I wanted to say no, but instead mumbled, ‘Er, I . . . yes. But, that is, I was just planning on exploring a little first . . . I have heard Ashberg Castle is one of the great wonders of this land and as this is the first time I have been here, I just thought . . . I hope you don’t mind.’
‘Of course I don’t mind,’ said the Prince laughingly, ‘and if I don’t, nobody will. Will they, Count Otto? Baron Tomas must do as he is told by us, isn’t that right?’
‘Yes, indeed, Your Royal Highness,’ said Count Otto stolidly. His glance at me was not altogether friendly.
‘That being so,’ said the Prince, ‘I’ve decided to show you around myself. What do you say?’
‘But Your Royal Highness,’ began Count Otto, ‘the guests will be waiting for you to return and –’
‘Hang the guests!’ said the Prince. ‘I’m the guest of honour and can do just as I like. And what I would like right now is to show Mademoiselle St Clair around Ashberg Castle, is that understood?’
Count Otto’s face was impassive, though I noticed a tiny pinch of white at the corners of his nostrils. He flashed me a hard look, then turned to the Prince. ‘Very well, Your Highness, as you wish.’
I’ve made an enemy, I thought, uneasy. If only I could have kept my mouth shut! It would just have been better to go back to the ballroom. Now, not only had I helped to annoy Count Otto, but I was forced to follow Prince Leopold on an unwanted guided tour of Ashberg Castle.
As we walked along, with the Prince rather pompously – and inaccurately – recounting the history of the castle, I couldn’t help but think that Max would have done a better job of telling it. He might have been cheeky about it, I thought, but I didn’t think he’d have been boring, and sadly, that could not be said about the Prince. He rambled on, seeming to enjoy the sound of his own voice more than the subject he was supposedly enlightening me on.
I was certainly paying the price for lying, I thought as we entered the council room where, centuries ago in the days before the Faustine Empire had annexed our country, the Lords of Ashberg had held court. One of the oldest parts of the castle, it was small, dark and rather grim.
‘Mademoiselle St Clair, you are looking a little tired,’ said the Prince, unexpectedly interrupting himself in the middle of a dull monologue on the history of the Lords of Ashberg, only half of which was true.
I started. ‘Er, no . . . yes, that is . . .’
‘Please sit down for a moment.’ He motioned me to a chair. What else could I do? I sat down, and he sat next to me and smiled.
‘Better?’
‘Thank you, yes.’ It wasn’t. The seat was long and my skirts were quite full but the Prince had still managed to sit uncomfortably close to me.
‘It makes you think, doesn’t it?’ he said.
‘Er . . . yes?’ I didn’t know what he meant and I heartily wished he would get up and that we could move on.
‘One must seize the day,’ he said. ‘The past belongs to the past, the future belongs to the future, but the present is ours. Don’t you think so?’
‘Um, I suppose so.’
‘I’m glad you do,’ he said, and he closed in, one of his arms around my waist, his other hand tilting my face up to his. His eyes looked into mine and he murmured, ‘Sweet creature, you would tempt a saint,’ and then his lips came down to mine.
‘No!’ I cried, jerking my head away violently. ‘No,’ I repeated, less harshly, as I saw the stricken look on his face. ‘I mean, Your Royal Highness,’ I quickly added, ‘I was not expecting this.’
‘Are you playing with me, girl?’ His voice was cold now, the stricken look gone.
‘No, of course not. It’s just that . . . if someone saw . . .’
‘So what if they do? I am Prince Leopold. It is my right to kiss whoever I please.’
And what of my right, I thought angrily. Instead, quietly trying to sidle away, I said, ‘Your Royal Highness, I am flattered, but I can’t –’
‘Why not? You seemed eager enough to be alone with me.’ The blue eyes now like ice, his thin lips set like the blade of a dagger.
‘No, that is, I –’
‘Stop this game,’ he said roughly and grabbed me by the shoulder. I struggled to free myself but he was stronger.
‘No, please, don’t –’ I cried.
