Charm (3 page)

‘That may well be true, princess.’ He winked at her. ‘That may well be true.’

She thought again of the castle and all its beauty and was quite envious that Buttons got to spend every day inside it.

‘It must be wonderful,’ she said. ‘So much more wonderful than it is in my imagination. I would do anything to be part of that life. Anything at all.’

‘Wonderful’s one way to see it, I suppose.’ Buttons finished his food and put the plate on the floor. The mouse scurried over and began sniffing for crumbs. Cinderella made a mental note to give that plate to Rose tomorrow at breakfast. Maybe it would make her sick and she wouldn’t be able to go to the ball. It was a mean thought, but she couldn’t help it.

‘Of course it’s beautiful,’ Buttons continued. ‘Beauty is easy with money and these people have the finest of everything.’ He looked at her intently. ‘But court life isn’t all dancing and music and love, Cinderella. The gentle don’t survive well when everyone is after power. Everyone is using other people to shuffle into a position where they have the king or the prince’s ear. It’s a place full of wolves in disguise. Why do you think I feel no guilt stealing from most of these people?’

Cinderella didn’t say anything. She didn’t care about all that and it wouldn’t matter to her anyway. She had no interest in power, she just wanted beautiful clothes and music and fun. Life had been hard enough over recent years.

‘Tell me again about their carriages,’ she said, eagerly. ‘The gold and silver ones. The king and queen’s one that never leaves the castle gates because it’s so encrusted with jewels they fear the ordinary people won’t be able to stop themselves tearing it apart to have a piece for themselves. Tell me about that.’

She smiled at him, and this time it was his turn to sigh. ‘They keep it in a converted stable at the back of the castle. It’s under constant guard. At night it twinkles as though all the stars in the sky have been captured and sprinkled onto its surface . . .’

Cinderella closed her eyes and let her mind drift as the familiar words washed over her.

B
uttons left an hour or so later, tipping the coal into the scuttle on his way, and taking the sack away with him to hide somewhere on his way back to the castle. The night had turned bitter, but Cinderella came up the outside stairs in just her worn shoes and with a shawl wrapped round her shoulders and watched until he’d vanished in the foggy mist that was settling over the streets like a blanket.

She didn’t notice the little mouse valiantly scrabbling his way up the stairs, his fur puffed out a little as if it could somehow protect him from the grip of the icy night. By the time Cinderella had retreated back into the house and firmly bolted the door behind her, he had reached the pavement. He stood up on his hind legs and sniffed the wet air, searching for the right direction.

This time he didn’t follow Buttons back to the castle, he turned away and scurried through the night towards the forest. He was glad he’d had the cheese and breadcrumbs. He had a long way to travel that night.

C
inderella had done her best to hide away for most of the next day – even going out for a long walk in the bitter cold – but she’d still been subjected to having to ‘ooh’ and ‘aah’ at Rose in her new blue dress. Admittedly, she did look prettier in it. Her skin looked less pasty with some rouge applied and the royal blue made her hair look darker. It was even managing to hold some curls, although Cinderella doubted they would last. Doubted and hoped not, if she was honest.

By the time Ivy’s carriage arrived, she was in a foul mood. She watched through the window as a footman helped Rose and her step-mother inside, her mind a nest of squirming dark feelings that she couldn’t even form into coherent thoughts. It was envy of course, she knew that. Envy and more than a touch of self-pity, but she couldn’t help herself. How was she supposed to feel? It just wasn’t fair. It was as if she didn’t matter.

‘Penny for them?’

The carriage rolled away and Cinderella let the curtain drop.

‘Doesn’t matter.’

‘Your mother got these for you.’ Her father was standing in the doorway holding up a box of chocolates. ‘It’s a two-layer box. Not cheap.’

‘I don’t want them.’ She almost stamped her foot, the way she had when she was annoyed as a small girl. How could a box of chocolates compare with going to a ball at the castle? Was she being laughed at now? It felt like salt in a wound. ‘And she’s not my mother.’

