by Holly Webb
The page boy closed the door behind him, and the whole room seemed to sigh and relax, as though everyone in it had been windup dolls, and their clockwork had run down now that their owner had gone to play with something else.
The princess smiled graciously at Rose. “I’m afraid I’m not sure what your duties are to be,” she confessed. “Papa doesn’t usually order my staff. But it was very sweet of him to give you to me.” She appeared to have no idea how strange this sounded, and Rose didn’t dare point it out.
“I’ll do whatever you ask, Your Highness,” she promised, bobbing a curtsy.
Princess Jane looked at her thoughtfully. “Most people say that, but I believe you will,” she murmured. Then she shook her head slightly, staring at Rose wide-eyed, as though there was something worrying yet rather interesting about her.
***
Mr. Fountain had laid protective wards all around the princesses’ rooms—after the first attack. No one had thought to ask him to do it before, as there hadn’t been any need. Now it meant that these rooms felt far friendlier to Rose than anywhere else in the palace, with their warm tingle of protective magic. But despite the welcoming spells, her new life was unbelievably strange. There was absolutely nothing for her to do.
Princess Jane and Princess Charlotte had ladies-in-waiting, waiting around to do everything. They had their own cook, who came to the suite every morning to take orders, and always looked depressed as Princess Jane really did prefer bread and butter to cake and fancy dishes as Bella had said, and Princess Charlotte was far too little for the kind of rich food he’d like to cook. The most exciting things he was allowed to make were gingerbread men for Princess Charlotte, and he made the most of it. They were the most beautiful gingerbread men that Rose could imagine, with intricately iced outfits and spun-sugar hair.
There were also three governesses, a dancing master, a gaggle of page boys, and several equerries, including Freddie’s cousin Raphael, but he was in disgrace and just moped around looking even dimmer than he usually did—or so Freddie claimed in the one snatched moment he and Rose had in the corridor when Mr. Fountain and the princess just happened to be going in the same direction. The palace’s usual maids did all the cleaning and tidying, and somehow managed to be almost invisible and completely silent. They wouldn’t give Rose lessons in that, even when she did manage to catch them.
So Rose was reduced to lurking behind Princess Jane and trying to look useful. She would have found it infuriating, but of course the princess was used to having people around her all the time. Rose had borrowed—stolen, actually—a feather duster from one of the maidservants, and she flicked it around when anyone seemed to be looking at her suspiciously. So far, everyone seemed to accept that she was just a rather strange present from the king. They all resented her being there, but no one realized she was actually a magical bodyguard. At least, she hoped no one did. If they did work it out, someone might start fighting her, and she didn’t want to unleash the fiery monsters or any of her other tricks until she really had to.
Even though Mr. Fountain and Freddie were at the palace too, it was impossible to see them for more than a moment, as she’d promised to stay with the princess all the time. She’d even slept the two nights she’d been there on a little folding bed just outside the princess’s bedroom. It wasn’t comfortable, and she hadn’t slept well—she kept having the strangest dreams, which was very unusual for her. She had woken twice the first night with only a sense of unease, but last night had been much worse. There had been pale-faced figures with black hoods pacing through her dreams, and they had seemed real. One of them had been behind Princess Jane’s drawing room curtains, grinning. Rose had been forced to get out of bed and creep into the drawing room, where she had picked up the poker from the fireplace, trying to remember the incantations Freddie had taught her for different metals. She repeated the words a little doubtfully, staring at the lump of metal in her hand. An iron poker seemed so unmagical. If it didn’t work, she supposed she could just rely on the old-fashioned method and hit someone with it. But as she reached the end of the spell, the cold metal seemed to grow warm and soft in her hand, as though she could reshape it into whatever she needed. Rose gripped it tightly, feeling it quiver, and made herself draw the curtains sharply apart.
There was nothing there. Nothing except an indrawn breath—a feeling of waiting—and a pattern of ice crystals sprayed across the windowpane, like a bunch of tasteful flowers.
