Archive of Our Own

Once upon a time...

The little girl was shy, and blonde, and dressed in the clothes of a servant. She stood with her head bowed, her toes turned in nervously, hands clasped behind her. Lady Tremaine had her hand on the girl's shoulder, figure stern but not overly forward, her two own daughters standing a short distance behind her fidgeting and pinching each other whilst their mother was not looking.

"Of course, we would prefer to be able to take her with us, but my brother says that he simply cannot take on any more servants. We have but a few in our household, and most are able to fend for themselves, but..."

She trailed off, a faint note of disappointment in her voice. The girl remained silent as Lady Tremaine glanced down, then glanced up slightly from beneath her eyelashes.

"Well, indeed. We would be very grateful if you would be willing to take her on."

The steward and the cook to whom they were talking looked at each other for a moment, then the steward nodded. "Yes, I believe we will be able to take her on. What did you say that her name was?"

Lady Tremaine pushed the girl forward slightly, then placed both hands back on the head of her walking stick. "Cinderella. Her name is Cinderella."

The girl curtseyed, then looked up shyly to the cook and steward. "At your service," she said, her voice very soft and trembling slightly as she bobbed a perfect curtsey nonetheless. Her hands were slightly raw and pink, as if she had been scrubbed clean, and there was a patch on the hem of her skirt. The stitching looked a little uneven, a child's work as well.

"Come on, then," said the cook, reaching out his hand to the girl. "You're one of us now, Cinderella. I'll show you around."

She hesitated for a moment, then slipped her hand into his and allowed herself to be led away, leaving the steward and Lady Tremaine to their monetary concerns. Only once did she glance back, tears in her bright blue eyes, to see the two Tremaine girls waving goodbye in a taunting manner. Quickly, Cinderella looked away again, back to wherever the cook was taking her.

"Have you ever been to the palace before, Cinderella?" he asked.

"No, sir." Her voice was meek, slightly frightened.

"Now, now, there's no need to call me sir," he said. "I'm Cook, or Benson. Mistress Mary will be watching over you most of the time, with the rest of the girls, but if you need anything, you can always come and find me. All right?"

"Thank you, Cook," she said.

Nothing more was forthcoming, and Benson lapsed into silence as they continued round to the servant's staircase and he gestured for her to go ahead. Automatically, Cinderella took down the torch at the side of the stairwell and held it aloft as they ascended, until they reached the top and she placed it in the holder again. Benson guided her along to a room at the end of the corridor, knocked, and waited outside as it was opened.

"Mary, the new girl that we were told about."

Cinderella looked down towards the floor again, and Mary crouched down in front of her to look her in the eye. She was an older woman, slightly greying, wearing a plain dark green dress that fastened high at the neck. "Hello there. What's your name?"

"Cinderella, ma'am." Another slight curtsey.

"Well, Cinderella," said Mary, "welcome to the palace."

Mary had to admit that she was, mostly, pleased with the girl. Cinderella was soft-spoken and well-mannered, some might say surprisingly so for a servant. She had taken less than a month to become quite used to the ways of the palace, to learn at what time she should rise, to take on her daily duties. And she always tried, that was certain. No-one had ever seen her attempting to break in her work, even when others might, and when on one occasion she found some stray money in one of the rooms, she returned it to Mary immediately.

But – and the housekeeper had despaired of this – she was in other ways difficult. Sometimes she would cry in the night, and speak of missing her father. She had a tendency to sing to herself, in a sweet voice but nevertheless loud enough that she was at one time heard by guests, and had to be hushed and hurried away before they found her. And Cinderella was, and this was difficult to put words to, in some way strange. She carried herself like a nobleman’s daughter, and did indeed have some strange ideas in her head.

It would be better for them all, Mary decided, that Cinderella learn her place as soon as possible. She was no lady’s maid, after all, just a chamber maid. She did not mean to be harsh, after all. It was simply easier that way.

“A dream is a wish your heart makes—“

“Really, Cinderella! What have you been told?”

“Oh!” The girl started, looking round from where she had been cleaning the floor. “I’m so sorry, Mary. I didn’t—“

Mary sighed, crossing to the bed and laying down the fresh linens upon it. “You do not learn, girl!” No matter the number of times that she was fined, no matter that she had recently received six switches on the hand for having been overheard, she simply would not stop with her singing. Oh, her voice was beautiful, to go with her pretty young face and curls of dark blonde hair, but it did not excuse her behaviour. “Besides, after Eugenia left us, we’re all short, you know that.

“Yes, Mary,” said Cinderella. She wrung out the cloth in her hand and returned her attention to the floor, sweeping back and forth to take off the grime of the last week, pausing to work more on a particularly dirty spot. Mary looked at her for a moment, sighed and shook her head before turning her attention to the bed. She had barely stripped it and begun to replace the sheets before Cinderella was humming to herself again, low and soft like a country brook, and with a smile the older woman let it be. She finished changing the sheets and replaced the coverlet, plumping the pillows before turning to Cinderella again. The girl had moved a considerable distance.

“Now, don’t forget to light the fire before you leave, and put the warming pan on. The King is to have guests tonight, after all.”

Cinderella nodded demurely, the closest she could get to a curtsey whilst still on the floor. For a moment she looked far younger than her fifteen years once again. “Yes, Mary.”

“Very well. I’ll see you this evening.”

Cinderella waited until the door was closed, then got to her feet and hurried over to the window. “All right, you can come in now,” she whispered, smiling as the birds came and settled on the windowsill. “Hello again, boys.” Her fingers brushed gently over the robin’s head, and he bowed it to her. “Sorry about that. You know that Mary wouldn’t approve. Now, you can come in, but make sure that you stay out of the way.”

The birds perched on the back of one of the chairs in the room as she finished cleaning the floor, then filled the fireplace and coaxed a flame into the coal again before standing up. The bucket of water went into one hand, that of coal into the other, and she crossed to the window. “All right then, I’ll see you at the next window.”

They exited and, smiling, Cinderella crossed to the door. She checked the corridor before stepping out, pleased to find it empty, and backed through the door of the next room to keep her coal-dusted hands from the handle. She set the coal down beside the fire again, opened the window for the birds, and was about to kneel to begin on the next floor when the door opened again.

“Oh!” She spun, guiltily, then folded her hands before her and bowed her head, trying to make herself invisible.

“Really, Hector, I don’t see how – oh, my apologies.”

Feeling her hands shake, Cinderella glanced up beneath the fringe of her hair to the two young men in the doorway. They looked a few years older than her, one blond and classically handsome, the other dark-haired and even-featured and less assuming in his good looks. The latter caught her eyes for just an instant, then swept his friend out of the room again and closed the door behind him.

There was a twitter from the blackbird on the sill. Cinderella spun, feeling heat grow in her cheeks. “No! Don’t be so silly. He was just surprised to see a servant, that’s all.” With a sigh, she finally lowered herself to her knees beside her pail of water, reached in for the cloth and wrung it out before beginning on the deep red tiles. “I just hope that Mary doesn’t hear of it, that’s all.”

A few moments of quiet passed as she made her way across the floor, then another chirrup from the blackbird. Cinderella gave a surprised laugh, quickly muffled. “Of course I don’t know who he is. And I doubt that I’ll see him again, so it doesn’t matter anyway, does it? Now, one more comment like that and you’ll have to go outside again, won’t you?”

There had been something about the young man that felt familiar to her, but she could not have said what it was. By the time that she reached her bed that night, long after sunset as all of them were now working harder than ever with one maid fewer than usual, he was all but gone from her mind, and by the morning he was nothing but another face among hundreds.

“Come on, Hettie!” She shook the bed of the girl on the other side of the room, receiving a sleepy moan in reply, and lit the candle on her bedside. “It’s nearly five! We simply must have all of the fires lit before six.”

Hettie sighed and rolled out of bed, but Cinderella, light in every step, was already leaving the room. She made her way down the back stairs, vaguely remembering that once she had not been part of this life – it seemed as if she had been here forever now, so familiar was everything! – and down the back passageway to the kitchen.

“Good morning, Benson!”

The cook, now old and rotund and half-balding, looked round from where he was already preparing food for the day and waved with a floured hand. “Good morning, Cinderella.”

The air outside was cold, and Cinderella’s breath formed little white clouds as she made her way across the courtyard in the barely-light. The flagstones were even beneath her feet, and she knew every step to the coalhouse on the far side. The sooner she got the buckets the better, with the cold raising goosebumps on her arms and—

An “Oh!” left her lips as she collided bodily with another figure. There were not many who were usually up at this hour, and she stumbled backwards in surprise, trying to make out their features. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

Finally she made him out through the gloom, her blue eyes going wide as she dropped into a curtsey. “I’m sorry, sir, I wasn’t watching where I was going. It won’t happen again.”

A hand came to rest on her shoulder. “It’s no problem, just an accident. Hey, look up.” She did so, tilting her chin upwards as she straightened up again, hands pressed flat against her apron. Even in the darkness, broken only by the faintest hint of sunrise and the lights from the castle windows, she could now recognize the young man whom she had seen in the palace the day before.

He hesitated, and she could not think why, before suddenly he said: “I was hoping to find you.”

“I am sorry about yesterday as well, sir,” she said hurriedly. “I didn’t mean—”

“No, please,” he said. He suddenly took hold of her hands, his palms warm and softer than hers; she was too astonished to pull away from him. As her eyes adjusted she could see more of his features, his sleek dark hair and deep, intense brown eyes. “What is your name?”

“C-Cinderella,” she stammered.

“Do you not recognize me?” he asked. She shook her head in bewilderment. “It… it doesn’t matter. My name is Christopher.”

She looked at him helplessly.

“It’s… nice to meet you,” he prompted.

