“Harper’s mam,” I breathe.
On the other side of Sir Stephen I see that Harper’s mother, strangely, is blushing.
“Aye, and you were such a fine music teacher,” she murmurs. “Teaching me so I could teach my lad. I couldn’t believe my good fortune, you giving me the harp, and then giving me the lessons for free. . . .”
“Weren’t you afraid that that would endanger Harper?” I ask sharply. I shoot a glance back at my friend.
“Yeah, I thought those harp lessons were going to kill me,” Harper mutters.
I shake my head impatiently.
“No, because then he was associated with the royal harp,” I say. “Then the evil forces might have hunted him down—”
It is strange how anxious that thought makes me feel.
“He was a male child, not a female,” Sir Stephen explains, in that same overly patient voice he always used when he thought I was taking too long to understand algebra. “There was no danger that someone would think he was the princess.”
I think about how everyone in the village always whispered about Harper’s mam, wondering where she’d gotten the harp and how she learned to play. Truly, I’m not sure anyone ever asked her directly, because she always seemed so sad. Who would want to add to her pain? Or maybe the entire village just wanted her to stay a mystery, so they’d have something to speculate about.
“It was a calculated risk,” Sir Stephen says. “The harp would be nearby, but not actually in the same cottage as the princess.”
“Thanks a lot,” Harper mutters. “Thanks for ruining my childhood.” He’s wandered over to peer down at the harp, which fell to the floor with Lord Throckmorton. Nobody has bothered it to pick it up or set it right. I’m almost expecting Harper to give it a kick, just like all those other annoyed, angry, hateful kicks I’ve seen him give it over the years. Instead he kneels down and pats it, like it’s a beloved pet that’s about to die.
“Uh, Eelsy?” Harper says. “I think you just broke your own royal object.”
I look down, and the harp does look shattered. The frame is twisted and warped, and splinters stick out where the wood cracked against Lord Throckmorton’s head. A few strings have popped off.
“Can’t it be fixed?” I ask, because now it’s not just my friend’s harp; it’s also the last remnant of my mother’s love for me. If I believe that story.
Harper plucks a string, which gives a forlorn, out-of-tune peal and then falls off.
“Oops,” Harper says. He bends closer. “What’s this?”
He’s pulling a tightly coiled scroll of yellowed parchment out of the cracked frame. As soon as he’s freed it, he begins unrolling the page.
I read over his shoulder as each word comes clear: “‘Last words . . . and . . . confessions . . . of . . . Charlotte . . . Aurora . . . Serindia . . . Marie,’” I say. I gasp as Harper unrolls the last bit, and three more words appear: “queen of Suala.”
32
Within seconds everyone is clustered around me. Even the feeblest of the knights somehow manages to leap up from the bed and crowd in close.
“Now, now, give the young lady some room,” the captain of the royal guard scolds, and at least then everyone edges back a little so I can breathe. I see that the captain is looking at me with new respect—because the queen’s note came out of my royal object?
I am still having trouble breathing, and it has nothing to do with the people crowded around me.
“That is the queen’s writing,” Sir Stephen says, peering over my shoulder at the parchment document. “I remember it well.”
The script is perfectly formed, and completely free of blots. Of course.
“Read it out loud,” Nanny urges.
“‘I, Charlotte Aurora Serindia Marie . . ., ’” I begin, and then stop, because I’m thinking, She had the same middle names as I do! Does that prove anything? I can’t decide if I should point that out.
“Oooh, my middle names are ‘Aurora Serindia Marie,’” one of the other girls says.
“So are mine,” practically all of the other girls say at once. Even Desmia.
Okay, no big deal, I think. Obviously all of the knights had the same idea, passing along those names.
I take a deep breath, and keep reading:
I, Charlotte Aurora Serindia Marie, queen of Suala, being of sound mind and much less than sound body, feel compelled to put pen to paper to tell my tale. I am certain that I have little time left, and even now I fear that I may be dooming others to a fate as dire as my own. But whosoever shall someday read these words, please know that I have never had anything but the most hopeful and merciful of intents.
I begin my tale in happier days, when my husband, King Bredan the Third, took the throne of Suala at the death of his much beloved but long-ailing uncle. Though my husband ruled with a fair and kind hand, a small number of jealous rivals were determined to stir up discontent, and they challenged his claim to the throne. Of greatest concern, they said, was the fact that my husband and I were yet childless, though we had been married for more than two years.
So it was with great joy last September that I told my husband that he could announce to all of Suala that I was with child. In the ensuing months I dreamed often of the coming child and paid much less attention to the troublesome affairs of state. I wanted nothing but to be around children; my greatest joy was to visit the children of Cortona in their homes, in their schools, even in the orphanage. But it disturbed me to think that my child would be dressed in the finest clothes, eat the finest foods, receive nothing but the finest care, while many of the children I saw were barely able to survive. I asked my husband for more money from the royal treasury for the orphanage in particular, as the poor motherless children there broke my heart. But alas, the royal treasury had been depleted by the war with Fridesia, the same war that has consigned so many children to their orphaned state. My husband and I fell into a harsh dispute, the most serious of our marriage. It was with heavy heart that I fought with him, day after day, but my joy knew no bounds when he began to take my side. What followed was a time of many meetings and negotiations for my husband, as he planned to do everything he could to end the Fridesian War.
