it hurt to look upon them. I hunched by her bedside, fearing that each shuddering breath might be her last. Time slowed. My knees grew numb against the stone floor, and my back ached; still I kept vigil over her. Rose had not slept for days, and I had dozed no more than a few hours in all that time. My thoughts had become frantic, feverish. I got up from the floor and peered out the window. Night was approaching, a time when only the wicked are about.

My mind whirled with tangled thoughts, each memory leading to another. The sunlight in Marcus’s garden, cleaning my skin of death’s stench. The same bright light in my face many years before, as I sat with Marcus along the riverbank, watching ships sail into the harbor. Marcus and Rose in the castle courtyard, their faces pink with cold, reaching up to catch snowflakes in their hands. Rose as a swaddled baby, clutched in her mother’s arms while Millicent vowed to see her dead. Flora’s voice telling us that no harm would come to Rose under her care. Was the potion I feared most the one that might save her?

I grabbed Flora’s ledger from the wooden box where I kept the collection of herbs and powders. Frantically, my fingers flipped the pages, until I found the list of ingredients. I had all but one: lavender blossoms. A memory pulled at me, elusive yet insistent. I closed my eyes and pictured myself following Flora through the castle garden. I could see her gauzy skirt graze the pathway as we passed the lavender bush. I could remember its sweet, fragrant scent. My smile of pleasure. Flora’s girlish voice: You feel it, don’t you? Lavender’s power to soothe the soul.

In that moment the decision was made. If I sat in this room any longer, waiting for Rose to die, I would go mad. I pulled a shawl from my trunk, then paused, staring at the gleam of red and green that beckoned from the bottom. I had saved Dorian’s dagger as a remembrance of my husband, never expecting to have a use for such a lethal object. But now, with bandits about, such a companion might strengthen my courage for what lay ahead. I strapped on a leather belt and slid the dagger in along my waist, gripping the handle to harden my resolve.

I picked up a candle and opened the door. The weak flicker of candlelight was hardly enough to see by, but I could have found my way in utter darkness, so familiar was the route. My footsteps clattered through the vast, silent space as I navigated the twists and turns of the fortress-turned-tomb, the place where I had lived through unimaginable happiness and crushing sorrow. I moved swiftly past the Great Hall, the scene of so many grand banquets, and into the Receiving Room, once my beloved queen’s domain, now simply another desolate, empty shell. No voice called out at the sound of my approach, yet I could not escape a pervasive feeling of watchfulness. As if the shadows of all those lost were watching me pass, waiting to see what I might do.

I pushed open the small door on the far side of the room and stepped out into the garden. The last rays of sunlight bathed the plants in an amber glow. Weeds had overtaken the beds, and the gardeners—had any remained—would have been harshly reprimanded for the unruliness before my eyes. But I rejoiced to see it, overgrown and untended as it was. An echo of past happiness still lingered there, along the paths I had wandered with the queen and Flora and Rose. Death might surround me, yet here I witnessed rebirth. The rosebushes were sprouting buds, and the herbs were bursting with new growth. If any hope remained, it was here.

I brushed my hands against the tender petals and breathed in the mingled scents, restocking my heart with happy memories. Though thoughts of Queen Lenore brought a pang of loss, I allowed myself to picture her sun-flushed and smiling, following Rose through the vine-covered archways. For all the kindnesses she had done me, I owed her the honor of remembrance. Not as she’d died, but as she had lived.

Finding myself in the heart of the rose garden, a place as holy to me as any church, I sank to my knees. Clutching my hands together, I closed my eyes and prayed for guidance, whether to Flora or to God I could not tell, for they became intermingled in my mind. I prayed for Rose’s salvation and my own, for the strength to carry on living if she did not. Slowly, the fear that had weighted my body began to lift and my breathing eased. Whatever happened next, I would know I had done all I could.

