Rose and the Lost Princess

by Holly Webb

  “Rose, what on earth are you doing with that cake stand? Put it down, girl. And come here.”

  It hadn’t been the most sensible item to try to look busy with, Rose realized, as she scurried across the kitchen, trying not to hear Susan sniggering. Miss Bridges put a hand on her shoulder and turned her to face the rest of the staff. “Rose has been—discovered,” she said slowly.

  Rose glanced up hastily and then down again as she saw an expression of unholy glee on Susan’s face. She probably thought that Rose had been caught stealing or fraternizing with next-door’s boot boy.

  “As a result, she will now be having lessons in magic with Mr. Frederick in the afternoons,” Miss Bridges continued smoothly. There was silence. Rose risked looking up again and saw that Sarah, Susan, and Mrs. Jones were all looking blank.

  “You mean—she’s one of them upstairs?” Mrs. Jones said at last, in a disbelieving voice. “Never! Not little Rose!” She sounded as though Rose had murdered someone. Perhaps the problem was that Rose could. Not that she wanted to, Rose added hurriedly to herself. She twisted her hands tightly together in front of her apron and tried not to look dangerous.

  “But she’s not born to it, Miss Bridges. This can’t be right,” Mrs. Jones said in a troubled voice. “Where did she get it from? She’s spent too much time messing about with that Mr. Freddie!”

  “I don’t think that magic is catching, Mrs. Jones,” Miss Bridges murmured soothingly. “I imagine that one of Rose’s parents must have passed the trait on to her. We should be truly grateful that she has ended up in a house where her talent may be put to use. The workings of Providence, I’m sure you will agree.”

  Mrs. Jones didn’t look as though she thought it was providential at all. She looked like she was about to explode, her face growing redder and redder with every minute.

  “Who’s going to do all her work?” Susan spat angrily. “Not me, that’s for sure!” She caught Miss Bridges’s steely eye and went back to buttering.

  “Considering that you hardly manage to do your own work, I doubt very much that you will do any of Rose’s,” Miss Bridges said coldly. “Your opinion on the master’s decision was not invited, strangely enough.”

  “Is this what you really want, Rose?” Mrs. Jones turned to her with hope in her eyes.

  Rose nodded. She hated to disappoint Mrs. Jones, but she’d tried pretending that her magic didn’t exist. It spilled over in unfortunate ways, and Rose thought it might get dangerous quite soon. Besides, she liked it. So far she hadn’t done a great deal of magic, apart from the bits she’d had to do because mad lady magicians were trying to kill her and her friends. She hadn’t had much time to enjoy those bits. But she had a feeling that magic lessons might be wonderful—she just hoped there wasn’t too much bookwork before the real magic started. And that was without even thinking about the money—Freddie had told her just a little about what magicians could earn, and it had made Rose dizzy.

  Mrs. Jones stared at her, shaking her head. Rose had a feeling that she didn’t realize she was doing it. The red had drained out of her face, leaving it pale and grayish. Rose thought she knew partly why Mrs. Jones was so upset—although she still didn’t understand why the cook disliked magic so. Mrs. Jones’s baby, Maria Rose, had died of the cholera—and if she had lived, she would have been about the same age as Rose. For Mrs. Jones, having Rose had been like seeing her daughter grown up, even sharing a name. But now, another daughter was leaving her behind, and Mrs. Jones couldn’t even bring herself to wish her well.

  Why are they so afraid of it? Rose wondered to herself. No one had bothered much with magic at the orphanage—it was one of those expensive luxuries that no one really cared about. There were more important things missing, like food. All she could think was that it was living so close to magic that scared them: having it there just on the other side of the door to the servants’ quarters and not knowing quite what it was—or what it wanted. That could turn your stomach, she supposed.

  It didn’t help that Gus liked to visit belowstairs for his daily treat of best Jersey cream, and he was so obviously not a normal cat. He delighted in looking supernatural and was a master at making knowing faces. Bill thought he was a devil.

