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“She’s suffered much sorrow, my aunt. I’m sure you’ve heard what’s happened to her daughter?”
Popinjay looked up from the exceedingly interesting contents of his teacup and bravely met Tulip’s gaze.
“I was very sorry to hear about your cousin.” And he continued: “Though I am very pleased you invited me today, Tulip. I was rather surprised when you did.”
Tulip’s face flushed, making her feel uncomfortable. She wanted to run away.
He’s just a prince. Don’t be ridiculous, she told herself.
She wanted to be anywhere but there, far away from the prince, with his beautiful haunting gray eyes, in a place where there were no princes at all. Surely there had to be such a place, where there was no reason to make idle small talk about the goings-on in neighboring kingdoms.
“I was reading about the history of your kingdom and its lands and I found it very fascinating. Did you know there was a great battle fought here?”
With a smile, she asked, “Which one? There were several.”
“Oh, I am particularly intrigued by the battle between the Tree Lords and the giants, but they’re all so compelling, don’t you think?”
And suddenly, Tulip didn’t feel the need to flee. In fact, there wasn’t a single place in all the kingdoms she’d rather be than with the handsome prince with the haunting gray eyes.
Pflanze had been waiting by a castle door for her witches to arrive when in a flash she saw the home she shared with the odd sisters perched on the Morningstar cliffs right above the turbulence of Ursula’s watery domain, as if it had always been there.
Perhaps if she hadn’t been privy to how her witches’ magic worked, she would have thought it had always been there; surely that was what the humans would think, and always had thought the many years Pflanze had been traveling with her witches. As much as she had grown to love Nanny and Tulip, she really did miss her witches. She greeted them with her large black-rimmed golden eyes speckled with green. She was sitting almost too perfectly, her white paws primly placed before her while she watched her witches walk the path leading to the castle gate.
“Pflanze, hello!” screamed Martha. “We missed you!” The castle grounds were covered in a light dusting of snow, which was unusual for the coastal kingdom, and the sisters knew a witch was behind it, but who?
The snow clung to the witches’ ringlets, looking rather striking in their pitch-black hair. The sisters had almost forgotten it was the winter solstice, with all their fretting over Circe and their dealings with Ursula. Luckily, they had thought to change from their tattered red dresses into their black silks, which were embroidered with many tiny silver stars cascading across their bodices and onto their voluminous skirts, invoking an enchanted evening sky. The three of them walked as one, as they often did, and seemed to be taking in the splendor of the castle, which was truly magnificent and shining like a beacon of beauty and light. The sky, they thought, was particularly breathtaking at twilight; it was their magic hour, when everything looked perfect and they felt anything was possible. It had been many years since the sisters were invited to call upon royalty, not since they had visited their cousin the old king, father to Snow White.
Visits from the odd sisters had become a thing of dread in most royal circles, so the sisters hardly knew how to act, having actually been invited and made to feel welcome by those not of their ilk. Though they wondered….Something was amiss; there was someone of their ilk nearby. They thought they had sensed it while approaching the castle grounds, but figured they were just sensing Ursula nearby.
But it wasn’t Ursula, was it? It was something else.
Someone else.
Someone completely unexpected. The sisters looked frantically about them, searching the sky for crows, wondering where Maleficent was hiding. Had she enchanted their companion to trick them into some sort of trap?
Pflanze adjusted her paws, and if cats could have done such things, she would have shaken her head at her mistresses. She almost wished she could let this hilarity continue, seeing her witches twitch and shudder about, searching in vain for Maleficent and her crows, but they hadn’t time.
It’s not the Dark Fairy, my witches. It’s her, the One of Legends. Pflanze saw the looks on her witches’ faces and knew they understood. Good, she thought. Now let’s hope they can put their differences aside long enough to deal with this problem.
They hadn’t time to dwell on past events. It was going to be difficult enough without Nanny and the odd sisters sniping at each other over some long-forgotten dealings, even with the Morningstars out of the way, with the king on business, the queen shipped off to her sister’s to calm her nerves, and Tulip entertaining Prince Popinjay for tea.
“So where is she, then?” asked Lucinda, but she saw for herself. Tulip’s nanny, with her silver hair and snow-white paper-thin skin, looked impossibly old, older perhaps than she herself knew. She was standing at the threshold with a broad smile and a twinkle in her eye, waiting to welcome them.
“Hello, sisters. Come in. You are most welcome.” The sisters and their beautiful cat followed Nanny into the grand vestibule. The entire castle was filled with candlelight, casting an unearthly glow on the ladies that softened their features, reminding the sisters of their younger days. “The castle looks beautiful,” said Ruby, admiring the light dancing on the walls.
“Queen Morningstar regrets not greeting you herself. She is currently recovering from recent events abroad with her sister, who, as you know, is in need of consoling herself.” The sisters knew of whom she was speaking but didn’t say. It was Nanny’s way of letting them know she remembered what had transpired between them so many years earlier.
“We’re happy you found a nice place for yourself here with Tulip. You were always very good with children and domestic concerns,” said Lucinda, wondering how much Nanny remembered.
“It looks like you keep to the old customs here, I
’m happy to see. Not even Snow White’s stepmother could make a better spectacle of the solstice,” said Lucinda as they made their way into the sitting room.
Nanny smiled.
“Please sit down. We have so much to discuss.”
Lucinda didn’t like being ordered about but decided Nanny was simply being cordial, so the three sisters sat as one on a beautiful red velvet divan across from Nanny. It was quite the picture, the three of them in their splendid black silks sitting on the red divan. Nanny mused they looked like black hollyhocks on a bed of bloodstained earth. Pflanze listened to the witches’ thoughts. As always, she carefully kept her own thoughts to herself. She didn’t want the sisters to hear this in fragments or random musings. She didn’t want to send them into a panic, rendering them useless to everyone, including themselves.
