Ghost of a Chance

by Susan Maupin Schmid

  Safety!

  I was content then to set down my pen, to lay aside my charge, and to withdraw. For what greater gift might a subject give his sovereign?

  —M

  The words were written in scarlet ink and seared into the page. Beneath them a starburst, crudely but decisively drawn, glimmered. Magic bubbled in its lines….My finger drifted toward it.

  The words drew out of past Wrays flashed at me. My finger halted an inch above the paper. I remembered the marvelous tombs of the Wrays dwindling into small stones in the Royal Cemetery. Warden Graves had been wrong. Those Wrays hadn’t made bad choices. They’d been plundered by Magnificent himself! Their wisdom, courage, joy, and tenacity had been yanked free and poured into the castle.

  And sealed by the starburst.

  I snatched my finger back and slammed the book shut. If I was a Wray, then what did this say about me? Was I lacking wisdom or joy or courage or tenacity? A cold sweat broke out on my forehead. I dumped the book in my box as if my hands might catch fire and slammed on the lid. Then, using my foot, I shoved my crate back under the bed.

  My ribbon dangled over my eyebrow. I pulled it free, slicked back my hair, and retied it. Bright morning shone through the windows. How much time had passed while I’d stared at those words? I had to get to work.

  As I jogged down the castle corridors, a strange sensation overtook me. The castle grew around me. It loomed larger and larger. And I shrank in comparison. Small. Insignificant. As tiny as a mouse. A weak, insignificant splat of nothing. I stumbled over a carpet and grabbed the wall to keep from falling.

  Magic bubbled under the stones, caressing my hand. The last Wray, it whispered to me.

  The truth struck me like a blinding light: no wonder the dragons hated me! I was a Wray! A Wray with a starburst-sealed locket! An empty one, to be sure, but a magic-kissed one all the same. Magnificent hadn’t used himself to create the magic. He’d used the people who’d come before him—the dead Wrays. Only the generations closest to me could be tapped, he’d written. And in doing so he’d changed their individual destinies, but not his own.

  No wonder the once-mighty Wrays had dwindled down to my mother the Under-chopper.

  Magnificent had not stolen only from those long-ago Wrays; he had stolen something from me: my future prospects and my place. Where would I be now if he hadn’t done it?

  A great lady? A countess? A princess married to a foreign prince?

  But then, where would we all be if the castle hadn’t been protected and the dragons hadn’t been bound?

  Magic coursed out of the wall and through me. I felt big, strong, and capable. The weight of the entire castle settled on my shoulders. I stood tall, squaring those shoulders.

  I felt the burning imprint of the book on my palms.

  “I won’t disappoint you,” I told all those former Wrays.

  Then I, Darling Wray Fortune, Guardian of the Castle, floated down the corridor, buoyed by my new sense of responsibility, and wafted into the wardrobe hall.

  “Darling?” Lindy asked. “Are you ill?”

  I ground to a halt, fingers curled as if I still held the book. The wardrobe hall was almost crowded. Lindy and Marci were there; so were Princess Mariposa and Selma the Head Laundress. The silver-gray dress the Princess had worn a couple of days earlier lay in damp folds over the desk.

  “I’m great,” I said.

  Lindy frowned, but the Head Laundress gestured to the dress’s collar.

  “I didn’t realize a jewel was still pinned to the dress when I laundered it,” Selma said.

  “Oh my,” Princess Mariposa said, fingering the large rent in the bodice’s front.

  “That’s a terrible rip,” Lindy said.

  “I always go over your clothes. I check every pocket,” Selma said, eyeing Lindy like a blotch on a freshly washed apron. “Lately, the Laundresses have noticed things messed with, rearranged…missing.” She arched an eyebrow.

  And she thought Lindy was behind it? Was that what the dresses had tried to show me?

  “No,” Marci burst out. “This is my fault, Your Highness. That dress should never have left my care with any jewel of yours still on it.”

  “No, ma’am, you mustn’t blame Marci!” Selma reddened. “This is my responsibility.”

  “A pretty dress like that all ruined. And Your Highness’s pin lost.” Lindy clicked her tongue.

  Princess Mariposa’s head whipped around.

  “My pin is lost?”

