Disenchanted: The Trials of Cinderella

by Megan Morrison

  Dash thought it was rather more of a shame about her feet — although it was sad to see a family as old and as integral as the Shantungs sink out of favor. It showed, he supposed, that a reversal of fortune could happen to anyone.

  “Look, she’s here,” whispered Paisley. “She came to school after all — the nerve.”

  Every head turned. Sure enough, outside the classroom door, a mess of bronze curls glinted just on the other side of Professor Linsey-Woolsey.

  Ella Coach had arrived.

  COMING back to Coterie was the very last thing that Ella wanted to do. She had begged her dad to let her go to another school instead — any other school. But her dad, of course, had let Sharlyn make the decision, and no amount of pleading had softened Sharlyn. “You’re fortunate that Madam Wellington is willing to meet with me,” Sharlyn had said. “I’m sure she thinks your behavior was nothing short of seditious. You deserve to be expelled.”

  Ella wished for expulsion, but no such luck. Sharlyn’s meeting with the headmistress lasted all morning, and by the end of lunch hour, Ella was forced to don her C-Prep uniform once more.

  She slouched her way to Fundamentals of Business, terrified. What would her classmates do to her when they saw her? What would they say? She tried to remind herself that she didn’t care what they thought, but that didn’t mean she wanted to endure a chorus of nasty insults and laughs and looks. “You brought this on yourself,” Sharlyn had said before departing from the campus. “I told you, didn’t I, that you would damage your own prospects, and not just the business?”

  Practical Elegance would lose money today, Ella knew. The Town Criers had made a full and gleeful report of her outburst at Charming Palace, and, as the scribe put it, “The loyal citizens of Blue will surely withhold their coin from Practical Elegance to show their displeasure.”

  “Good afternoon, Miss Coach,” said Professor Linsey-Woolsey as Ella came to the door. Ella tried to sidle past her, but the professor put out a hand and held her back. “A moment,” she said.

  Ella glanced over the professor’s shoulder into the classroom and flinched. Every head had turned. Her classmates stared at her, cold-eyed. The prince included.

  “Step this way,” said the professor quietly, and she pulled Ella aside, where they could not be seen. “I was at the ball,” she said.

  Ella looked at the ground.

  “Between your running away from Coterie last week and your outburst at the palace the other night, it’s clear that you have reached a boiling point.”

  Ella scuffed one boot against the stones. “If you don’t want me in your class, I’ll go.”

  “Not at all,” said the professor. “You see, I have a theory. Would you like to hear it?”

  Ella wasn’t sure. She gave a half nod, half shrug.

  “My theory is that you have not found your education here at Coterie to be … relevant to your experiences, shall we say.” The professor eyed her with interest. “Perhaps we can change that.”

  Ella had no idea what she was talking about.

  “Now, come in,” said Professor Linsey-Woolsey. “Don’t forget to take a smock.”

  The classroom was silent, and Ella was sure that everyone in it had been trying very hard to hear her conversation with the professor. Without looking up from the floor, she went to the hooks at the back wall and took down a smock. She donned it to protect her uniform from chalk dust, and she sat down at the back of the room, in the only available seat, beside Oxford Truss.

  “Wonderful,” Oxford muttered, scooting his chair away from her.

  Needing some distraction to keep her face from burning up completely, Ella dug into her knapsack and pulled out the little Shattering Day dress she was embroidering for Mrs. Wincey’s baby. She propped the hoop against her desk and began to stitch.

  “Your next project in this class,” said Professor Linsey-Woolsey in a clear voice, striding to the front of the classroom, “is meant to prepare you for the responsibilities that await you in the world. Many of you will be Garment Guild leaders and Assembly members, and your decisions will influence the health of the kingdom. It is imperative that you understand the repercussions of those decisions. Starting today, therefore, you will work in partners to create an original business and solve the kinds of problems that arise in real-world situations. You will create business plans and budgets, develop advertisements, and prepare a detailed presentation to be delivered to the class in a few weeks’ time.” She folded her arms. “Miss Coach. Kindly give me your full attention.”

