The queen was awakened by the sun as it crept over the horizon and spilled into her room. Why had the curtains been left open? She pulled the bed covers over her head and lay hidden for a few seconds before the morning bells forced her up. Her room was quiet and still. The usual flurry of women who helped her out of bed and prepared her bath was not there.
“Uuuugh, that’s right. They’re not coming.”
She crawled out of bed and shivered. Some warm tea would be nice. She reached over and pulled on the service bell. “There,” she said. “Someone will be here soon.”
The queen walked into her dressing room and looked through the wall-mounted dressers and wardrobes for something to wear. Like her bedroom, the closet was enormous and lined with windows. Beautifully appointed gold moldings and mirrors adorned the walls. Ornate, handcrafted furniture filled the room. It was her sanctuary, but too much for her to handle by herself.
She opened every drawer and rifled through every piece of clothing she could find. She paused in front of one of the mirrors and took a deep breath. Her hair usually stuck out in all directions before being brushed and tamed, but now it lay flat and limp against her scalp.
The queen slid her fingers along the side of her head. A handful of dry hair slipped through her fingertips. Her stomach churned.
Knock, knock, knock.
“Good morning, Ya’ Majesty,” a soft voice said from inside the bedroom. The queen turned, dusted the hair off her hands, and stepped out of the dressing room.
The servant bowed. “Is there something I can do for ya’?” she asked.
“Oh, yes,” the queen said. She gathered her thoughts. “Tea .. . . hot .. . . please.”
“Yes, right away,” the servant said, rushing out of the room.
The queen returned to the mirror. What is happening to me?
* * *
Sharp and piercing whistles echoed through the West Wing. A swarm of uniformed guards filled the hallways. Blackheart followed behind them. As they went down the hall, the men banged on doors and removed the servants.
Blackheart, wearing a soft blue dress with white stitched flowers, was a bright and shimmery beacon who elicited fear in those around her. She knew no one in the palace felt comfortable in her presence. She liked it that way.
A large masked man burst into Josephine’s room. He pulled her out by her hair and ordered her to wait for inspection.
Blackheart smiled at Josephine’s disheveled appearance.
The former princess, in a tattered nightgown and bare feet, looked to her left and right. Servants stood outside their rooms while guards ransacked their belongings.
One by one, Blackheart interrogated the women. Her assistant and most trusted guardsman, Zane, remained close by her side and searched for anything that might pique her interest enough to order an execution.
“You there,” Blackheart called.
An older, unsteady woman leaning against the wall looked up.
“What’s your name?” Blackheart asked. Wearing white gloves, she grabbed the servant’s face and looked for any signs of illness. “Can you squat? How much can you lift?” She gave the servant only a few seconds to respond before asking her to demonstrate her ability to bend and lift weight.
The servant squinted and struggled to lift a weighted bag. Her arms trembled. Beads of sweat sprouted on her forehead.
“How old are you?” Blackheart continued.
“I’m forty-two years old, Your Grace,” the servant replied.
The wrong answer to any of Blackheart’s questions was a death sentence. Blackheart stared down into the servant’s watery eyes. The meek and the powerful, face to face. She leaned in closer, until her nose almost touched the servant’s face. She knew what the servant was thinking and knew what she feared. No one wanted this much attention from Blackheart. “Off with her head!”
The servant fell to the floor. “No!” she pleaded. Her face contorted as she reached up and grabbed at Blackheart’s hand. “Please, Your Grace.”
Blackheart jerked her hand away. Without second guessing her decision, she moved on to the next servant.
Guards swooped in and dragged the first woman away.
In the middle of the next examination, loud screams erupted from one of the rooms down the hall. It sounded frail and hoarse, like an old screech owl. What in the world was that? Blackheart lost her concentration and pushed the servant back against the wall. “I’m not done with you, so don’t move.” She left her post and marched down the hall. “What’s going on in here?” she barked from the doorway.
“Your Grace,” a guard replied. He struggled to keep his grip around the palace’s oldest servant.
Therese screamed and pounded her frail fists against the large guard.
“I thought I told you to skip this room!” Blackheart shouted.
The guard’s eyes swelled and his jaw dropped. He let go of Therese and stood at attention. “My apologies, I wasn't informed."
“Your apologies? Your apologies won’t get your work done on time, you stupid pig.” She pulled him out of the room and pushed him down the hall. “Now get back to work,” she ordered. “I won’t tell you again.”
