by Anita Valle
Heidel
The Nine Princesses Novellas
Book 3
by Anita Valle
Heidel
Copyright © 2015 by Anita Valle
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the cast of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, e-mail the author at [email protected]
Anita Valle Art
Cover art by Rob Sullivan
Rob Sullivan Art
First Edition: March 2015
To Leorah B, who helped with this book. You're the best!
Characters
Maelyn - Throne Princess
Coralina - Festivity Princess
Heidel - Kitchen Princess
Briette - Chamber Princess
Lace - Wardrobe Princess
Jaedis - Market Princess
Shulay - Garden Princess
Ivy - Art Princess
Arialain - Door Princess
Prologue
“Have you ever known someone who died of Red Fever?” Princess Heidel asked her friend.
Lady Ardith nodded. “One of my mother’s maidservants. I was little... only five or six at the time.” Ardith was now a slender girl of twelve, older than Heidel by almost a year. They sat beneath an old willow tree behind the castle, a basket of pastries tucked between them. Heidel had spent the morning baking gooseberry tarts in preparation for her friend’s visit.
“Both of my parents died of Red Fever,” Heidel said without emotion. She had never known her parents, and the king and queen who took their place had more than filled any void she might have felt. Truthfully, she seldom thought about it. “But I was just a baby. Do you remember what it looked like? The fever?”
Ardith leaned against the willow, long legs crossed as she daintily chewed on a tart. She had a round, sensitive face; her hair a shade between blonde and brown. “I remember her face became red, like a rose. And she sweat a lot. The servants tried to put her in bed, but before they even reached her room....” Ardith shut her eyes. “That’s what frightens me most about Red Fever. It’s so quick.”
“I don’t think it’s scary.” Heidel dug in the basket for another tart. Ardith was nibbling through her second but Heidel had demolished five and wasn’t done yet. “I think it’s interesting. If we understood how the fever works, perhaps we could stop it.”
She finished her tart and stood, brushing crumbs off her pine green skirt. “Let’s go in the forest and try to climb a Lumen tree! I want a piece of fruit.”
Ardith shook her head. “Not now, please, I’m tired. I’d rather just talk.”
Heidel flopped down again. “About what?”
Ardith sipped her goblet of water. She smiled shyly. “Who do you like better, Prince Eravis or Prince Gavin?”
Heidel groaned. She didn’t know how this began, but her friends and some of her sisters – Coco especially – had suddenly become preoccupied with young gentlemen. Whereas Heidel thought of them the way she thought of bean soup: unpleasant but unavoidable.
“I hate Eravis,” said Heidel. “He thinks he can beat me at anything.”
“Well, can’t he?” Ardith said teasingly. Heidel’s cheeks began to simmer. She shouldn’t have agreed to race Eravis down the Wending Way; she was never a swift runner. He’d reached the bottom of the hill a full minute before her, and laughed when she arrived, panting and stumbling.
Heidel jumped up again. “I just need to practice. Let’s race around the castle, you and me!”
“Oh, Heidel, please!” Ardith grimaced. “I’m tired and it’s too hot to run.”
“Hot?” Heidel thought the weather was perfect, neither warm nor cold. And the willow’s hood of long, lazy branches kept them well-shaded. But Ardith, who hadn’t moved for half an hour, looked as if she’d been laboring under the sun, her face moist and red....
A thought fell on Heidel’s mind. It dropped to her stomach like a swallowed stone, clunking against her insides. “Ardith... are you...?”
Ardith had set down her goblet of water and was rubbing her eyes. “My head hurts. I want to lie down.”
“Let’s go in,” said Heidel, keeping her voice light. She helped Ardith to her feet. Hand-in-hand they walked back to the castle, Heidel beating off the thoughts that pecked like angry crows. It was nothing. Ardith’s gown was too heavy, overheating her body. Or she’d been stung by some kind of insect. Many things could cause a face to redden.