But they had been there—whoever they were. Rose was almost sure, yet not quite sure enough to sound the alarm. She crept back to bed, still clutching the poker.
Curled up in her blankets, she reached under her pillow for the snow globe. She still didn’t like it very much, but it was company of a sort. In a palace full of suspicious, magic-hating courtiers, such a wonderfully magical object made her feel less alone and less of a pariah. She had taken to slipping it in her pocket, and the biting cold had dulled to a refreshing chill that was quite pleasant in the overheated palace.
One of the skaters looked very like Bill, just with better hair. She missed Bill. Rose yawned and wondered if he missed her too.
***
Rose sat up, peering through the open door. Daylight, almost. No hooded figures had stolen the princess in the night.
Princess Jane was still asleep, so she could sit and think for a moment. Rose blinked and realized that the fire in the princess’s room was burning already—one of the maids must have been in to light it, and she hadn’t noticed. Rose wasn’t sure if she felt more guilty as a fellow servant or as a hopeless bodyguard. Maybe she and Freddie should take shifts through the night, so someone was always watching? But then, it would probably be a national scandal if a boy slept outside Princess Jane’s bedroom. And it would make it obvious that something was going on—she was undercover, that was the point. Rose sighed. It was chilly in the corridor, and the young princess was still fast asleep. Pulling the blanket off her bed, she wrapped it around herself and padded into the room, settling in front of the fire. She put the poker back on its hook and stared into the flames. Should she tell Mr. Fountain about her odd dreams? They seemed rather silly and insubstantial in the grayish morning light. She couldn’t set the whole palace searching and fretting because of frost flowers.
Seven o’clock chimed on the pretty clock on the marble mantelpiece. It was carved from dark wood and had flowers and birds all over. It wasn’t the kind of thing that Rose had expected to see in a princess’s bedroom though—she’d thought there’d be rather more gold.
“It’s made out of a bit of a ship.”
Rose tried to stand up, still wrapped in her blanket, and pitched forward, banging her head on the fireplace and just escaping falling into the fire. Dizzy, with odd white flashes behind her eyes, she barely felt the little hands hauling her up and leading her to the bed. She came back to herself spluttering as the princess tried to hold a glass of water to her lips. Horrified, she tried to jump up again.
“Stop it! You’ll fall over, and you’re already going to have a most disfiguring bruise.”
“I’m sorry, Your Highness…” Rose whispered.
“Oh, don’t worry. I shouldn’t think anyone will notice. I don’t have to meet anyone today. Otherwise, you probably would have to cover it up. It wouldn’t do if you looked as though someone had attacked you, would it? People might not think you were much good at protecting me—or too good, maybe?” The princess glanced thoughtfully at Rose before clamping a wet face cloth to her forehead. “You had better not let Papa see it. He’ll think someone tried to kidnap me again, and the fussing has only just died down.”
“You know?” Rose blinked at her. She felt stupid, but she wasn’t sure how much of that was due to the blow to the head.
“Of course!” Princess Jane glared at her. “Oh, it took me the rest of the day to work it out, but you sleep in front of my door! And, I’m sorry, but i
f Papa really wanted to give me a maid, it would be a trained lady’s maid or a dresser. You are quite ordinary.”
That’s what you think. Rose suppressed a smile, but the princess’s next words froze her.
“So ordinary that I can’t quite work out what Papa is doing. There must be something rather special about you, something that just isn’t obvious. I had thought that you might be trained in hand-to-hand combat, one of those amazing Eastern sorts, ju-jitsu or karate. But I don’t think you’d fall into the fireplace if you were. So I’m not quite sure what it is. You seem ordinary, but there’s something I can’t quite pin down.” She smiled at Rose. “You thought I was stupid, didn’t you? Lady Alice said that you came from Mr. Fountain’s household, so I suppose you’ve heard about me from Isabella, and she finds me terribly boring. I can’t help liking bread and butter, you know. Cake is nice sometimes, but I find I really can’t be excited about it.” Rose swallowed. Princess Jane was much more frightening on her own, when not surrounded by a horde of ladies-in-waiting.