  The back door from the mews banged, and Bill sneaked in, damp with the fog. As soon as he saw Miss Bridges, he removed his hat and tried to look respectful. Unfortunately, taking his hat off made his scrubby mat of hair spring up, and any pretense of a well-trained, well-turned-out servant was gone. Miss Bridges flinched. She tried her best with Bill, and he actually did his job very well, but nothing was going to turn him into a polished footman. Ever. “Me and Jacob found them all, miss,” he muttered. “They’re coming.”

  “Good. At least a few of the poor waifs will go home tonight,” Miss Bridges murmured. “Alert me when they arrive, Susan. And, Rose, you should go to bed. You will be very busy tomorrow, and you seem to have had an—unsettling experience.”

  Rose blinked at her until she realized that Miss Bridges meant being attacked by a mad enchantress. She supposed it had been rather unsettling.

  Susan bobbed a curtsy, but her dark eyes were alive with malice, and she watched Miss Bridges eagerly as she left the room.

  “I meant what I said,” she hissed to Rose, as soon as the housekeeper had gone. “I won’t be doing your share of the work while you’re off gallivanting with that unnatural boy.”

  Bill gave a scornful laugh. “Work! When did you ever do any work?”

  Susan turned on him, snakelike. “Well, you’ll be doing it then, won’t you? All Rose’s chores. While she’s upstairs with Mr. Freddie.” She smirked meanly, clearly expecting Bill to be jealous, but he only shrugged and smirked back.

  “You watch your mouth, Susan. You haven’t seen what she can do. I have. You don’t wanna get on the wrong side of little Rose.” He folded his arms triumphantly, but Mrs. Jones gasped.

  “You’ve seen her do magic? You knew about this before tonight and you didn’t say anything?”

  Bill looked uncomfortable. “Nobody asked me nothing…” he muttered. “Didn’t know I was supposed to.”

  “What did she do?” asked Sarah, the kitchen maid, with a sort of sick fascination.

  Mrs. Jones tutted, but she didn’t tell Bill to stop. She stared at him, being careful not to look at Rose.

  Rose felt like telling them to ask her, but she decided now was probably not the time to draw any more attention to herself.

  Bill grinned. “She poured treacle all over this bloke on a horse. He was yelling ’cause she nearly went in front of him, wandering along like a daft daisy. He tried to hit her.”

  “And she poured treacle on him?” Susan asked disbelievingly. “She didn’t strike him with lightning or anything like that? Just treacle?”

  “Was it good treacle?” Mrs. Jones gasped in distress. “The quality kind? Or that nasty, grainy stuff we had once that I sent back?”

  “Dunno.” Bill shook his head. “It was sticky. Stuck to that white horse a treat.”

  “She isn’t a proper witch,” Susan said scornfully. “Just some little orphan half-breed. Who’d want her? A changeling, most likely.”

  Rose’s heart swelled with pain. A changeling! A nasty little fairy child, made out of mud and spit? Maybe she was. After the excitement and terror of that night, she felt she could believe anything. And she knew she couldn’t face any more.

  Rose turned and ran out of the kitchen, biting her fingers to keep herself from letting Susan hear her cry.

  “See?” She heard Susan laughing as she ran away. “She knows!”

  Three

  Over the days that followed, Susan didn’t become any less horrible about Rose and her magic. She lost no opportunity to make mean, spiteful little comments, which Rose knew she should just ignore but somehow couldn’t quite. Susan had a knack for finding ideas that took root in Rose�
�s mind. “Your parents abandoned you because you’re a half-breed, I bet.” And, “Maybe you were born a frog, did you think of that?”

  But the magic made up for it. Rose could suffer Susan and her nastiness, as long as she had the magic. Rose had to hold on to it. That was why the lessons were so special—she was desperate to learn how it worked, why it worked. Rose was very keen on doing things properly, and everything magical that she had done so far had just happened. It almost felt as though it wasn’t much to do with her at all.

  “I’m sorry, my dears,” Mr. Fountain sighed as he shut the workroom door distractedly. He was frowning, and his mustache was particularly pointy, which meant he had been twisting it, as he did when he was worried. Clearly the visit from the palace that morning had not been a welcome one.

  “Who was it who came from the palace, sir?” Freddie asked curiously.