‘What is going on here?’ came a familiar voice at the door. Leopold dropped my arm and I seized my chance. Dishevelled, panting, I raced for the door but Max blocked it. ‘What just happened?’ he said coldly.
I swallowed, unable to speak.
‘She’s been flirting with me all evening, the little witch,’ said Leopold calmly. ‘What else was I supposed to think?’
Max looked at him. There was a strange expression in his eyes and he finally said, biting off the words, ‘This isn’t the way for a prince to speak – or behave.’
Leopold’s face stilled, an unpleasant gleam in his eyes. ‘You forget yourself,’ he said softly.
‘I most certainly do not,’ said Max in the same tone. They looked at each other like two wild animals sizing each other up before a fight.
I said, ‘Please stop, both of you. I’m . . . It doesn’t matter. I just want to go, please let me go!’
‘No,’ said the Prince, but Max stepped aside. I dashed past him down the corridor, holding up my skirts and running away as fast as I could, the enchanted shoes racing me towards an exit. I suddenly realised that in my hurry I’d left my evening bag and cloak behind, but that didn’t matter – they’d turn back into leaves at the stroke of midnight so even if someone thought to check the cloakroom for clues as to my identity, they would be none the wiser. It wasn’t until I was well out of the castle and down the hill that I realised my locket was also missing. When the Prince had grabbed me he must have snapped the chain, I thought. It might have been enhanced and enriched by the magic but it was real enough, and if the Prince found it and made enquiries there was a faint possibility it might lead him to me. But there was nothing I could do about it now. I was certainly not going to go back for it.
Once again, I avoided the areas where I might be seen. The night-fair was still in full swing. The clock in St Hilda’s Square began to count down the twelve strokes to midnight and by the time I’d got to the streets near my house, the last stroke sounded. All at once I was barefoot and stockingless on the cold cobblestones. To my immense relief, the dress did not fall away in shredded rags but just lost its magical glamour, returning to the simple muslin dress it had once been. At least that was something, I thought miserably as I trudged homewards. My evening was ruined and the magic of the hazel tree drained for no good purpose, but at least I wouldn’t break Maria’s heart as well.
I’d tell her I hadn’t had the courage to go to the ball.
I shivered, suddenly. I’d thought myself so clever, under my borrowed identity. But it might well have been my undoing, for if Leopold had thought I was a member of a great and important Ashberg family, he might well not have acted like he had. But I had come on my own, a supposed foreigner with no family and no reputation. If Max hadn’t come in at that moment, what might have happened? It might not have just ended with a stolen kiss . . .
I thought about what Max had said. Had he been warning me rather than scolding me? But if that was the case, why hadn’t he said so? Because ‘Leo’ was his best friend, and also the Crown Prince; when all was said and done, that trumped everything.
Passing through the woodland to the hazel tree, I saw that it had shrunk a great deal. It now only just reached my knees and its branches were almost bare. A few hours ago, the sight would have deeply dismayed me. Now, it hardly affected me as I walked listlessly back through the garden to the house, fortunately without attracting attention.
I got myself some cold water from the kitchen and washed my dirty feet and undres
sed, folding Maria’s dress carefully and hiding it under my bed. Shivering in my thin nightdress, I washed the underthings and hung them inside my cupboard to dry. I locked my door from the outside, replaced the key on its nail and, climbing in painfully through my window, crept into my cold and lumpy bed.
I tried to sleep. But everything kept going round and round in my head and in the end I gave up, lit a candle and sat up to read one of Mama’s books till, bit by bit, I began to calm and finally see that things might not be as bad as they seemed. I had escaped the Prince’s clutches, he had no idea who I really was, and neither he nor Max would guess the truth in a million years. At least I’d had a few moments of fun and glamour, and eaten some nice food, and Maria’s daughter could still dance at her wedding in her pretty muslin frock.
By the time I heard the first stirrings in the house as the servants then the family returned from their various outings, I was feeling a good deal better and even managed to fall asleep for an hour or so before my door was unlocked and a rough voice told me to get my ‘useless bones’ up for the first of my morning chores.
