The Real Cinderella, S. G. Ricketts [children's ebooks online txt] 📗

curling from its tip. The basket loppped down in the across from me and I flinched. “Make yeself useful and fix some of these, will ye”

“I am being useful.” I frowned teasingly up at her and returned to my writing.

A wide pair of hips came into my line of vision, hands propped against their sides. “If’n ye needed anymore help with yer writing, I’d have to send ye to the Temple.” I sighed and sat back, enjoying her back-handed compliment. She raised an eyebrow and pointed ominously at the pile of clothes. “Those are the kind of useful I mean.”

I stared in horror at the mountain of stockings, shifts, and shirts spilling over the edge of the cot and tightened my grip on the quill. The smell of old RObert’s feet was slowly filling the room. Gagging, I buried my nose in my sleeve. “You couldn’t wash them first at least?”

I earned myself a waggling finger. “Washing without darning leads to bigger holes. Now I know yer mother taught ye that much.”

I groaned, letting the comment slide by. Mama hadn’t, but Liza had. Liza... I could see her sitting by our fire, laughing at my failed attempts to fix a shift. The pain was too much. I’m so sorry... I bit my lip and looked at the pile.

Martha mistook my sudden quietness for embarrassment. I almost giggled at her look of self-reproval. “Now girl, I do need ye with the quill. Ye’ve gotten me so much more business, but that is exactly why I need ye to help with the more base chores.” She patted my hand and peered at me.

I hid my smile, Liza purposely forgotten. “Which I won’t need to know, as a maidservant.”
Martha’s face dimpled, but she held her stoic expression. Barely. “Ay.”

“And that I’m horrible at.” I raised an eyebrow.

“Aye.” She pursed her lips, trying not to smile.

“And that you’re trying to kill me with.”

She laughed as I picked up the nearest stocking, covering my nose with my free sleeve. I could smell it through the gingham of my dress. I giggled, flinging the stocking at her. “You can’t stand the smell either!”

“Nay, girl,” she gasped. The stocking made its way quickly back onto the pile. “Makes me want to vomit. But for his feet, old Robert is perfect. I keep asking him to let me chop them off.” She swept the clothes off the bed and back into the basket. “He keeps insisting he needs them.” I watched her through watering eyes as she sat back down across from me. Martha rolled her eyes and pulled the sheet off my bed, covering the basket. “Is that better, or will you forever keep your face half-covered?”

I took a tentative sniff and wrinkled my nose. “Better...but still smelly. Why won’t he let you cut off his feet?”

She smiled, then sat back in her chair. It creaked slightly beneath her weight. My own teasing faded as her face took on a decidedly sly look. “Ye know yer choice. Darn his stockings or tell me of this Liza.” Her eyes narrowed, watching for any signs I’d give in this time.

I quickly grabbed for the basket. “If my lord Liam knew...”

She tsked me. “If’n yer lord Liam knew, he’d have a few less holey stockings.” She grinned. “How about a deal. I’ve got a load of herbs that needs grinding. I’ll darn if ye grind.”

“Deal.”

“And talk.” I pulled a face, but the clothes were a little too much for me and she went to fetch her tools.

I stared at the paper in front of me. The contract still gleamed wetly in the firelight, another agreement between some merchant and Mistress Martha for her services. I set the quill in the inkpot, suddenly disturbed. A month ago, I’d been sitting in front of a fire just like this one with Liza. Over the weeks, Martha had unconsciously taken Liza’s place as my careful avoidance of my sister’s memory grew. My own guilt had done far worse than Liza’s selling herself into slavery: I’d replaced her entirely.

“What’s wrong, girl? Ye look like ye’ve seen a ghost.” The pistol and mortar clunked heavily by my hand and I jumped.

I stared at them blankly. How could I have replaced her? After everything she did, I couldn’t believe how heartless I was. “I...You...” I swallowed, almost unable to say it.

“I forgot about her.”

Her hands stilled in her lap. “Forgot who, girl?”

“Liza.”

I looked up at her sharp breath. Martha clucked her tongue. “Ye didn’t forget her. Ye just needed some time to think before ye could face her again. Don’t go putting more shame on that pretty little head than there need be.” It made sense, but the awful feeling remained. I flinched when she touched my hand. “Kat?”

My name sent chills down my back. Martha called me “girl,” almost as a pet name. Liza had called me “Kat.” It was too much. I could see her face in Martha’s, worried eyes trying to shoulder my burden yet again. “I can’t talk about it. I can’t... I just...”

“Why?” She brushed a curl out of my face, waiting.

I bit my lip. “Because-” Because I didn’t want to face what I’d done. I swallowed, shocked at the though. “Because it wouldn’t make sense,” I finished lamely.