A blush spread out across her cheeks, feeling like flame. “The honour is all mine, sir.” His hold on her hands was firm, without being too tight, his stance slightly secretive, all focused upon her. The cold was filtering through the dress that she wore, but she didn’t truly notice. Finally, Cinderella tried a nervous smile, but she slipped her hands out of his. “But I really can’t stay here.”

“Oh, I- the cold. Of course. I should not keep you any longer.” He gave a stiff, formal bow that took her by surprise, and she curtseyed in return. It had been years since she had curtseyed fully, rather than just dipping and bobbing in the way that the other maids did, but it still felt natural to sweep low and dip her head, keeping her spine straight all of the time.

They paused for a moment, then both gave a nervous laugh; his voice was warm, but a little odd and cultured to her ears. She didn’t have the heart to say that it was because she was afraid of what he might expect from her, or what she knew about her station. ‘Followers’ were not allowed; goodness knew what Mary would think if it came to light that Cinderella had been seen talking to a nobleman.

“I must go,” she said finally, breaking the tenuously hopeful silence between them. She went to turn back towards the house, caught herself, and hurried on towards the coalhouse. It took all of her strength not to look behind to see if he was following her with his eyes, and yet somehow she was just certain that he was.

For the first time in as long as she could remember, almost certainly the first time since she had been working at the Palace, it was difficult for her to work that day. She found herself glancing into mirrors to see herself blush, or humming beneath her breath and staring out of the window, seeing in her mind’s eye Christopher’s face. Part of her yearned to learn more, but she was certain that she would never see the man again. After all, he was a nobleman, and she was only a servant; she was probably a touch of amusement for the morning, and would be forgotten before noon. And besides, there was no point in her being so distracted that she almost put water on the fire and swept the floor with a coal-rag, either.

She was late in finishing her work that night, and had to flee in a most ungraceful way along the corridors as the murmur of conversation of the nobles floated towards her. There was still a smudge of coal dust on her cheek as she made it back to her room, and Hettie looked round sharply.

“Goodness, Ella! I thought that you had gone missing or something! It isn’t like you to be late.” She turned in her chair, finishing the braids that she was winding her dark hair into. She worked in the palace in order to be able to send a little money to her parents, to whom she returned at the weekend; as the oldest of six, she had been there since she was thirteen, a little time after Cinderella.

“I’m sorry,” Cinderella replied, slipping off her shoes and removing her bonnet. “I just… don’t know where time went today!”

She flopped down onto her bed, looking up to the ceiling above them. So nice, to be in a building lit with gas, unlike some of the houses still lit with candles. It flickered less on the paintwork. There was the sound of a chair scraping on the floor, then Hettie appeared in her vision, frowning but haloed in light.

“Goodness, what are you like? What is it caught you up today, then?”

“Nothing,” replied Cinderella playfully. She rolled over onto her front, kicking her knees into the air behind her, and reached beneath her bed to withdraw a single slim book. It was old now, worn and softened in its leather bindings, nothing more than a children’s storybook. She ran her fingers over the front, thinking of her father and how he had taught her to read when she was a child, in evenings after the nurse had left. “Nothing at all.”

Hettie shook her head. “Oh, to be fifteen and enraptured by anything! And make sure that Mary doesn’t catch you with that book, good gracious.”

“I’ve told you before, Hettie,” said Cinderella, laughter in her voice as she looked back over her shoulder to her friend, “there’s nothing at all wrong in here! It’s only children’s stories!”

“Able to read or not, you still shouldn’t have books,” Hettie replied. Though only twenty, she sometimes acted as if she might as well have been Mary’s age – the younger siblings, Cinderella supposed, or perhaps the looming spectre of spinsterhood.

With a sigh, she slipped it beneath her pillow. “Very well, I’ll be careful. Don’t want to get us into trouble, after all.”

And at least, she supposed, it had distracted Hettie from what it was that had been occupying her mind all day.

It was some time before she saw Christopher again. There was a celebration at the Palace the following week, in honour of the Prince’s eighteenth birthday – Cinderella took no account of the Prince’s given name, seeing as it hardly mattered to a servant, though she knew it was very long if read in full – and everyone was in a fine frenzy in preparation for it, cooking and cleaning and answering to the demands of some of the visitors.

Even Cinderella, chambermaid though she usually was, found herself caring for a woman of nobility from a neighbouring Duchy. The woman’s name, she gathered from overhearing commands passing between the woman and her accompanying ‘Nursie’, was Magdalena, and blood from outside the Kingdom had made her into a rare beauty: dusky-skinned, with a waist-length fall of thick black hair and glistening brown-black eyes that smouldered in her passionately attractive face. She tended to exotic clothes, as well, with ruffles and lace and bodices that needed to be pinned in order to give her the narrow waist that she so desired; she became angry with Cinderella for not achieving the seventeen inches she required, and would not calm until her Nursie fetched smelling salts and fanned her brow. Only then, trembling, was Cinderella allowed back in to score deep bruised lines on her fingers from the lines of the corset.

And so she cleaned lace and starched fabric and polished shoes, and on the day of the celebration Magdalena gave her one curt nod that added up to more than she had received from the woman in all the previous time, and Cinderella breathed a sigh of relief. The nurse, however, turned with a cool look on her face after their lady had passed, and with an order of: “You will clean this room whilst we are gone,” also departed.

The room fell quiet. With a soft groan at her aching feet, Cinderella settled down onto the chair before the dressing table, reaching up to mop her brow. Attending to Magdalena had been added to her usual work and had done nothing but make her day longer; she was exhausted. At the same time, as well, she could not help but look at her own reflection and compare herself to the foreign beauty.

A glance towards the door, then a faint smile came over Cinderella’s lips and she got to her feet again. She reached up to unpin the tight bun of her hair, letting it tumble down – past her shoulders now; she had not realised how long it had become. It curled most fetchingly alongside her cheeks, she supposed; she was not as pale as some of the noblewomen, but supposed that there had been times when warm skin and a faint flush in the cheeks had been considered attractive. Perhaps a man who thought such would remain, somewhere. Her eyes were blue; pretty, her father had told her, and her father had been right about many things.

A rejected dress hung on the door of Magdalena’s wardrobe. It was deep green, the colour of emeralds – Cinderella had seen, briefly, before they were locked away, that Magdalena owned items of jewellery with the beautiful gemstones in – wide in the neckline and flounced in the sleeve, with a moderate bustle to the rear. Cinderella scooped it up and held it against her body; the colour was too strong for her, but she had never held such a beautiful dress against her skin before. She swished the skirt back and forth, twirled, and for a moment could see herself in the ball as well.

A burst of bright laughter left her lips, then was swallowed up by the room. Cinderella’s smile dimmed, and she returned the dress to its place before tidying and cleaning the rest of the room. Foolish thoughts, she told herself. Perhaps Hettie was right in the comments that she made, and it was time for her to start growing up.

Later that evening she caught sight, from a distance, of another noblewoman in a fine dress, whose perfume left a soft smoky scent in her wake. But Cinderella tried to put it from her mind.

The celebration continued so late that she and many of the other servants had snatched a few hours’ sleep before rising to see its close and the work that would await them afterwards. Cinderella returned to Magdalena’s chambers, still rubbing sleep from her eyes, only to hear shouting and banging as she reached the door. She stopped, fearful for a moment, then carefully opened the door and looked within only to see Magdalena, hair half-loose and beautiful face twisted in anger, throw a glass perfume bottle so hard against the opposite wall that it shattered.

Nursie, at first cowering, caught sight of the open door and Cinderella’s fearful, uncertain face. “You!” She shouted, then stormed over and grabbed the girl by the wrist. Cinderella cried out, but the older woman pulled her in front of Magdalena and shook her as if a kitten held by the scruff of its neck. “Here, ma’am! No doubt this is your thief!”

“Thief?” cried Cinderella. “I don’t-“

“You think you can take my emeralds, you dirty servant girl?” said Magdalena. She slapped Cinderella across the face, drawing forward another frightened cry, then took the girl’s arm from the nurse and dragged her over to the jewellery box lying open on the dressing table. Cinderella could faintly remember placing it safely in the noblewoman’s trunk, locked, with the key somewhere that she did not even know of.

“No! I didn’t-“

“A liar as well as a thief!” Declared the nurse. “Well, you’ve a right fine one here!”

Tears started to well in Cinderella’s eyes, from pain and confusion and humiliation, as Magdalena scooped out the contents of the box and scattered them across the table. Gold and silver, pearls and sapphires, sparkled like a torn rainbow fragmented by her tears. “I didn’t do anything!” she said, desperately, her voice high and fast. “I just tidied the room and left, I promise you!”

“You’re saying that someone else stole them?” demanded Magdalena. “Ha! Return them to me, or I will hand you over to the law!”

“I don’t have them!”

“Liar!” Another slap across the cheek, and this time Cinderella did not cry out but huddled back from the burning pain of the blow. “Return them!”

“I don’t-“ Her voice cracked, and she choked back a sob, pride keeping the tears from running down her cheeks.

Magdalena released her, all but throwing her back against the wall. “Ha!” she said. “We shall see!”

“It wasn’t me,” Cinderella pleaded. “Please, I’m telling you, I haven’t done anything wrong! It must have been someone else!”

“Who else has been in my room?” Magdalena demanded.

For one moment, Cinderella caught the gaze of the nurse, behind Magdalena. The older woman’s gaze was shrewd, smug, and in a terrible instant Cinderella knew that she would never be believed if she said what she had just realised.

“They... they must just be lost,” she gabbled. “Whilst you were dressing. They must just be lost somewhere in the room. I’m sure that I’ll be able to find them, if you let me look!”