Mrs Jager was in a foul temper (the whisper in the kitchen was she’d overindulged in wine at the night-fair) and made me and everyone else run ragged. I had to get Maria’s dress back to her as soon as possible, in case Grizelda should get it in her head to search my room. Neither she nor her daughters surfaced till well past the hour when lunch should normally have been served. But I didn’t have a chance to slip out and return the dress till quite a while later.
In the meantime, I kept an ear out for gossip about the ball. There was a good deal, for it appeared the whole town was buzzing with news about the ‘foreign hussy’, who had turned up alone at the ball and who had danced more than once with the Prince only to then vanish. A footman had heard about it from a friend of his who’d got it from someone else who knew someone who’d been working at the castle that night. I could hardly recognise the picture he painted of the whole thing, for the story had been vastly embellished so that now the rumour that ran amongst the staff was that the Prince had fallen deeply in love and that he would not rest till he found the mysterious girl who had stolen his heart. The open-air address in the Square had even been cancelled as the Prince apparently no longer felt up to it. The whole thing divided the staff: some relished the romantic story while others thought the foreigner was up to no good and suspected her to be part of a dastardly plot to humiliate Ashberg and its finest families – some hostile foreign power or Faustinian snobs who wanted to ruin Ashberg’s reputation, depending on who you listened to. Because, as everyone knew, there was no way the Emperor would allow his only son to marry some foreign nobody, no matter how pretty she was or how much the Prince had fallen for her. Leopold had to make a good marriage, and while a girl from one of the top Ashberg families might at a pinch be suitable, somebody bowling out of nowhere with a foreign name and no reputation certainly wasn’t.
I listened to all this talk with some amusement, hugging my secret to myself. For the first time in a long time, I felt as though I had some power – the power of knowledge and of the truth. All these people gossiping and speculating, people who had helped to make my life a misery, or who had at least looked the other way. I was the only one there who knew what had happened. I was the only one there who knew the truth about the Prince. It was a bitter knowledge, but it made me feel strong. Stupidly so, as it turned out.
It was very late in the afternoon when I finally hit on the perfect excuse to slip away. Every month or so it was my job to gather up all the household rags and dusters that had become too tattered to use and take them to the rag-and-bone man. It wasn’t really time to do it yet but because of all the extra cleaning and polishing that had had to be done for Count Otto’s visit, I soon gathered up enough rubbish to convince the head kitchen maid that it should be done. It was easy to hide Maria’s parcel under the pile of rags and, with the heavy bundle on my back, I went out without anyone the wiser. Passing the hazel tree, I saw with a pinch of the heart that it was still quite bare and had shrunk and withered so much that it looked like nothing more than a dry, dead stick. There would be no more magic to come from it, I thought sadly. Everything was back to what it had been before.
As the rag-and-bone man’s shop was in a dirty backstreet a good way from the house I decided to deliver the dress and underthings safely back to Maria first. I dumped the rags in some bushes on the way and hurried in the other direction. I knew that at this time Maria was likely to be finishing up her afternoon duties in the Angel’s kitchen but, as I couldn’t risk being seen by the other workers, I intended leaving the parcel in her room with a note, then rush back to my rag duties before anyone wondered why I was taking so long.
I’d almost reached the narrow street that runs along the back of the Angel when disaster struck. I was racing along without taking much notice of what was going on when I suddenly spied another Mancer carriage – or was it the same one? – drawn up outside a house. Instinctively, I turned and went in the opposite direction, emerging on a street lined with elegant boutiques, outside which smart carriages were waiting for even smarter passengers. I had no other way to go. Clutching my parcel tightly, I scurried past the coachmen with head bent and heart beating like a drum. I tried to tell myself I had nothing to fear, that nobody knew, when suddenly –
‘What on earth are you doing here?’
Horror-struck, I stared at Odette, who had suddenly emerged from a hat shop. Only for a second did I stare; the next, I took to my heels and fled, with her lying shouts to ‘Stop! Thief!’ echoing behind me. I didn’t make the end of the street before I was tackled by two burly coachmen – my parcel sent flying, the brown paper bursting open to reveal its contents.
