Entwined

by Heather Dixon Wallwork

  The gallery was breath-puffingly cold, but Azalea did not stir up a fire. She ignored the mourning rules and pulled open the drapes of one window, letting in bright snow light. Flakes fluttered past the glass in swirls. The shadows of the flakes danced over Azalea and the sword on the pedestal.

  Azalea stared at it for a long time.

  It was already on its last leg. Cracked and nicked and dented. It would snap in half without much trouble. Did she possibly dare destroy it?

  It would free Keeper. Azalea’s mind twisted at the possibilities of that. Keeper magicking the palace all over again. Trying to take over the kingdom, and there would be another reign of terror. And…the blood oath. Azalea’s feet curled in her boots, along with her stomach. He would go after the King, surely.

  Azalea stepped away from the pedestal. She refused to put more of her family in harm’s way.

  Although…if she did free Keeper, the King would finally know about everything. He could get rid of Keeper before he did anything, couldn’t he?

  Except…the blood oath. Keeper couldn’t die until…

  Azalea pulled sharply away, leaning up against the frosted window, curling her fingers. She still felt Mother’s cold hands on hers. She felt awake in a nightmare.

  At the end of the hall, the doors burst open in a melee of delighted voices. The girls shaded their eyes against the light and flocked to the window, pressing their hands and noses on the cold pane to watch the blizzard.

  “I thought you were going to play spillikins?” said Azalea, backing away so the window had more room.

  “Changed our minds,” said Bramble. “We’re taking Mr. Bradford on a tour of the palace.”

  “An’ we’re not even charging him a penny!” squeaked Hollyhock.

  Mr. Bradford, who had Ivy tugging on one hand and Kale tugging on the other, managed a bow.

  “My ladies are most generous,” he said.

  His brown eyes caught Azalea’s, and they had a mischievous sparkle in them. Though he was solemn faced, Azalea knew he was grinning inside. The girls sat in the rectangle of light beneath the window, smoothing their skirts and scrutinizing him.

  “You once said you had studied at the university,” said Eve shyly. “What did you study, please?”

  Azalea blushed. It was all right for the girls to interrogate normal gentlemen, but this was one she wanted to keep.

  “Ah,” said Mr. Bradford, coloring as well. “Politics, actually. Some philosophy, and sciences. But…mostly politics, I’m afraid.”

  “How very appropriate,” said Bramble. Her face was completely blank.

  Flora raised her forefinger. “Please, sir,” she said. “Did you study dancing?”

  Mr. Bradford smiled and inclined his head to Flora.

  “One cannot enter a dance floor in Delchastire,” he said, “save one has a dance master.”

  The girls let out a unanimous gasp of delight, and the air buzzed with excitement. Ivy actually clapped her hands.

  “We learned,” said Mr. Bradford, now smiling his crooked smile in full, “how to escort a lady, how to turn her in an under-arm turn without clipping the flowers in her hair. How to bow to a lady at the end of the dance.” Mr. Bradford bowed with one arm at his waist, the other behind his back. “And how to hold a lady’s hand.” He took Goldenrod’s hand and folded his two gloved hands around it. “As gentle as a dove’s wing.”

  As Flora’s shadow, Goldenrod never harbored much attention, and she blushed pink to her ears. She beamed. The girls begged Mr. Bradford to teach them the fashionable Delchastrian dances. He wavered, glancing at the draped windows.

  “I’m not very good,” he said.

  “That’s all right!” squeaked the younger girls. “Oh, please!”

  “You can dance with Azalea.” Clover smiled a honey-sweet smile. Mr. Bradford’s face lit.

  “May I?” he said. He bowed to Azalea, his eyes twinkling part hope, part nervousness, and part mischievousness. “If my lady isn’t engaged?”

  “Take his hand!” cried Hollyhock.

  Azalea took it. It dwarfed and encased her own hand, and she felt the large knobbliness of knuckles under his gloves. She resisted the impulse to stroke them with her thumb.

  Her stomach fluttered as he led her to the middle of the hall, away from the glass displays and red velvet ropes. Leaning on his steady arm, she felt a touch dizzy. She caught the faint scent of fresh linen, and her heart began to beat in an Esperaldo jig stomp.