  The room erupted in vicious laughter. Ella shoved her embroidery back into her bag.

  “I will assign your partners,” said the professor. “When I call your names, please reshuffle yourselves accordingly.”

  “Can’t we pick our own partners?” Garb complained. “This is like primary school.”

  Professor Linsey-Woolsey ignored him. “Chelsea and Loom,” she said. “Garb and Oxford.”

  Garb gave an audible groan of despair as Oxford jumped up and hustled to the front of the classroom, getting away from Ella as fast as he could.

  “Lavaliere and Tiffany.”

  Paisley and Dimity both sucked in their breath. Ella could practically feel a chill in the air as Tiffany pushed back her chair and made her way to the front.

  “Kente and Paisley. Dimity and Mercer. Prince Dash and Ella.”

  THERE were actual shrieks of dismay. Dash looked up at the professor, astounded. She had been at the ball. She knew what she was asking of him.

  Lavaliere clutched his hand under the table. “Tell her no,” she hissed. “Refuse to do it. She can’t make you.”

  But Dash’s mother had made him promise long ago that he would not use his title and position to command such trivial favors. He was to be always a gentleman, never a spoiled tyrant. He was to respect his teachers and lead his peers by example.

  He shook his head slowly and rose from his chair.

  Ella Coach it was.

  ELLA’S head went cold and light. Her blood pounded in her ears. The prince would never put up with being assigned to her — surely he hated her guts.

  To her shock, a few moments later, Dash Charming sank into the chair beside hers. She kept her eyes on her lap so that her classmates’ looks of fury and disgust would not smother her. It was enough that she could hear their every noise of outrage.

  “Weft and Sari, since we have an odd number, you will work as partners for now, but when Chemise returns to school, you will be a trio,” said the professor. “All right, class. Your attention, please. Attention!”

  But the room was so socially disarranged that nobody could concentrate. Ella heard whisper after awful whisper.

  “That foul, canker-bitten peasant.”

  “Poor Dash — I hope the smell isn’t too much for him.”

  “At least he’s bald and can’t catch lice!”

  This comment, uttered by Garb, was greeted by a classroom-wide cascade of sniggering laughter that never seemed to end. Ella gritted her teeth. Do not cry, she commanded herself. Not here, not in front of them.

  “The first step,” said Professor Linsey-Woolsey loudly, to recapture the attention of the class, “is to decide what your business venture will be. To do this, make three lists. One, what are your skills? Two, what are your interests? Three, what are your resources? Use your answers to help you determine a line of business that plays to the strengths of your partnership.”

  Slowly and reluctantly, the students turned their attention to the task before them. A few began to list things in chalk on their slate desks, while others glanced back at Dash and Ella again, their faces full of judgment.

  Dash picked up the chalk and wrote three headings on their slate desk. SKILLS — INTERESTS — RESOURCES. His writing was swift and perfect. He poised the chalk under SKILLS and cast a glance at Ella, and she wondered what to say. Should she apologize to him for losing her temper in his home? There was probably etiquette for apologizing to royalty, but s
he didn’t know what it was.

  It was safest to concentrate on their schoolwork. “I can sew,” she said.

  Dash wrote Sewing under SKILLS, and then he continued to write. Riding, Jousting, Swimming, Sailing, Skiing. Tennis.

  Ella picked up her chalk and drew stars next to Riding and Swimming. When the prince looked questioningly at her, she explained “I can do those too, so we have them in common.”

  Dash laid down his chalk and sat back, and Ella leaned forward to add her skills to the list. Beside his, her writing looked childish; for the first time, she felt somewhat embarrassed by her village education.

  Knitting, she wrote. Embroidery. Spinning silk. Unrolling raw silk. Shearing sheep. Carding wool. Spinning wool. Cleaning. Cooking. Sickbed care. Gardening. Driving a wagon.

  Prince Dash starred the very last one, and that was all. A flush had risen in his pale cheeks.

  “We could do a messenger service, maybe,” Ella ventured. “Since we both know something about riding horses and driving wagons.”