I stood and made my way to the lavender bush, where the first flowers had burst from their buds. Pulling off a handful, I slipped them into my sleeve and braced myself for the return journey to the North Tower. It took my eyes some minutes to adjust from the outdoor twilight to the indoor gloom, and the flickering shadows seemed to mock me as I waved my candle in a pitiful attempt to banish them. Intent on my destination, I did not notice the faint glow emanating from the Great Hall. Indeed I might have passed by it altogether had a sound not immobilized me with terror. It was a voice, calling my name.

Slowly, I crept toward the open archway and peered inside. My gaze passed over the marble floors, the lofty walls, the priceless tapestries. Across the room a beacon of light pulled me forward, toward the royal thrones, where a darkened figure sat in wait.

Millicent.

The woman I had last seen as a near-skeleton had not lost her air of decay. Her mottled, scarred skin was stretched tight across her face, and white hair hung in thin wisps across her forehead and cheeks. But she had draped her hunched frame in the lush green cloak I remembered so well, and a glittering crown was perched atop her head. What a fool I had been to think the pox could fell such a woman! Her sunken eyes gleamed with the reflected light of the lantern at her feet. She watched me approach, step by step, savoring the moment. For what satisfaction is there in victory without an audience to applaud it?

So this is how it ends, I thought, with Millicent triumphant.

“Have you come to pay me homage at last?”

Her shrill voice catapulted through the room, coming back at me in a horrifying echo. I could only stare at her in mute dismay. I was tired, so very tired, and utterly drained of the will to fight.

“Elise.” The word was a hiss, a desecration of my name. “Bow down before me as the rightful ruler of this land.”

“Rose is the rightful ruler,” I said, not nearly as forcefully as I’d intended.

“Not for long.”

The terrible finality of her words chilled me. How could she know that Rose was close to death? Then I remembered the secret passageway that connected her bedchamber to Rose’s. Was it possible that she had been able to hear us from her sickbed? That while I thought her dead, Millicent had been listening to Rose’s moans and my desperate prayers?

“I am the last of my family’s line,” Millicent proclaimed, “and with Rose’s death the throne passes to me. As it should have, long ago.”

She had the look and bearing of a madwoman, yet I could not deny that her words held a certain truth. Had she not been born a woman, what a ruler she might have been! Freed of the bitterness that had so corrupted her soul, she would have been capable of greatness.

“Even Flora agreed, did she not?” Millicent looked at me with wide-eyed innocence, knowing that the name of her deceased sister would play upon my sympathies. “She knew that my brother was a fool. Yet he took the reins of leadership, and I was left with no greater task than to find a husband. Imagine, Elise! Would that have been enough for you?”

I had always spoken in favor of Rose’s inheriting the throne. How could I not feel a pang of sympathy for Millicent as she once was, a woman whose talents had been crushed by custom and expectations?

“The kingdom must have a strong leader in these troubled times,” Millicent continued. “I will be your savior!”

Did she know how closely her cry of victory mimicked a lunatic’s cackle? Or did she simply not care? There was something magnificent about her still, sitting in self-righteous glory upon the throne that had eluded her for so long. I stood at the edge of the dais, looking upward, an obsequious position that brought a twisted smile to her face.

“You have done your best for Rose, but it is too late. Come—we shall celebrate the dawning of a new era. I assure you, Elise, it will be unlike anything you have ever experienced.”

She pulled herself up to stand, clutching the throne with one hand and reaching forward with the other. I caught a flash of burnished gold and saw she was wearing King Ranolf’s signet ring. The ring that had been handed down from father to son for generations as a symbol of their rule. The thought of Millicent pulling it from the king’s lifeless finger filled me with an overpowering rage. Her lust for power had destroyed the royal family and transformed a glorious castle into a graveyard, yet she had emerged from the ashes, gloating at her victory.

Millicent flourished the ring before my face, demanding the ultimate gesture of supplication. As her twisted knuckles came to within an inch of my face, I felt the belt cut into my waist. The press of the dagger against my side. With a swift, sudden movement, I took hold of her hand and tugged with all my strength. The jerk knocked her off balance, and she toppled from the dais, landing on the floor with a dull thump. For all her menacing air, Millicent was still an old woman, and her frail body was no match for my ferocity. Her cloak and skirts had fallen back to reveal her skeletal legs and arms, a pathetic sight that might have evoked sympathy in any other circumstances. But I had no shred of compassion left for Millicent. I would never allow the kingdom, no matter how weakened, to be ruled by such a creature.