She watched me, neither demanding nor prying. Her hands returned to their steady darning and I relaxed as her gaze left my face. “So, make it make sense.”


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


We’d been happy once. Moderately happy, anyways. We were, after all, a builder family. Our good days were when all we did was march in place, pat bricks, and stay out of the overseers’ way. The world around us was in constant chaos but we were in a little bubble all of our own. I was safe, as long as Mama and Father were stomping beside me. It was the mindset of a child, still foolish and naive, but I clung to it with every fiber of my being.

My first revolt happened when I was four. Before then, I had a mother, a father, two brothers, and three sisters. I was second youngest, with only Thomas younger than me. I only remember bits and pieces of that happy time before. If I think back, I can just remember helping with my brother’s birth as only a four-year old can: I whispered what was happening to the boys outside. Father and the older boys were all crowded around, sweating and swearing with every scream. I felt so useful, until Thomas was born. I remember thinking he was ugly and noisy, but everyone else loved him. Once he was big enough for me to play with, I tolerated him a little better.

And, I remember my father’s books. Oh, the books... He’d been born high in the servant class, educated and employed in Cardeas, the City of Friendship. His tales of the capital would keep us enthralled for hours with images of spires piercing the sky and people living in huts stacked on top of each other. As a young man, he was sent to Builder’s Brooke. He’d brought all of his books with him. There were primers, fairy tales, histories, and maps. Everything he’d needed to properly teach his children, he’d managed to bring. We guarded our treasures jealously, telling no one and huddling around a tiny lamp at night so no one would know. Before that first revolt, I’d learned my letters, basic words, and my name: Kathryn. Father called me “little Kat.”

I don’t remember anything from the first revolt other than the screams and the dark. Mama, Thomas, Liza, and I were shoved into a hole under the bed. Thomas was still little but no one could have heard his cries over the noise outside. My oldest brother died. Father said he was trying to keep people away from our hut. He wouldn’t tell me how he died until much, much later. Stephen was caught with a whip around the neck. He was dead before Father realized it had happened... Father and the two older girls made it back. As for Stephen, my child’s mind forgot his face quickly, much as I tried not to. Father often told me I looked like him, all leg, black curls, green eyes, and not a lick of sense. He said it with pride. Stephen was the first to die.

A year later, my oldest sister vanished during our lunch break and came home at dark, dress dirty and face white. A few weeks later, we realized she was with child. Even Liza and I knew enough to know that this wasn’t the same as Thomas. We all kept quiet about it, but Natalie changed. She wandered about the house, stumbled through her brick building, and barely eat. Without telling Mama, she bought the moon-bringing herb in hopes of killing the child she carried. It was too strong a dose for her child body. We awoke to Mama’s screams and my father’s quiet whispers. I listened to her die through the door, bleeding her life away in Father’s arms. Natalie was only seven years older than I, with long golden hair like Liza and green eyes like mine.

This was when the whispers began. My father was an outsider and, ignoring the fact that all of their families had suffered, the villagers began to say we were cursed. It was my father’s tainted servants’ blood, they said. At night around our fire, my father explained over and over again that this was merely their ignorance and made it clear that Tali had not been curse. But, as the years passed, I began to doubt him. Over the next three, we survived four more revolts. My sister Claire vanished and Mama wasted away, sitting by the door in hopes that she would stumble in, just as Natalie once had. By the time I was nine, it was only Father, Liza, Thomas, and I. If this wasn’t cursed, I didn’t want to know what it was.

My only memories of happiness were around that litle fire. here, we were transported away from our horrible reality. Our crumbling walls were transformed into the uniform brick of a lord’s house. Our rags became the finery of maids and stable boys. Each night, my father taught us the other side of our heritage. Each night, I fell asleep curled between my siblings, a deep blue ribbon twisted around my fingers. Each night, I dreamed of the face that had given it to me and brought me the slightest bit of hope. And so we made it by, living for the nights of manners and learning and imagination, surviving during the days of heat and mud and hate.

Time passed, although I hardly noticed. Liza’s womanhood arrived and I watched as she began to bind her ever-growing chest. I watched silently as she bit back cries when Father pulled it tighter, but we remembered our sisters’ fates. Even little Thomas remembered. Even he was growing up, already at six nearly to my shoulder. Eventually I joined Liza in that ritual binding, biting back my own tears as the bandages bit into my skin. But it kept most of the men from looking our way. We kept our eyes down and our mouths shut. We became the invisible cursed family.

When I was eighteen, the Royals of Zyonn went to war. I don’t know who they fought, but Thomas and Father were conscripted. Father tried to fight for Thomas to stay. After all, he was