Читать книгу The Fairytale Trilogy - Valerie Gribben - Страница 16

The castle was perched atop a steep hill, and in the last speck of light Marianne could tell that it had looked upon finer days. On further inspection, Marianne saw that what had originally appeared to be a grand gateway was actually a tarnished and dilapidated heap of junk. After ringing the bell at the gate several times, Robin became impatient and, with a single kick, broke open the rusted lock. Inside the fortress walls, unkempt hedges blurred the once-neat rows of a shrubbery maze, heliotrope sagged from cracked urns, and weeds devoured the deformed and overgrown topiary. Swarms of ants were quarrying morsels from the neglected apple trees, heavy with rotting fruit.

“Robin, I’m dizzy,” she began.

“No, I’ve stopped for you once already,” he said, still searching for the castle’s entrance. “Ahh! There it is!” he cried, pointing to a door almost hidden by a wall of branches. Performing a small jig over the anthills, Robin knocked assertively on the door. A panel of wood rocked back and forth, until, with a crack, it slid back to frame a sunken face matted with wiry, gray hair. “You the last one?”

“Beg your pardon?” asked Robin.

“Are you the one they rounded up today for the watch?” she gurgled.

“Well, I came on my own to revive the princess,” replied Robin.

“And to receive the sizable reward,” interjected Marianne, sidling up to Robin. The housekeeper’s eyes raked over Marianne in her torn dress, still splattered with goblin juice. Well, you’re no paragon of beauty yourself, thought Marianne.

“Tonight will be the final test. After this night, Princess Penelope will die. Come in,” said the crone in a monotone voice, opening the door with surprising ease. “Her chambers are down that hall. You will not be allowed to leave them until the sun rises. No one may accompany you. You will be given the reward if you are found in the chambers at daybreak. . . . alive!” she added, before hobbling away.

Marianne shivered. “Robin, maybe we should rethink this.”

“Hmmm,” said Robin, touching a finger to his chin, “Starve to death or be able to dive through piles of money. Death, richness, death, wealth, death, pro—”

“Fine! I choose silence!” said Marianne, covering her ears. The sun had almost set, and she needed to get to the tunnel. “But Robin, do be careful,” choked out Marianne, facing Robin and trying to conceal the worry in her voice.

“What could happen?” asked Robin facetiously. He laughed as Marianne enumerated the dreadful possibilities. “I like to say that because I feel it undoes the hex. Now Fate knows that I have a sense of humor about these things.”

“You’ll be chuckling all the way to—”

“I need to go. Good-bye for now, Marianne. I swear I’ll see you in the morning.” Robin touched Marianne’s shoulder before entering the room, the door shutting behind him.

I’ll see you sooner than that, thought Marianne, descending the creaky staircase. Wait, I can’t stay up all night without something to pass the time. Instinctively, Marianne turned to her right and beheld “Royal Library” painted on a door. It was unlocked. Marianne glanced around like a child about to steal a cookie. Nobody was coming, so she dashed through the summoning entrance. A large book lay open on the table. Its curvaceous golden writing proclaimed Fairy Flings: Romances Gone Wrong Among the Most Magical of Magical! Marianne blushed as she picked it up. Well, I don’t have time to choose anything else, she rationalized, placing the book under one arm and sprinting from the room as though every book held a pair of disapproving eyes.

Moreover, when she passed the picture of the maidens dancing, she could have sworn she heard a giggle. Locating the fern beneath the painting of the fairy procession (in which all the fairies seemed to be frowning at her book choice), Marianne bent over and yanked open the gate to the tunnel entrance. Indistinguishable furry forms skittered away. Fairy Flings dropped from her hands and fell on her foot. “Ow!” cried Marianne, hopping about. It seemed that one of the fairies raised a hand and pretended to cough, disguising a buttery laugh. Glaring at the picture, Marianne picked up the book and ducked into the tunnel.

The passageway was smaller than she had expected, and Marianne was forced to inch along on her hands and knees. Noises of scurrying ahead of her nearly made Marianne wish she were Robin lounging in a posh chair; edging along, however, clinging to her ungainly book, Marianne did not encounter any four-legged frights. Her dress unraveled where she had torn the bandage for the goblin, and her knees ached. The walls seemed to be pressing in on her while the rats’ chitterings felt like they were screeching beside her ear. The tunnel began to sweat at her presence as she groped along. The dirt from the ground pushed itself under her nails. Marianne’s breathing accelerated, and her hair stuck to her clammy face. As Marianne put a perspiring hand to her pained forehead, she tried to will the walls to move back. The tunnel was endless; it slithered along the castle’s underbelly like an elongated insect. Why can’t it end? Marianne despaired. Why don’t I give up and die here? What’s the point of always suffering? Marianne thought, pulling at her collar in the stale air. It’s hopeless; I can’t go on. Yet another voice inside her mind spoke temperate, reasoning thoughts: Push onward. You must be there for Robin. Keep going. Only the witch’s magic holds you back.

