Halia: Daughter of Cinderella

by Armitage, J. A

  The room was illuminated only by half-burned candles, which worked in our favor. The stench of mold and stale beer hung heavy in the air, and the creatures around us made the hair on my nape stand up.

  Thankfully, Madam’s massive salmon-colored skirt peeked out from behind a wall, allowing me to spot her without circling the bar like an idiot.

  “Over there,” I whispered.

  “Wait here. I’ll get us drinks,” Lorenzo replied and returned a minute later with two heavy beer mugs. We sat at the table closest to the wall behind which Madam was, and I strained my hearing.

  “Haven’t I done a fine job? Aren’t you satisfied?” Madam asked.

  “You know I am,” a voice grumbled in return.

  “Then give me more magic. My daughters need it.”

  “I’m not going to waste precious magic so that your spoiled brats can win a popularity contest!”

  The air hummed with tension, and I waited for a slapping sound, but it never came. Instead, Madam Fontaine said in a menacing voice, “The girls winning the contest will give us a peaceful way into the castle. Do you really want to attack the king from outside the castle walls while he’s sequestered safely with all his guards when you could slip into the castle and have a much easier time bringing him down to his knees?”

  There was a long pause. Finally, the leader said, “A valid point. Here, take this. It will ensure that no one can resist your daughters. But you better hold up your end of the bargain.”

  A snort. “I always do. I already have the competition host in my pocket.”

  “I don’t care about that pompous fart. Make sure that before the eleventh, Arcadia belongs to us.”

  “It will. You know I’ve wanted this for decades, Rumpelstiltskin. I’ll do anything to get onto the throne.”

  I exchanged a glance with Lorenzo. The name Rumpelstiltskin sounded familiar, but I couldn’t recall where I had heard it.

  The man, Rumpelstiltskin, laughed lowly, the nasty sound reminding me of chalk screeching across the board. “After you take down Arcadia, we’ll unite with the others. We’ll be unstoppable!”

  Glasses clinked.

  “I’ll drink to that.” Madam cleared her throat. “How are things going in Urbis? Is everything still on track?”

  “Yes, the underground buildings with traps will be finished in no time. Everything is going the way it needs to. King Charming and Queen Ella will roll over like the pets they are, begging us to put them out of their misery.” He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was dark. “I would much rather have Arcadia ruled by you, not Acacia, but you must prove your worthiness.”

  My heart contracted, surprising me that I still cared. The fae had betrayed me so many times, and yet, the extent of her betrayal, the new layers I uncovered were still wounding me.

  “I am worthy,” Madam hissed.

  “So you say, but you still haven’t found the adopted princess,” Rumpelstiltskin replied coolly.

  “I did everything I could.” Panic oozed out of Madam’s voice. “I thought for certain it was one of my maids, but neither girl had golden rings in her eyes.”

  So that’s why she had been outside the orphanage the day we had been kicked out, offering us jobs. My fists balled, and hot anger coursed through me.

  “I even snatched that stupid broad Tia, but she doesn’t have more than one drop of magic in her blood.”

  “Then it must be the other one, the singer,” Rumpelstiltskin growled, but I wasn’t scared, too furious with Madam’s brazen admission that she had kidnapped my friend to care. “Get her.”

  “It’s not that easy!” Madam slammed something, probably her glass, down on the table. “She’s constantly surrounded by that darn demon.”

  “If you can’t bring her to me, then I’ll ask Acacia.”

  “No! Don’t. Arcadia is mine. I started this, and I’ll finish it.”

  “Very well. But if this singing girl causes any problems with the takeover, Acacia becoming the ruler of Arcadia will be the least of your worries. Do you understand?”

  “Yes.” For the first time, I heard fear in Madam’s voice.

  “Good,” Rumpelstiltskin replied. “A deal is a deal after all, and a promise is a promise.”

  Chairs scraped against the floor, and I practically dived into my mug of beer, only daring to look up when Madam and Rumpelstiltskin had passed our table. Rumpelstiltskin was a short, middle-aged, impish man. And yet, he was the one who had allowed Madam to become the villain she had always aspired to be.