Magdalena paused, suspicious, but something in her eyes said that she wanted, perhaps, to believe the servant girl begging her for empathy. Cinderella’s hands curled into fists at her sides, holding back her urge to tremble, as she straightened up and looked the lady in the eye.

“I’m sure that I’ll be able to find them, and this is nothing more than a misunderstanding,” she said. Her voice was shaking, just slightly, but she managed to stand firm, and finally Magdalena gave a curt, purse-lipped nod.

“Very well. You have your chance, serving girl; I will be back in one hour. Come, Nursie.”

She swept from the room, and for a moment Cinderella felt bile rise in her throat, then the door closed with an audible click of the key in the lock.

Again, the room was quiet. Fear overwhelmed her and Cinderella gave one tight sob, the sound echoing, then bit her lip to hold it back. With shaking hands she tidied the mess that Magdalena had made and began searching, any drawer, any bag, anywhere that she could think of for the jewellery to have been hidden. Nothing came, and fear began to make her more frantic in her movements until, finally, she stood in the window and looked out to the waning moon and the bright stars.

“What can I do?” she whispered to them, leaning on the windowsill for a moment.

A movement in the garden below startled her, and jumping she peered down to the figure. It took a moment for her to recognise him, then she gasped, holding one hand to her mouth. Christopher looked as startled to see her as she was him, then he smiled and raised one hand in something of a wave. Colouring, Cinderella waved shyly back, then the sound of the key in the lock again pulled her back to the moment and she whirled to the door.

Magdalena stepped through, the nurse closing the door behind her. Her cheeks were still flushed with anger, eyes glittering, but her voice was cold and controlled as she said, “Well?”

“I think that I’ve remembered what happened, ma’am,” said Cinderella. It came out on impulse. Magdalena arched one eyebrow in encouragement, and with her heart in her throat Cinderella continued: “I didn’t realised until after you’d left that the emeralds were outside the box, and it was already locked. So I gave them to your nurse to look after.”

“You did no such thing,” said the nurse sharply, a little too fast.

With every ounce of honest hope and innocence, Cinderella replied: “Perhaps you have just... forgotten. It has been a busy night.”

“I-“

“I’m sure that you put them in your bodice, on the left side,” she added, quickly. The woman’s dress rested unevenly, something making the fabric ripple on that side. Magdalena looked to her nurse with a frown.

“Caroline? What do you have there?”

The nurse looked between her mistress and Cinderella quickly, probably unable to offer the younger girl the venom that she would have done. Then she reached into her bodice, her mouth forming an ‘o’ as if surprised, and withdrew a glittering handful of green and gold. Cinderella thought that her knees would give way beneath her.

“Well – oh my! I hadn’t even realised!”

Magdalena looked sharply at Cinderella. “Get out,” she said, stepping aside from the door. Willingly, Cinderella fled, the door barely closed behind her before there were tears on her cheeks. She heard behind her the beginnings of shouting again, and hurried along the corridor, reaching the corner before a hand closed around her arm.

She turned with a short scream, only to realise that the hand that held her was male, and that the man on the other side of it was Christopher himself. Cinderella looked up at him in utter confusion, another tear breaking free from her face and rolling down, tasting of salt, before he whispered, “Come with me,” and gently pulled her away from the gas-lit room.

At first she was barely able to speak in front of him, but he coaxed and spoke to her until she admitted that there had been some trouble – a ‘misunderstanding’, she lied – and that it had upset her. Frowning, he had offered to speak to Magdalena, and Cinderella had pleaded with him not to lest there be more trouble caused. Then, finally, he had nodded and acquiesced, and handed her a handkerchief to wipe her eyes with.

She tried to give it back, and he just shook his head and wrapped his hand around hers, around it.

“Sir, I... really don’t understand,” Cinderella said softly. She looked up from between her lashes, still darkened with tears, to the man that sat on the bench beside her. Without question she had followed him out into the gardens, to some secluded spot in the shade of a willow tree beside a pool, with wildflowers and an elegant folly of a ruin softening the land. She had not even said a word when he had removed his jacket, laid the sash beside him, and placed it around her shoulders against the cold; she had simply looked at him in fear and wonder. “Why...”

The words trailed off helplessly. Christopher put both of his hands around his, turning slightly in his seat so that he could face her directly. “Cinderella,” he said softly, “I can barely say that I understand myself.”

Again, she found herself wordless before him. His gaze was gentle, real; she could not bring herself to think that he was playing some game with her.

“From the moment I first saw you, there was... a light about you, a beauty. More than just your looks – your spirit. I thought you were some goddess sent to me,” he said.

This time heat and colour did not stain her cheeks; she was too astonished, too enraptured by his words. He reached up to stroke her cheek gently, his fingertips light against her skin.

“I simply had to see you again. I have been able to think of no other these few days.”

“Sir,” she whispered, but he cut her off.

“Please, do not call me that. My name is Christopher.”

Cinderella shook her head, looking away, down at the hand wrapped around the edge of the bower-seat on which they rested. Her knuckles were white. “I... I cannot,” she said.

He paused, then sighed. “Then at least, do not say sir. If you would rather, do not name me. But please, Cinderella...” his voice was almost a caress on her name and she shivered slightly, despite the warmth of the jacket around her shoulders. “I must see you again.”

She shook her head, slowly for a moment but then more fiercely, tears blurring her vision as she squeezed her eyes shut. “I am but a servant,” she said. “And you-“

“My father would kill me if he but knew that I had talked to a servant,” Christopher said.

His voice was serious. Cinderella raised her eyes to meet his, the dark gaze unwavering. The corners of his lips were tugged down slightly, as if he was struggling with upset himself. “And I would be cast from here if it was known that I was talking to a nobleman,” she replied.

“Then let us not be a servant or a nobleman,” he said. “Perhaps we should just be Christopher, and Cinderella.” He glanced up towards the lightening sky, a pinkish glow on the horizon announcing the approach of the dawn. “Have you a half-day of holiday?”

“Sunday,” she replied, not knowing why she did not lie. “But I have no family to visit.”

“I will meet you here,” he said.

“But-“

“Please.”

His voice was shaking, just slightly, and his hands were wrapped around hers again. Cinderella found herself nodding, gaze unmoving, lips parted in wordlessness, then he smiled and it was more of a light coming into the world than the sunrise could ever have been.

Most commonly on her Sundays she had little to do with herself, and so it was uncertainly that she prepared to do anything at all on this occasion. Of course, it was also impossible to do all that much without revealing to Hettie that something was afoot, and so it was not until Hettie left to visit her family and give the young ones the penn’orth of sweets that she had bought for each of them that Cinderella was able to whirl into action, drawing from the recesses of her wardrobe her good dress, normally kept for Sunday services, last worn when a distant cousin of the King died and the Palace had been forced into mourning. She checked over it keenly for any sign of moths or wear then, satisfied, donned it.

It was a little more severe than what she usually wore, with a tighter bodice and a finer finish to the grey wool, and for a moment Cinderella thought wistfully of the beautiful clothes that she had, briefly, seen in Magdalena’s chambers. But there was nothing to do about it, save for don the pair of white gloves that she had saved for over the years and had kept safe in a box beneath her bed, and a pretty bonnet with white ribbons that had much the same story behind it. Then, hands trembling, she made her way down the stairs, ignoring the whistles from a couple of the stable boys as she passed, and into the gardens.

The spring and early summer weather had been kind to the gardens, and they had come to leaf and flower beautifully. Cinderella held her skirt slightly away from the grass as she picked her way down the gravel path that Christopher had showed her earlier that week, brushed aside the dipping bough of an old tree, and slipped through to the secluded garden where they had sat and spoken.

To her surprise, he was already there waiting, his back to her as he looked up into a magnolia tree planted opposite. Cinderella hesitated, then cleared her throat, one hand held politely over her mouth as he did so. Christopher started, turned, and smiled, before striding across the grass to take her hand. She was pleased that he did not look upon her dress, though she was becoming acutely aware that he, in his fine fitted cream suit and wingtip shirt, displayed a very different status from her own.

“I’m glad that you came,” Christopher said finally, gently leading her past the willow tree and to a bank and small stream beyond. “I feared that you would not.”

She nearly replied that she had feared the same of him, or even of herself, but could not place such negative words around a smile. “Let us not talk of were-nots,” she said. “I am so happy to be here. But...”

“No buts,” he said, “please.” He looked down to where a blanket was spread across the grass, a wicker basket beside. “I hoped that we could lunch here today, if...”

His words trailed off, and Cinderella could not suppress the slightest giggle at his nervousness. Somehow it made her feel far better, and releasing his hand she sat down upon the blanket, hugging her knees. The steam – she guessed put in by the gardeners when this place had been created – bubbled and tumbled down a few feet away, the air here a little cooler than it was elsewhere beneath the bright sun.

She looked up at Christopher again, then released her knees and sat more normally upon the ground. “I would be glad to lunch with you.”

A smile spread across his face, and she wondered how old he was. Or what there might be to know about him at all. They had only been able to speak twice before, and for all that she knew she was being foolish by risking her job upon meeting with him, but as he sat down beside her and shyly turned to draw food from the picnic basket she could have sworn that it was worth it all.

“Say,” she said, drawing patterns on the rug with her finger, “what is your full name? I don’t believe that you’ve said.”

He hesitated for a moment. “Christopher... Rupert.”

Cinderella looked up, her brows pinching together just slightly as she frowned. “Rupert? I know of no family with such a name.”

Another hesitation, this one guiltier, then Christopher reached across and placed his hand over hers. It was warm, and the movement took her by surprise enough for her to gasp slightly. “I am sorry, Cinderella, but I cannot tell you my full name. It... may be too dangerous for us all.” As she looked downwards, uncertain of whether to feel insulted, he hooked one finger beneath her chin and tilted her face up to his again. “Besides, my name is too long. I am sure I would bore you by the end of it.” As she laughed, a little, he added; “That’s better. Now, what is your full name?”