“What?” Ella explodes behind me. “But—if that was fourteen years ago, that never—”
“Let’s hear the rest,” Sir Stephen says, blinking his wise old eyes at her.
I look back at the parchment, and read on:
We announced the birth of our child, our beloved daughter, on April the thirtieth, a day of great rejoicing and celebration throughout the kingdom.
“Doesn’t she say the baby’s name?” one of the knights interrupts.
“Did you skip over my name?” a girl asks. “You did it on purpose, didn’t you—you’re trying to cheat, you—”
“If I was trying to cheat anyone,” I say through gritted teeth, “don’t you think I would have pretended the queen wrote my own name in there?” I hold up the parchment for all to see. “Look. It doesn’t say the princess’s name at all, just”—I swallow a lump in my throat—“just ‘our beloved daughter.’”
There are a few moments of jostling—everyone trying to see the parchment—and then they all fall silent.
I go back to reading.
Alas, I have come to the sad part of my tale, sadness upon sadness. I can hardly bear to write this; the quill trembles in my hand. Such suffering as I have known, in such a short span of time . . .
Two nights ago a man entered our royal chambers. In the darkness I could not see his face; I heard no utterance of his voice. All I saw was the flash of a sword’s blade, and then my husband lay dying, and I . . . I was mortally wounded as well. The life ebbs from me with each word I put to paper.
I believe the killer was a man known well to us, a man my husband and our royal guards (who were also slain) would have trusted. I believe my husband must have recognized the man, because Bredan cried out, as he expired, “What? More blood spilled over Fridesia
?” I can only conclude that the killer opposed my husband’s plans to end the war; I am heartsick that my persuasions may have led to my husband’s death, when my intent was only to prevent the loss of other lives.
I would weep for my husband, my Bredan, but there is not time for that. My time on this earth is coming to a close; soon enough I will meet Bredan in heaven, along with the others I have loved and lost. I need only a few more hours of courage, and then my pain will end.
Beginning at daylight the morning after my husband’s death, the knights began to come to me, secretly, alone. The Order of the Crown, the assembly of knights most loyal to the king, is made up of thirteen men; thirteen times I heard a whisper beside my deathbed: “Your Majesty? How can I protect the princess?”
What was I to do? Whom could I trust? What if any of those men were traitors?
I sent them all away. I told them to come back the next day. I prayed that I would have a next day, just one more day in which to make my decision, to take action.
“Wait a minute,” Harper interrupts. “Did I miss something? Where was the baby princess during all this? How did the king and queen keep the assassin from killing the princess, too? See, that’s something I’ve never understood about—”
An entire roomful of knights, would-be princesses, and guards all turn on him at once: “Shh!”
“Keep reading!” Nanny begs.
I obey.
I thought of the children at the orphanage, all those poor, motherless babes I’d seen lying in rickety cribs, crying after food that was never enough. Though my other attempts to help have led to nothing but tragedy, would it be wrong, in my last actions, for me to try to provide for at least some of them? A knight in possession of an infant he believed to be the princess would surely treat her well, would he not?
I sent a trusted maid to the orphanage director. I asked for baby girls, only those young enough that they could pass for newborns. It seemed providential—a sign of divine blessing upon my plan—that the maid returned with exactly the right number of infants.
“You mean—the queen gave out orphans?” Sir Roget demands, sounding appalled. “She passed off common babies from the orphanage as the true princess?” He turns to the girl he must have raised, the one who is at his side holding him up. “Except for you, of course, dear Lucia, because you really are—”
“Perhaps you would let Cecilia finish reading before you draw any conclusions?” Sir Stephen asks in a barbed voice.
Sir Roget shrugs and nods his consent.
I go back to the parchment.
Now I am lying here listening to thirteen happy babies cooing in the royal nursery—such a glorious sound! Such a sound to heal a shattered, grieving heart! But I am beginning to have my doubts about my plan. I will tell each knight to keep each child hidden, to keep her safe above all other goals. I know the knights are disbanding the Order of the Crown and going their separate ways, and this will keep the girls from ever meeting. I will tell each knight that the girl in his care must never attempt to sit on the throne as long as there is any danger—and I believe there will always be danger. I fear our land will be marked by turmoil and bloodshed for generations to come.
And yet, and yet—perhaps these girls can be happy? Perhaps they can be nurtured and loved; perhaps they can grow to become lovely, strong young ladies, as others cannot?
Perhaps some good can come out of evil, some joy from all my sorrows?
Or perhaps . . . I fear even to write this. I have not forgotten that I am not certain that all the knights are trustworthy. I have not forgotten that the evil and greed for power that led to my husband’s death has not been expunged from our kingdom. I pray that I am not consigning any of these girls to a worse life than she would have had in the orphanage.
Strangely, it is Desmia’s face that my eyes stray to at that moment. She stares back at me, an indecipherable expression on her face. I go back to reading.
