by Cameron Jace
“And don’t worry about Mr. Oddly Tune,” she said from the hallway. “May he and his laughable name rest in peace.”
Shew grimaced. How was it possible to keep anything from the Queen?
“Would someone prepare my bath?” she ordered other servants outside.
“Why does she have to weigh my heart, Tabula?” Shew asked in the absence of her mother.
“Ah—” Tabula stuttered, unable to look Shew in the eyes. “I’d better be going, princess.”
She watched as Tabula clutched the Queen’s mirror and left with it, closing the door behind her.
Shew walked to uncover one of the mirrors in her room and inspect her image. She was a mess.
“Who the hell am I?” she muttered again. “And why can’t I remember why they weighed my heart? How is it even possible to weigh someone’s heart?” she scowled at her own image. Although her reflection looked like her, it also looked like a stranger. People tend to think of themselves as good and kindhearted, until they look in the mirror and discover they have blood on their hands. Of course, that’s when they decide to go buy another mirror. For a long time, Shew stood in front of the mirror, imprisoned by the silence of her room.
Suddenly, she could hear something crackling in the walls. It was a strange sound, as if someone was walking inside them. Alert, she scanned the large chamber with her eyes.
11
The Princess and the Pauper
The sound kept increasing.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a pair of black boots behind the curtains. Someone was there, eavesdropping; maybe the black cloaked person from the Field of Dreams.
Shew stood frozen at first, but quickly decided she had enough and hurried to pull the curtain open and expose this mysterious person.
When she was halfway across the room, she heard someone call for her from behind.
“Joy!”
Shew froze in place and turned around. She saw Cerené tucked away in the unlit fireplace with a broom in her hand. It was Cerené who’d made the noise in the walls, she was sneaking in through the fireplace like usual.
“Stop staring and come over and help me,” Cerené said.
Shew lent her a hand. Cerené threw her precious broomstick into the room first—it was a strange broomstick, heavy and made of some kind of iron. Shew pulled on Cerené with all her might and dislodged her from the fireplace, spreading ashes into the luxurious chamber.
Cerené looked like she’d been working in the coal mines.
What was new? This was Cerené, all ashes, all the time.
“Thank you,” Cerené said. “You should make one of your many servants clean that fireplace of yours.”
“But of course, Cerené” Shew nodded, bowing her head and letting out a giggle.
“It’s full of dead squirrels. If you persuade the Queen, I can really clean this mess,” Cerené said. “How can a castle so beautiful have such an awful fireplace?”
“What were you doing in it anyway?”
“I wanted to surprise you,” Cerené picked up her broomstick and smiled at her. Shew couldn’t see much of Cerené’s face except her teeth.
Shew suddenly remembered there had been someone behind the curtain. Cerené had distracted her unknowingly.
When she turned around to look for them, they were gone. She pulled the curtain back and looked out the window, but she didn’t see anyone she didn’t recognize.
“Looking for something?” Cerené asked.
“It’s nothing. Don’t worry.”
“So you like my surprise?” Cerené said.
The way she asked melted Shew’s heart instantly, “I do like your surprise, and I’m glad you’re not mad at me anymore,” she responded with a sincere smile. “However, you need to bathe. You look buried in all that ash.”
“You don’t look bad yourself in all that…” Cerené held her smile. “Blood.”
Shew laughed from her heart. So did Cerené. Although one of them was a princess and the other a maid, they both had a lot in common.
In the middle of laughing, Shew saw a newer scar on Cerené’s neck. This one was a different scar. It was a bite mark that Cerené tried to hide underneath the ashes.
“Who did this to you?” Shew broke her laugh and gently grabbed Cerené by the neck. “Talk to me, Cerené. I’m not going to let go without you telling me about this. Who did this to you?”
“I am a Slave Maiden, remember?” she pulled herself away, holding onto her broom like a cane.