  3

  7th August

  “Maybe you should take a break and practice your singing,” Lorenzo said.

  I continued my pacing. “How can I be thinking about the competition when we still don’t know where Tia is or what has happened to her?”

  “We know she’s alive.”

  I threw him a withering look. Yes, Mikka was still feeling the bond, but she was also bedridden and unconscious half of the time, which made me certain that Rumpelstiltskin and his nasty fae were still milking Tia for magic, life energy, or both.

  “Worrying won’t bring her back.” Lorenzo cupped my face, and his lips brushed against mine.

  For a moment, I allowed myself to melt into the kiss and enjoy it, but then panic kicked in once again. “We need to find out where they’re keeping her before they decide to kill her.”

  Lorenzo sighed. “I searched all of last night and asked everyone. Nobody knows.”

  A lightbulb went on in my head. “Madam delivers her victims to Rumpelstiltskin directly. She has no middle man.”

  Lorenzo nodded. “That’s my guess too. I paid someone to stake out the house at dark. They’ll report immediately if they see anything at all.”

  “But Madam would expect that and would find a way around that.” I thought about all the fabrics and huge dresses she had and the trunks that were meant to transport them. “They’re kidnapping their victims in broad daylight.”

  Lorenzo considered this for a moment. “Perhaps. Or maybe they’re done with kidnapping people since they have enough magic and life force siphoned away.”

  I shook my head. “Madam and Rumpelstiltskin said they were almost done, but people like them are too greedy to stop at “enough.” They always want more. The sisters are worried about winning the competition. They’ll support their mother any way they can, becoming reckless.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “We should follow the sisters, not their mother. We need to give them an easy target. Someone who won’t fight back and won’t be missed.”

  Lorenzo snarled. “Not Mikka. We will not exploit her current state.”

  “Shouldn’t that be up to me?” Mikka leaned against the bar. It didn’t surprise me that she had sneaked up on us, given how quietly she moved. “I want to go.”

  “No!” Lorenzo balled his fists.

  “The sooner we get Tia back, the sooner I’ll get better.” Mikka’s gaze softened. “Please.”

  I put an arm around her shoulder. “We won’t let anything happen to her.”

  Lorenzo let out another snarl, this one softer.

  “We can’t let Rumpelstiltskin and Madam waltz into the palace. We need to stop them before that,” I said. “I don’t want to expose Mikka to danger in her current state, but what other choice do we have? If we do nothing, the situation will only get worse!”

  Lorenzo must’ve finally seen reason because he nodded slowly.

  I doubted that the sisters paid much attention to anyone but themselves, but on the off-chance they might recognize Mikka, I hid the half-demon’s white hair in a turban. With her hair pulled back and her face pale, she looked even sicker and like an easy picking.

  While Lorenzo and I waited in a side street opposite the boarding house, Mikka ambled toward the house. The plan was for her to walk up to the second floor, knock on the sister’s room, and beg them for shelter. While I was certain the sisters wouldn’t be able to resist the trap, I was still nervo
us. What if they recognized Mikka and hurt her? What if instead of ensnaring them, we were giving them our friend on a silver platter?

  The seconds trickled past painfully slowly, and my urge to go inside and get Mikka out grew stronger and stronger. Lorenzo seemed to share my thoughts, practically humming with tension.

  “Should we—” I began but stopped as a young boy skittered out of the house and ran, a coin bag in his hand. A messenger. Was he notifying the coachman? I received my confirmation when a bit later, an ugly fuchsia-curtained coach pulled up. The main door to the boarding house flew open, and the sisters came out, heaving a trunk between them. I was right. They did smuggle people in the middle of the day. Instead of pride, I felt angry at myself. How many people could I have saved if only I had thought of this earlier?

  The sisters pulled the trunk into the carriage with the help of the coachman, and Bernadette got in while Georgette took the position of the coachman. Given the few words she exchanged with him, she probably told him to get lost since he nodded and eventually left after she gave him a few more coins.