Blackheart stood in the hallway and admired the chaos that had unfolded. Guards were everywhere, moving in and out of the rooms, pulling out old dressers, boxes, and anything that could be used to hide something.
Two of the guards drug a servant toward Blackheart. “This one was hiding food in her mattress,” the taller guard said. “She probably stole it from the kitchen.”
The teary-eyed woman shook her head. “It’s my food, my dinner from last night. I wasn’t hungry so I saved it .. . . to eat later.”
“Not hungry?” Blackheart smiled. “Lock her in the tower. Let’s see how hungry she gets after a week in there.”
Blackheart looked around for her next victim. “Well, if it isn’t my little milkweed,” she said to Josephine with a large ghoulish grin. “You’re next.”
Zane dropped a weighted bag in front of Josephine.
“First I need to see you lift this bag,” Blackheart said.
Josephine looked down at the bag and back at Blackheart.
“Well?” Blackheart asked. “Don’t keep me waiting. Can you lift this bag or not?”
“The question is,” Josephine retorted, “what gives you the right to storm in here and do all this?”
Blackheart grabbed Josephine and pushed her back up against the wall. “I have every right. Like you, these people are no more than garbage and aren’t worth my spit. They have one purpose and one purpose only. And when they are no longer capable, it is my job to see that the garbage gets taken out. Now then, can you lift this bag or not?”
Josephine reluctantly lifted the bag.
“That’s a good girl.” Blackheart grinned. “Now let me see you lift the bag over your head.”
A guard ran down the hallway and stopped in front of Blackheart and Josephine. “Your Grace! Your Grace!”
“What is it?” Blackheart asked.
“It’s Marie. She’s missing.”
“What do you mean she’s missing?” Blackheart said. “Go and ask the foreman to make sure she doesn’t have her doing something else. Let me know what she says.”
Blackheart turned back to Josephine. “Where was I? Oh, yes. Lift this bag over your head.”
A quick smile flashed across Josephine’s face. She lifted the bag high into the air and dropped it.
Blackheart smirked. “Just imagine it, dear. A line of these dirty sympathizers will be kneeled over and tied to barrels. You’ll be right up there with me when I give the order.”
“You wouldn’t dare,” Josephine said.
Blackheart laughed. “Or what, Josephine? Just be ready for tomorrow. I’ll send for you in the morning. Oh, and not to worry, I’ll have you looking your old self for a nice public appearance. It will be delightful.”
Blackheart turned to Zane. “We’re done with this one. Let’s move on.”
One of the queen’s ladies ran down the hall. Rattled and out of breath, she called out, “Your Grace? Lady Blackheart?”
“Not again.” Blackheart groaned. “I’m over here. What can possibly be so important?”
“It’s the queen,” the girl said. “Something terrible has happened. You’re required immediately.”
“What’s wrong?” Blackheart asked.
“I don’t know, Your Grace,” the girl replied. “I was sent to take you back to the queen’s bedroom.”
Blackheart instructed Zane to supervise the sweep as she and the girl rushed out of the West Wing. Outside the queen’s bedroom, Blackheart opened the large doors.
The queen was in bed, sobbing. She used the edge of her night gown to pat her tearless eyes.
Blackheart’s gaze was immediately drawn from the queen to a body lying on the floor in front of the bed. Who was it? The body was drained of life and color and appeared to be as dry as bone.
Not again. The familiar scene sent chills down Blackheart’s spine.
“I don’t understand. When she came in, she was alive and well,” the queen said. “But now .. . . now she is that! It happened right in front of me! One moment she was serving me tea and the next she was gasping for air. Then she fell and turned into that!”
Blackheart kicked the corpse. It was stiff.
“What happened to her?” the queen cried out.
Blackheart ordered the girl to leave and to keep what she had seen to herself. She locked the door behind her.
“Oh, my dear baby cousin,” Blackheart said. She walked to the bed to hug the queen. “Don’t worry. I’m sure once the doctor looks at the body, he’ll have an answer.”
“I’ll tell you what happened to her,” the queen said. “She died because of me.”
“Nonsense.”
“It’s true. I have the Widow’s Curse,” the queen said.
Blackheart scoffed. “The Widow’s Curse? Please. That’s nothing more .. . . that’s just an old .. . . an old story,” she said, taking in deep breaths.