  “Havers. The Lord Chamberlain,” Mr. Fountain added as an aside to Rose. “Fussing about these idiotic protests. What does the stupid man think I’m going to do about it? Just because I’m their tame magician, they think I speak for all of us. Ridiculous.”

  “Protests?” Rose asked, frowning.

  Mr. Fountain fingered his mustache and sighed.

  “The news about Miss Sparrow has gotten out,” he explained reluctantly. “Public reaction has been, shall we say, rather extreme…”

  “I don’t understand.” Rose looked from Freddie to Gus to Mr. Fountain, her eyes wide with worry. “We saved them all. We didn’t do anything wrong. I mean, we were going to break in, but we didn’t even do that in the end, because she captured us.” Then she swallowed. “Is it because we set that mist monster on her? We didn’t know what else to do, honestly we didn’t!”

  Gus laughed—a low bitter sound—and stood up on her lap to bump her cheek lovingly. “They are not seeking to protect the witch, Rose.”

  Rose saw Mr. Fountain blink, and Freddie flinched, but Gus stared at them both sternly. “I only call her what she was.”

  “That’s what everyone is calling her now, Gus.” Mr. Fountain’s face was equally stern. “And a great many worse names. And they’re not just using them for her.”

  “All of us,” Freddie whispered. “They think we’re all like her—murderers, child killers, making up foul spells to steal people’s souls.” He shrugged. “Who knows what else.”

  “That’s just the point.” Mr. Fountain sighed. “They don’t know. They just don’t understand what we are, what we do. So they’re thinking up the most fantastical, mad ideas, and rumors are running through the city like rainwater.” He looked into Rose’s frightened eyes and smiled a bright, rather unconvincing smile, rubbing his hands together briskly. “They’ll forget…sooner or later…Magicians are too useful to lose. Don’t worry, Rose. Work!”

  He strode over to the table. Gus jumped off Rose’s lap and bounded after him, springing up onto the table with a surprisingly athletic leap for such a portly cat. He sat in the middle of the table, his tail wrapped snugly around his paws, the tip just twitching with anticipation. His whiskers trembled eagerly. He adored magic and hated it when his master spent too much time at the palace. Mr. Fountain was the Chief Magical Counselor to the Treasury, which really just meant that he made them a lot of gold. But because he was at the palace so much, he had an unofficial role as the only magician the king actually knew. This was useful, in some ways, but rather time-consuming.

  “What are we going to do?” Rose whispered, smoothing her hands down her apron, letting the scratchy feel of the starched cotton slow her jumpy heartbeat.

  Freddie looked eagerly at the book Mr. Fountain was drawing down from the shelf. One of the odd, frightening, dark-leather ones, Rose noted uncertainly. Magic lessons so far—she had only had two—had been wonderful but not really magical. There had been no fireworks, no fizzing sparks. Nothing as exciting as the mist monster Freddie had conjured up to fight Miss Sparrow. Instead, they’d had interesting discussions on the powers of different metals and how lead boots had protective qualities. That sort of thing.

  But she had a feeling that today was going to be different. With the snow falling outside and the promise of a real spell, the air in the workroom felt charged with excitement, and Gus’s fur was spitting tiny little blue sparks.

  Mr. Fountain laid the book on the table, opened it, and smoothed out the pages lovingly. Freddie and Rose leaned over curiously to read the title at the top of the page. It was handwritten in emerald-green ink. The Theory and Practice of Weaving a Glamour Spell, With Some Personal Observations of My Own.

  “Who wrote it?” Rose asked, admiring the spiky, elegant handwriting.

  “My own mentor, many years ago. He was particularly expert at glamours.” Mr. Fountain smiled secretively, remembering.

  Rose nodded, but she was frowning. “Freddie said glamours are terribly difficult,” she murmured apologetically. “I don’t know anything about them.”

  “There wouldn’t be much point in me teaching you if you did,” Mr. Fountain pointed out. “Glamours are actually relatively simple, but they are draining. Do you remember how you told me that Miss Sparrow lost her glamours when you attacked her? She could bring them back, but they were never quite as convincing after that, once you’d seen the real her underneath. Glamours have to be maintained; you can’t let them slip. That’s why they’re so difficult to do.”