  “Oh no,” Selma piped up, digging in her apron pocket. “I have it. Right here.”

  The emerald lay facedown in her palm. The gold wire pin on the back was bent. She laid it gently in the Princess’s outstretched hand.

  Princess Mariposa blinked back tears.

  “Was—was it terribly valuable?” Selma said.

  The Princess shook her head, folding her fingers around the jewel.

  “Was that your mother’s?” Marci asked gently.

  Princess Mariposa nodded.

  “I’ll pay for the repair, whatever it costs, if it takes me the rest of my days,” Selma said.

  “I’ll pay!” Marci cried.

  “May I see it, Your Highness?” I asked, wiggling between Marci and the Princess. “Please?”

  Startled, Princess Mariposa opened her hand. The emerald winked at me in the morning light, and then I noticed the surface was carved in the shape of a butterfly. A thin gold rim surrounded the stone.

  “It’s beautiful,” I said. “Did the Queen give it to you because of your name?”

  “When I was sixteen,” she said with a catch in her voice.

  Marci shook her head, warning me. Don’t upset Her Highness. She gathered up the dress. “I’ll speak to the Head Seamstress,” she said. “I’m sure the bodice can be replaced. Good as new.”

  Princess Mariposa waved the dress away as if the matter was dismissed. She turned to Selma. “I should have remembered to remove the pin. We’ll say no more about this.”

  Selma bobbed a curtsy. “Thank you, Your Majesty. It will never happen again,” she said.

  “I’m sure it won’t,” the Princess agreed. “It never has before.”

  Lindy nodded as if that was a satisfactory end to the matter. She’d always taken the greatest care with Her Majesty’s clothes. She might get annoyed with the Laundresses, but damage the Princess’s dress? Never.

  Throwing one last look at Lindy, Selma left. Marci carefully folded the dress into a parcel.

  Princess Mariposa glanced down at her palm.

  “The jeweler can repair that,” Marci commented. “I can have it sent down to the city today.”

  Princess Mariposa turned the pin over in her hand, considering. Then she held the pin out to me.

  “Thank you, Marci, but I can’t part with it. Darling, take this to my room and place it in the tray on my bedside table.”

  “As you wish,” Marci replied.

  “Yes, Your Highness,” I said. I took the pin and curtsied.

  Lindy eyed me; I was not to dally. I hurried off to the Princess’s bedroom.

  I paused at the bedroom door, savoring the moment. I, Darling Wray Fortune, Princess’s Girl, was carrying one of Her Highness’s prized jewels. I glanced down at the emerald pin, expanding it in my mind.

  Not just any jewel. No. This was the treasured Heart of the Forest. Long ago, a powerful enchantress poured all her love for the Mountain King into the gem. But the Mountain King did not love the enchantress in return, so he cast her gift deep into the caves under the mountain. There it languished, burning with its emerald light of true love. How the mountain ached with that stone buried in its depths! It rolled the gem in soil and pushed it up, inch by inch, foot by foot, year after year, until it finally expelled the jewel onto a sunlit path by a mountain stream.

  I grinned. I couldn’t wait to tell Gillian that story. I’d add a big finale….I clicked my tongue, considering. The story needed the right heroine to find the jewel. Ah, a goat gir
l with an ailing mother! Perfect. I opened the door and sailed in.

  The Princess’s bedroom was as she’d left it. The bed curtains of royal-purple velvet lined in blue satin hung untied. A coverlet of blue satin embroidered with purple-and-gold butterflies lay tousled at the foot of the bed. Lace-trimmed silk pillows were scattered on the floor. A dressing gown had been flung over a panel of the headboard, which rose in great carved heights under the canopy. A half-empty crystal goblet waited at a marble-topped bedside table.

  “What are you doing in here?” Francesca asked, brandishing a feather duster.

  “I am on an errand for Her Highness,” I proclaimed, producing the jewel with a flourish.

  “Well,” she said, “get on with it.”

  It was then I noticed that Francesca wore a long string of the Princess’s pearls draped around her neck. She’d been standing before a tall mirror over a fancy table topped with a bowl of roses. A grin broke out on my face.

  Francesca had been playing dress-up with the Princess’s jewels! And I’d caught her doing it.

  “Are you tidying up the room?” I asked. “Do the pearls help you?”

