The Wide-Awake Princess (4 page)

Annie pulled Gwendolyn’s arm across her shoulders and hauled her to her feet. “You’ll have to help me if I’m going to get you to your bed,” said Annie. “Put one foot in front of the other... That’s right.”

“I always have had to help you, haven’t I, Annie?” said Gwendolyn as she dragged her other foot forward. “No magic, that’s your problem. Always felt sorry for you. Told Digby, ‘I don’t care if she’s homely, she’s still my sister.’”

Annie jerked her forward a little harder than she needed to and said, “You’re too kind.”

While Gwendolyn stumbled along, yawning mightily, Annie half dragged, half carried her into the next room. Gwendolyn’s movements were no longer so graceful and she looked awkward when she tried to climb onto the high bed. She couldn’t quite make it to the mattress, so Annie had to give her a shove. The older sister sprawled across the bed with an
oof!
and flopped over onto her back.

“That’s better,” Gwendolyn murmured as she stretched out her legs. Annie stepped back. The moment she let go of her sister, the color drained from Gwendolyn’s face again, but her teeth straightened themselves.

“I should check on the others,” said Annie. She had heard her mother snoring, so she knew she was all right, but she wasn’t so sure about the rest of the castle’s inhabitants. There had been that crashing sound, after all. Someone might have been hurt when the curse took hold.

Annie nearly tripped over a sleeping guard when she stepped into the corridor. It was littered with bodies and looked at first as though there had been a battle in which everyone had died without shedding a drop of blood. She started down the corridor and was relieved to find that they were all sleeping. A few people looked as if they were sleeping peacefully slumped against the wall, but there were others who Annie was certain must be uncomfortable with their bodies twisted at odd angles and their heads canted to one side. She helped the worst of these, touching them long enough to get them in more comfortable positions. They woke for the short time she touched them, but they were so drowsy that not one of them questioned her.

Just down the corridor from Gwendolyn’s room, Annie found a serving girl stretched atop the shards of a shattered pitcher, snoring. “This must have been what crashed,” Annie muttered, and made sure that the girl hadn’t cut herself. She continued on and was amazed that no one had gotten hurt, not even the scullery maid who had fallen asleep with her sleeve in the fireplace. It was almost as if the fire had gone to sleep as well, for it seemed to be just a shadow of flames and not hot enough to burn. Even so, she moved the girl away from the fireplace and doused the fire with a pot of soup cooling on the table. It barely fizzled when it went out.

Annie was crossing the Great Hall when she realized that over the unceasing sound of the wind chimes she
could hear the faint tap of her soft-soled shoes hitting the herb-covered floor. It was a sound she had never heard before, at least not in the Great Hall. The Hall was the heart of the castle and normally bustling with activity at all hours of the day and night. The sounds of people talking, dogs barking, pages playing games, and, lately, the music of the minstrels had made it one of the liveliest places in the castle. She had never heard it so quiet before, and it made her stop and listen. The people were still there, of course, draped across the tables and sprawled on the floor where they’d landed when they collapsed. Some of them were even snoring, but the faint sound was lost in the huge room, and for the first time that day, Annie began to feel afraid.

She walked more quickly now, still hoping that she might find someone awake. When she discovered her father sitting upright on the oversized chair in his private meeting room, she thought for a second that he might not have fallen prey to the curse, but as she approached she realized that he, too, was asleep and that the wide curving back of the chair was all that kept him from falling over like the nobles around him. Annie left him there, unable to help him any more than she could her mother or sister.

She was walking through yet another corridor when she glanced out the window and an idea occurred to her. Retracing her steps, she entered the Great Hall and looked for one of the little dogs that some of the ladies of
the court always kept with them. She found one at the feet of an old lady she’d never really liked. She hadn’t liked the dog, either, but he was small and easy to carry, so she picked him up, petting his head to calm him when he came partially awake.

Stepping around the sleeping guards at the door, Annie crossed the courtyard and reached the drawbridge. It was still down, but with no one to guard it she wondered how long it would be before someone who had no right to be there wandered in. The little dog seemed perkier now that they were outside, and Annie began to think that her plan might really succeed. Maybe the curse worked only as long as its victims were inside the castle. Maybe she could bring them out and everyone would wake up.

Thinking that the soft tinkling music she heard was part of the magic in the castle, Annie ignored it when she knelt to lay the little dog on the ground. “Ow!” she exclaimed, scrambling to her feet. Prickly rosebushes had started sprouting from the normally soft grass and she nearly stumbled over one that had sprung up behind her. Retreating to the road that led to the drawbridge, she set the dog near the edge of the moat. Although the dog had been alert enough to lick her hand just moments before, as soon as she was no longer touching him the little animal’s eyes shut and he went limp, making breathy sounds as if he had inhaled too much dust.

“So much for that theory,” Annie muttered as she
scooped up the little dog. Cradling him in her arms, she recrossed the drawbridge, returning to the courtyard within the castle walls as the climbing roses twined around the taut cables. She stopped once she was past the portcullis and looked back. The roses had already covered the drawbridge, but didn’t seem to be growing past the walls. Instead, they twisted and looped around themselves, reaching higher than her head and creating an impenetrable barrier armed with long, razor like thorns.

Annie shuddered and hugged the little dog tighter, disliking the roses even though they weren’t a bad idea. Everyone in the castle was sound asleep and likely to stay that way for years, if she remembered the curse correctly, which meant that whoever had made the roses grow around the castle wall had probably done it to keep people out rather than in. Even so, a wall like this would protect her family and friends better than any guards. Unfortunately, it also meant that Annie was trapped, or would have been if she hadn’t known a secret or two about the castle.