  “Strong magic,” Freddie muttered, his dark eyes glowing. “How do we start?” He scanned the book eagerly, then looked up in surprise. “We just make up any incantation we like?”

  Mr. Fountain nodded. “The words are more to help you concentrate than anything else. Repeating them keeps the glamour going.”

  Gus brushed his tail across the page, his luminous fur picking up a tinge of green light from that brilliant ink. “But you must know yourself before you can change,” he whispered, “or who knows what you might come out as.”

  “What on earth does that mean?” Freddie asked sniffily. “I hate it when you go all mystical.”

  Gus eyed him with disfavor. “All mystical? Is that what you call it? You really are a most commonplace child.”

  “What Gus is trying to say,” Mr. Fountain put in wearily, “is that you can’t glamour yourself without a strong sense of who you really are. Your starting point. Here.” He handed Freddie a small, silver-framed hand mirror. “Begin with something simple. Turn your eyes blue.”

  Freddie stared into the mirror, scowling, and Rose’s heart thumped anxiously. After Freddie, she would have to try, and she had no idea who she really was. What if she couldn’t do it? She loved the idea of glamours, becoming someone else, even for only a minute. Her whole life as an apprentice felt like some enormous magic trick as it was. But how much magic would be denied her because she hadn’t a family to tell her who she had been? Freddie would gloat too, she thought.

  “Have you thought of the words?” Mr. Fountain asked. “You can say them out loud if you like, though of course for a really convincing glamour, they have to be silent, or it’s rather obvious what you’re doing.”

  Freddie looked superior. “I’m already saying them. There! Don’t my eyes look blue? A little?”

  Rose peered at him. “No. Oh! Weren’t you meant to change the brown part of your eyes?”

  “What?” Freddie looked anxiously back to the mirror. The whites of his eyes were slowly turning a rich, deep, glowing blue. It was a rather disturbing effect.

  “You also have to be accurate…” Mr. Fountain pointed out. “But a good first try.”

  Freddie’s eyes lost their strange color in a gentle fade, like rinsing the blue out of washing. He glared at Rose, as though daring her to do better than he had.

  Rose blinked. She really had no idea what she was supposed to do. The book said just to see oneself with the required changes. But how? Freddie handed her the mirror and watched her, hawklike—a hawk w
ith strangely bluish eyes.

  Rose stared at her reflection. Her mirror-self looked pale and worried. Just seeing oneself differently didn’t sound very clear. It sounded almost too easy, especially for someone who made moving pictures appear on anything shiny.

  “Try changing the color of your hair,” Mr. Fountain suggested to Rose, and she grimaced at her short, dark locks in the mirror. Orphans had their hair cut very short, to avoid lice, or at least to make lice easier to get rid of. Rose wasn’t planning to cut hers again ever, but it would be a long time before she had luxuriant long hair like Isabella’s. Rose smiled, imagining herself, seeing a new Rose in the mirror, with rose-petal soft cheeks and rich waves of golden hair rippling down her back. The kind of hair that needed a maid to brush it every night…

  Long hair, long hair,

  Long and fair…

  Long hair, long hair,

  Long and fair…

  Long hair, long hair,

  Long and fair…

  Rose chanted it to herself silently, the rhythm bouncing through her brain.

  “Rose, stop!” Gus’s mew had an undertone of panic, and Rose reluctantly dragged her eyes away from the pretty filigree mirror. She gasped, a hand going to her mouth in shock and staying there to hide a smile.

  Gus was blond. His fur was distinctly longer than usual, and it was a soft golden-toffee shade—much the same color as Freddie’s hair, which was now waist length. Mr. Fountain’s hair hadn’t grown, but it was blond too, and so was his beautiful mustache, which was now hanging to his shoulders in two caramel-colored ringlets.

  Rose glanced hopefully back into the mirror, anxious to see her own transformation. But her hair was the same dark brown as usual and not an inch longer.

  “What did you do?” Freddie demanded indignantly. “Turn it back! Make it go away!”

  Rose gave him a worried look. “Um. How?” she asked Mr. Fountain. “I don’t actually know what I did, so I’m not sure how to undo it…”