  Azalea’s skirts swished as he brought her into dance position. He was tall; she straightened into the best form she could, her eyes level to his chin. The girls leaned forward, memorizing each movement as Mr. Bradford placed his hand on her back, just beneath her shoulder, and lifted her other hand, gently. He had excellent form.

  “It will probably end up with Azalea leading,” said Delphinium, across the hall. “She’s so bossy.”

  Azalea closed her eyes. Sisters! She could strangle them!

  “A trois-temps waltz,” said Mr. Bradford, smiling crookedly. With his rumpled hair and uneven cravat, it seemed to make him symmetrical. “If that is agreeable.”

  Beneath his steady form, Azalea thought she felt his fingers trembling, just a touch.

  “I love the waltz,” said Azalea. She dimpled.

  The girls, at the edge of the hall, held their breath as Azalea and Mr. Bradford began.

  Mr. Bradford was not a perfect dancer. His steps were a bit flat, and he stumbled through the transition steps, but…

  He was shockingly easy to follow. The pressure of his hand, the step of his foot, the angle of his frame…it was like reading his mind. When he leaned right, they turned in perfect unison. He swept her across the gallery in a quick three, a dizzying pace. Gilded frames and glass cases and the window blurred in her vision, and Azalea spun out, her skirts pulling and poofing around her, before he caught her and brought her back into dance position. She could almost hear music playing, swelling inside of her.

  Mother had once told her about this perfect twining into one. She called it interweave, and said it was hard to do, for it took the perfect matching of the partners’ strengths to overshadow each other’s weaknesses, meshing into one glorious dance. Azalea felt the giddiness of being locked in not a pairing, but a dance. So starkly different than dancing with Keeper. Never that horrid feeling that she owed him something; no holding her breath, wishing for the dance to end. Now, spinning from Mr. Bradford’s hand, her eyes closed, spinning back and feeling him catch her, she felt the thrill of the dance, of being matched, flow through her.

  “Heavens, you’re good!” said Azalea, breathless.

  “You’re stupendous,” said Mr. Bradford, just as breathless. “It’s like dancing with a top!”

  Azalea stumbled through the transition step.

  “A top?” she said.

  “Ah, a very graceful, delicate spinning top,” he said, coloring.

  Azalea laughed. He brought her into a hesitation step, and time hiccupped to a stop. Azalea was so close she could smell the starch on his cravat.

  “I didn’t think I would have a moment alone with you,” he said, his voice richer now it was quiet. He hesitated and touched a strand of auburn hair, brushing it away from her cheek. “Princess Azalea.”

  Everything flashed to the moment she had stood at the cab door, wrapped in a lady’s old coat and shivering in the morning air, and her words, starkly painting the frosted silence with the dark, jagged letters, I’m Princess Azalea….

  The internal music faded.

  “Mr. Bradford, why are you here?” said Azalea. “I mean here. At the palace.”

  The spark in Mr. Bradford’s eyes faded, a touch. He opened his mouth, then closed it. And kept it closed. Azalea pulled away.

  “I think you ought to dance with Bramble, not me,” she said.

  His dark eyebrows did not move a fraction.

  “That was it?” called Bramble from the other side of the hall. In the rectangle of window
light, the girls pouted and folded the arms. “That was just a waltz! And not a fancy one, either! We feel cheated.”

  Mr. Bradford’s crooked smile returned to his face, and he pulled Azalea into a sudden dance position with a rustling of skirts.

  “Let us show them my favorite dance!” he said. “The polka!”

  Azalea had only danced the polka twice in her life, and now she relearned it at neck-breaking speed as he danced her across the floor in a galloping flourish. She hadn’t expected Mr. Bradford to be a polka sort of gentleman. Lord Teddie, yes, but Mr. Bradford? He was quite good! Azalea’s skirts billowed and bounced. The energy caught, and all the girls leaped to their feet, dancing, clapping, and singing a bright tune. When Azalea spun away, dizzy and breathless, Mr. Bradford swept up Kale and threw her into the air. She shrieked with delight. Everyone whirled, black skirts blossoming around them over the long red rug. The snow outside twirled with them.

  Hollyhock jumped about with such fervor that she paid little attention to where her leaps took her, and laughing, she whumpfed, hard, against the sword’s case.