Annie had no intention of staying in the castle. If she did, she’d be long dead before anyone in her family woke up. There had to be something she could do to end the curse, but she’d have to leave the castle to find whatever it was. Her family should be fine where they were until she got back, which wouldn’t be long if she was lucky.

Hurrying to the Great Hall, she paused before stepping inside. Although she was used to the faint music of
the wind chimes and was able to block them out, there was something different, or at least she hadn’t noticed it before. Everyone was just as she had left them, and their breathing was just as deep and regular, but now it was more uniform. All the people seemed to be inhaling at the same time, and exhaling in unison. The noise was faint, but it almost sounded as if the castle was breathing. It frightened her enough that she tiptoed across the stone floor, positioned the dog beside his owner as quietly as she could, and tiptoed out again.

Annie crept up the stairs, on edge now in a way she hadn’t been before. The sound of breathing wasn’t as obvious in the stairwell as it was in the Great Hall because there weren’t as many people there, but she could still hear it each time she stopped to move someone she had overlooked, or to glance behind her, which she did with increasing frequency. She had the strongest feeling that someone was watching her, yet as far as she knew, she was the only one awake in the entire castle.

“Is anyone there?” she called out once, but the only response was silence.

Queen Karolina’s eyes were moving behind their lids when Annie knelt beside her. “Mother,” she said, hesitating only a moment before placing her hand on the queen’s shoulder.

“Mmm,” the queen murmured, frowning slightly.

“Mother,” she said again, giving the queen’s shoulder a shake. “I have to talk to you.”

“Whatizzit?” her mother mumbled, opening one eye a crack.

“It’s the curse. Gwendolyn pricked her finger on a spinning wheel and now everyone’s asleep. There must be something I can do.”

“There is,” said her mother. “Lemme go back to sleep.”

“In a minute. I need you to help me remember exactly what the curse said. First that wicked fairy said that if Gwennie pricked her finger on a spinning wheel, she’d die. That’s right, isn’t it, Mother?”

Annie gave her mother another shake when she didn’t answer. The queen, whose hair had begun to turn gray, muttered, “That’s right. The fairy Voracia.”

“And then that fairy with the revolting name stood up and changed the curse.”

“Sweetness N Light. Lives in the Garden of Happiness.”

“That’s right! She changed the curse so that instead of dying, Gwennie would sleep for a hundred years.”

“And wake when the love of her life kisses her on the lips,” said the queen. “She said he has to be a prince. Won’t work otherwise.”

“I can’t do much about the hundred years, but I can find a prince,” Annie said. “Maybe he’ll be able to help me with the hundred years thing.”

“Go get Digby. He can kiss her,” her mother replied.

Annie frowned. “I will if I have to, but that man is such a twit.”

“Maybe so,” the queen murmured as her daughter took her hand away. And once again the only sound was breathing.

Annie got to her feet and looked around the room. The ladies would have to stay where they were; she wasn’t about to take them all back to their beds the way she had Gwendolyn. Even her mother’s room was too far to take her.

She was about to leave the room when she noticed the piece of parchment that her sister had dropped. Gwendolyn couldn’t read, so it was no surprise that she hadn’t even glanced at the parchment. Annie, however, had made a point of learning to read and write. In fact, she had tried to learn many things that Gwendolyn couldn’t do, mostly because she had no desire to compete with her sister in all the things she could do perfectly. Where Gwendolyn was as light on her feet as thistledown, and was the belle of every ball, Annie had crept away to learn dancing from the Gypsies, who didn’t care how gracefully she could twirl on her toes. Gwendolyn rode sidesaddle like a lady and wore beautiful clothes. Annie put on boys’ clothes and had the stable master teach her how to ride bareback. She had a groom teach her how to juggle, something Gwendolyn would never have considered doing. An old soldier taught Annie how to handle a bow and arrow. She made friends with the servants’ children and asked them to teach her how to swim in the
Crystal River and catch fish from its bank. Every time she discovered something that Gwendolyn couldn’t do, Annie tried to learn how to do it.

There were many things that Gwendolyn could do perfectly. There were many more that Annie could do very, very well. Unfortunately, reading the writing on the piece of paper wasn’t one of them. It took her a minute of scrutinizing the florid writing with all its curlicues and whorls before she was able to make out the simple message.
Happy Birthday
was all it said, but the writing was so fancy that it looked as if there might be more.

Annie had been so worried about everyone in the castle that it hadn’t occurred to her to wonder who had sent the spinning wheel. She’d assumed that the evil fairy must have sent it, but few fairies were able to write, and she’d never heard of any sending notes. The note was on nice enough parchment, but it was the kind her mother might have had, certainly nothing fairy-made.

She turned the note over, hoping there might have been some indication of who had sent it. When there wasn’t anything else on the parchment, she bent down beside the trunk and examined it down to the smallest detail. It didn’t look like fairy work. Although it was beautifully made, she saw a few places on the bottom where the marks of the adze hadn’t been smoothed away; a trunk made by a fey craftsman would have been flawless. The man who had delivered it had appeared
human as well and not like someone an evil fairy might have sent. Whoever had sent the trunk had been human, not fairy, and that was the most puzzling part. As far as Annie knew, neither Treecrest nor Gwendolyn had any human enemies.

ANNIE STAYED IN THE CASTLE for the rest of the day. She made sure that everyone was safe and comfortable, from the highest nobles down to the boy who cleaned the pots for the scullery maids. She put out all the fires in the fireplaces, lifted the bucket from the well that was dangling from a sleeping groom’s hands, and tried, unsuccessfully, to close the drawbridge facing the town. The climbing roses kept the drawbridge from moving, so Annie walked along the battlements to see how far the roses had encroached on the castle grounds. She was relieved to see that they had stopped on the other side of the moat and hadn’t come any closer than the portcullis on either of the two drawbridges.