The princess was still watching her thoughtfully. Rose couldn’t think straight herself. It was too terrifying to be sitting on a princess’s bed, next to a princess. A princess who was helpfully holding a cold cloth on her head and tutting about the possibility of a black eye. She seemed to think it was not at all the thing for one’s maids to appear battered.
Rose’s dizzy mind returned to the clock. “It’s made out of a ship?”
Princess Jane nodded. “Yes. Most of my furniture is, you know. Sailors like to carve things, apparently, and they will keep sending me it all. It would be awfully bad manners to send any of it away. It’s partly why I have the doll’s house.” She waved a graceful hand at the enormous white and gold confection, just visible in her drawing room. “Papa asked the navy to mention discreetly to the hands that miniature furniture would be more useful at the moment. But the doll’s house has had to be enlarged twice already.”
“Sailors made your bed as well?” Rose asked, putting out a hand to stroke the carved woodwork.
“Almost. It was a present from His Majesty’s dockyards. It’s a lateen-rigged caravel.” Princess Jane’s tone of voice suggested that she had learned this off by heart, quite possibly at the same time as rather a lot of other nautical terms. “The figurehead is supposed to look like me, but I don’t think it does, do you?”
Rose peered diplomatically around at the foot of the bed, which was shaped like a tiny ship, albeit with pink silk curtains falling from a rather eccentrically placed mast instead of sails. She had already noticed the figurehead, and she thought it really bore a remarkable resemblance to Jane. It wasn’t just the pretty, regular features, and the neatly banded hair; it was something to do with the rather wooden expression.
But she shook her head firmly, even though she regretted it a second later. “No. Ow. I mean, I’m sorry, Your Highness.”
“You definitely aren’t trained in unarmed combat,” Princess Jane murmured. “A display came to the palace to entertain us a few weeks ago. All adepts of the fighting arts are very brave and long-suffering. You would be able to climb a mountain with a broken leg, and you certainly wouldn’t be saying ow for a mere black eye.” Rose tried to look blank and possibly a little faint, but the princess didn’t seem very convinced. “You didn’t answer the question properly.”
“No, Your Highness. It doesn’t look like you. Your coloring is much more natural.”
“Well, of course it is. Mine isn’t painted!” Princess Jane sighed with just a touch of irritation. “Are you feeling better? We’ve a little time before anyone else comes.” She hopped up and fetched a satin dressing gown. Rose scrambled to help her into it, but she shrugged it on anyhow, batting Rose’s hands away. “Oh, don’t fuss, I can do it myself. Come on. Charlotte is too little to play with the dollhouse properly, and it’s much better with someone else.”
Rose obediently followed her into the drawing room and kneeled in front of the house. It was perfect, painted white to look like stuccoed stone, and crusted with balconies, pediments, and columns. A tiny gilded frieze ran around the building just below the roof, illustrating the exciting events of the sea battle that had established Jane as the darling princess of the nation, with a group of heathen gods and goddesses of the sea watching in the main pediment while riding a number of interesting sea creatures. Several of the goddesses had tails and were coiling them about rather indiscreetly.
“Help me undo this.” Jane pointed to the front of the house, and Rose leaned close to see what she was trying to do. She smiled delightedly when she realized that the sea goddess’s trident was actually a little hook that held the front of the house together, and when Jane slipped it, the whole front hinged out to reveal the rooms inside.
“I can’t touch that, Your Highness!” Rose gasped. It was too delicate, too pretty, too precious. Without meaning to, she folded her hands behind her back.
“You are supposed to do whatever I tell you,” Princess Jane pointed out, her eyes flashing, the wooden expression leaving her face for the first time. She looked much better that way, Rose noted at the back of her mind, and wished that the princess melted more often. She hadn’t realized before, but the frozen look was so sad.
“I don’t know how,” Rose whispered apologetically.
“Look.” The princess handed her a tiny doll that might have been Rose herself in a pretty cotton, print gown. “A housemaid. And here are her brushes. You can’t get that wrong, can you? Sweep the nursery, please.”
