Once Upon a Dream (38 page)

AND THIS WAS WHEN,
Aurora Rose was pretty sure, everyone was supposed to wake up.

“I’M STILL HERE,”
the prince said—rather unnecessarily, Aurora Rose thought. He ran a hand through his thick, dirty mane; chunks of broken and burnt hair came out. “At least I
hope
I’m still asleep.”

Aurora Rose regarded the pile of filth where Maleficent had died. In the middle of it, like it was the only real thing left, lay the giant spindle, still gleaming and sharp.

Lianna lay nearby, broken and torn apart. Her black eyes were open to the apocalyptic sky above.

A cold wind blew over the degrading landscape. Aurora Rose took comfort that someplace beyond the trees, her people were safe.

“They said royal blood would break the spell,” Phillip continued. “You killed the evil queen…what’s going on?”

“She wasn’t a real queen.”

Her voice was strangely flat because of the desolate world, the lack of anything for sound to bounce off.

She took a deep breath and winced when it hurt her ribs and chest.

“Hey, look,” Phillip said, pointing to the only other distinctive thing among the piles of trash and rubbish. It was the image of the real Aurora, asleep on her bed. He approached it and tried to walk through, like a door. But he just pushed through it like it was air and wound up looking at it from behind.

For just a moment sleeping Aurora stirred, and dream Aurora felt hope rise in her chest.

But all sleeping Aurora did was drop an arm over the side of the bed. Her fingers uncurled as she relaxed back into deep sleep.

A single crimson drop fell from the tip of her wounded index finger.

“Royal blood,”
Aurora Rose murmured.

Royal blood.

She knew what to do.

Aurora Rose squared her shoulders and straightened her helmet.

Then she turned back toward the spindle.

“Don’t you dare,” Phillip said uneasily. “Rose—what are you doing…?”

She ignored him.

“Rose,
stop
!”

He leapt up just as she reached the sharp, ugly black thing.

But all she did was touch her finger to it.

Phillip sighed in relief.

Aurora Rose stiffened.

The pain that ripped through her body wasn’t that of a single pinprick. It was as if fire climbed up through her veins and then out through her ears, through her mouth, through her nose, into the world.

She gritted her teeth and tried to ignore it. That was what a queen would do.

Cradling her bleeding finger, she walked slowly and carefully to the image of the sleeping princess.

She looked at herself. The hollow cheeks, the beautiful hair, the slender neck, the spotless gown.

“What a mess,” she murmured.

The little girl—the young woman—who could figure out an escape from her fake life and arranged marriage only through death. Who had never known enough to question anything.

She took one last look around the bleak, terrible world where she controlled everything. It could be a paradise if she just imagined it.

She took another deep breath, reached through the image, and held her own hand, touching blood to blood. The last time she had pricked her finger, it was to sleep. Forever.

This time it was to wake up and
live
.

PRINCESS AURORA ROSE WOKE,
suffocating in heavy corseted gowns. She had sworn she would go right to work but was surprised by her own skin.

“I was older in the dream,” she said aloud, surprised by her own voice. Several years had passed with Maleficent. Here she was still sixteen.

She swung her uninjured, younger legs around to the side of the bed, where Phillip was stretching and yawning.

“Wake up, Prince,” she said, clapping his shoulder. “We have a lot to do.”

Their moment of peace and transition ended quickly. Screams, inevitable but still shocking, began to ring out from different areas of the castle. Some people were
not
waking up. Some people were as dead as they had been in the dream.

Three tiny creatures, red, blue, and green, buzzed into the room and rapidly became familiar, very welcome little ladies.

“Aunts!” Aurora Rose cried, surprised by how glad she was to see them—the rush of feeling that overcame her—despite their betrayal mere hours before in
this
world. She leapt up and gathered them in her arms, squeezing tightly.

“Rose!” Fauna cried happily. They all had tears in their eyes, even Merryweather.

But still.

“We,” Aurora Rose whispered in Flora’s ear, “will talk.
Later.
”

“Well, yes, of course, my dear, but—”

“MY LADY!”

One of the faster, smarter guards—Aurora Rose made a mental note to review him later, with a possible eye to promotion—appeared at the door, face haggard and aghast.

“The king and queen—your parents—are dead! Murdered! As well as countless other nobles and servants…
here
…” he added, a little unsure of himself. None of the others who had slept had the advantage of knowing the full story of Maleficent’s true intentions and the point of the dream. Doubtless they would be confused and terrified.

“Thank you,” she said politely. “Sadly, I am already aware of the situation. This is all the result of the evil that Maleficent wrought.”

Phillip was finally upright, still stretching and grim with the loose ends of the adventure.

The guard’s eyes kept flicking to the prince’s.

“I need you to take as many guards as you can and scour the castle for any remaining of Maleficent’s servants,” Aurora Rose said. “Kill them all. Afterwards we need to send a unit to go to her lair and destroy it utterly. Set fire to it and all its contents. I don’t want a repeat of…recent events. We must make sure that every aspect of her is dead and gone.”

