Page 22 of Prince of Blaze and Embers
There was a knock at the door. I spun. Bella was fully in the doorframe, leaning on one arm and her eyes were as wide as I’d ever seen them. Her jaw dropped so hard I thought it might burst through the floorboards at her feet.
“I—It can’t be real,” I muttered, pointing behind me at the tortoise. “It talked to me.”
“Ash.” Bella finally picked her jaw back up. “I’ve never seen anything like it! Wow! Absolutely ravishing!”
It took me far too long of a moment, but I finally noticed Bella was staring straight at me, and refusing to look at the tortoise I was pointing to right behind me.
“Don’t you see it?” My whole head dropped as I turned backto the tortoise. My chin collapsed to my chest and both my eyebrows blasted up in shock. There was… nothing… nothing but wet footprints that were my own. I ran over and kicked through the air where he had been. My leg struck nothing and I felt like an absolute fool.
“Ash?” Bella raised an eyebrow. “Should I be worried about you?”
“I—I…” My head shook from side to side, trying to figure out what the hell had just happened.
Did I make up that whole thing? I even came up with a name for it.
I laughed so hard I clapped my thighs with a shrill cackle.
“Ash?”
“Yes, Bella… the clothes. They’re to die for.”
“Are you all right?”
“Oh, I thought I saw something, but I suppose I didn’t.”
“Girls, supper is ready. Please be present in tha’ next ten minutes, or yer food’ll get cold, and all my effort will have been fer’ cold potatoes.”
“I’m absolutely famished.” Bella licked her lips. “C’mon. I don’t want to wait.”
She pulled me by the wrist out the door, and as I looked back to where the tortoise Cornelius had been, I saw the faintest shimmer of rainbow-colored light reflect off where his shell had been. Or where I thought it had been.
CHAPTER 10
The aromas from the table hit my nostrils as Bella pulled me from my room, my gaze hanging over my shoulder to where the tortoise named Cornelius was, and perhaps where I had left my sanity.
Rosa pulled out a chair for me without even a glance. She’d been doing this a long time, and I didn’t think I’d ever had a chair pulled out for me in my life. I’d normally think there was a catch, some price to repay or some secret debt owed I wouldn’t discover until later, but my gurgling tummy screamed for me to not worry and sit. On the green table skirt were three dishes, all covered with white kitchen towels.
Rosa scooted the chair in under me and then went to remove the napkins. What I saw before me made my taste buds tingle on the sides of my tongue. There was an enormous mound of roast beef slathered in its own brown juices, a heaping bowl of mashed potatoes, and lastly, a crunchy loaf of bread with jars of fresh butter and jam beside it.
“Are we waiting for… them?” Bella fought to take her gaze from the food to the front door, closed shut. I wasn’t sure if the door was locked from the inside or not, but even if it was unlocked, the feast before me overtook any dreams of running off into the forest, seeking out true freedom.
“Begin, begin!” Rosa waved her arms overhead. “I didn’t work on this all day to have you two sitting waiting for the men. One thing I’ve learned about powerful men over my lifetime is you have to expect their work will always take precedence.” She leaned in toward me, whispering into my ear, “And to always keep some food warm for them when they do finally show up.” She pointed to two plates of food on one wood-burning stove, both covered in napkins. “So dig in, girls! Before it gets cold! You got that dragon stench off’a ya. That’s good. Now eat.”
The bread crunched in my hands as I tore it. The soft butter slathered like pure bliss upon it before I shoved it into my mouth, letting my eyelids melt and causing another deep moan of ecstasy.
“Where did you learn to cook like this?” I squeezed the words through the mouthful of heavenly, buttery, salty bread.
“Aren’t you going to eat with us?” Bella asked between shoveled spoons of whipped potatoes.
“I’ll eat later. Too much to do now. You two girls enjoy."
“You think it’s poisoned?” Bella whispered to me.
“Definitely poisoned.” We both laughed, and I nearly choked on the not-chewed-enough bread. Bella clapped my back.
Five minutes in, after the first round was shoveled down, Rosa returned from the kitchen and laid two carafes of deep red wine on the table with four glasses.
Bella and I exchanged bewildered glares. All the wine I’d ever had I had to steal from my masters, and if they found out, my ankles and back were sure to be left healing for days after.
