“Best of luck,” she called.
There was no need for directions. Though the city’s buildings had, over time, grown up and out in pieces, each new extremity jutting over the street to block the light and view, the castle was on yet higher ground, and I could see it perched on the rise of the hill. As I got closer, my surroundings hardened: both wood buildings and earthen streets turning to stone. Proximity to power desired permanence—and wasnot without its dangers. The sun occasionally caught on the castle’s blue-gray turrets, causing brief, bright moments of blindness. I used a gloved hand to hold the fan above my eyes.
As I neared the outer walls, my path, lined with topiaries and stone benches, filled with people. Courtiers rushed past, tittering and clucking in groups of two and three. A bearded man played a stringed instrument beneath the shade of a maple tree. A youth, missing his leg, leaned against a marble plinth, attempting to adjust his bandages. A pregnant redhead sat on a bench, crying into a handkerchief. Castle servants hurried in currents around us all.
I crossed a small bridge over the green-watered moat. The guard house, a squat functional building, attached to the palace wall like a growth. Next to it, the massive gate lay shut. A smaller door, cut into the wood, was partially ajar, though flanked by a uniformed guard standing on duty. He watched me approach.
“Good day.” I nodded.
He remained expressionless. “State your business.”
His eyes were small and high on his forehead, giving the impression that there was not much space for thought inside. He had a cut on his chin from a poor job shaving. “I am Lady Tremaine,” I told him. “I request an audience with the queen.”
His expression barely changed. “Time with the queen isn’t doled out based on request.”
“Nevertheless, please pass the message that Lady Tremaine is here for an audience.” I stared at the cut on his face for a moment too long and he raised a hand, unconsciously, toward his chin.
“Her Majesty isn’t available.” When he lowered his finger, there was a spot of dried blood on its tip, which he inspected.
“The man operating the gate doesn’t determine who gets an audience,” I scoffed.
He squinted at me, the scab forgotten. “Do you know how many people come here demanding to be let in?”
“My name is Lady Etheldreda Verity Isolde Tremaine.” I enunciatedeach word with clarity.Soft voice, controlled pace, Agatha reminded me. “I am here to request an audience. Duty obliges you to relay my message.”
Finally, the guard looked me over, taking a moment to examine my dress, pausing on the series of bows down the front of my stomacher. I did not look the same as the crowd—the people of missing limbs and falling tears—that lined the path to the gate.
“Lady Tremaine,” he echoed.
I gave him a curt nod.
After a moment’s hesitation, he shrugged. “I’ll relay the message.”
“As you’re obliged to.”
His small eyes narrowed. “A response may take a long while.”
I set my jaw. “Then I shall wait.”
Lady Tremaine did not exist. Or rather, she was not a real person. But, though it was not the world’s name for me, it was my truest one: An accurate depiction of what I gave and took from each of my marriages. Tremaine was the name from my first, the marriage of my heart. My title came from my second.
After marrying Robert, arriving at Bramley Hall that first day was like unwrapping a gift I’d chosen for myself and then forgotten. Spring blossoms blanketed the trees, scenting the air and scattering their petals like aromatic snow. The ground was dry, and the house looked bright and clean, and larger than I had allowed myself to imagine. Though I held Robert’s purple lips in no higher esteem than the day we had met, as he helped me and the girls down from the carriage, I could not help but think: If the future were a person, I would kiss them.
The staff was all lined up in front of the manor. Housemaids and kitchen maids and footmen. I insisted that Robert introduce me and my daughters to each one in turn. We went down the row—bobbing to the scullery maid and the groundskeeper and the coachman who haddriven us over—until the end, when it became more obvious that it wasonlythe staff who stood to greet us.
“Where is Elin?” Robert asked.
A tall, thin woman stepped forward. The housekeeper, a metal ring of keys attached to her belt. Alice. “In her room,” she informed him, with an efficient nod.
“She should be out here, shouldn’t she?” Robert asked out loud. I wasn’t sure who he was asking. The staff remained quiet. He turned to me. “Should I fetch her?”
“Perhaps—” I began.
“Or should I send someone to get her?” He peered upstairs at the mullioned windows.
I glanced over at Rosie and Mathilde, who had jostled for days in a carriage to come to a new home where they knew no one. They stared back at me, open-eyed. “We might—”
“It is cold out. And if she comes here, then we will just end up inside anyhow,” Robert mused. “But if—”
