“It is all right, Paulie, dear,” Marie said gently, taking a long wheezing breath. “It is not a secret.” As a child, she had suffered from every childhood ailment, from infection to the pox. She had been slow to speak and slow to walk; for a long time, it was assumed she was slow in every capacity, and arrangements had quietly been made for transfer to an institution in Geneva—until she surprised her governesses by speaking in complete paragraphs at the age of four, and discussing logic with her tutors by age seven. She had worn braces on her legs to straighten the tibias, a helmet on her head to round out her skull, and a contraption on her back to make her sit up straight. For most of her life she had felt more like part of a machine than a girl, harnessed and strapped and attached to a variety of painful apparatuses to improve her looks and posture.
Marie scrutinized herself in the mirror. She was seventeen now, no longer shackled by contraptions or sitting in a wheelchair. But a few years ago she had caught the wasting plague, a rare and debilitating illness of the tubercular variety, which caused blood in the lungs, shortness of breath, and weakness in the constitution. It had turned her pale coloring almost translucent. She had thin brown hair, a high forehead, a narrow nose, and intelligent gray eyes. The dress did give her a little bit more color, even as she despaired of ever looking pretty. It took almost an hour for the ladies to get her properly outfitted—to hook every eye in her corset and tie every bow on her skirt, to plait her hair and arrange it artfully around the nape of her neck.
When they were finally satisfied with her appearance they led her to the queen’s bedroom, where two hundred courtiers were already gathered behind the railing that separated the private from the public space of the room. The assembled were the great and the good of the realm: the noble ladies and lords, dukes and earls, ministers and officials, high-ranking enchanters; even the Merlin was there for a change, looking impatient as he scanned his pocket watch. She had heard Aelwyn was supposed to return to the palace that day, and wondered when her friend would come to see her. Emrys nodded a greeting, and Marie shuddered inwardly; she had been uneasy in his presence ever since the day of the fire. He had stormed into the burning room and cast a spell to put out the blaze, his face full of wrath and anger. Emrys was a sorcerer, a wizard, a master of the dark arts. Like many of the queen’s subjects who did not understand magic or its workings, Marie was afraid of the man who wielded it.
The queen’s bed was a grand four-poster draped with the most luxurious of velvets, embroidered with the white fleur-de-lis of France and the white roses of England. Marie held her breath as a gnarled hand reached and pulled the curtains away. The queen appeared in her nightdress: a small old woman, stooped, hunchbacked, balding at the top. She was neither stately nor regal, but when she appeared all two hundred members of the court bowed low. Marie kept her head bent and tried not to cough. She snuck a peek as her mother walked behind the dressing panels, where her ladies-in-waiting helped her into her morning robe and breakfast cap.
The court kept their bows in place until the queen spoke.
“Good morning,” she said, addressing them at last. Her voice had a majestic timbre, powerful and authoritative. It was a voice that made proclamations, turned commoners into lords, and sentenced enemies to death.
The crowd chorused a hearty “Good morning, Your Majesty!”
“Her Royal Highness, Princess Marie-Victoria Grace Eleanor Aquitaine, Dauphine of Viennois, Princess of Wales,” said the herald, announcing Marie’s presence.
“Marie, my child, will you join me for breakfast?” Eleanor said, looking pleased and surprised, as if she had not orchestrated her daughter’s appearance herself.
Marie took a seat across from her mother at the gold-and-white table in front of the railing, which was set with an exquisite breakfast. It was a command performance; the entire court hung on their every word and scrutinized their every action. Her hand was shaking a little as she accepted a cup of tea, but it was not from being on stage. No, the fear was always there; underneath the love and obedience, thrumming like a barely heard note, there was a cold panic in her bones whenever she was near this strange creature, this ancient mother of hers. Her eyes watered and her throat itched. Marie chastised herself for her cowardice, but she could not help herself. She had always felt mute and powerless and distant in her mother’s presence. She glanced at the queen’s wizened face, lined with wrinkles as heavy and deep as the folds in the curtains behind her. Queen Eleanor was over one hundred and fifty years old.
Growing up, Marie had noticed that the other children who lived in the palace had mothers whose faces were creamy and soft to the touch. Who is this old crone? she’d wondered when the queen visited the nursery. She could still recall the shock and dismay she’d felt when she understood that her mother was not Jenny Wallace, the pretty, apple-cheeked nurse who held her in her arms, but the imposing old woman in jewels and furs who appraised her with a grimace.
Mother and daughter sat across from each other. The queen was dressed in her plain morning robe, which even in its simplicity spoke of power and ease and position. The brocade and embroidery were so fine as to be almost invisible; the fabric was smooth to the touch, weightless on her frail shoulders.