‘She’s looked after you since you were very small, Cinderella. She loves you.’ He’d been carrying a chequers board under his arm and he set it down on a coffee table and drew it close to the fire Cinderella had made with some of the coal Buttons had brought. It was a good fire and neither her step-mother or step-sister would feel the benefit of it. A small victory maybe, but it was something.

‘You’re not writing tonight?’ she asked.

‘I thought we’d have some father and daughter time,’ he smiled at her. ‘Eat some chocolate and play a few board games. What do you think?’

‘I think I’d rather be at the ball, but my
mother
didn’t invite me.’

Her father sighed and in the glow of the fire she noticed, for the first time, that more of his hair was grey than brown, and wrinkles ran like a spider’s web across his face. How did that happen? He was suddenly middle-aged, not the smiling, solid man who’d bounced her on his knee when her real mother was still alive.

‘You have a lot to learn, Cinderella. It’s not so easy as that.’

‘She hates me.’ She flopped down into the chair opposite him, feeling more ten than twenty. ‘She always has.’

Her father burst out laughing. ‘Don’t be so childish!’

She glared at him – probably childishly.

‘Your step-mother, well, she feels a great responsibility for what her daughters lost. For what she
lost
. You were too young to understand. When she left the old earl and married me their entire lives changed. And does she miss the trappings of her old life sometimes? Of course she does. I could never give her all the things she used to have. Things she’d had all her life.’ He gazed into the flames. ‘But she chose us, Cinderella. Over all of that. And she never looked back.’

‘You make it sound like true love.’ Cinderella snorted; it was a ridiculous thought. ‘If my mother hadn’t died, you wouldn’t have
needed
her.’

‘Oh darling,’ he smiled at her softly. ‘It was true love. It
is
true love. You were too young to remember it all properly. Your mother – well, she could be difficult. If she hadn’t fallen sick then I would have left her for Esme, just like Esme left the Earl for me.’

Cinderella stared at him as cold crept up from the pit of her stomach and burned her cheeks like ice. He couldn’t mean that. He just couldn’t. ‘You’re lying.’

Her father shook his head. ‘No. It’s true. It was true love. I was just the old Earl’s secretary, but she fell in love with me and I with her. If you’re lucky you’ll find the same thing one day.’

‘Not without going to a ball, I won’t!’ She got to her feet, tears stinging the back of her eyes. How could he have fallen in love with her stupid step-mother? How could he say her mother was
difficult
? True, she didn’t remember her much, most of her early memories seem to just feature her father and flashes of a woman holding her close and reading her stories, but she was her
mother
. ‘You’re as bad as she is!’

She stormed out and stomped up the stairs, leaving the warmth of the fire and the chocolates behind her. She slammed her bedroom door and flopped down on her bed. A few moments later her father knocked on the door but she told him to just ‘Go away!’ before burying her face in her pillow and crying. She wasn’t quite sure who she was crying for, but she knew she was completely alone. Not even her father was on her side. It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair.

She must have eventually cried herself to sleep, because the next thing she knew, she was freezing cold on her bed and lights were being carried through the hallway, slivers of yellow moving and creeping under her bedroom door. There was a flurry of activity in the hallway; then feet coming up the stairs and her step-mother’s laughter, loud and brash, dancing up ahead of them.

They were back.

Cinderella wrapped her shawl around her and lit the candle by her bed as if that small flame could give some heat as well as light, and then crept over to the door. She didn’t want to face them and be drawn into conversation, but she did want to hear what they were saying. She hoped it had gone badly for them. After all, her step-mother had shamed the old Earl she’d wed by walking out on him, and although he’d died two years ago it was likely she still wouldn’t be welcome in the court circles. Even being the daughter of a lord was no shield against scandal. The sound of merry, tired giggles, however, put paid to that hope. Cinderella looked at the clock on the wall. It was just after half-past one.