When they passed through the castle’s main doorway, Ardith’s cheeks were cherry-red and she’d begun to whimper painfully. Heidel was about to send a servant to fetch the queen, when the queen herself came upon them. With her was Joc, the Royal Cook; a stout and sturdy man with thick arms and a wide smile.
Though the queen was not Heidel’s mother by birth, a stranger could have been tricked to believe it. Both had autumn red hair and milky skin, though Heidel’s cheeks were peppered with freckles. But the queen’s figure was slender and graceful, qualities Heidel would never possess.
“Ardith isn’t well, Mother,” said Heidel. She didn’t voice her suspicions, they were senseless and rash. She would tell Joc later and they’d laugh at her foolish fears.
But Joc stared at Ardith with rigid concern. His soft blue eyes turned to the queen and the look they shared filled Heidel with dread.
“Come, Lady Ardith,” Joc said quietly. Ardith’s hot hand slid out of Heidel’s as Joc guided her down the corridor. Heidel began to follow but the queen caught her shoulders. “No, Heidel, no,” her mother whispered. “You must keep away.”
“What?” Heidel twisted out of her grasp. “She’s my friend!” She started off again but the queen seized her arm. “She’s ill, Heidel! It’s too dangerous.”
“Let go of me!” Heidel pushed off the queen and sprinted toward her friend. Joc was helping Ardith up a nearby staircase, his arm cradled beneath her honey-gold hair. She hunched against him, moaning as she climbed.
The queen shouted for the guards.
Before Heidel had even reached the staircase, they were upon her. It took three guards and twenty minutes to wrestle Heidel to her private chamber at the opposite end of the castle. By the time the guards departed, one suffered a bloody nose; another, three bright scratches above his left eyebrow. The largest was left to block the door until Heidel had ‘composed herself’.
Heidel composed herself by throwing everything in her chamber at the opposite wall. When her strength gave out, she sat amidst the rubble, crying hot, angry tears. Her friend was ill. And she couldn’t be with her.
An hour had passed when someone tapped on the door. Heidel looked up, expecting her mother. But it was Joc.
“Is Ardith better? May I go to her?” Heidel hurried toward him, tripping on the books and dolls and garments that littered the floor. Joc laid a hand on her shoulder. “Ardith cannot see you, Princess,” he said with saddened eyes. “She died a few minutes ago.”
A hard blade of pain split Heidel’s chest. “No!” She shouted, shoving Joc back a step. “NO!”
Joc nodded and held out his arms. Heidel’s rebellion crumpled and she fell against his chest, sobbing into the course weave of his tunic. Joc had served the Royal Family since the princesses were babies. He felt more like a father to Heidel than the king.
“I w-wanted to s-see her,” said Heidel.
“’Course you did, Love.” Joc stroked her hair with calloused fingers. “But your mother was afraid. She didn’t want you catching it.”
“It was Red Fever, wasn’t it?” Heidel drew back to look at
him. “I thought it might be.”
Joc nodded.
“Why didn’t you give her medicine!” Heidel shouted. Joc had medicine for every ailment Heidel had ever known. The queen summoned him whenever one of the princesses fell ill.
“I tried, Princess. But there is no medicine that cures Red Fever,” said Joc.
Heidel glared at him, almost scornful. “Of course there is! You just haven’t found it.”
Chapter 1
Princess Heidel carried a steaming cup of tonic and set it before her sister, Ivy. Ivy struggled to breathe at the best of times, and for weeks had been afflicted with a thick, choking cough. The tonic, hopefully, would open her passages and bring air to her starving lungs.
“It’s very hot,” said Heidel. “But try to drink it that way; it’s more effective.” She had shredded the root of elecampane, an herb from her garden, and soaked the pieces in boiling water before straining them out. To sweeten the bitter taste, she’d added honey and nutmeg.
It still would be terrible.
“Thank you,” Ivy squeaked amidst the coughs that shuddered her chest. She sat on a stool by the kitchen worktable, her crutch propped within reach. Like Heidel, Ivy’s hair was reddish, though of a different hue. Where Heidel was dark russet, Ivy was bright pumpkin-orange, gathered by a ribbon at the nape of her neck and flowing behind in a long tail.