“Absolutely, my lady,” the guard said. He looked relieved that someone was taking charge of the situation—but hesitant about carrying out those orders. “Perhaps Prince Phillip or your cousin the prince of Fendalle—”

“
Can both help out with the search,
” Aurora Rose said, putting some spit into her words. She changed her mind about his promotion. “If they are up to it. All able-bodied men with swords are welcome to do so. Nay, encouraged.”

She moved purposefully out of the room, still with the infinite grace she had been born with. But there was iron immobility to her shoulders.

Fauna sighed. “Already a queen, that one.”

The three fairies, and Phillip, hurried after her.

In the real world she had been in the castle as an adult for only a few hours. But it was, with some superficial differences, nearly exactly the same as the Thorn Castle. She had no trouble finding the throne room. If nothing else, the sounds of chaos would have led her there.

For just a moment Aurora Rose caught herself, viewing the room she had destroyed just moments earlier in her mind. The real one was different in ways that made her queasy: lengths and heights of things were changed; colors and decorations were off. It was set as if for a party….

My
wedding, Aurora Rose realized belatedly. She stood halfway down the grand staircase she was supposed to have descended with Phillip, her arm in his, to greet their parents. Gold and blue tapestries hung everywhere; shiny horns with pennants hanging from their bells flashed in the light.

But this was not the scene the musicians had prepared themselves for. Beautifully dressed ladies dragged their priceless gowns through pools of blood and wept. Men tried to comfort them or each other, or they themselves wept. Bodies sprawled on chairs and the floor in terrible poses.

“PEOPLE,”
Aurora Rose shouted, trying to channel King Hubert’s lusty call from the dreamworld. Only a few looked at her. One, however, was a horn player. Aurora Rose impatiently gestured at him.

He complied immediately. Like the guard before, he was only too happy to have someone giving orders.

He played a loud royal flourish—and could perhaps be forgiven if it wasn’t perfect.

At
that
the crowd turned around. Strange noises, murmurs of recognition and astonishment, rose from them. They remembered her from their dreams. They remembered the battle, her facing off against the dragon.

“Noble ladies and honored gentlemen,” Aurora Rose said as demurely as shouting would allow. “It is a sad day for our kingdom. My heart goes out to all we have lost and those who loved them. I know that no words of mine can stem your grief.

“Even so, there is much work to do. Those who aren’t in need of immediate assistance, please return to the rooms in which you are staying. Our servants will care for your every need, and we will send for you all as soon as things are…tidied.”

There were a few mumbles of protest, but otherwise everyone who could leave seemed glad to do so. No one went alone—all were in little groups, whispering and discussing and sharing what they remembered, the strange experience they had all endured while asleep.

A man in severe black robes and a soft hat strode over to Aurora Rose. Other men in similar robes followed behind him. They all wore thick golden chains with heavy gemmed pendants on them. Ministers or secretaries or some such, Aurora Rose decided. Like the ones who had yelled at her in her dream within the dream.

It seemed that, sometimes, sleep did indeed mirror life.

“Your Highness, it is very good of you to take this under your own personal direction,” the first man began. “But as you are new to the kingdom and have had no experience with such matters…”

“And are a woman, moreover,” another man put in.

“And a woman,” the first man continued. “Your delicate constitution may not even survive the
viewing
of your parents, much less what else needs to be done. What I’m saying is perhaps you should leave the sorting-out of things to us, your father’s advisors…and maybe your uncle Prince Jaundry….”

Aurora Rose regarded him mildly, trying to conjure memories of the beautiful girl full of grace everyone was supposed to fall in love with so easily.

“Did I not face down a dragon, unarmed, while the rest of you fled to the protection of the woods?”

The man blanched.

“I haven’t a…”

“Oh, yes, you remember it well, please do not pretend it wasn’t
real
,” Aurora Rose said firmly, trying not to hiss the way Maleficent would have. “After such an ordeal, believe me, I am quite capable of taking over civic matters. If you have some disagreement with my manner of doing things, you may of course bring it up later in conference with me.
Privately.
Also, from here on out you will address me
correctly
: as
Your Majesty
.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” the man said, nervously glancing at the men around him. None would meet his eyes.

“Excellent,” Aurora Rose said. “Thank you. I look forward to meeting with all of you later to discuss how to proceed.”

She strode forward out of the knot of men, Phillip and the fairies trailing smartly like an entourage. The prince was trying very hard not to smile.

It took her a long time to make the short journey to the thrones. Noblemen and -women, who had looked so alike and unreal in their perfect dresses and matching raiment in the other world, became human through tragedy in this one.

It took her a moment to recognize Duke Walter of the Five Trees, the short, sensible middle-aged husband of Lady Astrid. The princess had never had much to do with him in the Thorn Castle; only his wife.

His cheeks were wet and red and he held Lady Astrid’s head in his lap, refusing to let anyone take her away.

Aurora Rose knelt and clasped his hand.

“I am so sorry,” she whispered.

He nodded, not really paying attention. Even a brave princess who fought dragons and saved everyone—including him—couldn’t distract his attention from loss and grief.

She steeled herself and moved on.

The young, powerful, and now dead Marquis and Marchess of Longbow had left behind three children, the oldest of whom was twelve. He tried to look brave, but hysteria leaked from the edges of his eyes with tears.