I drew the dagger out from my belt and brandished it before me. My body retained the memory of Dorian’s lessons; I could still feel his arms pressed against mine, guiding my strokes. My hand seemed to move of its own accord, following the steps laid out by my husband years before: Twist the blade sideways so it slides between the ribs, then thrust upward with a sudden, brute force. Show no hesitation. No mercy. Millicent’s screams and mine blended together as I took aim at her heart, plunging the dagger into her flesh until the handle—and my hand upon it—jammed against her chest. Blood gushed from the wound, spattering my fingers and sleeves. I pulled the blade free and stared, appalled, as the crimson liquid poured from her bodice.

Millicent’s mouth gaped in silent agony as she struggled to breathe. I took a step back, then another, distancing myself from the pool of blood that was gathering at my feet. Her knobby hands grasped at the air, and her body writhed as her life force gradually seeped away. She looked, for once, like a harmless, helpless old woman, and I was momentarily aghast at what I had done. Then I saw her eyes, blazing with a hatred that banished any doubts. I would never be safe until she was dead.

Millicent had fooled me once before, when I thought the pox had taken her. I would not make the same mistake again. I watched as her twitching movements slowed, as her eyes closed and her gasps faded into silence. Gingerly, I stepped forward to check for signs of life. Millicent’s arms and legs lay motionless, and her chest was still. Her mouth hung open, frozen in an eternal, futile cry.

How, then, could her tormented screams still assault my ears?

I turned to look behind me. There, in the doorway, stood my cousin Prielle, eyes wide with shock, shrieking loud enough to wake the dead.

As if such a thing were possible.

The sight of me rushing toward her, bloodied and still clutching my murderous weapon, did nothing to ease her distress, for she shrank away from my embrace, trembling. I wiped the dagger flat across my skirt to clean it as best I could; I knew I would never wear the dress again.

“Prielle, thank God you are safe,” I said. “Please, do not be afraid. I can explain.”

“I thought . . .” Prielle struggled to keep her voice steady. “I thought I would be safe here. When you came to my house that day . . .”

“You were inside? Was it your face I saw at the window?”

Prielle nodded. “When I received your letter, I did exactly as you said. I stayed indoors and waited for my parents. They left as soon as the fighting ended, to reestablish trade with their partners in the north.”

Prielle’s parents had followed the same roads used by the returning soldiers, walking through a cloud of contagion. I could already guess how her story would end.

“They said they would be gone only a few days, and I waited and waited, but they did not return. As soon as word got out about the pox, the servants fled—said they’d take their chances in the country. But I remembered your warnings, and I stayed. Alone!”

I put a hand on her shoulder to calm her, for tears were now coursing down her cheeks.

“I guessed my parents were dead. They would never leave me so long otherwise, without sending word. But I did not know what to do! And then one day I heard a knocking on the door, but I was too frightened to answer. I peered out the window, and when I saw your face, I was so happy, for I thought myself rescued at last, and I rushed down the stairs, but by the time I came out, you had already gone.”

“I am so sorry,” I said. “So very sorry.”

“I didn’t know what to do. But today I decided I would rather take my chances with the pox than stay another hour in that house by myself.”

The shadows had deepened; the candle I had brought and Millicent’s lantern had both been extinguished during our scuffle. Soon Prielle and I would be left in complete darkness, and who knew what further perils might lurk there?

“I am so glad you have come. But we cannot stay here.”

I glanced back at Millicent’s body, a jumble of twisted limbs that bore little relation to the imposing figure that had once held such power over me. She was dead. Why, then, did I feel so empty?

Suddenly I remembered Rose, lying alone all this time. Without my cajoling had she given up the fight for her life?

“Come,” I urged Prielle. “We must go to the princess’s room.”