  Everything happened slowly, as though underwater. The entire case fell in an arc and smashed against the floor.

  Glass exploded. Someone cried out. The sword skittered across the floor and came to a rest beneath one of the forbidden sofas. A sick, panicked feeling erupted throughout Azalea. Her mind shrieked. She fled to the sofa, knelt, and grasped for the sword.

  Though dented, pockmarked, and mottled as always, it was unharmed. Azalea nearly fainted with relief. She placed it gently—ever so gently—on the sofa. After making certain Hollyhock wasn’t cut or bruised, she sent Flora and Goldenrod for the broom, and made the youngest girls sit on the sofas before they cut themselves. Mr. Bradford was beside himself, apologizing profusely while picking up the larger pieces. Flora and Goldenrod arrived minutes later, to everyone’s chagrin, with the King.

  “He followed us,” said Flora in a tiny voice.

  “It fell by itself,” squeaked Hollyhock. “It really did.”

  The King sucked in his cheeks at the display of smashed glass, overturned pedestal, and frightened girls. Azalea didn’t give him time to lecture but scooped up the sword from the chair.

  “Sir,” she said, taking it to him. “It could have broken. Will you take it to the silversmith? Right now? It must be mended. Please.”

  The King frowned at her pleading face.

  “It is a blizzard out, Miss Azalea.”

  “Tomorrow then. As soon as possible. Please.”

  Perhaps softened by her concern, or her pale, pinched face, the King agreed, at Azalea’s insistence, to take it first thing in the morning. He helped them clean up the broken glass, lecturing all the while to the younger ones about how they would have to mend their own stockings to pay for such an expensive repair, and at the same time taking care that none of them stepped near the glass. Azalea swept up the pieces, deep in her own broken, troubled thoughts.

  The knock sounded again that night.

  Azalea was leaning against the mantel, feeling ill, while Ivy and Kale pestered her to tie their slippers, when the tentative, polite knock came. Goldenrod opened the door and, once again, showed the girls. No one was there. Azalea’s eyes narrowed as the trembly feeling of something awry flickered underneath her skin.

  “I don’t like this,” said Hollyhock. “It gives me the shivershakes.”

  Azalea went out into the hall, looking up and down an empty corridor. The odd sensation stayed with her. She swallowed a panicky feeling. Was Keeper growing stronger? Could he conjure magic outside of the pavilion now? Was it from the sword’s fall earlier?

  “I think you should all stay here tonight,” said Azalea. “This feels too odd. Let’s stay here. We already danced today, anyway.”

  Everyone protested loudly at this. Gritting her teeth, Azalea clenched the lamp in her hand as they descended into the silver forest. Each silver-encrusted step she took made the feeling increase, and dread filled her at the thought of seeing Keeper again. It did not help that the girls were jumpy. Jessamine clung to Azalea’s skirts and whispered in a crystalline voice, “Someone’s here. I think someone is here!”

  “Jess, will you shut up!” Bramble seethed, clutching Lily with shaking hands.

  Hollyhock, at the end of the line, gave a shrill yelp.

  “Someone stepped on my shawl!” she cried.

  She dove into the center of girls, leaving the shawl strewn across the silver path. It was Clover’s and much too large for Hollyhock, who had been dragging it, leaving a trail of silver sparkles. Azalea pushed her way to the back.

  “Nonsense,” she said, holding up a trembling lamp. The silver leaves glittered. “I’ll bet you just caught it on something. These branches, see?”

  Azalea knelt on the path and brushed pine needles from the knit shawl. Shaking it and sending a puff of silver dust from it, she folded it, stood quickly—

  And hit her head against something hard and solid.

  “Ow!” she stammered.

  “Oh, forgi—”

  The man’s voice cut abruptly. Azalea blanched at the empty mist. No one was there! Behind her, the girls’ eyes grew as wide as tea saucers.

  “It’s a ghost!” squeaked Flora.

  The girls screamed. They clutched their skirts in both hands and kick footed it to the bridge.

  Azalea was faster. She rounded them off at the arc of the bridge, grasping the handrail and blocking them.

  “Go back,” she said. “Don’t you see? Keeper’s trying to scare us. I’ve had enough. We need to go back. Now.”

  The girls stared at her, both frightened and sad. Jessamine’s bright blue eyes, Hollyhock’s muddy green, Eve’s dark blue, all of them blinking.

