Cinderella Is Dead(62)

“No,” Constance says, stepping close to the coffin. “Gabrielle is gone. They … they’re all gone.”

“Who are you?” Cinderella asks, studying Constance carefully.

“My name is Constance. It’s been generations since Gabrielle was alive. She was my grandmother many times over.”

“You—you look like her.” Cinderella’s breath rattles out of her. “My Gabrielle.”

A knot forms in my throat. Gabrielle’s name from Cinderella’s lips sounds as if nothing but love remains in her memory, faded as it must be.

“Something is—wrong. Very, very wrong,” Cinderella says.

Constance ventures closer. “I need to ask you something. I need to know what you were trying to tell Gabrielle the night you went to see her.”

“The night I went … to … see …” Cinderella gazes off. “I can’t … remember. Everything is faded.”

“Give her a moment,” says Amina.

“And you—I know you.” Cinderella stares at Amina. “I know you.”

“Yes,” Amina says, shaking her head as if she doesn’t want to be reminded. “I helped you get to the ball all those years ago.”

“The ball?” Cinderella asks. “Oh—I—I remember that. Yes. The ball.”

“Please,” Constance says. “Try to remember. You went to see Gabrielle, but they took you away before she even got to speak with you. Were you trying to tell her something about the king? She heard you say he was cursed. What did you mean?” Constance reaches into the coffin and gently takes hold of Cinderella’s hand. I am, for the hundredth time, in awe of her bravery.

“We don’t have much time. How do we stop him?” Constance presses.

“Stop—him?” Cinderella shifts in her coffin. “Stop him … stop him … STOP HIM!” She screams so loud the entire tomb reverberates, and recognition flashes in her eyes. She is suddenly alert, focused, and afraid. She reaches up and takes Constance’s face in her hands. “Look at me. He did this to me.”

I step closer to the coffin. “What did he do?”

Cinderella holds Constance tightly.

“He … takes,” Cinderella stammers. “He takes—he was always taking. And the sadness—I was so alone.”

Constance rests her hands on Cinderella’s outstretched arms. “What do you mean? What kind of magic does this?”

“What does he take?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” says Cinderella. “I don’t remember. There was only him, and the light, and then there was nothing.”

The light. My vision. They are connected.

“I saw something in a vision,” I say to Cinderella. “I saw the king, and I had a feeling in my chest like I was being pulled into a void.”

“I can’t remember.” Cinderella sighs and slumps against the side of the coffin. We are running out of time.

“Is there anything else you can tell us?” Constance asks.

Cinderella tips her head back, closing her eyes.

My thoughts go in circles. What is Manford doing to these girls? What kind of dark magic does he wield? I have to go back to the palace. “I’m going to find a way to end him. I promise you.”

“She’s fading,” says Amina. “She doesn’t have much time.” She quickly takes out a long piece of string that has two knots in it. She holds her shears up and clips it in half.

Cinderella begins to sink back into her coffin, and Constance struggles to hold her upright.

“What was that for?” Constance asks. “What did you do?”

“She doesn’t belong here,” Amina says quietly. “We have to let her rest, and I will not be bound to a living corpse for the rest of my days. I cut the connection between us. You have to let her go.”

Constance nods, lowering her eyes. “We’ll stop him. I swear it.” She sounds determined enough to march right up to the king and try to kill him herself.

“Don’t let him hurt anyone else,” Cinderella says, her voice nothing more than a whisper. “I took the little book—the journal—to Gabrielle. I—I couldn’t give it to her before—before they took me away. Find it.” She closes her eyes, and Constance lays her down inside the coffin.

Cinderella’s chest rises and falls a final time before she stills like the marble statue. Constance places the burial shroud over her and arranges her hands across her chest. We stand in complete silence for a long time. I wait for one of them to move or speak.

“Help me put the lid back,” Constance says.

After heaving the lid into place, we go out of the tomb and Constance and Amina sit on the step. I pace in the overgrown grass.

“What do we do now?” Constance asks. “We still don’t know how to stop him.”

“No, but we know Cinderella was trying to give Gabrielle some kind of journal,” I say. “Whatever was inside was important to Cinderella. And the light—what light was Cinderella talking about?”

“She said it was only him and her and the light,” Constance says. “And then nothing. He was there when she died, and she said he did that to her.”

I nod. I still don’t know where this leaves us, and I sit down at Constance’s feet.