“Ella. Well, Ella is my real name,” she added. “Ella Tremaine. But everyone has called me Cinderella for almost as long as I can remember now.”

“Tremaine?” He frowned in thought, pausing between removing carefully linen-wrapped bundles from the basket. “I believe that I have heard the name before... a nobleman?”

“My father... was a gentleman of some means, once,” said Cinderella. Her voice dropped. “However, his estate passed to my stepmother, some years ago. I have not had contact with her in years.”

“You were passed over for inheritance?” He sounded astonished, as if the very idea of such a thing shocked his sensibilities. But Cinderella had not thought of it in such terms before, and looked almost as surprised as he in return.

“Why, I suppose so. But if I had not come here, I would not have met you,” she added, before the conversation could become too uncomfortable or the talk of her father too painful to bear. “And we would not be here now, would we?”

Christopher considered for a moment, then nodded. “Such is true. Here.”

To her surprise, he held out a china plate towards her; more than that, upon it were grapes and ham, boiled eggs and other pieces of fruit. Cinderella’s hands flew to her mouth, then she lowered them to her breast and looked at him in fear. “Oh, no, I simply could not--”

He placed the plate down in front of her, laid cutlery – why, it looked like silver! – next to it, then a glass. “Well, it will do no good to waste it,” Christopher replied, drawing also from the hamper a bottle from which he removed the cork and filled both his glass and that which he had set before Cinderella. The soft scent of lavender was added to the air. Seeing the look in her eyes as he looked up again, he stopped, setting the bottle aside, and took on an air of concern. “Cinderella, I do not mean to... I do not understand. I simply wish for this to be a pleasant picnic for us both.”

“But I am but a servant!” she half-whispered. “I could not dine such as this!”

“I thought we had agreed,” he said gently, “that we had no roles here, only names. And if we were to have roles, did you not tell me that you are the daughter of a nobleman? Perhaps it is time that someone, at least, treated you as such. Please, eat.”

Cinderella hesitated fearfully, then picked up one of the grapes and pressed it to her lips for a moment before biting through the skin. Sweet juices filled her mouth, and she gave an unbidden smile at the memories of her childhood it bought flooding back.

“There,” said Christopher, “that’s better.”

After a while she forgot that she was not supposed to eat such as this – save for the occasional leftovers that Benson kept for her, of course. They started talking again, about the garden, the food, and before she knew it she was talking about her childhood, the things she remembered, what a good man her father had been. For the most part, Christopher simply listened, a distant smile on his face as he sat enthralled in her tales and the animation of her features as she talked about riding as a child, remembering the horses, or going down to see the sea, the beaches far from bustle of the city port. He suggested that perhaps one day she would again, and she simply laughed.

She teased more information out of him. He enjoyed riding, and the outdoors, but also reading and the study of history. He was coy about whether he had wishes for his future, and she supposed that she understood such, but he did say, somewhat wistfully, that he wished he would be able to travel some day, to see what in the world could be bought to the Kingdom that might improve it. She nodded eagerly as he spoke.

“And what of you, Cinderella? Surely—”

He got no further before there were the sounds of footsteps and crashing through plants behind them. Both of them whirled, Christopher frowning, Cinderella with a growing aura of fear, as from the undergrowth the voice emerged:

“Your Highness? Your Highness, are you here?”

“The Grand Duke,” muttered Christopher beneath his breath, getting to his feet. “Damn him...”

Cinderella felt as if she was falling as she got to her feet. She stumbled backwards, into the dipping fronds of the willow, lips parting and shutting again as she stared in horror at Christopher. He turned to face her, reaching out pleadingly, and she could not back away more quickly than he crossed to her and took hold of her hands again. So soft... of course they were a Prince’s hands.

“It does not matter,” he said, as fiercely as his grip was gentle. “It does not matter, Cinderella. I am still but Christopher, and—”

“Your Highness!” came the slightly desperate call. Closer now. Cinderella had seen the Grand Duke once, when he was giving orders to the butler and the first footman. “Please! Your father begs your presence!”

“I did not know,” she said desperately.

Suddenly he embraced her, drawing her head to his chest. She could smell his cologne, feel the fine finish of his jacket, the way that one hand cradled the back of her head. Her head fit so perfectly against his shoulder; unconsciously she curled into him in return. It was only for a moment though, and then he drew away again, leaving her staring up at him desperately.

“It does not matter. I will find a way back to you.”

He kissed her on the lips, sweetly, chastely, and she felt herself go weak at the knees.

“Light a candle at your window for me, Cinderella,” he said. “I will find a way back to you.”

And then he turned and strode towards the sound of the voice that was desperately seeking him, and Cinderella shook in utter bewilderment and fear and blossoming love.

For a while she was too frightened to leave the gardens, and eventually she crept back to the Palace with her head bowed, ignoring Benson’s cheerful greeting. Tears were starting in her eyes as she hurried up the stairs, and she was anticipating the second bout of tears in what felt like a very short time indeed by the time that she hurried into her room, tearing her bonnet off her head and her gloves from her hand, hair falling in messy chunks around her.

“Ella!” Hettie cried. Cinderella looked up in surprise, tears sitting on her cheeks though she had not realised that they had fallen, and found herself enfolded in the second embrace that day. Hettie gathered the younger girl to her bosom as the tears finally won out and Cinderella sobbed, held beneath hushing and soothing murmurs by this woman who had been a stranger when they had been given the same room.

She was guided to her bed and sat there for a while, taking great gulps of air as the fit of tears passed, and a handkerchief was pressed into her hands. “Thank you,” she said weakly, wiping at her cheeks. Hettie was gently removing the other pins from her hair, letting it fall freely down her shoulders, then gathering it into one simple braid.

“There we go, Cinders, there we go,” she said softly. “Now, what’s this about, then?”

“It...” Cinderella tried to speak, managed mostly another dry sob. With a hiccough, she blurted: “He...”

“Ah...” Hettie bent to pick the gloves off the floor and folded them onto Cinderella’s pillow. “Come now, come on.” She sat down again, threw her arm around the younger girl’s shoulders, and gave her a squeeze. “Oh, it always feels like the end of the world, doesn’t it? What happened, hmm?” Cinderella did nothing but shake her head. “All right, all right. Come now, you’ve the rest of the evening to mourn him, and then work tomorrow to distract you. We’ve all been there.”

“What can I do, Hettie?” she asked. She twined the handkerchief so tightly around her fingers the skin was turning white, lip trembling. This week had been too much, too fast, it seemed. “I thought...”

Hettie sighed. “They all say one thing and do another, Cinders. Oh, Cinderelly, Cinderelly...” She clasped the girl to her breast once again, and rocked her gently, and did not ask a single question more.

By the time that she slept, it was in exhaustion. By the time that she woke, it was numbly, and with that same numbness she found herself going about her tasks. For the next few days it was so, and it was not until the next Sunday, a full week having passed, that as she was changing the candles in one of the guest rooms she thought properly of Christopher again.

She rolled the stubs of candles in her hand; they could have burnt a little longer, but the Palace would rather not have them burnt down too low. Many of the servants took home the short candles instead. Cinderella slipped one into the pocket of her apron, alongside the key to her room and the ribbon there, and then continued on. After all, it would not do to have to work into the afternoon when it was supposed to be free, simply because she had not finished her chores.

Hettie returned from her family exhausted, but Cinderella could not sleep and as darkness became more full in their little room she finally gave in. Throwing aside the blankets that were barely necessary in the warmth of the summer, she padded barefoot to the window and cracked it open slightly. Barely a breeze came in; the air was still and humid this year. She had set the candle in a saucer earlier, but now lit it with trembling hands, and set it at the edge of the sill where it could be seen outside. She did not hold out much hope for it changing anything, but sometimes... sometimes you had to do things all the same.

Two more days passed, and the candle finally guttered out into a pool of warm wax. It was still soft to the touch the next morning when Cinderella found it there, in the pre-dawn twilight, wholly spent. She bowed her head, accepting, and was about to leave the room when there was a knock at the door.

Fear gripped her. Had she somehow been discovered? Hettie peered out from beneath the narrow screen they used for a modicum of privacy whilst washing in the morning, frowning, a dripping sponge in one hand. For a moment Cinderella remained frozen in place, then Hettie said, “Ella, please answer that,” and she found herself moving again.

How she found the composure to open the door, she could not say. But she opened it, to find outside one of the scullery boys, flour on his collar and his face shining. He extended a grubby hand towards her, a letter clutched in it.

“Who is it?” asked Hettie, still from behind the screen.

“N-nothing,” replied Cinderella. She reached into her bodice, produced a hapenny, and dropped it into the boy’s outstretched hand. A wide grin split his face as he gave her the letter and then disappeared away again.

On the front, in elegant writing: Ella Tremaine.

None knew her surname here. Cinderella’s eyes widened, then hastily she hid the letter inside her bodice, before Hettie looked out again with frustration in her features. “Well? What is going on out there?”

“One of the serving boys looking for trouble,” she half-lied.

“Well, I daresay he knew that he’d get none from you,” replied Hettie, her voice sounding a little smug as well as a little relieved. She disappeared behind the screen one more time, raising her voice a little to make up for it. “You’ve had no worse trouble than being told off for singing! Some of the little rotters could learn a lot from you, I’ll say.”

Despite herself, Cinderella laughed. “Well, I’d best get started for the day. Millie hasn’t Eugenia’s skill with a broom, sadly, so I’ll likely be keeping an eye on her again...”

“The girl is twelve, Cinderella.”