  “Bull’s eye,” I whispered, revenge running thick through my veins. Lorenzo’s hard body wrapped around me, and this time, I didn’t feel queasy as we teleported after the carriage even though we must’ve done it at least a dozen times. Each time Lorenzo stopped, we moved further out of the city. The shops and pubs vanished first to be replaced by cheap houses for laborers. Those, too, disappeared soon to give way to random cottages on the outskirts of the city. The huts grew sparser and sparser, and by the time Lorenzo released me, we were in a thick forest.

  Unable to see the carriage or a path, I cursed. “Did we lose them?” Panic raced through me.

  Lorenzo took my hand and guided me deeper into the forest. I followed him, hoping he knew where he was going. One moment, there was only wilderness, and then it appeared out of nowhere—a cottage hidden by trees. Next to it was a dirt road where the carriage was parked. I had to admit, I was impressed that Georgette had been able to get the two horses down this road without flipping the carriage. She jumped off the bench and helped her sister drag the trunk toward the house. Halfway there, Bernadette’s fingers slipped, and the trunk crashed to the ground with a heavy thump. I cringed, feeling awful for putting Mikka through this and praying she didn’t get a severe injury from the dumb sister’s carelessness.

  Once the sisters were inside, Lorenzo and I tiptoed toward the house.

  “Don’t look through the window,” he cautioned just as I was about to peek inside. Thankfully, I ignored him because the person I saw made me grab Lorenzo’s hand and pull him away a few feet.

  “What?” he hissed.

  “Acacia’s here. You need to stay away, or she’ll sense you.”

  Lorenzo pressed his lips together. “I won’t let you go in by yourself.”

  “I’m not planning to. I can spy on them from the outside.” When he hesitated, I added, “I’ll be fine.”

  Finally, he nodded, I hurried back to the house, pressing my ears against the wall.

  “We have another one for you,” Georgette said, and there was a clicking sound, which I took to be her opening the trunk.

  “Don’t just stand around! Help us,” Bernadette said.

  I balled my fists at the thumping noise, guessing they dropped Mikka again.

  “A demon?” There were surprise and a hint of caution in Acacia’s voice. “You foolish girls.”

  “She’s not a demon. She’s a girl!” Bernadette protested.

  “It doesn’t matter what she is. She’s passed out. And if you’re right, that only means that she has more magic for you to siphon off, so it’s a good thing,” Georgette said, and I could practically see her pouting.

  Acacia tsked. “You really think a demon just walked into your boarding house. Very unlikely. She works for Lorenzo.”

  There was a pause.

  “Not anymore,” Bernadette said defiantly. “Hook her up.”

  “It’s a trap. And you went right for it, you silly girls,” Acacia hissed.

  “Do it! That’s an order!” Georgette said.

  “I don’t take orders from you.” Icicles dripped from Acacia’s voice.

  “We’ll tell Mother that you refused.”

  “You stupid girls. Run back to the boarding house and get your Mother, now!”

  “Why?”

  “Because we’ll be ambushed at any moment.” Noises and murmurs I couldn’t make out followed, and then the sisters hurried through the door and jumped into the carriage. Hidden from them, I glanced at Lorenzo, who shook his head. I agreed. We could go after the sisters later. Right now, we needed to free the prisoners and show Acacia that actions had consequences.

  As soon as the carriage was out of sight, I ran to the front of the cottage. Lorenzo teleported next to me, and we threw the door open.

  My breath hitched at the sight in front of us. Everywhere I looked, listless humans were lying and sitting on the floor, their limbs on top of each other. Every single person had a tube attached to their upper arm that was pulling a white, shiny substance out of them and into a see-through jar that was a quarter full.

  Acacia smiled at us, her blue eyes sparkling with pure menace. “Right on time.”

  Lorenzo teleported in front of her and jabbed a dagger into her stomach. A scream tore out of my throat. I knew she was the enemy. I knew she had done horrible things, but I wasn’t prepared to kill her.

  Blood gushed out of her stomach wound, and the thick scent of iron filled the room.

  “Where are Tia and the queen?” Lorenzo growled, and I surveyed the sleeping faces all around me, belatedly realizing that neither my friend nor my adoptive mother was here.