“What are you talking about?” All kinds of obscene scenarios flashed in front of her eyes. What did they do to her? Who were they? “I thought Slave Maiden meant…”
“It means I am a slave. I only do what my masters demand of me,” Cerené said, “even when they want to feed. Why is it so hard for you to get it?”
“Who’s been feeding on you?” Shew grimaced.
“Who do you think? There are only two insane people in this castle,” Cerené said, wiping her face with Shew’s bed sheets. She did it spontaneously, unaware of the consequences the Queen had in store for Shew.
“Two?” Shew wondered. “You mean the King and the Queen?”
“I mean you and the Queen,” Cerené blew her nose in the bed sheet.
“Are you calling me insane?” Shew smiled.
“Everyone thinks you’re some kind of a monster,” Cerené said. “I know it for sure. I helped you bury one of your victims.”
“Oddly Tune was no victim,” Shew bent forward. “He was a werewolf. How many times do I have to remind you?”
“You drank his blood, Joy,” Cerené said, wiping her teeth with the bed sheet. “But I don’t hate you. Being a monster is good. I expect you to be strong enough to stand in the face of those want to hurt you,” she said. “And maybe those who hurt me,” she said under her breath, but Shew heard her.
How could I not admire a Slave Maiden who sits on my bed, treats my bed sheet like toilet paper, dares to call me what I really am, and then tells me that she forgives and doesn’t hate me?
Shew sat next to her, “Does the Queen feed a lot on you?”
“I don’t know. Whenever she needs to,” Cerené said, pulling out her glass urn from under her dress. She had wrapped it around her waist, covered it with curly leaves, and knotted it with vines from the trees.
“You know she slaughters young girls and swims in their blood, don’t you?” Shew said, trying to sound as tender as possible. The imagery of what the Queen did sent a cringe through her soul.
“I know. I’ve seen it,” Cerené said.
“You have?”
“I have figured out most of this castle’s secret doors and pathways,” Cerené’s eyes glittered.
“I can imagine,” Shew said. “I’m wondering why the Queen spared you, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“Isn’t it obvious? She doesn’t hesitate in bathing in any peasant girl’s blood,” Shew said. “So why hasn’t she killed you?”
“Maybe she thinks I’m good at housework?” Cerené suggested, her eyes darting aimlessly, trying to figure out why. “I could be a senior servant like Tabula one day.”
“I doubt that is her intention,” Shew said.
“Do we have to talk about this?” Cerené asked. “I came to show you my magic!” She held her glass urn up in front of her.
“I want to see your magic,” Shew assured her, but she was still thinking about why Carmilla spared Cerené. It crossed her mind that even if Cerené decided to expose the Queen, no one would believe her. She had no one to tell, no one respected her, and if her mother had been a burned as a witch, it was easy to accuse Cerené of being like her. It made sense why Tabula had sent her to wash Shew after biting the prince.
In the Kingdom of Sorrow, Cerené was a nobody. She could’ve been killed without anyone missing her.
“Are you still thinking about why the Queen spares me?” Cerené broke the silence.
“So you actually
have an idea?” Shew said.
“Yes,” Cerené looked sideways, inspecting for intruders then leaned forward, “the Queen wants my Art!”
“Oh?” Shew raised her eyebrows.
“You think your Art is that valuable?”
“You have no idea,” Cerené’s face lit up from behind the ashes, titling her neck upwards, and making both her hands into fists. “My Art is astounding!”
“Alright, then it’s time for you to show it to me.” Shew would have preferred if Cerené just told her what the Art was. The things Cerené had shown her were fascinating, though. It was reasonable to think the Art was worth the suspense and the wait. What could Cerené possibly have that the Queen would desire enough to spare her life?
Shew’s thinking confirmed the Queen’s phoniness when she warned her not to mingle with Cerené. In fact, the Queen must have told her the Italian fairy tale for a reason, something to stir Shew’s thinking.
“Remember when I told you my Art is made of a Heart, a Brain, and a Soul?” Cerené said. “There are two Brains, the tools for my Art, one of them can only be obtained from a house in the Black Forest.”