‘Oh, Rose. How wonderful.’ Her step-mother had reached the top of the stairs and Cinderella carefully pulled her door open a fraction to hear them more clearly. ‘You danced with two Earls. Two. Can you believe it?’

‘It didn’t
mean
anything. It was just dancing.’ Rose was quieter, still down in the hallway. ‘Oh, it’s good to get these shoes off. They’re killing my feet.’

‘And the prince kissed your hand!’

‘I think he kissed everyone’s hand.’ Rose’s voice was full of good humour. She didn’t sound like Rose at all. Then her feet thumped up the stairs.
That
sounded like Rose; she didn’t have an ounce of grace in her clumsy body.

‘But isn’t he handsome, Rose? I mean, I knew him of course, when he was a boy and he always had something about him, but well . . .’

‘Yes, he’s very handsome. Now, please, please, please help me get this dress off before my ribs break. I told you it was too small.’

‘Men like a slim waist, Rose. And, unfortunately, you’re rather too fond of food.’

Their voices faded and then there was the click of a door closing as the two women disappeared into her step-sister’s room. Cinderella waited until there was only silence and then pushed her door shut. Her blood raced through her veins, the cold and her tiredness sloughed off as she absorbed what she’d heard. Two earls. And the Prince had kissed Rose’s hand.

She picked up the framed print of the smiling Prince that she kept in her room – the picture Rose had once laughed at her for, even though nearly all the girls in the kingdom had one – and climbed into her bed, pulling the covers up to her chin. She stared at the handsome smiling face. How could he have kissed Rose’s hand? It must have just been politeness. Yes, that was it. He’d kissed all the girls’ hands, isn’t that what they’d said? There was nothing special about Rose.

She blew the candle out and lay back on her pillow, the picture face down on her chest, and tried to calm down. Yes, she hated that Rose had gone to the castle when she hadn’t, but maybe tonight’s ball going well wasn’t such a bad thing. Maybe if Rose got married off to some horrible old Earl like her mother had been, then surely their family would be respected enough for her to be invited? Just once. Just once. How she wished for it.

She closed her eyes and let her mind drift into the familiar fantasy.

She’s standing in the castle and the ballroom is full of men and women dressed in their finery. As her name is announced at the top of the stairs, all eyes turn her way, and although no one knows who she is, they’re dazzled by her style and beauty. She dances with the most handsome men, but all the while her eyes are locked with the Prince’s until eventually he comes to claim her as his own. As they whirl around the room, they only have eyes for each other and she knows that he’ll love her forever and she’ll love him forever and they’ll never stray. The music slows and he pulls her closer, his strong arm tight across her back. She can feel his body heat and every inch of her skin is aching for him to kiss her. Eventually, he does. His lips brush hers, teasing her until she can barely breathe and then his tongue touches hers and stars explode in her head.

Her fantasy shifted, as it always did, and it was their wedding night. The party was over, although in the streets it would continue for hours, and they had retired to their bedchamber. He was standing close to her, his lust so clear in his hazy eyes, and his hands undid the strings of her shift leaving her naked before him. Her hand slipped into her nightdress and teased her right nipple as if it was his fingers and then mouth. She gasped slightly, lost in the moment, her head filled with experiences she could only imagine. His hand in her hair as he kissed her. Her arms wrapped around his neck as he pushed her to the bed. Feeling him pressing against her as they lost themselves in their passion. Her hand moved further down, sliding between her legs and exploring the wetness there.

Her hand was his hand, and then, as her own touch moved into a rhythm, he was inside her, moving with her, his mouth on her neck, his own moans coming louder, her arms over her head and pinned down by his hand as he possessed her. They moved like frantic animals, growing rougher with each other as their needs grew more urgent until finally, in her small bed in the merchant’s house, Cinderella’s back arched and the stars exploded bright behind her closed eyes.