Marianne’s head throbbed with anguish as both voices converged in her ears. She advanced doggedly, her head drooping, her arms shaking with exhaustion, her knees bleeding.

Drafts of cool, fresh air revived her senses. Marianne beheld to her left, not three yards away, a dim light. Shoving aside all feelings of depression from her mind, Marianne trundled desperately toward the breeze. Upon reaching the grate, Marianne grasped the bars and pressed her face against them, guzzling in the rejuvenating air. The tunnel had widened significantly, and she was able to sit up.

Marianne assessed the scene before her. In the moonlight filtering through a gauze-covered window, a lavish room was bathed in its silver beams. An enormous dressing table with a gilded mirror was situated on one side of a gigantic golden bed that held in its folds an inert body, facing away from Marianne. In the mirror’s reflection Marianne could clearly see Princess Penelope. Loose, yellow curls surrounded her painted porcelain features. Penelope’s clothing was made of the finest silks embellished with the tiniest stitches of painstakingly intricate detail. For a second, Marianne felt ashamed of her shabby clothing and her natural appearance.

Robin, across the room in an upholstered chair, drew her eyes. He was already deep in slumber, but Marianne could see his hands shaking. Robin was in the throes of some nocturnal nightmare. What I wouldn’t give to open this grate and rush over and comfort him, Marianne thought, as Robin’s cries weakened and his hand tremors subsided. He must be thinking of my—of our parents. Seeing him relax, Marianne felt a horrible pang of envy, then self-pity. I wish that I could see them, that they could speak to me in my sleep when I’m lonely, even if it makes me hurt. I really have no one, no home. Robin tries to fill in the void, but nothing can replace knowing how I fit into the world. Marianne clasped her hands together and brought them to her lips before exhaling and dropping her shoulders.

She picked up the book, slightly dirtied by her journey through the tunnel, and placed it in her lap. At least this will keep me awake, thought Marianne, hoping for vicarious guilty pleasure as she opened the book. A gaudy picture of a fairy locked in a fervent embrace with an elf in a field of heather caused Marianne to stifle a giggle in her throat. In Penelope’s room, Robin turned slightly, but the princess remained as still as ever. Marianne pushed her hair behind her ear, suppressing a smile as she read underneath the picture: “Though Maybelline and Alfred shared an undying passion for one another, it was willed in the scintillating stars that they should never be able to achieve the peaceful union they craved.” The story following the picture was written in melodramatic, overwrought phrases: “‘I can never marry you, my love,’ cried Alfred, hand upon his forehead. ‘It has been destined that we part, like a walnut and its shell.’ At this, the fair fairy fell to her knees and cried out, so that all the world could hear her, ‘Farewell, but my life shall never have meaning without you!’ and fell into a wild river. Since fairies cannot swim, Maybelline drowned, and Alfred grieved his whole life and never found happiness. The End.”

The book was brimming with similar tales of star-crossed lovers. All the stories seemed to conclude with the fairy dead and the lover living on in misery. The most depressing romance was that of a young wizard who fell in love with a vivacious fairy while he was engaged in a war that had taken place hundreds of years before. The caption cautioned: “Though it is a well-known fact that when a fairy willingly kisses a wizard, he will have control over her for two to three minutes, the brash wizard Alamus forgot, and told his fiancée to ‘jump in a lake,’ thus ending her life and sentencing him to a lifetime of sorrow. The End.”

Marianne put down the book. Unsurprisingly, she felt a bit drained. She had read every story, but the sky remained as dark as ever and the moon still perched high outside the window. Marianne tried to entertain herself by estimating the value of the miniature china sheep on Penelope’s bedside table, but the clock ticking in the corner dominated her thoughts. She watched as its slender hands performed slow cartwheels, again and again. She yawned, and her ears popped. It was taking a mammoth effort to prop open her eyelids. Sleep was urging her to acquiesce to its demands. Marianne shook her head, trying to clear her mind, but her senses were already surrendering to the call of comfort. Marianne, cried a faint voice inside her head, don’t give in! But with a final yawn, Marianne lay down on top of her book. I’ll just take a short nap, she promised herself as she drifted off to sleep in a boat anchored on a tranquil sea.

Marianne awoke with a start. Was it the rats retreating or was it an unexpected spasm in my sleep that chased them away? No matter, I’m awake. Marianne ran her hands through her hair as she tried to steady her nerves. I’m sure they never actually came that close, Marianne persuaded herself, before noticing that the corners of Fairy Flings had been gnawed off.

Looking out the window, Marianne could see a harkening sunrise. The room, though, was still the night’s territory, shrouded in danger. Marianne affectionately watched as Robin fidgeted. Turning her attention then to Princess Penelope, however, Marianne felt the fine hair on the nape of her neck stand on end, and she had to cover her mouth to keep from screaming. Princess Penelope had opened her eyes.