  The prince’s eyes traveled over to the table beside theirs, where Weft and Sari were working. Mathematics, their list began. Public speaking. Social skills. Dancing. Dress sense.

  Ella followed his eyes. “Should we add any of that?” she asked.

  In reply, Dash took up his chalk once more and wrote Mathematics.

  “Not social skills?” Ella asked, surprised, drawing a star beside Mathematics. “Or public speaking?”

  The prince gave a dry laugh. “No.”

  Ella hesitated. “You can dance, though,” she finally said, and she scribbled the word Dancing. “But I can’t star it, because I’m terrible.” She laid down her chalk, not sure what to do next. “There we go, then,” she said lamely. “Let’s make a business.”

  HE surveyed their list, unhappy with his contributions. Nearly everything on his list was a leisure activity, while nearly everything on Ella’s was an actual working skill. His embarrassment surprised him; he wasn’t sure what to make of it. It wasn’t as though he would ever need to card wool. It wasn’t even as though he wanted to.

  She drew a squiggly line under INTERESTS. “What do you like?” she asked.

  Dash wrote out his interests, uncomfortably aware that he had nothing new to say. His interests very closely matched his skills. Swimming, riding, skiing … these were the things he liked, so these were the things he could do.

  Ella’s list was different. Knitting, Embroidery, and Swimming were there, but so were many new items. Eel Grass. Salting. Shattering Day. My friends back home. History. Travel.

  “You enjoy traveling?” Dash asked, glad to see something he could relate to. He starred it.

  Ella looked a bit shy. “I think I’d like it,” she said. “One day it’s something I’d like to do.”

  “Then you’ve never traveled at all?”

  She shook her head. “From home to here,” she said. “That’s the longest trip I’ve taken.”

  He could barely comprehend it. He had been to Orange to study, to Lilac for winter sports, to the Olive Isles for sailing competitions. He had been all over Tyme. How strange it would be never to go anywhere.

  “One day, I’d like to go to find one of the Siddae, on the Golden River,” she said absently.

  Dash ran a hand over his bald head, which the Siddae, with their hairless, tattooed scalps, had partly inspired. “So would I,” he admitted.

  “Really?” Ella looked at him with interest. “You’d want to go and meditate by the river?”

  “I’d like to try.”

  She nodded. “My mum always wanted to,” she said. “But it didn’t work out.”

  “She could still go, one day,” said Dash. “Perhaps when she retires.”

  Ella looked at him strangely. “Oh, I see,” she said, after a moment. “No — the woman at the ball wasn’t my mum. Sharlyn’s my stepmum. My real mum died two years back.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Dash said. “I didn’t realize.”

  Ella’s face was suddenly expressionless. She worked her lower jaw back and forth, and he realized that she was trying not to cry. He looked away from her to give her a moment of privacy in which to collect herself, and he wondered what he would do if his own mother died. If her ship sank and she drowned on her way to the Olive Isles.

  The idea was unbearable. To drive it out, Dash considered Ella’s list of interests and busied himself drawing stars beside Shattering Day, History, and Salting.

  “You know Salting?” Ella’s voice was disbelieving.

  “My aunt lives there.”

  “Oh, right … So you’ve been?”

  “A few times.”

  “And you like it?”

  “Is that surprising?”

  “It’s just so common compared with Charming Palace.”

  Dash supposed that was true. “I like the music,” he said.

  “Oh, music! Obviously,” said Ella. She wrote it under INTERESTS, and Dash starred it. Then, on impulse, he reached over to write under the SKILLS column again.

  Keeping secrets, he wrote, and he glanced at Ella. “And giving things back,” he added quietly. “Thank you again for that.”

  Her face softened. And then she snickered and wrote Putting out fires. Under that, she added Excellent aim when throwing juice.

  Dash laughed aloud and instantly regretted it — Loom was at the desk in front of them, and he glanced over his shoulder to see what was going on.

  Ella, however, was grinning. She shot Dash a quick look, then reached over in front of him. Under INTERESTS she scribbled Fair treatment of the labor class.

