Oskar held a hand to his chest. “Your words wound me!” He winked, but Anja shook her head and returned to her violent stirring. Oskar watched for several moments. “Anja,” he said in his softest voice. “What’s wrong?”
Anja stopped and wiped her forehead with her sleeve. “It’s the princess’s birthday today.”
Oskar blinked. “Princess? Oh, the monster!”
“She’s not a monster,” Anja snapped.
Oskar shut his mouth and patiently waited for the head cook to continue.
Anja sighed and shoved the wooden bowl across the counter. “She’s just a child. But they have her locked up like—never mind. Go tell Footman Henning I’ll have the king’s lunch ready in time.”
Oskar refused to be dissuaded. Though he was only a teenager, he already had an employment goal in mind: attendant, the highest role he could achieve as a commoner. If he wanted to make his dream a reality, he needed to befriend the right people—like Anja. Besides, he genuinely liked her. She had been kind to him in the first month when he was insipidly stupid about palace conduct.
“Anja, just tell me. You know me—I’m discreet. I won’t repeat your words if you don’t wish it,” he said.
Anja rested her hands on her floured counter. “It’s Princess Rakel’s birthday, and as a special ‘treat’ she’s been taken out of the tower they keep her imprisoned in and allowed to wander the palace gardens.” She spoke softly, her voice barely above a whisper. “Our queen took the young prince and left when she did so she wouldn’t be here when the princess is ‘loose.’ King Ingolfr doesn’t even want to look at her. But all the palace servants have found an excuse to be on the east wing so they can get a look of the dangerous princess.” Anja’s voice was bitter.
“You think her treatment is unfair?” Oskar guessed.
“Aye, I do.” Anja clenched her apron in a fist. “She’s naught but a little girl, but she’s treated worse than an animal. I—” The head cook shook her head and tried to smooth her now-rumpled apron.
Oskar leaned back, calculating. Anja had a little girl who was five or six—not much younger than the monster-princess.Is that why she is upset? Because she is a mother and still sees the princess as something human?He turned his speculative gaze east.
“Fixin’ to go see her yourself?” Anja asked.
“No. I am just curious what you see in her that others have missed.”
Anja turned back to her batter. “Go take a look,” she said bitterly. “Maybe you’ll see it too.”
Oskar tapped his fingers on her counter. “What is it that you hope I see?”
Anja’s doe-brown eyes teared over. “Her humanity.”
Oskar followed her advice,driven more by curiosity than the belief that Anja was correct.She has magic; how human can she be?Oskar snorted as he strolled into the open-air corridor that hugged the palace perimeter and edged around the beautiful, blooming flower gardens.
Guards were positioned every few horse lengths, penning the garden in. Instead of facing out to protect their charge from any harm, they all faced the gardens, their weapons drawn.
Oskar craned his neck, but he couldn’t see the monster-princess. He saw a number of servants loitering down the corridor, whispering to each other. When a guard glanced at them, they moved along, casting speculative glances over their shoulders.
Whistling, Oskar strolled after them, lingering where they had stood. Sure enough, the position afforded him a view into the heart of the garden, where a little girl sniffed a flower and reverently touched its petals.
He was shocked. He didn’t see a monster, or a fiend, or even a mad creature that the puppeteers and picture books so often displayed. Instead, he saw a beautiful little girl, who had her mother’s silky hair—though it was so light colored it was white—and her father’s wide blue eyes. She shared Prince Steinar’s elegant but severe features, and she clasped her hands the same way the Queen Mother used to when she was alive.
She moved from one flowerbed to the next, completely unaware of his scrutiny, although she did glance at her guards from time to time. She looked at everything with wonder, as if she was seeing it for the first time.
And she may be.Oskar gave himself the luxury of feeling sorry for the monster-princess for a moment, then ruthlessly shoved it away. She was beyond his help, and she still had magic. Those with magic were to be feared and cast out.
Oskar turned to leave, and at that moment the monster-princess sneezed.
It made her guards jump, and in moments all of them had their pikes, swords, or arrows trailed on her.
The monster-princess’s blue eyes went wide as she twisted around, her terror stark on her face as she looked at the guards with dread. She stepped on the hem of her dress and fell, cracking her head on the rock-lined foot path.
She clutched her skull, and her eyes glossed with tears, but she made not a sound. Oskar had a little brother who would scream until he was red in the face if he stubbed his toe. How did one little girl have such fortitude to hold in so much pain?
Oskar switched his gaze from the girl to the soldiers, but none of them moved to help. He shook his head and turned to go, but glanced over his shoulder one last time—which became his undoing for life.
The monster-princess sat up. One of her grubby little hands was held to her head, but she stared at her other hand—which was skinned and bleeding a little—with dismay.