“I’m sorry you’re sick on your birthday.” Heidel climbed onto a stool near her sister. Ivy cradled the drink and sipped carefully. “Sixteen years of-” (cough, cough) “-medicine.” Ivy smiled. “I’m still waiting for one that tastes good.”
Heidel laughed. “Mine are better than Joc’s!” She kicked off her shoes, nestling her toes on a large, shaggy hound that slept beneath the table. Squire was her favorite footrest.
“Did Joc-” Ivy crumpled into coughs again and simply waved at her tonic.
“Joc taught it to me,” said Heidel. “But the nutmeg was my idea.”
Ivy’s face drooped and Heidel cursed herself for mentioning their former cook. He’d been gone for almost a year. Not because he died... because he had run away. Around Ivy, one should never speak of anything sad. Or ugly. Or frightening. Her frail body housed an ever frailer spirit.
“What kind of cake would you like?” Heidel spoke brightly, folding her arms on the table. Ivy sipped her tonic and sighed, gratefully drawing the air to her lungs. “Princess-and-the-Pea.”
Heidel gasped in excitement. “A Princess-and-the-Pea Cake? I’ve never done one of those!”
“You never had to,” Ivy mumbled, another reference to Joc who’d always made the princesses’ cakes. Heidel smothered a groan.
“Sometimes I imagine he was kidnapped by a barbarian horde,” said Ivy. “But he defeated them and became their king. And now they have to cook for him.”
Heidel smiled. She missed Joc no less than any of her sisters, but saw no point to such fantasies. Joc was gone. That was that.
The soothing smell of warm bread sifted through the kitchen. Heidel had halted her breakfast preparations when Ivy limped in, nearly blue with suffocation. At any moment her sisters would be descending to the dining hall. Being Kitchen Princess for nearly a year had taught Heidel something: princesses ate a lot.
She stood and returned to the plate of cold pork she’d been slicing. Ivy drank dutifully, her fine features pinched as she tried to ignore the taste.
“You said what, fifty guests tonight?” Heidel asked, trying to determine how large to make the cake. Ivy shook her head. “Thirty at most. I don’t want a crowd. Oh!” Her startled eyes jumped to Heidel’s face. “Oh, Heidel, I forgot to tell you. Prince Eravis is coming.”
Heidel’s knife stopped sawing through the hunk of pork. “Eravis?”
“I’m sorry.”
“You invited him?”
“It was Coco!” Ivy coughed several times into her sleeve before continuing. “We met him yesterday in Merridell and he wished me a blessed birthday. And then Coco invited him. You know how she-”
“I know,” said Heidel. She tried to hide her bubbling rage. “Why was... he in Merridell?”
Ivy shrugged. “Coco might’ve asked. But I was coughing and didn’t hear much.” From the adjoining dining hall came the sound of scraping chairs as the seven remaining princesses arrived for their breakfast.
“Go to them.” Heidel handed Ivy her crutch. “Tell them I’m nearly done.”
Ivy propped the polished wooden crutch beneath her shoulder and limped through the door on her misshapen foot. Heidel released the cloud of curses that had collected in her throat.
Eravis was coming. Eravis who, somehow, did everything better than Heidel. Dancing. Riding. Speaking. Baking. While most princes never poked a royal toe in the kitchen, Eravis, like Heidel, found pleasure in preparing food. The cakes he made were masterpieces, almost too beautiful to eat.
And Heidel’s cakes were disasters.
Chapter 2
The nine princesses sat together at the far end of the dining hall. They shared one side of the high table, facing outward toward their guests. The backs of the princesses’ chairs rose nearly to the ceiling, the dark wood adorned with carvings of leafless trees. Ivy, as Birthday Princess, had the middle chair tonight.
Long tables and benches had been arranged around the room, with a square of open space for jugglers and musicians. Heidel listened to a minstrel singing a sentimental ballad as she tucked away the roasted peacock on her plate. Her feet ached from hours of heavy toil in the kitchen. But she was pleased to see the guests enjoying their food.