By the time a shocked lady-in-waiting discovered them, Rose had progressed to being the cook, not without a pang at the thought of Mrs. Jones back at her house. The doll’s kitchen even had tiny versions of Mrs. Jones’s adored copper jelly molds and a rather more impressive patent stove.
The princess squashed all doubts about the suitability of playing with Rose and the dollhouse by reminding everyone that Rose was supposed to be a companion, the king had said so, which no one could deny. She told Rose in front of at least six ladies-in-waiting and the dancing master that she was to have care of the dollhouse as her special duty. “Charlotte is always messing it up,” she added to Rose in a hissing whisper. “And I can’t abide it being untidy.”
In fact, Rose thought that little Princess Charlotte was a most unnaturally neat four-year-old, but she would never dare tell Princess Jane that. Charlotte adored the dollhouse, partly because it was really her sister’s, and once she realized that Rose was there to help her play with it, she spent the whole afternoon—while Jane was with her governesses in the schoolroom next door—making Rose enact grand parties in the ballroom.
The parties almost always ended with the house catching fire and all the dolls having to be lowered off the balconies in lace handkerchiefs borrowed from the ladies-in-waiting. The ladies were doubtful about this at first but soon discovered that Charlotte was much less inclined to interrupt good gossiping time if she was allowed to play with Rose. Lady Alice even smiled at Rose when Princess Jane finished her lessons and came to fetch her.
Jane looked accusingly at the dolls all fainting on the carpet, and Rose started to tidy them away quickly when one of the pages announced a visitor.
Visitors to the princesses’ rooms were quite rare, even more so since the kidnap attempt, Rose gathered, so Jane and Charlotte were distracted at once, and even Rose looked round eagerly.
When she saw who it was, she had to stop herself from running to greet him, which just showed how much she was missing the Fountain house, as she’d never normally want to run to Freddie.
He bowed exquisitely and winked at Rose when the princesses couldn’t see.
“Have you brought a message from Mr. Fountain, Frederick?” Princess Jane inquired.
“Yes, Your Highness. My master sent me to ask if I could be of service in entertaining you, as you asked a week or so ago. I was due to come with Miss Isabella if you remember.”<
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Princess Jane clapped her hands delightedly. “Oh, yes! Are you going to do tricks?”
Rose looked at Freddie worriedly. His magic could be rather hit and miss, and she thought this sounded somewhat risky.
“May I borrow your maid, Your Highness? To assist me?” Freddie beckoned anxiously to Rose, and she hurried over as soon as Jane had nodded graciously. The princesses and the ladies-in-waiting settled themselves in a semicircle around Freddie to watch.
“Are you sure you can do this?” Rose muttered worriedly, as she helped Freddie spread a cloth over a little table.
“He isn’t doing most of it. I am,” a purring voice told her from somewhere around Freddie’s waistcoat.
“Gus!” Rose whispered in delight. She really had missed the cat. There were no pets in the palace apart from the queen’s very spoiled little Pekingese lapdog.
“Don’t give him away!” Freddie hissed.
“I couldn’t if I wanted to. I don’t know where he is!” Rose snapped back.
“Watch chain,” Freddie muttered out of the corner of his mouth, and Rose realized that he had a very smart gold watch chain draped across the front of his waistcoat with little golden charms hanging from it. She had supposed he had just dressed up for the princesses, but now she saw that one of the charms was a tiny golden cat, with one sapphire eye and one topaz. It winked at her, the sapphire blinking out of sight for the merest instant.
“Ohhh,” Rose murmured in relief, and Freddie shot her an irritated glance.
“I’m not that bad!”
“It took me a while to develop the transformation spell,” Gus whispered. “I thought I might come and help you. Perhaps. The house is horribly quiet without you all, and I’m sick of sleeping. Scaring the servants is entertaining for a day or two, but Susan screaming just makes my ears hurt now.”
Rose gave a grateful little sigh. She was sure Gus would decide to stay. He hated to miss interesting magic, and the chance to catch a royal kidnapper would appeal to his predatory nature.