  Francesca flung the feather duster over her shoulder and clutched at the pearls, wide-eyed with horror. The feather duster bounced on the table and glanced off the bowl of roses. A cascade of petals fluttered to the floor. Startled, Francesca trod on the petals, releasing their scent into the air.

  “I—I—I—” Francesca sputtered.

  I chuckled. She’d pulled a lot of mean tricks on me, and now I had something on her. I waltzed over to the bedside table and laid the pin on the tray there. Another day, I might have tapped the tray with a finger to hear the crystal chime. But not today! I turned around. Francesca was on her hands and knees, scrambling to collect the fallen rose petals.

  “Now, Francesca,” I said, “do be sure to do a thorough job of Her Majesty’s room. And do clean off those pearls before you put them back.”

  Francesca gasped, dropping her fistful of petals to grab the necklace and examine it. Realizing there was nothing wrong with it, she jumped up.

  “If you breathe one word, I’ll—”

  “Yes? You’ll what?”

  “I’ll—”

  “Be in big trouble? Look silly in front of the other Girls?”

  “You—you—” she gasped.

  “Lose your place as Head Girl? What? Come on, what?”

  Francesca took a step toward me, balling her fists at her sides. Patches of red danced on her cheeks. Her eyes darkened to coal.

  “I’ll have my mother find a reason to get rid of you,” she said.

  Behind me the headboard creaked, and I had the feeling that eyes were boring into the back of my head. Ghosts? I glanced over my shoulder.

  Despite my eerie sense of being watched, nothing was there.

  I turned my attention back to Francesca.

  Could the Head Housekeeper find a reason to get rid of me? A part of me thought not; I was the Princess’s favorite—she took me to the Royal Cemetery, not Francesca. She’d introduced me as her friend, not Francesca. But if she found out about the dresses…I’d have to see to it that that didn’t happen.

  “Be careful—those petals could stain the rug,” I said, strolling toward the door. “And don’t worry. Your little secret is safe with me.”

  With my new sense of importance, I took extra care over my work, keeping one eye on Lindy and one on the wrinkled handkerchief before me. Lindy whistled as she whisked her iron over a petticoat. If she had a guilty conscience, it didn’t show. I’d suspected her wrongly before, I remembered with a twinge. When I’d thought she was plotting against the Princess, she’d been sneaking off to meet her boyfriend, Captain Bryce. She might have a bit of a temper, but she wasn’t mean.

  Whoever had fiddled around in the Laundresses’ domain, it wasn’t Lindy.

  Forty-Nine had insisted I go down to the under-cellar. And I had. But since then, I’d been too involved in my own search for answers. I’d neglected the problem the dresses wanted me to solve. I folded the handkerchief neatly and added it to my pile of finished work.

  “Here,” Lindy said, holding out a camisole. “See what you can do with this.”

  Lindy never let me touch the Princess’s clothes. And I couldn’t help thinking about how sore she’d been because I’d touched up that sleeve.

  “Really?” I said.

  “Sure.” She grinned. “Aren’t I training you to take over for me someday?”

  I smiled so big my ears nearly met at the back of my head. I took the delicate silk garment and laid it over my ironing board. Then I picked up my water bottle and sprinkled it. Then gently, as if the camisole were a baby, I smoothed it with my hot iron.

  Lindy spoke over my shoulder. “Press each ribbon separately. One quick pass, don’t loll around about it.”

  “Okay,” I said, pressing the lavender ribbons one at a time. Did all Princesses wear such fancy underclothes? I grinned, imagining Dulcie howling over such a camisole.

  No doubt ribbons would itch as badly as her winter clothes did.

  “Okay, just tickle that lace, don’t scorch it!”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said, tracing the lace trim with the tip of my iron.

  When I was finished, Lindy held the camisole up for inspection.

  “Didn’t I know you’d be my best Under-presser ever?” she asked. “Didn’t I pick you out special?”

  Actually, Marci had shoved me into this job, but I wasn’t about to remind Lindy of that.

  “Finish up there and take the afternoon off,” she told me as she returned to her ironing board.

  “Yes, ma’am!”