My heart dropped when we first entered the bedchamber, for Rose lay so still she might have been an effigy carved atop a tomb. Then, hesitantly, she turned at the sound of my footsteps. Her cheeks were pink, but not the blazing scarlet that had so frightened me in the days before. Her eyes were bloodshot and her skin slick with sweat, but my dear Beauty was awake and alert. The fever had broken. Rose had survived.

I had imagined myself falling to my knees in grateful prayer should Rose be spared. And I did sink to the floor, but it was not to give thanks to God. I collapsed because I no longer had the strength to stand. Relief mingled with a suffocating grief, and with wretched moans I wept for the king and the queen, for all those souls who lay forgotten and unmourned in the chapel below. I wept for Prielle’s family and my own, for my poor dead brothers who had known only drudgery and hunger in their short lives. And I cried for my younger, innocent self, who had died along with all the rest.

The sheets rustled. I raised the hem of my gown to wipe aside my tears and runny nose, and brushed back the hair that had come loose from its holders and hung ragged about my face. Leaning against the side of the bed, I rested my head on the pillow next to Rose’s. She stared at me in confusion, her mind still muddled.

“Elise.” Her voice was as faint as an echo heard from a far-off corridor.

“I am here, my darling.”

Rose looked over my shoulder, trying to make sense of the unfamiliar face that had entered her room.

“We have a new companion,” I told her. “My cousin, Prielle. I know you will become great friends.”

Prielle hovered behind me, unsure of her place. I waved her forward, and she joined me at the bedside, her pinched expression loosening as she looked down at the princess she had so long envied. Then, in a gesture that touched my heart, she dipped in a curtsy. Rose watched, motionless as a figure on St. Elsip’s Bridge of Statues, then looked back at me.

“Is it true?” she whispered. “My mother?”

Before I could formulate the right words, she understood what my hesitation portended. I watched as the full force of it hit her anew: the fate of her parents, the castle, her life. She closed her eyes in a vain attempt to blot out the vision, and I was overcome by hopelessness. The anguish I had seen wash across her face was beyond my power to heal.

Prielle stared at me with questioning eyes, and I saw her for the first time as she must have appeared to Rose: a thin, terrified girl, clad in a filthy dress more suited to a beggar woman than to a successful merchant’s daughter. Great blotches of red marred her bodice and skirt, and I realized to my horror that the stains were Millicent’s blood, pressed onto Prielle’s gown from my own. I glanced down at my reddened, sticky hands and felt my stomach twist with revulsion. Frantically, I pulled off the dress. I tossed aside the lavender twigs I had picked in the garden and scrubbed my hands and arms until the skin stung. Once I had changed, I told Prielle to do the same, insisting she take one of Rose’s gowns. Our old clothes I burned in the fireplace, destroying all evidence of my murderous deed.

I watched the flames catch at the fabric and tried to formulate a plan for the coming days. I now had two young women in my care, looking to me for guidance. When Rose was well enough to travel, we would go to Marcus—a thought I clung to as a beacon, lighting my way forward. But that would be merely a temporary respite. Rose was now the ruler of this land; she could not hide from her duties forever. Who would serve as her advisers, her courtiers, her ladies-in-waiting? Who would clear the bodies from the castle? Restock the stables with horses and the storerooms with food?

And how could Rose ever sit upon her father’s throne, now that it was sprayed with Millicent’s blood?

When nothing remained in the fireplace but ashes, I urged Prielle to lie on my pallet. I could hear Rose’s down-filled mattress rustle as she shifted position, and I wondered if her thoughts were mirroring my own. The pox may have passed, but I feared for her nonetheless. Would her agitated mind deny her the rest she so desperately needed? Could her fragile body withstand such strain? Consulting Flora’s ledger once again, I mixed up the sleeping potion, forcing my attention to remain on the task at hand rather than on the risk I was about to take. Gently, I urged a spoonful into Rose’s mouth, then watched as her eyes fluttered shut and her hands fell slack against her bedcovering. I continued to watch as her chest lifted and sank in a peaceful, unchanging rhythm.