“So were we once,” she replied. It came out gaily, but a sadness caught at Cinderella’s heart for a second, and she decided that if she could get some sweet dough from Benson for the girl, she would. With a wave that Hettie could not have seen, she left the room, the letter that she concealed feeling warm and crisp against her skin.

My dearest Cinderella,

It grieves me beyond all possibilities of expression that I did not illuminate you earlier in our meetings of my true status. In my defence I can claim only my fear that you would not wish to talk with me; selfish though this wish may have been, I beg of you to understand its motivation. Like the child of Vesta, blesséd by Artemis, you appeared before me; a goddess in the guise of a serving girl. And have the gods not always appeared so to Men, not least in the cases of those fairest of them?

Cinderella, Ella Tremaine, I cannot bid you fly from my mind. My thoughts on rising are of you, and when I sleep no visage but yours can cool my fevered dreamings. I regret beyond all powers of Mankind the situation in which I have left you, and yet – forgive this impetuous soul for its saying so – the only wish that I hold within my aching heart is to set eyes upon your gracious form again.

I beseech you not to spurn me from your sweet embrace. Already you have hold of my heart and all my faculties; I wish only that I could grant you more. No Palace nor castle nor fair mansion could ever be enough for you, and yet I wish that I could gift unto you these and more. My live began afresh from the moment that I first came within your presence, and I dread the thought that we may lose each other and all this also may be lost to us.

I will take it upon myself to find my way to you again. By the promises of all the stars, and though all the Kingdom may rise up against me, I will not allow us to be lost.

Yours in all utterness,

Christopher

His handwriting was beautiful. Strange that such a thing should be so strong in her notice, though perhaps it came from the slowness with which she was able to read the beautiful words which he had sent to her. Finally she read it, though even then could barely bring herself to believe, and realisation set her dancing and twirling with her hands outstretched until she fell dizzy to her bed, to sleep deep and peaceful for the first time since she had thought Christopher taken from her.

In the days that followed she was buoyant, but impatient, and Hettie tutted and laughed alternately at the way in which the moods of her young friend seemed to change. Of what had transpired, though, Cinderella said nothing, and it was doubtless put down to nothing more than the variance of youth.

Nonetheless, for all her desire nothing came to pass, at least until one late evening when, sweat on her brow and coal-dust on her hands, she was finishing again cleaning one of the rooms. Poor Millie, homesick and lost, was being comforted by Hettie whilst Cinderella dealt with the end of the work for them both. She was just straightening up from arranging the fire when the door opened.

Cinderella shot to her feet, bowing her head, preparing to curtsey and mumble an apology. Only then, beneath the strands of hair, did she glance up to see the figure in the doorway.

“Cinderella,” he said softly.

For a moment she looked at him in disbelief. “Christopher? Oh!” Trying to hide behind her hand, she turned her face away, cheeks burning red. “Please, I cannot let you see me like this!”

A gentle hand wrapped around her wrist to draw her hand away, fingers coming beneath her chin to bring her eyes to his. Their gazes met and warmth ran through her, an unintended smile coming to her lips.

Christopher stroked her cheek gently. “I care not,” he said.

Again he kissed her. His mouth tasted of fine food and wine, his lips soft against hers as he cupped her cheek and gently drew them into each other. Her hands crept onto his shoulders, his arm around her back to press her to his chest, and Cinderella gave a little gasp as his tongue slipped into her mouth. Then it was exploration, tentative searching, her hands running over the soft fabric of the white shirt that he wore.

She had heard some of the other maids giggling and swapping their bawdy stories, of boys and men and beds, but had always blushed and hurried away before she could be drawn into such conversations. Followers were not allowed, though of course many of the acts talked of were far more than following, and Cinderella had seen no reason before now to move away from the rules.

But her body knew what her mind did not, and as she became breathless with Christopher’s kisses both of them sought more of each other. He fumbled with her bodice; she left coal-dust smears on his beautiful linen shirt as she pulled it from his chest; he all but caressed the skirt from her hips; she knelt to take the boots from his feet. The bed was cold when they reached it, but became quickly warm, as with clumsy but desperate hands and mouths they sought each other’s bodies. Christopher’s muscles were firm beneath her touch, his skin darkened with sun, fine curls of hair across his chest and arms and down beneath his navel where Cinderella ran her fingers. In return he kissed her breasts and stomach and hands, despite their rough texture and the calluses from years of work on hard floors, and brushed her sweat-damp hair from her eyes to kiss her brow. And there was a little pain, and a little blood upon the thick brocade, but then his touch melted her and all thoughts fled by the time that she lay, cooling and on fire, in his arms.

The candles in the room lit it only dimly, the fire playing red against their skin. Cinderella twined their fingers together, watching the alternation of their hands, wondering how it had been so simple for things to feel this right. Her head was tucked into his shoulder, breasts against his side, one leg hooked over this as if to keep the last fragments of that fire between them. Outside an owl called.

“I am sorry,” said Christopher finally. In their lovemaking he had been more verbose, whispering her name and her beauty and promises that she could not even remember, and she had been desperately quiet with better ideas of what to do with her mouth. But then there had been silence, and though it had been comfortable at first it had turned almost pained.

She shifted to face him, his expression troubled, the fire putting shadows that made him look far older than the eighteen years she knew he held. “What do you mean?” she said softly.

Christopher turned to face her, running one hand along her jaw. “I do not know what to do next,” he said softly. “And for that I am sorry. You deserve so much more than this... artlessness.”

“I would have nothing else than this,” she replied, her arm laying across his chest almost possessively. “There is no more, nothing more than perfection.”

He kissed her again, slowly and tenderly, and a fluttering aftershock of warmth ran through her. “Then what are we to do?” he whispered.

“We have made no plans before now,” she whispered back. “I see no reason why we cannot continue without them.”

Of course, there were a thousand reasons. But she locked them away into her heart, and kissed Christopher over and over again, and as their bodies once more found each other she could almost believe that this could somehow continue.

Summer waned, and Fall bought soft colours and stripped out the leaves of the garden which they had often escaped too. It became more difficult as the seasons turned to find time together, stolen in empty rooms or the garden, to talk or sit in silence or hold each other tightly. In desperation their affair continued; and Cinderella knew that such a word was only appropriate, for stolen nights and desperate kisses and fumbling hands and mouths and promises. Christopher could not hide how troubled he was, and Cinderella faked a lightness of heart for him, but sometimes when she crept back to her room in the darkness and saw Hettie sleeping soundly it was hard not to give in to despair.

Winter came, with snow and ice, and for a while things became easier as there were fewer guests and less demand was made upon Christopher’s time. But then the King and Christopher both were called away to the neighbouring Duchy for matters of diplomacy, and Cinderella sat lonely at her window to watch the snow fall and took solace only in the fact that they looked still upon the same skies.

By the time that he returned, it was almost spring, and her sixteenth birthday finally neared. The first tentative leaves were appearing on the trees, the first snowdrops breaking through the ground, when they crept from the Palace to the reappearing gardens, and sat again beside that bubbling stream where he had first admitted himself to her, this time with a blanket around their shoulders and their heads tilted together.

Christopher’s shoulders were stiff, and when she kissed him he seemed unwilling to respond; eventually Cinderella took hold of both his hands in hers and turned her blue eyes upwards beseechingly. “Please,” she said, “what troubles you?”

“The Duchy of Calôn is rich,” he replied, “and their family is ancient. My father... wishes to create an alliance with them.”

For the first time, Cinderella could see a dampness in his eyes, and with terror in her heart she reached up to brush beneath his eye. Her hand came away dry, though she knew not how. No words could make it past her lips.

“He has decided that I will marry the daughter of the Duke,” said Christopher finally. His eyes closed, and his voice cracked as he said: “Her n-name is Magdalena de Calôn, and she is marriageable. My father wishes us wed by midsummer.”

There was nothing to say. Despite the blanket around their shoulders, Cinderella felt cold creep over her skin, through her pores, seemingly into her very bones. Her vision blurred and she took a moment to realise that it was with tears as arms wrapped around her and Christopher held her painfully close, and for the first time in her young life she felt true desolation as if only now, with something to lose, could she understand what it was that she almost had.

Without words, they seemed to know what was to come. Days and weeks crept by, and she did not see Christopher again, save for from a distance when the servants crept down to see the great balls and celebrations that were being held. Cinderella withdrew into herself, returning to her work as if she could clean away her own pain, and for all that Mary or Hettie or Benson would question her she did not reply.

In the May, Hettie left the service of the Palace to be married, and Cinderella left the Palace for one more Sunday afternoon in order to be at the wedding. Hettie, radiant in her best dress and with a bouquet of early blossoms, hugged her just once, very tightly, before disappearing into the crowd that were to celebrate at her new house. Cinderella, although invited, returned early to the Palace and sat with her book open on her lap, not seeing the words and barely knowing that the pictures were there. The next week, Hettie’s replacement arrived, a scrawny girl of nine with a birthmark on her cheek and a foul-tempered reticence that Cinderella, in her hopelessness, did not have the time to gently break down.

Midsummer neared. She watched the flowers in the gardens multiply, the roses pruned, the castle cleaned more thoroughly than ever in preparation for the announcement of the Prince’s betrothal. Whispers flew through the Paris that a ball was to be held on the first of July for the announcement to be made, although covert preparations for the wedding itself were already being arranged. Magdalena had yet to return to the Palace, but all knew already that it was to be she, and girls were vying for the position of lady’s maid to the new Princess.

Sometimes the work became so heavy that even on Sundays Cinderella was forced to work from sun-up to sun-down, sweeping and polishing, lighting fires and doing laundry, even running errands in the town as it dawned on her that there were fewer and fewer female servants older than she. On one such day, in a horse-drawn carriage with two other maids, she passed Hettie in the street and forced a smile and faint wave in return to her friend’s enthusiastic smile.