  She hadn’t given me a whole afternoon off in ages. My irons fairly sizzled as I whipped them over my work. I pressed and folded so fast it nearly made me dizzy. As soon as I finished, I headed for the closet. I’d rescue Lindy from Selma’s wrath! I’d find out who was bothering the Laundresses.

  I reached out for the closet doorknob when I heard someone behind me.

  “Darling,” Marci said, “shouldn’t you be working?”

  “I have the afternoon off.” I let go of the knob and turned around. “Lindy said so.”

  Marci jingled the keys on her chatelaine.

  “That so? Then you should run along,” she said.

  I’d have to go to the under-cellar and investigate without a dress.

  I sighed dramatically to let her know what a valiant sacrifice I was making and stomped off. The castle had too many bosses. You couldn’t take two steps without tripping over one. I marched down the back stair and along the corridor to the kitchens.

  Mrs. Pepperwhistle stood inside the Soup Chef’s room. She held her leather-bound housekeeper’s book in her hand.

  “A little less pepper,” she told him. Then she saw me. “Are you where you should be?”

  “Lindy gave me the afternoon off,” I said.

  Mrs. Pepperwhistle regarded me silently for a moment. “Very well,” she replied.

  I skipped on down the corridor, stopping at the Pastry Chef’s room on the chance that he might need a taster.

  A Scullery Maid brandished a broom at me.

  “Don’t put one foot on this here floor,” she said. “I’ve cleaned it three times today.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, trying to appear sympathetic while looking for the Pastry Chef. “Why so many?”

  “This morning there was sawdust tracked about. Sawdust! I’ve never seen the like. And then someone—I’m not naming names—spilled a jar of cream, and what a mess! And now, half a crock of flour. Whoosh! Everywhere!” She paused, panting. “If one more person makes a mess on this floor—”

  “I was passing by,” I said quickly, and ducked out the doorway.

  Clearly, the under-cellar was the only safe spot in the castle.

  A noisy clatter greeted me as I stepped off the stair. Pots clanged as they changed hands from Under-scrubbers to Under-dryers. The slap of paddles chu
rning clothes in washing vats. The squish of clothes running through the wringer. The splash of water all around. A faint whistle of steam rising off the hearths. Everyone was hard at work.

  I gravitated toward the laundry. The dresses had disguised me as a Laundress, so it seemed like a good place to start. I wove through the laundry stations, nodding at the Laundresses with a neighborly air and keeping a sharp lookout for anything unusual.

  It would help if I knew what I was looking for. Why would someone mess about in the laundry? I wouldn’t tangle with a Laundress armed with her heavy wooden paddle. I stepped on a sliver of soap and slid across the floor, arms flailing, kicking up sawdust.

  “Don’t get any of that in my vat!” Ursula warned, eyeing me as if I needed a good scrubbing.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  I bent over to pick up the soap and spotted a glimmer. Squatting down, I dug through the soft, crumbly sawdust that the Laundresses laid down to soak up the excess moisture. My fingers grazed a hard lump. Grasping it, I yanked it free. It was a half-empty saltshaker. Maybe whoever was causing trouble in the laundry worked in the kitchens?

  “What’s this doing here?” I exclaimed, holding it up.

  “Give me that!” Ursula padded over to me.

  I dropped the saltshaker into her outstretched palm. She squinted at it.

  “That must have come from the kitchens,” I said, seizing on my chance to exonerate Lindy.

  “Selma is going to hear about this,” Ursula muttered. Then she thrust it into her apron pocket and shook a finger in my face. “Go play somewhere else, Darling. We have work to do.”

  “I wasn’t playing,” I protested.

  “No? What were you doing?” she demanded.

  I didn’t bother to answer her. I dusted the sawdust off my hands. What a day! I, Darling Wray Fortune, had solved the Laundresses’ problem, satisfied the dresses’ demands, and still had time left over. I skipped off. My foot struck something solid in the sawdust. I felt it bounce off the toe of my boot.

  But I hurried on, not stopping to see what it was.

  “New stockings,” Jane said over the rumble of kitchen chatter. She handed me a lavender ball.

  Marci sighed as she leaned toward the crackling fire. The three of us sat wedged in a toasty corner, ignoring the envious glances of latecomers. The Head Cook sat at the end of the table, sorting a pile of recipes.