The coachmen stared. ‘And what’s this?’ said one of them sternly.
‘Please, please let me go. It’s not how it looks, I promise. Please –’ I was almost sobbing, but it made no difference. I was obviously poor. I’d been caught fleeing while carrying a parcel of clothes in a street full of dress shops. I’d been called a thief. Guilty as charged, as far as they were concerned.
I had to get away. Struggling desperately against their iron grip, I managed to reach down and bite one of them on the arm. He howled but instead of letting me go, gave me such a cuff on the side of the head with his other hand that my ears rang. ‘You little hellcat,’ he said between gritted teeth. ‘You vicious little hellcat.’
‘What’s going on?’ said Odette, coming up towards us, her sister close on her heels. Her eyes widened as she took in the contents of the parcel. But it was Babette who, baffled, said, ‘I don’t understand – it can’t be – it looks just like that other dress. But Mother saw to it, didn’t she? So how could Ashes . . .?’
Odette said nothing as she looked at me, her eyes gleaming with a nasty light. And suddenly I was filled with terror, and it gave me a mad idea. I couldn’t pretend nothing had happened. But Odette and Babette were not – at all costs – to suspect the truth. Better to be thought of as a thief. I said, desperately, ‘I – I wanted to replace the other one. And, you see, it was . . . it was so tempting to . . . when I saw it, I just could not help myself and –’
‘She admits it, the shameless thing,’ said Babette.
Odette, a younger version of her mother, still said nothing but continued to stare at me as if she were trying to see inside my heart to my deepest feelings. Yet she was still young, not experienced like Grizelda at unpeeling a person. After a moment she said, ‘She’s certainly shameless, and she’s got to be stopped,’ and, turning to one of the coachmen, ordered, ‘Go and get a policeman and come back quick smart.’
Off he went while the other coachman held me tight.
‘Mother won’t like this, Odette,’ Babette said. ‘It’s embarrassing for our reputation to have a scandal played out in the street.’
‘No, no, Mother will understand,’ said Odette, i
mpatiently. ‘See, Ashes will be thrown in prison like she’s deserved for a long time.’ She went over to the parcel. ‘Look – it’s not just the dress she’s pinched, but underclothes, too.’
‘It’s strange – it looks almost the same as that dress Mama destroyed yesterday,’ said Babette with a frown.
‘It’s the same pattern,’ I said, quickly. ‘A popular pattern, you see, and –’
They looked at me in disgust. Babette said, loftily, ‘No high-class fashion house makes two dresses exactly the same – it’s just not done.’
‘It won’t be a high-class fashion house,’ snorted Odette. ‘She couldn’t have even gotten a foot in the door! And look at that material – it’s not top quality. No, it must be from one of those places that make cheap copies of fashionable frocks for shop-girls and waitresses. Am I right?’ she said, staring at me.
I hung my head and nodded reluctantly, glad for her mistake.
‘Where is this place?’ snapped Odette.
‘I . . .’ I swallowed. ‘I don’t want to say.’
‘You’ll have to, you little thief, when the police ask you,’ said Babette.
‘You’re not the police,’ I said tightly. ‘I don’t have to tell you anything.’
‘How dare you!’
‘Easily,’ I said, beginning to enjoy myself in a miserable sort of way. ‘I don’t care what you think, you jumped-up clothes horse with sawdust for brains.’
Babette’s jaw dropped. Her eyes bulged. She squeaked, ‘Odette! Did you hear what she said?’
Odette smiled thinly. ‘Don’t worry, Babette. She’ll soon have time to ponder her bad manners when she’s locked up in the dark with only rats for company.’ She turned to me. ‘You’re such a fool, Ashes. Don’t you even see what you’ve done? You’ve shown exactly what you are – a common criminal. No-one can protect you now. Our father will completely disown you. Even if they don’t hang you, which they should, you might as well be dead.’
Moonlight and Ashes Page 7