I pray that these girls will never be used as pawns in political games, as I have sometimes been used, as queen. I pray for them quiet lives out of the public eye, their sorrows few, their joys many—and all of their emotions kept to themselves, not thrown out for the entire kingdom to see.
And yet, I fear . . . I fear . . . Is the darkness I see before me only because my eyes grow dim? Does any hope remain? I must believe that hope remains . . .
I am writing out thirteen copies of this letter. I shall tell each knight that I will send one royal object with the child in his care. These are objects my husband has used for sending out spies; each object contains a secret compartment for hidden messages.
“Hey, Cecilia, guess what!” Harper says. “That means you didn’t actually have to break open your harp to get your message out!”
How can he make jokes at a time like this? I don’t even bother looking up.
I will leave it to God’s will—to his providence? to fate?—to determine when and if my messages will ever be found. I think of you—whoever you are—there in the future, reading this, and I hope you do not judge my actions too harshly.
“Isn’t she ever going to say who the actual true princess is?” the captain of the royal guard asks impatiently.
“Yeah, why would she wait so long to reveal her big news?” Harper agrees.
“Well, maybe because she thought it would be obvious, because the true princess would be so clearly different from the ordinary orphans,” one of the girls says. I don’t know her name—I decide I don’t want to know anything about her.
“Or maybe she’ll just say that she gave the true princess to the most trusted knight, the man she was sure would never be a traitor,” one of the knights says. “The queen always liked me.”
“Can’t you just skim forward a bit, until you come to the princess’s name?” another knight says. “Just look for ‘Porfinia’; it’s P-O-R . . .”
I gasp, and that silences him. I’m already reading ahead. I’ve already read quite far enough.
“What is it?” the royal captain asks. “Can you see—who’s the true princess?”
I look up at all those hopeful faces, all those self-satisfied, self-assured, all-too-certain faces.
“None of us,” I whisper.
33
A tumult breaks out in the crowd. In an instant I see the certainty and confidence on just about every face turn to astonishment, disappointment, shock. Two or three girls begin to wail. They hide their faces against their knights’ shoulders, though the knights themselves are reeling. They look as though I have delivered a worse torture than the rack, than the thumbscrew, than the executioner’s pike.
“You mean, it really was Desmia all along?” the royal captain asks.
“No, not even Desmia. She came from the orphanage too,” I say. I glance toward the pale-faced girl. “Sorry.”
She winces.
“I think . . . I think Lord Throckmorton knew,” she whispers. “I used to have a crystal globe that he took away from me . . . I saw it in his office later, cracked open . . . And after that he always looked at me like . . . like . . ., ”
“Like he’d read your copy of the queen’s letter?” Ella asks gently.
Desmia nods. Her shoulders slump; she sways unsteadily, standing alone. I feel so sorry for her that she has no knight to cling to, no grandfather figure to comfort her from the most devastating blow of her life. I am glad to see Ella step forward and put her arm around Desmia.
Desmia looks grateful too. But then she quickly glances back toward me, bafflement spreading across her expression.
“Then . . . did the queen give the true princess to her trusted maid?” Desmia asks.
“A maid—pshaw!” one of the knights grumbles.
Desmia ignores him. “If none of us is the true princess, who is?”
“Just listen,” I say. I resume reading, though it is difficult to do so. My eyes blur; my voice shakes.
Perhaps you are wise enough to deduce how much I’ve left out of my story. I’ve left this
part for the last, because it is so hard to write about—even harder than writing about my husband’s murder, my own impending death. Can you not guess what else I have to tell you? Must I pour my bleeding heart out onto the paper thirteen times?
I must, I know. I must be clear, for the sake of all the girls.
The night of my beloved daughter’s birth, even as the entire kingdom celebrated, my child did not breathe. Though she emerged as perfect and beautiful as any child, she never took a breath. I held her in my arms, willing her to open her eyes and look back at me, willing her to draw air into her lungs, willing her to live! But she did not. . . . When the royal physician finally took her from my arms, I went wild with grief, and the physician gave me a heavy draught, to blunt my pain and send me into sleep.
When I woke to myself three days later, I found my grief unabated—nay, multiplied. For my husband had feared to tell our overjoyed kingdom of the child’s death, lest his subjects begin to believe that the monarchy—and thus, all of Suala—is cursed. (Are we?) I see now how much he feared, and the accuracy of his fears. But I could not care about the monarchy when my heart was already overflowing with sorrow. My husband forced me to stand on the royal balcony, holding a blanket cleverly folded to look as though it enclosed a child—when really there was nothing there. My husband had the royal physician sent into exile. My husband acted as though he had everything under control.
Perhaps he was a bit wild with grief, himself.
I do not know if my husband would have someday announced the child’s death, when the politically expedient moment came. Or mayhap we would have turned to the orphanage—as I’ve done now—for an impostor princess. But I tell you, now that I’ve heard these girls cooing in the royal nursery, I will be able to look each knight in the eye tomorrow and tell him, with all sincerity, “This is my child. Please take care of my child.” As far as I am concerned, these girls are all my children now. They stand in place of the children I would have had, had I been allowed to live.