“House?”
“An evil house,” Cerené leaned in, whispering.
“Huh? Evil house,” Shew said. “If it’s such an evil house, why would it help your Art?”
“There is something special in the house, something we need.”
We? Shew thought. Although I am barely contributing to anything, I like the idea of ‘we’.
“What kind of something special?” Shew wondered.
“A furnace!” Cerené exclaimed. “One where children are cooked.”
12
A Trail of Breadcrumbs and Candy
Cerené called it the Candy House, an abandoned house on the top of a hill beyond the forest. She described it as the second most haunted house in the Kingdom of Sorrow.
“If this is the second, what is the first?” Shew asked, following the tiny ashen girl into the dark of the forest. The way Cerené guided her through the secrets of Sorrow, reminded Shew of an imaginary childhood she should have experienced. Had she not been a prisoner of the Schloss by her father King and mother Queen, she should have experienced the kind of adventures Cerené did. The girl might have been poor but the world was her playground. Nothing could’ve been more fun than a childhood of exploring the doghouse in the garden and pretending it was a rabbit hole to another dimension. Of course, in Sorrow she didn’t need to pretend anything. Surreal and imaginary was normal.
“The most haunted house in Sorrow is the Schloss itself,” Cerené said, ducking to avoid a bending tree branch—trees acted mostly like humans in Sorrow, using their branches like arms, tickling you, playing with you, and sometimes doing things that were more sinister.
“The Schloss is not haunted,” Shew squinted her way through.
“Oh, yes, it is,” Cerené said. “Did you know your cellar was a dungeon used for torturing enemies and that the Schloss had been seen in others places around the world before your father even built it in Sorrow? It’s a Genus Loci.”
“What’s a Genus Loci?”
“All the things I just mentioned about the Schloss before. Basically, it’s a place with a soul of its own. Pay attention, Joy.”
“Oh,” Shew said. “I get it,” Trust me, you don’t have to tell me about the Schloss.
“The fact that you and the Queen live in the house makes it haunted already,” Cerené chuckled nonchalantly.
“I’m not offended by what you just said, thank you very much,” Shew let out half-a-laugh. Shew began regretting she had told Cerené to speak her mind. The girl was too frank to be honest.
“Don’t shake hands with the trees by the way,” Cerené said without looking back. “It’s a trap.”
“Shake hands?” Shew saw two tree branches taking the shape of human wooden hands and shaking each other as if they were friendly. One of them turned to Shew and offered her a hand. Shew snarled at the tree branches. She scared them so much that they ran away on eight branches, like spiders on eight legs.
“What have you done?” Cerené peeked back from between the bushes. Her ashen face was barely visible. Only her blue eyes and white teeth showed—the toothpaste had been working its magic.
“I snarled at them,” Shew said impatiently. “I’m fed up with all the scare. I think it’s time I use my powers.”
“No, you shouldn’t,” Cerené objected. “They already fear you. Many things in the forest fear you. They know who you are, and it scares them.”
“I don’t remember the Rapunzel plants or the Wall of Thorns being scared of me,” Shew said.
“The Rapunzel plants are said to be watered by the devil. That’s a different story. The Wall of Thorns hurt you because it is scared of intruders. By reacting the way it did meant it’s actually scared of you, too, the way bees sting a person if they fear them,” Cerené whispered. “Now that you scared the trees, we have nothing to hide in. That was the whole point of walking in their shade.”
“If everything here is scared of me, why aren’t you scared of me?” Shew drew back her fangs.
You’re my friend, Joy,” Cerené said. “And sometimes you’re weird but I forgive you.”
“I’m weird?” Shew felt insulted. She had been dealing with all kinds of weird Cerené had gotten her into since they met.
“Do I have to remind you again that you bit a cute prince and killed Oddly Tune, Joy? That’s weird,” Cerené rolled her eyes and turned around, arching her back like a sneaky cat on her way to catch a rat. “Come on, we have a long walk ahead of us.”
