Stepsister(12)

“I heard Maman shouting at you about the parasol and the slippers. I thought this might help,” she’d said, setting the tray down next to Isabelle.

It had been a kind thing to do. But Ella’s kindnesses only ever made Isabelle angry.

She’d looked at her stepsister, who had no need of parasols and pinchy shoes. Who looked like a goddess in a patched dress and an old pair of boots. She looked down at herself, awkward and gauche in the ridiculous gown, and then she’d picked up the cup of hot chocolate and hurled it at the wall. The madeleines had followed it. The silver tray, too.

“Clean it up,” she’d ordered, a nasty glint in her eyes.

“Isabelle, why are you so upset?” Ella had asked.

Seething, her hands clenched, Isabelle said, “Stop, Ella. Stop being nice to me. Just stop!”

“I’m sorry,” Ella had said meekly as she’d bent down to pick up the broken pieces.

That meekness should have mollified Isabelle, but it had only fueled her anger.

“You’re pathetic!” she’d shouted. “Why don’t you ever stick up for yourself? You let Maman bully you! You’re kind to me and Tavi even though we’re horrible to you! Why, Ella?”

Ella had carefully put the shards of porcelain on the tray. “To try to undo all of this. To make things better,” she’d replied softly.

“You can’t make things better. Not unless you can change me into you!”

Ella had looked up, stricken. “Don’t say that. Don’t ever change into me. Ever.”

Isabelle had stopped shouting, struck silent for a moment by the vehemence of Ella’s words. And then Maman’s footsteps had been heard in the hallway, and it had been all Isabelle could do to hide her book and grab her parasol before her mother was in the room, shouting at her to hurry up. They’d left for a garden party minutes later, one so mind-numbingly dull that Isabelle had forgotten her intention to press Ella for an answer. And now it was too late.

Martin, tired of standing still, nipped Isabelle’s arm sharply, dispelling her painful memories.

“You’re not much good at behaving, either, are you, old man?” she said to him.

She led the horse into the cool stone stables and removed his tack. She didn’t need to tie him. Martin was a horse of few ambitions and running off was not one of them. Before putting his harness on, she gave him a quick brushing. It wasn’t necessary; he hadn’t been worked very hard, but Isabelle craved the feel of him under her hands, the velvet of his nose against her cheek, his gusty, grassy breath.

When she finished, she led him to the cart. As they walked through the stables, Isabelle glanced at the empty stalls. The pair of graceful Arabians that had pulled the carriage, and the huge Percherons who’d worked the fields, were gone, sold off after the groom left.

Though she tried not to, Isabelle couldn’t help looking at the very last stall. It brought memories, too. The horse that had lived in it had also been sold. Years ago. Nero. A black stallion seventeen hands high, with onyx eyes and a mane like rippling silk. Riding him was like riding a storm. She could still feel his strength as he stamped and danced underneath her, impatient to be off.

She could feel Felix, too. He was sitting behind her, his arms around her waist, his lips by her ear, his eyes on the stone wall ahead of them. He was laughing, and in his laugh was a dare.

“Don’t, Isabelle!” Ella had called out. “It’s too dangerous!”

But Isabelle hadn’t listened. She’d touched her heels to Nero’s sides, and an instant later, they were galloping straight at the wall. Ella had covered her eyes with her hands. Isabelle had leaned forward in her saddle, her chest over Nero’s neck, her hands high up in his mane, Felix leaning with her. She’d felt every muscle in the stallion’s body tense, and then she’d felt what it was like to fly. She and Felix had whooped as they landed, then they'd streaked across the meadow and into the Wildwood, leaving Ella behind.

As quickly as they’d come, the images faded and all that was left was an empty stall with cobwebs in the corners.

Nero was gone. Felix, too. Taken away by Maman like so many other things—her leather breeches, her pirate’s hat, the shiny rocks and animal skulls and bird nests she’d collected. Her wooden sword. Her books. One by one they’d all disappeared, each loss like the swipe of a carver’s knife. Whittling her down. Smoothing her edges. Making her more like the girl Maman wanted her to be.

Isabelle had cut off her toes, but sometimes she could still feel them.

Maman had cut out her heart.

Sometimes, she could still feel that, too.





Fourteen


“Six sous,” the baker’s wife said, her meaty arms crossed over her huge, freckled bosom.

“Six?” Isabelle echoed, confused. “But the sign says three.” She pointed to a slate on the baker’s stall with a price marked on it in chalk.

The woman spat on her palm, rubbed the 3 away and wrote 6 in its place. “For you, six,” she said insolently.

“But that’s double the price. It’s not fair!” Isabelle protested.

“Neither is treating your stepsister like a slave,” said the woman. “Don’t deny it. You were cruel to a defenseless girl. Got your comeuppance, though, didn’t you? Ella is queen now and more beautiful than ever. And you? You’re nothing more than her ugly stepsister.”