  “But,” said Ivy, “we only have tomorrow left.”

  “We never should have come here in the first place. It was stupid.”

  “Calm down, Az,” said Bramble, shifting Lily in her arms. “We don’t like Keeper either, but why stop dancing? You don’t have to be a bully about it.”

  Azalea’s fingers gripped the cold, sleek railings.

  “Is there a problem?”

  Keeper’s smooth voice sounded behind her. He leaned against the arched doorway, arms crossed, cloak dripping over his shoulders. He looked roguishly amused.

  “’Zalea says we have to go home,” said Hollyhock.

  “And she’s absolutely right,” said Keeper, straightening, cutting a fine, hard figure against the silver-white dance floor. “I hardly have enough time as it is, getting everything ready for the ball tomorrow night.”

  The girls’ mouths formed perfect Os.

  “A…real ball?” said Hollyhock.

  “We’re not of age,” said Ivy.

  “Ah! But you are invited to this ball. As princesses, it is your right. And I, your host.”

  Keeper clapped his hands together, unfolded them, and blew. Like when they had first seen him, months ago, glittering brilliant snow whorled from his hands and swirled around them. They sparkled in pieces, bright flashes against the mist. For a moment Azalea was almost taken by it, feeling it brush past her face in a magical swirling breeze. She could see it, dancing in the pavilion with this magic snow as their partner, whirling about them in a flurried, glittering spin, the dessert table piled with caramels and chocolates, the ceiling dripping with arcs of white holly boughs and gleaming ornaments.

  Flora gave a cry of delight and pulled a card from her black apron pocket. In simultaneous excitement, the rest of the girls produced cards, magically created in their pockets. They bounced with eagerness as they shared the stationery, silver embossed with their names, an invitation for the next evening. Azalea flicked her own into the lake. It floated for a moment and disappeared beneath the misty surface.

  “So as you can see,” Keeper said, his voice lulling as the glimmering snow flurried into the lake around them, “you really should go back. I have quite a bit to do.”

  “Natur
ally,” said Bramble in a half smile of awe. “That is—take all the time you need. Az hasn’t felt well anyway. We’ll nurse her up for tomorrow.” Bramble gave Azalea a wry smile of encouragement and prodded the girls to the willow branches.

  “A moment,” said Keeper. “Miss Azalea.”

  Azalea’s heart dropped. She turned against her will, and glared at Keeper’s dead eyes with all the strength she could muster.

  “I ask a dance of you,” said Keeper. “I should very much like to dance the Entwine. We never finished the last.”

  The girls nudged Azalea, smiling, their eyes alight. The Entwine was their favorite dance, too. Even Bramble perked up a touch. Clover, on the contrary, took Azalea’s hand.

  “No…Mr. Keeper,” said Clover. “She’s ill, can’t you see?”

  Keeper snapped out the crimson sash, burning color against the whites. Azalea cringed, thinking of the thread.

  “No—no, it’s all right,” said Azalea, touching Clover on the shoulder and slipping her hand away. “I’ll dance.”

  The girls watched from the bridge, biting their lips in anticipation, and Azalea found herself on Keeper’s hard arm as he half escorted, half dragged her to the middle of the gleaming dance floor. Azalea took the end of the long red sash with only one thought in mind: to get the dance over with and get out of there.

  “Good luck, Mr. Keeper,” said Bramble as the girls sought for better views between each other. “Azalea’s never been caught. You can try, though.”

  His dead eyes on her, Keeper produced Mr. Bradford’s watch from his silk waistcoat, clicked it open, and tossed it to the floor. Azalea cringed at the clatter.

  “Three minutes,” he said. He snapped his long gloved fingers, and the music began.

  The tempo was breakneck—faster than Azalea had ever gone before, and she was caught off her guard from the very first step. She whirled in and out and underneath the sash, dodging its tight snaps before it wrapped around her wrists with blinding speed. Keeper did not say a word. His mouth pressed tight, razor thin, and his eyes narrowed.

  Azalea kept up with the furious pace of the music, but each breath burned, and sweat trickled down the front of her corset. Three minutes had to be up by now. Angry, Azalea ducked out of capture again, and kicked Keeper in the knee.