At long last my Beauty slept.

Yet I could not. I watched her throughout that night, attentive to every breath and whimper. When the sun came up, I cooked a mix of oats and nuts in the fireplace and devised a list of activities to fill the day, just as I had done when Rose and I were first locked away. I took out my sewing basket and asked Prielle to join me in embroidering handkerchiefs. I found the poem that Rose had written to honor Dorian and read it aloud, trying my best to add dramatic flourishes. Prielle listened, wide-eyed, and gushed in admiration at the end. But Rose made no response. She would not speak or eat. She refused even to look at me.

As the hours passed, I became increasingly desperate. In the evening I exhausted myself baking a cake in a skillet over the fire, using up the last of our sugar on a dish I hoped would tempt her. The cake itself emerged sunken and half burned, and though Prielle accepted a piece gratefully and gobbled it down in a flurry of crumbs, Rose turned away from my offering without a word. In a fit of frustration, I threw the pan to the floor. Even that clatter failed to rouse her interest. Her face remained toward the wall, resolutely blank. As the shadows overtook the bedchamber once again, her empty eyes seemed to gleam, a point of harsh clarity when all else was dim.

Prielle sat huddled on the floor in front of the dying fire, her thoughts as much a mystery to me as Rose’s. She had told me once she hoped for nothing more than a good marriage and a home filled with beautiful things. Was that simple wish to be denied her as well? I felt a wave of love for that frightened yet good-hearted girl, even as my patience with Rose’s willfulness dwindled.

“Tomorrow you will rise from this bed,” I told her. “You must eat, else you will never get well.”

“And what then, Elise?” The words were clipped, cold. “Prepare for my coronation? Push aside my mother’s body that I might sleep in the bed where she died?”

“Of course not,” I snapped. And yet what else had I imagined? This was the seat of the kingdom’s rulers. If she were to take up the crown, it would be from here. “We will leave the castle for a time, until it has been put back to rights.”

“To rights?” she asked mockingly. “As if I could ever forget what I have seen here!”

“You will not. Yet this is your home.”

“No longer. Not without Mother and Father. I never wanted the throne, or the jewels, or the adulation. My parents are dead, and I wish myself dead alongside them. Better that than condemned to a lifetime as queen!”

She had not yet regained the strength to shout, so her final words came as a rasp. Yet I saw the fire blaze once again in her cheeks. If she were set against the life laid out before her, she would not fight to regain it.

Before I could protest further, she had pulled the cover over her face, hiding from my judgment. I turned to look at Prielle, who sat with her knees drawn up toward her face and her arms wrapped around her legs. She looked like a cowering child, and for once I had no words of reassurance to offer. Darkness overcame us, and I did not rise to light a candle or move from the chair in which I collapsed. I simply sat through those endless dark hours, my mind tormented with the twists and turns of a puzzle that had no solution.

I must have dozed at some point, for I awoke with a renewed understanding of why it is wise to retire to bed come nightfall. For evil thoughts take strength from the dark, while hope thrives in the light. With the coming of day, my circumstances did not seem as dire as they had at midnight. Rose and Prielle remained listless yet unfevered, and I gave thanks for their continued health. It would not be long before I could seek out Marcus—my heart fluttered at the thought—and he would help us decide our next steps. For a time, at least, we would be free of the castle’s misery.

Despite her lethargy I insisted that Rose get out of bed and wash. I changed her covers and took off her sweat-stained nightdress, insisting she choose a clean gown from her trunk. Pouting, she pulled out the first that came to hand, a simple dress, free of adornment, that seemed in keeping with her dreary mood. The bodice hung loosely at her waist, and I was dismayed by the proof of how much weight she had lost. Yet her face showed none of the hollowness that illness often brings. Her once expressive eyes no longer sparkled, and her pale cheeks had lost their healthy pink glow, but she was still beautiful. When I attempted to brush her hair, she pushed my hand aside, and I used the ribbons I had picked out to arrange Prielle’s wavy tresses instead.