It was that night that the dreams began.

Dreams of dancing and music, of lights and beauty. Dreams of beautiful dresses and jewels and just beauty, abstracted and distilled. She dreamt of dancing through light that flowed like water around her, and of Christopher, and of being gathered into his arms once again. She dreamt of Christopher reaching down in a halo of light to her darkness and drawing her, so gently, so easily, out of it to stand beside him. She dreamt of hope.

And awoke in despair.

The dreams continued for two weeks. June peaked, and began to fade, and the reality of the Ball came closer and closer as an ache grew in Cinderella’s heart. And yet, somehow, something inside her was changing. The fear and misery within her began to dull, to change, to emerge as a fire of determination. Her wistful longing for Christopher’s face became a determination again. And at night she would take out the letter he had sent her, almost a year ago now, and remembered what they had promised to each other.

That a way would be found.

The day before the Ball arrived, a Sunday, and the Palace was more abuzz than ever. Cinderella rose in the small hours, before light had even started to emerge in the sky, and fought through the morning with a relentless speed that shocked even Mary. By noon her chores were not yet done, and frustration was beginning to channel through her, but bowing her head once again she finished her work and fled the Palace with a coat undone on her shoulders and hope and a small purse clutched in her hands.

She made her way down into the city, to Hettie’s house, and hammered at the front door with a fist still red raw from scrubbing walls and floors. It was Hettie’s husband that opened the door, a sweet man and older than her, with a young child from his previous wife whom Hettie adored. Cinderella asked for Hettie, and she appeared, her face glowing with domesticity and her clothes worn but well made still.

“Cinderella? What on Earth is it?” she asked.

Cinderella swallowed, then clenched her fists. “I need your help,” she replied.

She told Hettie everything. With what she planned, there was no point in pretending otherwise, and for all that the woman stared in slack-jawed amazement it was plain to see that she could not imagine Cinderella, of all people, fabricating such a story. The words tumbled furiously as the rickety coach they were in made its way through town, out to the leafy suburbs where once, and only once, had Cinderella recently been sent on one of the errands which she had been given.

She started with Christopher. With meeting him, with their falling in love, and she disguised the truth only in making it seem later than in reality that his rank came out. Hettie sat in astonishment as Cinderella charted in words their affair, its ending, the desperate love which she knew that they still had for each other. And then her plan: in all her years she had not told Hettie of her youth, before the Palace, and like most there it had been assumed that she was a child of poor family who had no option but to send her into servitude. When she told her true story, Hettie’s eyes went wide and she gripped the girl’s arm.

“My mother used to work for the Tremaines! Dear lord above, Ella, why did you not say before?”

“Would you have believed that this girl with rough hands and pauper’s clothes was a noblewoman?” replied Cinderella. “Besides, I did not understand. How could I have? I was a child of seven when they bought me here!”

The coach rattled to a stop as she spoke, and she looked through the window with hope flowering in her eyes. “Here,” she said, leaning across to open the door. “Come on, this is where I need you.”

Hettie followed her from the carriage and watched in astonishment as Cinderella pressed coins into the coachman’s hand. He nodded, sat back in his seat, and started preparing a pipe from his pocket. Cinderella took hold of her friend’s hand and tugged her up the driveway, fine gravel crunching beneath their feet, sun blazing down through thick green foliage. Finally they came up to an ornate pair of gates; beyond, they could see a continued driveway, a courtyard, and the front of a mansion-house.

“Good God,” said Hettie. “Where on Earth is this place?”

Cinderella had stopped before the gates, one hand wrapped around the wrought iron, eyes dimmed with nostalgia. A sad smile spread across her features as she looked into the overgrown grounds, the stone façade of the house still warm pale gold in the summer sun.

“This is the Tremaine Estate,” she replied. “This is where I grew up.”

“How are you going to get inside?” Hettie reached out and rattled the thick iron chain that bound the gate closed. It had rusted slightly with the years, but still stood staunch. “Do you still have keys?”

“No,” Cinderella said. She nodded her head to the side, along the high stone walls that surrounded the house. “This way.”

“Oh, honestly...” Hettie sighed, but dutifully followed the girl round to the right of the gateway, for what seemed like an age in the two yards’ gap between the wall and the woodland surrounding it. Cinderella, in her servant’s dress, did not have to lift her skirt over mud or thorns, but more than once Hettie caught her hems and muttered a curse beneath her breath as she continued.

Finally, Cinderella stopped, pressing at stones in the wall. Around a few of them, mortar had crumbled away, and she pushed a couple to reveal that they slid back a couple of inches into the wall.

“This must be some elaborate prank.”

“My father showed me when I was very young,” replied Cinderella. She put her foot against one, reached up for another, and rocked as if testing them for a moment. “It was our secret way in and out. None of the servants knew about it, nor my Mother... well, Mother probably knew about it, but we pretended that she didn’t. There’s a ladder on the far side that we can use to get down again.”

With that she drew herself up and started climbing, struggling with the unfamiliar moves but with enough strength in her to do so. Every so often she would pause, test a few bricks to find one that moved or slid aside, and then continue up.

“You’re mad!”

“A fool in love!” replied Cinderella, reaching the top of the wall and sitting astride it, hands on the top. “Come on, Hettie. Please!”

Hettie hesitated for a moment, then rolled her eyes and picked up the hems of her skirts to tuck into her waistband. “The things that I do... you could teach the servant boys a thing or two for mischief at this rate, Cinderella! Clearly the lack of my influence... oh, good grief... has had bad effects on you.”

All Cinderella did in response was laugh, slipping over to the ladder on the far side. She half expected the wood to have gone rotten with age, but somehow it was intact enough for her to climb down, the steps creaking a little holding up well. Hettie continued her grumbling all the way up to the top, over and back down again, brushing lichen and dust off her hands as she set foot on solid earth again.

“When I wake up, I’ll have one treat of a dream to tell you about, I swear.”

Cinderella was not listening. She walked across to the lawn, now calf-height and ragged, overgrown with wildflowers, and then hopped in onto one of the stepping stones that had been placed there. For a moment she was a child again, long ago, having to jump from one to another because her legs were not long enough to step. Now, though, she could stride from one to the next, in her head surrounded by trimmed lawns, kept roses, the chatter of people and smell of her father’s pipe-smoke. Hettie followed as a distance as the girl crossed the area of lawn, stopped in the courtyard to run her hand around the stone of a fountain long since gone dry, then turned to the steps and the front doors.

Each step up them felt like the ascent of a mountain. Finally Cinderella reached the front doors, their great heavy locks, and drew from her pocket a key that had warmed with her body heat. She could remember her sixth birthday, her father presenting it to her as if it was the greatest gift in the world, and she had thought it was at the time because it made her a grown up. She had hidden it from her stepmother, folded it into her skirt, forgotten for so many years what it was. And now...

It slid into the lock perfectly. Was harder to turn, but then she heard the sound of the tumblers falling open and a smile spread across her face.

She stood staring at the door for a while, her hand resting on the doorknob. Then Hettie reached past and pushed the door open, and what had started as a gasp turned into a cough as dust assaulted her senses.

“Go on,” said Hettie softly. “Go inside.”

Cinderella’s eyes watered, from the dust she told herself, as she crossed the stoop to stand in the hall once again. Stairs swooped to the upper balcony, doors opened to other rooms; she could still imagine the colour beneath the thick dust on the carpets, the shining wood the banisters had once been. “They really did leave,” she said.

“Pardon?”

“When my stepsisters said that they were leaving... I didn’t think that they were telling the truth.” She walked to the foot of the stairs, gently touching the newel. Dust came off on her fingers to show the rich dark oak beneath. “They used to lie to me a lot. But I suppose... they really have gone.”

“How long has it been?”said Hettie.

“Nine years.” She started to walk up the stairs, her footsteps – however soft – echoing in the empty room. At the top of the flight, a portrait: a handsome man, dressed smartly, standing with a knowing smile on his face and his hand on the shoulder of his wife. She was pretty, delicate, with pale blonde ringlets and a delicate frame. And then the babe in arms; she had lived to see her daughter’s fifth birthday, but no further, succumbing just days later to a fever that Cinderella had never known the name of. “And I should still have been in mourning clothes.”

To this, Hettie said nothing, but followed Cinderella through the dull hallways, cut with shafts of light that crept between heavy curtains. To the very end of the house, up another flight of stairs; Cinderella did not have to think twice, or to look round. Finally they came to a room with a pretty plaque upon the door, the word Ella in curling font and surrounded by small flowers. A pause, a smile, and then Cinderella pushed open the door to another dark room.

“I need some light,” she murmured, crossing hastily to the windows. She threw them open, letting bright sunlight wash into the room, and Hettie had to blink and let her eyes adjust.

By the time that they did, Cinderella was standing in the middle of the room again, her arms hugged tightly around herself. “This was my mother’s room,” she said softly. “She loved the sunlight, so my Father had this room made up for her... when she was ill.” Tears came into her eyes, and she had to swallow them back. “For a while, we all thought it would work, and then...”

She brushed at her eyes with the back of her hand, and looked around again. The bed, the armoire, the nightstand, the screen... all untouched. As if not even ghosts had been in this room since her mother had died.

“Is this what you came for?” said Hettie.

“No, not exactly... perhaps,” Cinderella conceded. If she closed her eyes she could smell the lavender her mother used to fill vases with to sweeten the air in the room. She opened the doors of the armoire, then stepped back in horror. “No... no!”

Hettie crossed to stand beside her. “What is it?”

“They’re gone! Her dresses, her things...” She looked around desperately, as if the clothes she had expected to find there would magically appear again, then tears came to her eyes. Suddenly she knew. “Oh no, oh no... my stepmother...”