  SHE wasn’t sure what possessed her to write it. She blamed it on his laugh. The sound disarmed her, like his smile, and for a moment, she was bold.

  But only for a moment. Then she realized how stupid she was.

  The prince stared down at her words. His face had drained of color.

  “What do you mean?” he asked in a voice that suggested he knew what she meant, and he did not like it.

  She was relieved when Professor Linsey-Woolsey swooped in front of their desk to survey their lists. The prince casually used the wet rag at the corner of the desk to wipe away Fair treatment of the labor class. He wiped out the silly things they had written at the bottom of the SKILLS list too.

  “Have you decided on a venture?” asked the professor.

  “Not yet,” said Dash, and Professor Linsey-Woolsey moved on to the next table. When the prince remained silent, looking at her, Ella knew she had to answer.

  “I didn’t mean anything by it,” she said.

  “Don’t lie,” the prince said quietly. “Just explain.”

  “It’s — look, it’s just that people working in the shops aren’t treated fairly,” Ella managed, keeping her voice a whisper.

  “What shops?”

  “You know — the silk shops. The wool shops.”

  “Are you accusing the Garment Guild of injustice?”

  Ella swallowed. The Garment Guild was unjust. It was also the oldest and most powerful institution in Blue, and its members had built this kingdom — even little children knew that. Many times, in her village school, they had sung the wretched old anthem: “The Guild That Made This Country Great.”

  If only there were some way out of this conversation. If only she could fly.

  Ella wished suddenly for the fairies. Maybe if Serge and Jasper were with her, they could do some sort of magic to make the prince forget what she had written. But then, that wasn’t what her mum had wanted, was it? Her mum had died believing that if Ella had her chance, she could change the world.

  Well, here she was, talking to the prince himself. If this wasn’t a chance, nothing was.

  “How much do you know about workshops?” she asked under her breath. Most of their classmates were the children of Guild members. The last thing she needed was for everyone else in the room to hear what she was saying.

  “I know enough.” The prince’s voice was formal now. D
istant.

  “Do you know about the roop outbreak in Coldwater?”

  The prince frowned. “You mean the sick people who went to work,” he said. “The ones who were supposed to stay home. Yes, I heard.”

  “You did?” said Ella, surprised. “Scores of people died at —” She lowered her voice still further. “At Jacquard and Garter.”

  His frown deepened. “Isn’t that their fault?”

  “Whose fault?”

  “The sick people.”

  Ella’s blood pumped faster. “How?”

  “They used Ubiquitous, didn’t they?”

  “What, to hide the roop?” said Ella, who was near trembling now with the effort to keep her voice a whisper. “Yeah. They use lozenges to hide their coughing, and they keep working until they drop dead. If they don’t, they get sent home without a single naut to buy bread with, and their babies starve. But I guess they don’t deserve to have babies if they can’t feed them, hey? After all, it’s their fault they were born poor. They should be punished for being so stupid. If they were clever like you, they’d’ve been born with crowns on their heads.”

  The prince gaped at her, and Ella’s heart slammed. She was sure no one but him had heard her. But she’d gone too far. She was being — what was the word Sharlyn had used? Seditious.

  Professor Linsey-Woolsey was back. “Something wrong?” she asked, her brow creasing. “Is there a disagreement?”

  “Yes,” said Prince Dash, still staring at Ella.

  “May I help?”

  “No.”

  The professor looked alarmed but left them to themselves, and the prince’s frozen expression of angry shock began to frighten Ella. What had she been thinking? Why had she been so honest? Had his beauty melted her brain?

  “Let’s just do a messenger service for our project,” she whispered. “All right? I’ll make the budget. Just please forget what I said.”

  HE would not forget what she said.

  He was stung beyond words. He was born to his crown, but he wasn’t stupid. He could see logic. He’d been in his father’s office when Lady Jacquard had spoken about Coldwater, and Lady Jacquard knew everything there was to know about business. By refusing to stay home, the laborers had made one another ill.