She leaned toward Princess Briette, sitting at her left. Briette wore a gown of buttery yellow, a color well-suited to her caramel brown hair. She had neglected to put on a crown, as usual.
“Where’s Eravis?” Heidel whispered.
Briette smiled with a subtle nod at the opposite corner of the room. Heidel looked but couldn’t see whichever guests were dining there. Her view was blocked by a small table mounded high with Ivy’s gifts.
Heidel grinned. “Thank you.”
“We thought you’d want him out of sight,” said Briette. Heidel smirked. “Maybe. But now how am I supposed to throw bones at him?”
“Did you want to?” Briette asked, surprised.
Heidel rang out a hard laugh. Poor Briette. Attempts at humor died on her doorstep.
When the minstrel finished his song, Maelyn, the eldest princess, raised her goblet and offered an elegant toast to Ivy. She elaborated on Ivy’s art, the paintings, sculptures, and ornaments that bedecked their small castle, stirring envy among the monarchs of much grander realms. Ivy listened with a bashful smile, her carrot hair fire-bright under the torches. Heidel hoped the nobles took notice of Ivy’s beauty. Most people, it seemed, could not look past her crutch.
Applause followed Maelyn’s toast. Heidel’s gaze drifted to the stack of gifts again. Fruit and wine and fabric and jewelry and perfume and books. Much of it rare and costly. “We should keep watch,” Heidel whispered. “Especially when the nobles leave. Someone may try to snitch Ivy’s gifts.”
“Oh Heidel.” Briette sighed and reached for her goblet of wine. “You still think a mysterious thief is creeping about the castle?”
“Someone stole my Lumen bread,” said Heidel, her fingers clenching the knife by her plate. “Right from my kitchen. When I was gone – only moments! It had to be someone we know!”
“You were absent for several minutes,” said Briette. “It could have been a vagabond who climbed through the window. I don’t think we’ll find the thief unless he confesses.”
Heidel narrowed her eyes at the gifts. “Or tries again.”
“Well, I can’t prove this,” said Briette. “But I don’t think it was hunger that motivated the thief. I think he took the Lumen bread because it’s a delicacy.”
Heidel bristled at the idea. “A thief who snatches fancy food for his own enjoyment?”
Briette shrugged. “Just a notion.”
Heidel
thought of her Princess-and-the-Pea Cake, waiting in the kitchen. Six hours of work, standing unguarded. She pushed back her plate and stood. “Excuse me a moment.”
She skirted along the stone wall, behind the crowded benches of nobles. At the end of the room she pushed through a swinging door. The kitchen was hot, as always, the air seasoned with wood smoke and herbs. The fire in the hearth burnt low, beneath the empty iron spits on which she’d roasted the peacocks. Her worktable sprawled across the front of the kitchen, leaving the rear for sacks and barrels and cupboards.
Heidel stopped short. The door fell shut behind her, fanning air across her back.
A man stood by her worktable. He faced the Princess-and-the-Pea Cake, which rose halfway to the ceiling like a small tower. One hand covered his mouth as he chuckled to himself. Heidel knew that scornful chuckle, that overly-confident stance, that artfully-tousled head of dark hair. And when he turned, she knew that sly, twisted grin.
“Hello, Princess Headache!”
Heidel planted her hands on her hips. “Get out of my kitchen, Eravis.”
Chapter 3
“Prince Eravis,” he said, lifting one eyebrow to a haughty angle. “Let’s not forget our manners, my thorny little rosebud.”
“Let’s also not forget that I skewered twenty peacocks today.” Heidel’s eyes roved disdainfully over Eravis’ attire. He favored dark colors, deep reds and blues and greens, always set off by a jeweled belt or heavy gold neck chain. “Apparently I missed one.”
To her surprise, Eravis belted a loud laugh. “Well, no harm done! I see you put away the extra stuffing.” His eyes fell to Heidel’s waist.