“Oh it’s very real, Elzana,” the queen said, “The curse has finally come for me after everything that we’ve. . .”
Blackheart gasped for air. She pushed herself away from the queen and fell to the floor.
The queen cried out for help. Guards outside the room were unable to open the locked doors.
Breathless, Blackheart instinctively crawled toward the nearest window and opened it. Air came flowing into the room. She took in a few deep breaths and leaned against the window frame with her eyes closed. She could barely stand.
“Do you see? It’s me," the queen cried. “I’m cursed.”
“Shut up!” Blackheart shouted. “Give me a minute to breathe.” The wind never felt sweeter. Like cold water on a hot, dry day, it was refreshing.
“I’m a cursed widow!” the queen repeated.
“You’re not cursed. Now stop your crying,” Blackheart said. She grabbed a sheet off the bed and covered the desiccated corpse.
“I’ll cry if I want to,” the queen said. “This isn’t happening to you.” She picked up a small mirror and pointed to her reflection. “Look.” She angled the mirror so that Blackheart could see. “I don’t even recognize the woman looking back at me.” Her eyes puffed up. “I can’t even cry real tears!” she wailed with a huge childlike frown.
“You look like this corpse,” Blackheart joked.
The queen threw the mirror toward Blackheart. “I’m in no mood to joke around.”
Blackheart stood next to the dead body and stared at her cousin. Now that she mentioned it, her appearance had changed. Her cheeks were sunken in and her skin was stretched tightly around her skull.
“Well, if I’m not cursed then what’s wrong with me?” the queen asked. She got out of bed after Blackheart failed to answer. “Tell me what’s wrong with me?”
“I’m sorry,” Blackheart replied. “I don’t know.”
The queen stood in front of her cousin. In a deeper than usual voice, she again asked what was wrong. She covered her mouth and fell to her knees. “Something terrible is happening. And that’s not all,” she quietly confessed.
“What’s not all?” Blackheart asked.
The queen pouted. “I think I’m being visited. For the past few nights, something kept creeping in and crawling around the walls of my room. It moves back and forth in the darkness, like some kind of shadow person.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It makes some kind of noise, but I can’t make out what it is.” She reached out to her cousin.
Blackheart kneeled down to hug the queen. In an attempt to comfort her cousin, she said softly, “They’re just nightmares. You’re just feeling a little sick. It’s normal to feel this way after giving birth. It will pass.”
As the last words poured out of Blackheart’s mouth, the queen growled and aggressively pushed her away.
“What was that for?” Blackheart shouted.
“Don’t you dare remind me of that,” the queen warned. She stood up and hovered over Blackheart. “I’ll cut your head off myself.” She grabbed Blackheart by her collar and single-handedly lifted her off the ground. “Do you understand me, Elzana?”
Blackheart squirmed.
“I gave up my child for you, like everything else. And now I’m cursed. I don’t want anyone to know that I let you kill my daughter. Is that understood?”
Blackheart realized that everybody in the palace knew that the queen had been pregnant and that she’d given birth. Of course people were going to ask about and talk about the baby, but now seemed like a bad time to remind her of that.
“Speak, you good for nothing twit!” the queen screamed. After a moment of silence, she dropped Blackheart and turned away.
Rattled, Blackheart drew back and rushed out of the room, leaving the queen alone with the corpse. Face flushed, she walked past the guards. “There’s a dead body in the room. Get rid of it. Oh, and leave the window open,” she said without stopping.
Too upset to give any further instructions, Blackheart limped away to her own bedroom to salvage her appearance and what little pride she had left.
“I need your assistance,” Blackheart said as she entered her bedroom and slammed the door behind her. She walked over to the corner post at the foot of her bed and kicked off her shoes. “I know you’re back there, stop ignoring me.”
From out of the closet, Blackheart’s personal servant rushed across the room. “I’m sorry, Your Grace. Here I come.”
“Untie the back of my dress,” Blackheart said as she patted at the sweat on her neck and forehead.
The servant worked at the strings and pulled at the garment.
Blackheart yanked it from the servant’s hands and inspected it. The dress was torn at the collar where the queen had grabbed her. She threw the dress back at the servant. “See what you can do to salvage this.”
“Yes, Your Grace.”