This time there was nothing to say. A hand settled on her shoulder for a moment, but she threw it aside, all but storming to the bed. A white sheet still covered it, and dust rose as she sat down heavily, putting her head into her hands. “Oh, fool indeed...”

Hettie stood before her for a moment, then knelt down, patting her on the knee as Cinderella buried her face in her palms. “Now, come on, surely there’s... ow!” Frowning, she drew away slightly from the object against which her knee had bumped, then she pushed aside the sheet. “Tch, a travelling case.”

She was about to push it away, when a hand covered hers. “Stop,” said Cinderella gently. She got to her feet again, motioning for Hettie to back away, then drew out the travelling case and set it upright. She hesitated for a moment, then opened it, giving a gasp – this one not of horror – as she looked inside. A relieved expression came to her, a look of salvation, and she reached in to draw out the dress inside.

“Her wedding dress.”

The words were barely audible. Cinderella held the dress against herself, the white silk falling against her body, sweet lace around the neckline.

“It’s all here... all her wedding things...”

“This is what you came for,” said Hettie finally, understanding dawning in her eyes. Cinderella turned to face her, still holding the dress against herself, cheeks flushed though her eyes were red with tears or the holding back of them. Then further insight: “You’re going to the Ball.”

“A servant can do nothing... but perhaps a noblewoman would be worthy.”

They paused for a moment longer, looking at each other in utter astonishment at their own fortune, then Hettie was the first to break the silence with a peal of laughter. “Cinderella, I will never know another like you. Come on! We’ve only got tonight to ensure that the dress will fit you! And how we’re going to get that travelling case over the wall remains to be seen...”

Somehow they had wrestled it back out over the wall, with the help of some rope. The driver of the carriage looked at them strangely, but more coins in his palm quelled the questions on his tongue, and he returned them to Hettie’s house just long enough for her to kiss her husband goodnight before they both continued on up to the Palace. Benson, of all people, was in the night kitchen, and though he shook his head in astonishment he waved them quickly on before Mary could catch them, and they made it to Cinderella’s room, case still intact, with nothing more than sore arms and quick breathing to chastise them.

“Do you have a tailor’s dummy?” asked Hettie. Cinderella looked at her pointedly. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I forget already what it was like to work here... come on then, put the dress on and we’ll have a look.”

Since leaving the Palace, Hettie sewed for a little money to supplement her husband’s income, and in her brief visit home had collected her sewing equipment. Now she stood Cinderella on a box in the centre of the room, the beds pushed up against the walls, and set to work with pins and tape as the light outside began to dim, pausing only to light the candles in order to better see what she was doing.

“You’ll never have the latest fashion in this, Ella,” she said through the needle and thread in her mouth, touching up a fragment of hem that had fallen loose. “It’s twenty years old and more!”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Cinderella. “I’m not a servant in this dress.”

“That’s true,” said Hettie, more softly this time. “Now keep still whilst I work out what we’re going to do with this bustle... I can move the fabric round, but there’s only so much I’ll be able to change.”

“Please, keep it.”

Hettie looked up, brows moving slightly, to see a pained look on Cinderella’s face.

“It’s my mothers. I... don’t really want to change it too much. Just make it fit.”

A nod. “All right, then.” Hettie went back to her pins, shifting the fabric round Cinderella’s narrow waist, noting how it was straining a little at the bust and would need to be let out, when the door to the room opened. Both women looked round, shocked and guilty, to see Victoria, dark shadows under her eyes and a scowl on her lips, staring at them from the doorway.

“What are you doing?” she demanded, with a shrewishness far beyond her years. “You aren’t supposed to be in here.”

“Hettie is a friend of mind,” said Cinderella quickly, clasping her hands together in front of her. Even with her hair simply pulled into a bun, she looked ethereal in the old dress, like a ghost herself. “She’s helping me with the dress... oh please, Victoria, don’t tell anyone.”

The girl closed the door behind her, still glaring. “Why are you messing with that dress? We’ve got work to be doing tomorrow.”

“It’s... a long story,” said Cinderella with a sigh. For a moment she thought that she saw a softening in Victoria’s expression, a hint of interest, and she licked her lips before adding: “Though perhaps I should get used to telling it. I was sent to the Palace after my parents died, by my stepmother. But I was not always a servant, and, well...” she hesitated for a moment, but this time there was definitely a flicker of curiosity. “I’m going to reclaim my birth right,” she said, surprised to find her voice trembling slightly. “And the man I love.”

For the first time in the month and more that she had been here, Victoria’s expression softened. It took years away from her as she stared up at Cinderella, the wraith-like figure in white. “Like something out of a fairytale?” she asked.

“I suppose so,” said Cinderella, smiling shyly.

“Not if we don’t get this dress done by morning,” said Hettie, breaking the moment between the two. “Don’t mind us, Victoria, you get some sleep. We need to get this done.”

They worked until dawn, the light coming in at the window a relief for eyes that had spent the whole night working by candles. Finally, though, the dress was finished, the headdress cleaned, the shoes prepared. Hettie had marvelled at how beautiful, and how delicate, it all was, and Cinderella had hugged her and almost cried in relief that there seemed to be even a chance. Even Victoria, on waking from her deep sleep, had looked at the dress hung from the beams in the ceiling and smiled. Cinderella yawned and rubbed at her tired eyes, only for a knock to come at the door and all three to look round sharply.

“I’d best get that...” said Cinderella slowly, stepping away from the dress and opening the door just a crack. “Hello?”

Mary was outside, looking more tired than ever with the increasing pressure of arranging things for the Ball. “Oh, you’re awake, mercy me. Cinderella, I’m so sorry to say this, but the Lady Magdalena has insisted that you be her maid for the Ball this evening. She will not have any other, says that after what happened last time you’re the only one she can trust.”

“Mary, I can’t, I—”

“Cinderella, she is throwing things around her room. You will go to her, and you will do what she says, and Lord have mercy do not make this the first time in all of your years here that you have been wilful. Do you understand me?”

Cinderella looked at her open-mouthed, fear crashing down upon her.

“Do you understand me, Cinderella?”

She nodded, and replied in a small voice: “Yes, Mary.”

Without even an acknowledgement of it, Mary nodded, whirled and walked back down the corridor, leaving Cinderella to turn back to Hettie and Victoria with shock written across her face.

“Oh no,” said Hettie. “Not when we’ve done all this work. You go and tend to this Magdalena, and then you come right back here, do you hear me?”

“You don’t understand,” Cinderella said, fists balled and hands held to her chest. “Lady Magdalena is the woman that the Prince is supposed to marry!”

This time it was Hettie who wore the expression of disbelief. Then she stopped, shook her head and pointed to the door. “Do not think of it. Go, do your job, and no matter what comes to pass I have no doubt this will be the last day of it. And this evening, you shall see your Prince again.”

The lights were low, the room dimmed as the fire started to go out. Christopher sat before it, elbows on his knees and chin resting against his folded hands, staring sightlessly into the flames. He knew what was to pass this evening; it was nothing short of an open secret now. The Lady Magdalena de Calôn, beautiful, eligible elder daughter of the Duke of Calôn, was to be officially betrothed to him at the stroke of midnight tonight, in order that they be wed before the month was out.

There was a time, of course, when he would have assented quite willingly. This time last year, perhaps, or just before his eighteenth birthday had come to pass. He had known his duty then, and observed it above all else; his father needed him to marry before too long, to become King himself, and to produce an heir. In that order, of course. And then some day he would need to rule the Kingdom, and would need to do so with a Queen at his side. That was how things worked.

But now... all that he could think of were blue eyes, and fair skin, and a sweet heart in a lost nobleman’s daughter. And no matter how eligible the Lady Magdalena was, he knew that he could not love her.

He buried his face in his hands, wondering how the actions of the last year could have led to this, and sat in silence even as the door to his chambers opened.

“Your Highness?”

The Grand Duke, of course. Christopher raised his head, but did not answer, as the Grand Duke came within the circle of weak firelight.

“Your Highness, the Ball is about to begin. It is required that you are present.”

“Of course, of course,” he said softly. The Grand Duke was looking at him with suppressed concern, an expression that Christopher had become used to seeing in these passing months. How to explain that he had fallen in love? Such was not supposed to happen to a man in his position; he was supposed to marry first, and discover love afterwards, and thus ensure that he was to be happy. “I am coming.”

The Grand Duke fussed and flapped slightly at his shoulder until Christopher waved him away, entering the ballroom to find his father waiting. And then came the usual rigmarole: the introductions, the beginning of the music, the calling of titles and announcements of entrances.

Eventually Lady Magdalena arrived, just late enough to draw attention to herself without appearing rude. Christopher forced a smile to his face as she entered, the music dipping low so that her name could be announced above them before she swept down the stairs. She was wearing deep blue, the colour of the sapphires at her neck and ears, her dress the very height of fashion with its bustled skirts, low neckline showing a sweep of dusky skin, and the neat white lace gloves upon her hand. She walked like nobility, even like royalty, even he had to admit that; her dark hair, dark eyes and rich skin garnered her looks of desire and envy from every angle. But that this had been last year, and he would have been willing to wed her.

She walked straight to him, and curtseyed deeply; he bowed in return, grateful for an excuse to break eye contact. Then he straightened, assumed his role of Prince, and graciously extended one hand to her.

“May I have the honour of dancing the next minuet?”

A ripple of whisper ran through the room; he carefully took no heed of it. Magdalena smiled, and he suspected it was a real smile, and inclined her head.

“Certainly, your Highness.”