Rose sank into the chair before the window, overlooking the country view that had first drawn her to this room. Silently, she watched the unchanging hills and fields, and I tried not to be discouraged by her languid manner as the day progressed. I convinced her to take a few sips of soup at midday, but she did not join Prielle and me in hushed conversation. Noting Prielle’s weary expression, I urged her to lie down for a rest in Rose’s bed, and she soon drifted off, the worry easing from her face. How very peaceful she looked, free of all cares, and I wished I could be granted the same respite. Minutes dragged as if they were hours. How many times had I warmed water over the fire, tried in vain to ply Rose with food, stared at these four walls? I felt I had been trapped in that tower for years, watching over a princess whose loveliness remained unchanged, even as the last of my own youth melted away.

It was the rumbling I heard first, faint yet steady. Hoofbeats.

“Rose? Do you hear that?”

I might as well have addressed an empty room. Rose sat as she had all day, ignoring me. I leapt to my feet, straightening my gown and smoothing loose curls off my face. Though I could not see the front courtyard from the tower windows, I heard the clatter of horseshoes on the paving stones, a familiar sound from the days when the castle bustled with life. I had thought our visitor must be Marcus, but surely the pounding was louder than what a single carriage would make?

“I will see who it is,” I told Rose.

My spirits lifted as I fled the room. I rushed down the stairs to the entrance hall and out the front doors, pulling up short when I saw what awaited outside. A contingent of proud, muscular horses stamped and whinnied along the drive. Their riders had the stiff bearing of soldiers, but the finest sort, dressed in velvet tunics and tall leather boots. A few held swords with elaborately carved handles. As I walked warily toward them, they gathered in a ring around me, staring with the wonder of people confronted by a mythical creature. At the center was a slim man who led his white horse forward to stop next to me. He held himself with the stillness of authority, and every aspect of his appearance signaled noble birth, from the soft leather of his riding gloves to the way he gazed at my face and clothes, assessing my importance.

I bowed my head. “I am Elise Tilleth, lady-in-waiting to Princess Rose.”

“She lives?”

The voice rang out to my left, and I turned to see a man slide down from his saddle, doffing the slouched hat that had partially obscured his face. It was Joffrey, the ambassador from Hirathion, staring at me with a desperate intensity.

“She fell ill, but the worst is past.”

“Ah. . . .” The gentle exhalation was a poor expression of the relief that washed across his face.

“I regret to report that the pox did not spare her parents,” I continued. How easily the polite words came, neatly glossing over the horrors that lingered in the building behind me. “Our losses have been terrible indeed.”

Joffrey was silent a moment, allowing the effect of my words to settle among his companions. Then, collecting himself, he indicated the imperious man on the white horse and said formally, “May I present His Majesty Prince Owin of Hirathion.”

“We heard tales from travelers who fled your kingdom,” the prince said. “Tales of a royal princess locked away, awaiting rescue. Joffrey was most insistent we come and discover the truth of the matter.”

The prince was still quite young, I noted. The age when a man is most likely to be tempted into a quest to save a beautiful maiden. He dismounted and glanced about. “Where are the groomsmen?”

“Gone, or dead. Along with the guards and the cooks and everyone else.”

“You and the princess are here alone?” Joffrey asked me, horrified.

“That will not do,” said Prince Owin. “Take me to her.”

The demand brought a restless movement from one of the soldiers. Moving forward, he revealed himself as a burly man of middle age, the sort of loyal fighter entrusted with the safety of an heir to the throne. “If she’s been sick, it would be better to stay away,” he urged.

Joffrey looked at me searchingly, his eyes silently begging for approval. “You say she is recovered?”

I thought of Rose, sitting in mute despair. Could this man’s face help lure her back to the world?

“She is weak, but the pox is no longer with her,” I said. “I am sure of it.”

Prince Owin pulled off his gloves and tossed them to one of his men with the carelessness of someone whose needs have always been tended to by others. “Gilbart, take the men and search the grounds for other survivors. Joffrey and I will see to the princess.”

