Fairest (Page 37)

There should not have been anything flammable. The hearth should not have caught fire. But it wasn’t long before Levana could see a new brightness among the smoldering logs. The real flame licked and sputtered, and after a while Levana could make out the edges of dried leaves charring and curling. The kindling had been hidden by the holograph before, but as the real fire took hold, its brightness far outshone the illusion.

Levana’s shoulders knotted. A warning in her head told her to get up and walk away, to go tell someone that Channary was breaking the rules, to leave fast before the fire grew any larger.

But she didn’t. Channary would only call her a baby again, and if Levana dared to get the crown princess in trouble, Channary would find ways to punish her later.

She stayed rooted to the carpet, watching the flames grow and grow.

Once they were almost as big as the holograph, Channary again reached into the little bowl of sand—or maybe it was sugar?—and tossed a pinch into the flames.

This time they turned blue, crackled and sparked and faded away.

Levana gasped.

Channary did it a few more times, growing more daring as her experiment succeeded. Two pinches at a time, now. Here, an entire handful, like little fireworks.

“Do you want to try?”

Levana nodded. Pinched the tiny crystals and tossed them into the flames. She laughed as the blue sparklers billowed up toward the top of the enclosure and crashed into the stone wall where there should have been a chimney.

Rising to her feet, Channary began searching through the nursery, finding anything that might be entertaining to watch burn. A stuffed giraffe that smoked and charred and took a long time to catch flame. An old doll shoe that melted and furled. Wooden game pieces that were slowly scorched beneath their protective glaze.

But while Levana was entranced by the flames—so very real, with their smell of ashes and the almost painful heat blasting against her face and the smoke that was darkening the wallpaper overhead—she could tell that Channary was growing more anxious with each experiment. Nothing was as enchanting as the simple, elegant blue and orange sparks from the sugar bowl.

Snip.

Jerking away, Levana turned just in time to see Channary toss a lock of brown hair into the flames. As the lock curled like springs, blackened, and dissolved, Channary giggled.

Levana reached for the back of her head, found the chunk that Channary had cut nearly to her scalp. Tears sprung into her eyes.

She made to scramble to her feet, but Channary was fast, grabbing her skirt in big handfuls. With a pull, Channary yanked Levana back onto the floor. She screamed and crashed to her knees, barely catching herself before her face could hit the floor too.

Even as Levana tried to roll away, Channary was catching the hem of Levana’s dress between the scissor blades, and the sound of ripping fabric tore at Levana’s eardrums.

“Stop it!” she screamed. When Channary kept a firm hold on her skirt and the tear escalated all the way to Levana’s thighs, Levana locked her teeth, grabbed up as much of the fabric as she could, and yanked it out of Channary’s grip.

A large shred of material was torn away and Channary cried out and fell backward into the fire. Shrieking, she quickly pulled herself out of the hearth, her face twisted in pain.

Levana gaped at her sister, horrified. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. Are you all right?”

It was clear that Channary was not all right. Her lips were snarling, her gaze darkened with a fury Levana had never seen—and she had seen her sister’s anger many, many times. She shrank back, her fists still gripping her skirt.

“I’m sorry,” she stammered again.

Ignoring her, Channary reached a trembling hand for the back of her shoulder, and turned so that Levana could see her back. It had happened so quickly. The top part of her dress was charred, but nothing had caught fire. What Levana could see of her sister’s neck was bright red and there were already small blisters forming above the dress’s neckline.

“I’ll call for the doctor,” said Levana, climbing to her feet. “You should get water … or ice, or…”

“I was trying to save you.”

Levana paused. Tears of pain were glistening in her sister’s eyes, but they were overshadowed by the crazed look, glowing with fury. “What?”

“Remember, baby sister? Remember how I came in here and found you playing with a real fire in the fireplace? Remember how you fell in, thinking it wouldn’t hurt you, just like the holograph? Remember how I got burned while trying to rescue you?”

Blinking, Levana tried to take a step back, but her feet were rooted to the carpet. Not from fear or uncertainty—Channary was controlling her limbs now. She was too young, too weak to get away.

Horror crept down her spine, covering her skin in gooseflesh.

“S-sister,” she stammered. “We should put ice on your burns. Before … before they get any worse.”

But Channary’s expression was changing again. The fury was contorting into something cruel and sadistic, hungry and curious.

“Come here, baby sister,” she whispered, and despite the terror twisting inside Levana’s stomach, her feet obeyed. “I want to show you something.”

*   *   *

Levana couldn’t stop crying, no matter how hard she tried. The sobs were merciless and painful, coming so fast she felt faint from an inability to breathe as her lungs convulsed. She crumpled over her knees, rocking and trembling. She wanted to stop crying. So badly she wanted to stop crying, in no small part because she knew that Evret, in his own private chambers down the hall, could probably hear her. And at first she’d dreamed that he would take pity on her, that the sound of her tears would soften his heart and bring him to her side. That he would comfort her and hold her and finally, finally realize that he’d loved her all along.

But she’d been crying long enough now, with no sign of her husband, to know that it wasn’t going to happen. Just one more fantasy that wouldn’t come true. Just one more lie she’d constructed for herself to escape into, never realizing she was welding the bars of her own cage.

Finally, the tears began to slow, the pain began to dull.

When she could breathe again, and thought she could stand without collapsing, she took hold of a bedpost and hauled herself to her feet. Her legs were weak, but they held. Without the strength to reinstate her glamour, she tore off one of the sheer drapes that hung from the bed’s canopy and draped it over her head. She would look like a ghost wandering the palace halls, but that was fine. She felt like a ghost. No more than a figment of a girl.