A nod to the orchestra, and music gently began to swell again. Christopher took hold of Magdalena’s hand, missing how another hand had sat in his, and led her to the dance floor. It was effort to maintain the smile upon his face as his feet followed the steps of the minuet: forwards and backwards, delicate steps to the side, a bow in the appropriate places. He had been dancing since a child, though he had only more recently developed any sort of taste for it; it took no effort at all to dance through the music, come to an end, bow deeply to the polite smattering of applause that followed.

For the next dance there was another partner, this woman nervous and little and flustered with his attention, and his smile grew a little more true at the thought of how well she would remember her night of dancing with the Prince. He could not begrudge her such. Then a third dance, with another woman, and as he steeled himself to ask Magdalena to dance again the music hushed once more.

Surely there were no more guests to come. Christopher stopped mid-sentence in conversation with the Grand Duke, paused, then turned to face the doorway.

“The Honourable Ella Tremaine,” came the announcement, “daughter of Baron Tremaine.”

The room hushed.

It was not for some time that he realised his mouth had dropped open at the sight of Cinderella at the top of the stairs. She wore a white gown, not bustled as was the fashion but with wide skirts; gold and pearls glimmered at the hem, the bodice, the lace flounced collar. Her shoulders were bare, neckline thrown low, to reveal her soft skin and the delicate line of her neck, unframed by jewellery. Long white gloves clad her arms, white shoes her feet. A fine net of silver filigree, again strewn with pearls, held her hair in place, crowned with white ribbon.

A dream, walking into the room. For the first time in oh, so long, he found himself smiling, warmth spilling around his heart as she looked straight across the room and into his eyes. Whispering filled the room again as she descended the stairs, eyes lowered, hands not touching the hem of her skirt. Who was she, he could hear them whisper. To arrive too late, and without escort, and wearing a dress that went out of style at least twenty years ago. And now she walked straight towards the Prince with her head held high! Well, he could hear them say, whoever this Ella Tremaine is, she will be the talk of the Kingdom before the week is out.

And Cinderella smiles at him across the room, and he does not care. Because they have found each other once again.

They danced too much that night. So much that those whispers became more than whispers, that the Prince is dancing too often with the same girl, that there is a scandal afoot. But neither could care less; though Magdalena grew visibly angry and the King bewildered, though the Grand Duke attempted to reprimand the Prince for his behaviour, though it had been so long since Cinderella danced that more than once she forgot which steps to tread, they danced until her feet ached and the evening had worn well on.

Only then did Cinderella retire to a chair, flushed, breathless and exultant, whilst the Prince – no, whilst Christopher – sought out a glass of wine to refresh her somewhat. She put one hand to her cheek, unable to feel through her glove the old powder and rouge that she and Hettie had found, but knowing that it was there all the same.

“Ella Tremaine,” sneered a voice behind her. Cinderella started, turning in her chair before jumping to her feet with her heart pounding in her chest. She should have known; of course she should have known, with such a grand occasion and such a great Ball. She did not recognise either of the two women standing right behind her chair, at least for a moment, but their mother behind... oh yes, Lady Tremaine was unforgettable, burnt into her nightmares. Which meant that the girls behind her chair, Anastasia and Drizella, wearing identical looks of hatred, could only be darker in their intentions than they had been a decade before.

“Such is my name,” she said, voice trembling slightly. She drew herself up as best she could, but the sight of her stepmother made her want to do nothing more than run. Suddenly she felt seven years old again. “And I will no longer go without answering to it.”

The dark-haired girl sneered, the red-haired one folded her arms across her chest and looked across haughtily. Lady Tremaine looked sternly at Cinderella, hands folded on the head of the walking stick that she carried. “Indeed? Well, personally I would not have a serving girl,” this with a curl of her lip and her voice both at once, “in a hand-me-down dress sullying the name of my husband.”

“Do not speak so of my father,” said Cinderella. Her voice was quiet, but it surprised even her with its coolness. “Do not besmirch his name.”

“My my, what educated words for such a lowly girl,” said Lady Tremaine. “Did you learn them from eavesdropping on those whom you serve?”

Her throat tightened. Cinderella could taste bile in her throat as she stood before them, searching for any words to reply with, when there were footsteps behind her and Christopher appeared. “Is there a problem, ma’am?”

The sudden appearance surprised her too much to do anything, but Anastasia and Drizella immediately spread wide curtseys – ones which, Cinderella could not help but note, seemed a little too obsequious – whilst Lady Tremaine with the stiffness of one hemmed by age dipped at the knee and inclined her head.

“Your Highness,” she said. “It is such an honour to make your acquaintance. May I introduce to you my daughters? Drizella, Anastasia.” She motioned for the two girls to step forwards, suddenly all fluttering fans and coy eyes and quivering bustles. “We returned from abroad in order to attend this Ball, your Highness.”

“May I express my gratitude for your doing so,” Christopher replied calmly. “And I would ask, if I may make so bold, that you pass on to your daughters my appreciation of their rare beauties. If I may interrupt, however, I came to ask Miss. Tremaine for the honour of this waltz.”

Both of the girls seemed to perk up, then their looks of glee turned to horror as the Prince turned to Cinderella and held out his hand to her. All but forgetting the pain in her feet, she quickly took his hand with a bob and a bow of her head, and allowed him to sweep her away from her step-mother and –sisters.

“Your hand is shaking,” he said quietly as he drew her into hold.

“That is my stepmother,” she replied. A glance round to his face caught he frown that spread there. “She is the one who bought me here.”

“I remember.” His voice was lowered, becoming more dangerous, and she felt the vibrations of his words through her chest, burring against her sternum. “How long were she and your father wed?”

“Less than two years,” Cinderella replied.

He nodded. “Very well. You have more claim to the house than she.”

“I would not see them destitute.”

Christopher did not reply for a moment, but his hand squeezed hers. Weakness and tiredness welled in her, and despite the swirling music she wanted for a moment to rest her head upon his shoulder somewhere far from here and quiet. Her feet were aching from the dancing and the day’s work and the shoes that fitted her less than perfectly, and even Christopher’s hand on her shoulder and around her hand could not hide that all from her.

The music swelled to a crescendo, then declined, and she swirled into a deep curtsey, bowing her head in exhaustion. To run, to run far from here, and forget that this had ever occurred...

“Cinderella,” said Christopher, and she looked up a little more sharply than she had intended. “Will you be my wife?”

“What?” she could not believe her ears, and would have forgotten to rise to her feet again had he not reached out, taken hold of her hand once more, and drawn her upright. “Your High-”

“I am but Christopher,” he said. Brown eyes met blue, her hand trembled in his, but before she could draw away he held it more tightly. “Cinderella, Ella Tremaine, whatever name you would use. It is to be announced tonight that I am to be wed. Can I say that it is to be to you?”

She thought she was about to awaken once again, then with tears in her eyes that made the light in the room form a halo around his head she smiled.

“Yes.”

He kissed her hand, before them all, earning shocked whispers afresh. Then whispered, “Go,” and she ran from the room, before anyone could stop her. Holding her skirts aloft and leaving one shoe behind upon the stairwell, heart so light that it felt as if she was going to fly from it. One of the soldiers at the door tried to stop her, but she knew this Palace better than they and slipped into the servant’s passage to run to her room.

Hettie was asleep upon her bed, but awoke as the door was flung open and Cinderella, laughing, blushing, shaking, burst into the room.

“What is it?” she declared, getting to her feet.

Cinderella swooped her into an embrace, despite her squeak of protest. “It... we...” she broke off into more laughter, unable to complete a full sentence. Hettie steered her down onto the bed, where she lay back with her arms thrown above her head, staring up towards the ceiling. “We are to wed,” she said finally, sweetly, her voice like singing.

“You are what?” said Hettie bluntly.

“Wed! Christopher asked me... oh, if this is a dream, let it continue for all eternity.”

There was a moment’s silence, uncomfortable, and Cinderella’s smile faded slightly. She propped herself up on her elbows to look across to Hettie, strands of hair starting to fall free from her hairnet to curl around her cheeks. “What is it?” she asked.

“Daughter of a Baron or no, I do not know what chance you could have, Cinderella. He was supposed to be wed to a Lady, and...”

In an instant, Cinderella was on her feet again. “I have done what I can,” she cried. And for a moment she thought that she might fall to tears once again, but in a deep shuddering breath she controlled herself once again. Her voice became lowered, calm. “I have done what I can. Now it is his turn.”

Hettie looked uncertain, but moved to hug her friend once again. They stood there in the darkened room for a while, perhaps praying in some silent way, until the knock at the door came that they had known was coming all along.

Midsummer. The gardens of the Palace had been thrown open the wedding, white roses and pink dahlias blooming, lavender filling the air with its intensely sweet scent. At the edge of the lake, the Prince waited, dress in his finest regalia, finally with a smile upon his face after so long.

Cinderella wore her mother’s dress. She had not been sure whether she had wanted a Lady’s maid or not, but the Prince had insisted, and it had been the strangest thing in the world to awaken before dawn but to not have to rise. Christopher had promised that their honeymoon would be spent in her father’s house, bought from Lady Tremaine and now being cleaned and aired ready for use.

The only difference in clothing were the shoes, this time perfectly fitting her feet. Even so, as she descended from the pagoda in a cloud of flower petals, her arm looped through Christopher’s, one slipped from her foot. She turned with a surprised laugh to find the King kneeling before her, silver silk slipper cradled in his hands.

Blushing, she proffered her foot for him to slide the slipper onto. “Your Majesty,” she said softly, bobbing as if about to curtsey again, when he looked up with a smile in his eyes and stopped her with the barest raising of his hand.

“You are my daughter now,” he said.

Cinderella smiled afresh, and bent slightly to kiss him on the forehead. “Then I have two fine fathers,” she replied.

Then Christopher took her hand again and, in a further whirl of petals, whisked her away. To a world just far enough from, and just close enough to, her past.

...and they lived happily ever after.