  I surged forward. “Don’t kill her, or she won’t be able to tell us.”

  “Unless a knife goes through her heart, it won’t kill her,” Lorenzo replied as he secured Acacia’s hands behind her back. She hissed at the contact.

  “If you try to pull out the knife, it’s only going to hurt more,” Lorenzo warned Acacia. I had no idea how one would do so with their hands bound, but I supposed if anyone could do it, it would be Acacia.

  “Are you sure about this?” I whispered when Lorenzo walked over to me. “We don’t want her to bleed out.”

  A muscle ticked in his jaw. “She won’t. She’s fae. Her wound is already healing. Her body will push out the dagger slowly. And then we’ll have to stab her again.” At my horrified face, he added. “The handcuffs are made from iron, but they alone are not enough to hold her. Let’s hurry before her reinforcements arrive.”

  I glanced around the room at the drawn faces. None of the humans were paying any attention to us. “Can I remove the tubes?”

  Lorenzo nodded. “Yes, it shouldn’t hurt them.”

  Yet, I still cringed as I took the first person’s arm and carefully eased the tube out. A few droplets of blood leaked from the wound. “I’m sorry,” I said, but the middle-aged woman didn’t pay any attention to me, so I moved on to the guy next to her, whom I recognized as one of the competitors from my singing contest. He also didn’t react to my touch or me helping him. On and on, I went. About a dozen of the people were eliminated contestants, the others were a mix of travelers and women from shelters and children from orphanages.

  A manic cackle broke my concentration on helping those poor souls, and I glanced backward to find that the dagger was no longer in Acacia’s stomach, but on the floor, her wound healing just as Lorenzo had said it would. However, before she could do anything, Lorenzo grabbed the knife, poised to strike again.

  “You’ll never win,” Acacia said, as Lorenzo brought the dagger forward.

  “Is this really necessary?”

  “Yes, it is.” He skewered the fae deeply, and a shudder claimed me. If Acacia ever got him, she’d make him pay. No, I couldn’t let myself think like that. I couldn’t go there.

  “Did you get everyone?” Lorenzo asked a few minutes later. I glanced around, confirming
that all humans were now tube-free.

  “All done. What do we do with this?” I pointed at the quarter full magic jar.

  “We take it. And get the hell out of here before the others returned.”

  I nodded and turned to the victim closest to me. “We need to go.” No response. “Wake up.” I shook the young girl. “Please! We don’t have time.” I shook her harder, and then desperately pinched her. Still, no reaction.

  “You’ll never get them out of here,” Acacia cackled, basically begging Lorenzo to skewer her with a second blade.

  Lorenzo threw her a dark look, then turned to me. “I can’t teleport them all out of here. You need to get them out while I return to Daydream with her.” He spit the last word at Acacia.

  “What? But I can’t—”

  “You can, and you will. Find a way.” Lorenzo jerked Acacia upright, who finally had gone pale, the sweet stench of fear emanating from her.

  “Lorenzo, don’t leave me here!” I screamed as his arms closed in a bruising grip around Acacia.

  “It’s like you said. This is your mission, so find a way.” With that, Lorenzo and Acacia teleported away.

  “No!” I screamed until my lungs ached, then I turned to the humans who still all looked asleep. I couldn’t bring myself to stab them with the dagger Lorenzo had given me to see if they would wake up, and I couldn’t drag them all outside before the sisters returned.

  I rubbed my throat, trying to come up with a solution, and that’s when I realized what I had to do. Of course, why hadn’t I thought about it earlier?

  “Wake up, wake up. We must leave now. Awaken.”

  I paused when nothing happened. Was my singing not strong enough, or had Acacia damaged the consciousness of these poor people beyond repair? I gritted my teeth. I would not allow the greedy fae and the tyrannical Fontaines to abuse Arcadia’s citizens.

  “Wake up, wake up. We must leave now. Awaken. I command you: awaken.”

  I put so much force into my voice that it vibrated and filled the room. When one by one, the humans’ eyes fluttered open, I almost cried with relief.