Blackheart walked into her closet to find another dress. She pulled out one dress after another. “This won’t do. Not this, you’ve worn this already.” The dresses piled up behind her. “No, no, no!”
The mumbling escalated into violent shouting. “I am so tired of her ridiculous garbage!”
She grabbed a large pile of dresses and threw them outside her closet. With tears running down her face, she ordered the servant to stand still. She grabbed one of her belts and began swinging. “That stupid… good for nothing… why… do… I… even… try!” Blackheart struck the servant with the belt after each word.
The nightmare lasted only a few moments before the servant fell to the floor, wailing in agony. Glowing red streaks of swelling flesh brightened on her arms and face.
Hovering over her, Blackheart said, “Now you know how it feels to be me.” She dropped the belt and left the servant lying on the floor as she walked back into her closet to get dressed.
* * *
The queen stood and stared at the body. Thoughts of her baby came flooding in. She had been fighting herself, insisting that her decision to let go of the newborn was the right choice. But no matter how much thought she put into it, it ate at her conscience and made her feel even more alone and isolated than she already felt. Anger and sadness churned inside of her.
“There’s nothing I can do now,” the queen told herself, “she’s gone.”
She moved on with the morning and filled her bath with water. She undressed and sighed as she ran her hands over her withered body. Her fingertips slid across dry, cracked patches of skin. Her breasts sagged and appeared deflated. There has to be something I can do to fix this, she thought. She poured different kinds of bath oils and salts into the cold water and dropped in a handful of eucalyptus stems. Maybe this will help heal my cracking skin.
The queen lowered herself gently into the bath and tried to relax. The water was cold and the oil rose to the surface. The salts sank to the bottom and grinded against her skin. Even the eucalyptus clumped together, as if refusing to release its therapeutic essences. This was like sitting in a cold cup of tea—a poor-man’s bath.
She refused to let a simple thing like a bath get the best of her. She closed her eyes and eventually drifted away into a dream. The queen saw herself in her bath, cradling her baby in the crook of her arms. The room was bright and filled with people. Everyone was laughing and joking with one another and appeared to be having a good time. Elzana was seated on a chair near the tub. She was also smiling.
No one made a big fuss over the baby’s appearance and legitimacy. She looked at them and the baby and felt a little more at ease after they started commenting on how beautiful the girl was. The queen agreed and gently kissed the baby’s forehead.
Everyone in the room started circling around the bath.
“Let me hold her,” one woman said.
“Oh not yet,” the queen replied. She caressed the child’s bright red hair. “I can’t get enough of her.”
“Come on,” another said. “Just for a second.” Hands from all around the tub reached in for her baby.
“No, stop, she’s mine!”
“Come on, dearie,” Elzana said. “It’s only for a little while.”
“No,” the queen repeated. “She’s mine!”
In one quick swoop, Elzana lunged in and pulled the baby out of the queen’s arms. “No she’s not, she’s dead!”
The queen jerked herself back into waking reality. She sat up, alone and in the dark. Alone and cradling no baby.
* * *
Blackheart stepped out of her closet, dressed but not yet ready. She pinned her wavy hair back and slipped on a pair of plum purple gloves. She picked up a feathered hat, walked past the servant, and smiled.
The servant looked down and fixed her gaze on the floor in a desperate attempt to blend in with the wall, but the red streaks running across her face and arms refused to hide.
“Cheer up, dearie. You’ll feel better once you clean up,” Blackheart said in an upbeat tone. “You’re a mess.”
“Yes ma’am, Your Grace.” The servant’s voice trembled.
“Good, it’s settled then,” Blackheart said before leaving the room. “Take the rest of the day off.”
As Blackheart made her way back to the West Wing, passersby stepped aside and bowed. “Good morning, Your Grace,” they sang.
Blackheart swelled and held her head high. She weaved through the service corridor traffic and returned to the West Wing. It was a mess. Piles of clothing, books, blankets, and other keepsakes were scattered throughout the hallways. Servants were looting what they could from the abandoned rooms, keeping what they wanted or needed and discarding others’ personal items. Pictures, small diary books, and other scrap littered the hallway.
Zane swaggered toward Blackheart. “The sweep is almost done,” he announced. “Thirteen servants have been taken to the tower so far.”
“Good,” she replied. “Let’s find the fourteenth.”