I had been granted time by then to accept the state of the castle as it was, but its air of eerie foreboding struck me anew as I led the two men inside. They flinched at the stench that filtered out from the chapel, and the silence of the halls settled upon us as we walked. There were no questions, there was no conversation. Just the sound of our footsteps climbing higher and higher, to the tower at the top of the castle.

I tapped lightly on the door to alert the girls to my arrival, then pushed it open. For a moment an image was framed before us: Prielle, lying asleep on the bed, her golden-brown hair tumbling onto the pillow, skin burnished by the sunlight. Her delicate pink gown—a princess’s garment—enhanced the blush of her cheeks. One hand lay demurely across her stomach; the other was flung sideways across the bed, as if in a gesture of welcome.

Ignoring all propriety, Prince Owin strode into the room and fell to one knee beside the bed. “Princess Rose,” he murmured.

Directly behind me Joffrey caught his breath, and I whirled around to see if he would be the one to correct his master’s error. But Joffrey was not looking at me, or the prince, or Prielle. He was looking at Rose, sitting in the chair by the window, in a position initially hidden by the open door. Her lower lip had dropped in surprise, and she stared at Joffrey in astonished silence. Joffrey was at her side in an instant, reaching for her hands, clutching them to his heart as her expression softened from bewilderment to joy. Here, at last, was the girl I had thought forever lost. A girl who might yet be capable of happiness.

“Elise?”

Prielle’s perplexed voice carried from the bed, and I saw that the prince’s voice had roused her from sleep. He reached out a hand to clasp hers, then pulled it toward his lips for a kiss. It was a reckless gesture, to touch one he thought recently felled by the pox, but the prince was flush with the bravado of youth.

I had every intention of clearing up his confusion. But then I heard something that made my heart leap. Rose’s laugh. And I knew immediately that I might never hear that sound again if I told the prince the truth. To those who would judge me harshly, I can only say that the idea came to me fully formed, as if delivered by a higher power. With a simple switch of names, Prielle could live the pampered life she had longed for and my dear, darling Beauty would be free.

For so great a deception, it was easily accomplished. Prielle was dressed in a manner befitting royalty, while Rose, her striking looks muted by illness and clad in a plain gown, was easy to dismiss as a mere attendant. Joffrey’s thoughts were quick to follow my own. He was the only member of the long-ago delegation from Hirathion who had seen Rose up close, the only one who could have pointed out the prince’s mistake. It was treason for him to go along with such a ruse, yet he did it willingly, risking death to secure Rose’s happiness—and his own.

With a few whispers and glances and nods, it was done. It was Prielle whom Prince Owin carried down from the tower, Prielle whom he insisted be swathed in a blanket and cradled in his arms on his white horse. Rose took a place on Joffrey’s mount, clutching her arms around his waist and pressing her face against his back, until they seemed to form a single figure. Prince Owin’s man Gilbart tied my satchel of possessions to his saddle and lifted me onto his horse behind him.

We rode off, and I did not look back.

Those who tell the tale of Sleeping Beauty end it here, with the princess saved by a prince’s kiss. Is it the truth? A princess was locked in a tower, and she was discovered by a prince. But she did not sleep, and it was not his kiss that brought her back to life. Though a royal wedding was celebrated—completing the requisite happy ending—the princess was not the woman who said her vows that day. She disappeared into a new name, a new life. One she had finally been able to choose for herself.

Attendants make for poor heroines, and I do not care if my role in Rose’s story is forgotten. But I do not wish the lesson of her life to be obscured in myth. What saved Rose was love. Not the infatuation an impressionable youth may feel on seeing a pretty, helpless girl asleep on a bed. No, the love I speak of is far more powerful. It is the love between those who have grown from girls to women together, exchanging laughter and tears, sharing a bond no one can break. The love that kept me at my dearest companion’s bedside, hour after hour, willing her to survive. The love of a mother and father who deafened themselves to their daughter’s cries in order to keep her safe. The love of a man who risked everything to give his beloved a fresh start.

A love strong enough to beat back death.