“Do you even know where you’re going?”
“We’re following the breadcrumbs on the ground,” Cerené said. “Look at your feet.”
Shew saw a trail of breadcrumbs, indeed. They were scattered randomly on the ground, creating a snaky trail in the distance.
“Is that like a secret sign that shows the way to the Candy House?” Shew said.
“An evil witch lives in Candy House, she likes to eat children, and she lures them to her house with the trail of breadcrumbs,” Cerené explained.
“What’s so luring about breadcrumbs?”
“When you’re poor, breadcrumbs left by a witch on the ground are luring, trust me,” Cerené said. “Besides, there is candy scattered on the ground, too.”
“Who leaves shiny candy like that on the ground? Is this candy poisonous?” Shew asked.
“No, it makes you faint,” Cerené said, climbing a small hill. “It’s devilishly enchanted candy. This candy and each brick, window frame, door, and even the roof of Candy House is made of delicious colorful candy.”
“Is there anything else you want to tell me about the forest?” Shew asked, now that Cerené seemed to be the expert.
“Yes,” Cerené said. “Watch out for the Forbidden Color. You know what that is, right?”
“I know red is a forbidden color in Sorrow,” Shew said. It had been one of the mysteries she hadn’t figured out—or maybe she just couldn’t remember it like she couldn’t remember Cerené. No one was allowed to wear red in Sorrow. Even the red fruits like apples and vegetables like tomatoes were golden. Rumor had it that they were the color red outside of Sorrow. “You want to enlighten me with something else about that fact?” she wondered.
“Of course, I want to enlighten you,” Cerené said, sniffing the air around her as if Candy House had a certain smell she would identify. “Red is forbidden because it’s the color of Death.”
“Death has a color?”
“Death wears a red cloak and holds a scythe, walking around the Black Forest,” Cerené stopped and turned around, making sure Shew wasn’t going to take this lightly.
“I don’t suppose Death is also a girl?” Shew mocked her.
“You’re damn right, she is,” Cerené glared. “A woman actually. She wakes up everyday with a list of people she has to collect their souls and roams Sorrow, looking for them. Once she f
inds them, she chops off their heads,” Cerené swung her broom in the air. “Pomona, the Goddess of Fruits and Vegetables prohibited all plants from being red, even apples and tomatoes.”
“That’s why apples and tomatoes are red in Sorrow?” Shew was skeptical, but it was the only explanation she’d ever heard so far. “Why did Pomona do that?”
“Because if red is nowhere to be seen in Sorrow, then it’d be easier to catch Death,” Cerené said. “I heard these were the Queen of Sorrow’s orders. She wants to catch Death itself, among other things,” Cerené rolled her eyes, and walked farther.
“But how were the Sleepers dressed in red in the Field of Dreams? Is there significance to that?”
“The Sleepers are dead girls, killed by your mother,” Cerené explained, not looking back. “They wear red because if order for them to die, they must have been visited by Death. The red rather marks the spot, which in our case are the Sleepers, until they wake up a hundred years later. And if you’re going to ask me how I escaped beyond the Wall of Thorns wearing the red dress, I took it off once I entered the Black Forest. Now stop asking question. You talk too much.”
“Whatever you say, Cerené,” Shew mumbled.
“Stop,” Cerené waved her hand. “We’ve arrived.”
Shew stopped, looking over Cerené’s shoulder. There was a house made of candy in the distance. It varied in colors from purple, yellow, orange, and red. It glittered with pumpkin lanterns with zigzagged smiley mouths and swayed slightly in the nighttime breeze.
“You said we had a long walk ahead of us,” Shew licked her lips, tempted to taste the house.
“That’s strange,” Cerené said. “It should have been. I guess the house changed places just as the Schloss does. I told you it’s haunted. I even heard there was a doorway inside that transports you straight to the Schloss.”
“Let’s go,” she dashed in front of Cerené toward the candy.