As Blackheart was finishing the last inspection, the silhouette of a cat running down the hall caught her attention. “What was that? Did you see that?”
“What was what, Your Grace?” Zane replied.
“That animal. I just saw a cat run down the hallway.”
“I didn’t see anything.” Zane looked to either side and shrugged his broad shoulders.
“What do you mean you didn’t see anything?” Blackheart then looked at the servant she was inspecting. “Was that your cat? You know better than to keep an animal.”
“No, of course not, Your Grace,” the servant replied. “I wouldn’t dare.”
Blackheart hesitated before pushing past the two to follow the cat. “We’ll see about that. Zane, hold her here until I get back.”
Blackheart turned the corner. Old ruined statues lined both sides of the hallway. There were no doors. It appeared to be a dead-end. I’ve never been in this part of the West Wing before, she thought, confused.
She saw the cat sitting at the far end of the dark hall. “There you are,” Blackheart said as she stomped toward it. When she bent down to grab the cat, it looked up at her and smiled.
“You’re wearing my favorite color,” the cat said.
Blackheart jerked back into an upright position. “What .. . . what the hell?” Taking a step back, she huffed. “How did you get in here you leper? Guards!” She turned around and walked back in the direction from where she came, but stopped when a purple haze filled the corridor.
The haze thickened into a fat furry body. Then, a tail and two pointy ears appeared, followed by two big bright yellow eyes. Finally, a grin popped out of nowhere to complete the face. “Leaving so soon?” the cat asked.
“Yes, I have nothing to say to you.”
“But you just got here. And besides, you’re going the wrong way. Your friends are that way, aren’t they?” The cat pointed in the opposite direction.
Blackheart looked over her shoulder. The empty hallway stared back at her. The cat was gone and she now stood at the end of the hallway facing the wall.
“What? What just happened?” she asked. “How did you . . . ”
The cat rematerialized and floated around Blackheart’s side. “What’s wrong? Did you lose your way?”
“I don’t have time for this, you dirty imp.” She turned and walked away.
“Ah, but you see, time is all you need,” the cat said, trailing behind her.
“Need? For what?” Blackheart asked.
“Don’t let your pretention and pride blind you. I’m talking about your desire to become queen—succession. That’s the reason why you had the queen’s daughter killed, isn’t it?”
She stopped and glanced around cautiously. “What? What do you know about that?”
The cat floated past Blackheart and looked her straight in the eyes. “All I know is that the queen is cursed. It is just a matter of time before time catches up to her,” the cat continued.
“Cursed? So it’s true?” she whispered.
“Yes, cursed. The widow is cursed. And it comes at a good time for you too. You see, there needs to be a successor.”
Blackheart puffed up her chest and grinned.
The cat flipped backwards and laughed. “I suppose it is possible. But, is it probable? After all, Josephine probably thought she would become queen when the king never returned, but that didn’t do her much good, did it?”
A scowl flashed across Blackheart’s face. “Don’t you dare compare me to her.”
“Well, what do you know about being queen?” the cat asked.
“Ha! I rebuilt this kingdom from the ground up. This is my kingdom. I know everything about it and have earned the right to rule it.”
“Yes, yes, you have done a lot. It’s just a shame that no one really appreciates what you have done. Do you think the queen appreciates you? Do you think it was right for your cousin to treat you the way she did earlier today?” the cat asked.
Blackheart clenched her teeth together. “What are you talking about?”
“I was there. I saw how she picked you up like a rag doll and threatened you. It was actually very amusing to see.”
She swung at the cat’s face, but her hand passed through it as if it were made of air. “You little monster.”
The cat hovered in front of Blackheart, swinging from side to side as if perched on a pendulum. “No, no, no. Don’t you see? You don’t have what it takes. You’re weak.”
Blackheart smiled. “I’ll show you, leper. When I’m queen I will finish what I started. I will do what the queen couldn’t. Justice will be deliciously served.”
The cat sniffed at the air. “You’re making me hungry.”
“Prepare yourself. I will burn the Caterpillar’s Forest down to the ground if I have to. No leper will be spared and you .. . . oh yes, you .. . . will be the first to go.”
The cat floated down to the ground and disappeared, but the animal’s voice trailed on. “Just remember, dear. Time is against you.”
Alone, she returned back to Zane and her work. As she did, she vowed, “I’ll show that dirty leper. I will be queen.”