Brighter Than the Stars

Nicole - The Palace

The world was dead silent except for my breath, which cut through the night. It was pitch black, which was a good thing–it was unlikely anyone would see me, especially because I was dressed in all black. Inside the palace, I would stand out, but I wasn't planning on anyone seeing me in there, anyway. If everything went right, I wouldn't.

I slipped on my gloves before I started to climb, barely even hesitating before I started up. The stones were big and smooth, which made it difficult to get a grip, but the cracks were wide enough that, if I could reach high enough, I could make the climb easily enough.

At least it wasn't raining.

I had used to love the rain. Mamá had made mugs of hot chocolate and pulled cookies or pastries out of the oven–so the whole house smelled like cinnamon and sugar and chocolate. She'd sit in a big chair by the window and wrap us both in a blanket that smelled like her (roses), and we'd sit and watch the rain together. My father would come in, soaking wet but not mad about it at all, and leave his boots on the stand at Mamá's insistence, before he'd come over and sit in the chair opposite. There had been no yelling, no crying, no anger, no sadness. None of that.

Back then, she'd tucked me into my nest of blankets and stuffed animals (of which I owned far too many, all of them homemade), and told me goodnight and J'amouria te. I love you. She taught music lessons out of our house–piano, flute, and the harp–to the older girls, who were sent from Mrs. Benfort once they reached ten, because that was her and Mamá's deal. Except for me. I'd been too young to really learn anything, but she'd started to teach me notes and scales and sometimes even basic Atalese and Aeloni children's skipping songs. To her, I was mi amouria (my love), and she spoke to me almost solely in Atalese, because she'd thought I should learn it. My father had stumbled through lessons, too, not picking up much more than a few basic phrases, but at least he'd tried. The before and after version of him were two far different pictures.

After she'd died, I'd been terrified I wouldn't be able to speak it anymore, and I'd gone out to the woods and chattered to myself–and to her–in Atalese. I'd tried to stumble my way through a song on the piano once, but my father had come home early, and nearly broke my fingers when he slammed the cover down; he would have, if I hadn't snatched them back in time. I wasn't supposed to play any sort of music, and I wasn't supposed to speak her language–or read it. Not that that had stopped me. I hid the two books I'd managed to save (one of hers, and a fairytale book of mine), and took them out to the woods to read. There had been others, once, but I'd made the mistake of reading one in the living room, and my father had burnt all that he could find.

I'd quickly outgrown the fairytales, and it'd seemed almost ridiculous to me–reading about magic and fairs and wishes and happy endings while I sat in the woods, bloody and bruised, freezing cold but too scared to go home.

I hadn't been the only child lonely and afraid. Once the economy plummeted, that had been almost normal. There had been plenty of children who walked around like ghosts, bruised and dead-eyed, just waiting for the end. We'd stopped telling ourselves one more day, and hoped that the day would be our last. The church had tried to help us–I'd waited in the basement with other children, waiting for clothes that we knew would be patched, torn, grimy, and probably wouldn't even fit right. But they were clothes–even if it was such a change from the dresses Mamá had sewed for me before. The church had given me a dress once, and it'd been almost pretty, even with a sleeve ripped and a stain on the skirt. Except I'd put it on when I'd gotten home, and, as soon as my father had seen, he demanded I'd take it off and give it to him.

He'd burned that, too.

I'd cried for hours about it on my room, sprawled across my bed and just as dramatic as any princess in a storybook. It'd been so stupid of me–it had just been a dress. That was it. And it'd made my father mad, anyway, so he'd stormed into my room and told me to stop, or he'd "really give me something to cry about." After a while, I'd learned that crying got me nowhere, except sometimes hurt. So, I'd stopped. It was easier to emotionally shut down, to feel nothing at all.

I shook my head. I needed to stop thinking, to focus on the climb. If I thought about anything else, I got distracted, and that led to mistakes, and mistakes led to falling. I couldn't afford to fall–not again. When I fell, it messed up every climb after that, and stayed on my mind like a parasite.

I picked the lock and pulled myself in the window. While the Princess herself had security, she didn't employ much throughout the rest of the castle. It seemed like she thought that as long as she protected herself, it would be fine. I closed the window behind me–I didn't want to risk anyone on the ground seeing it and thinking it suspicious, as unlikely as that may be.

I began opening drawers and chests, pulling out documents and letters. I dropped them in a pile on the desk before I began to sort them, not entirely concerned about being neat. I put the ones back that didn't have any sign of my father, and appeared to be just regular business. But those signed with either M.C. or his fancy, business signature, I left out on the desk.

I flipped through them aimlessly as I searched for anything we could use. Most of them started out harmless enough–general business correspondence, where my father had apparently taken on the role of an Aeloni ambassador. Annalisa had fallen for it, hook, line, and sinker. As the letters went on, it became more and more apparent to me that this was not normal, nor a good thing, it seemed Annalisa had been slowly fooled over time. Honestly, I couldn't blame her–I knew what a good liar my father was, and I'd believed so many of the things he'd told me, growing up. He made everything seem logical, even when it wasn't.

I came to the last letter, and my chest tightened. It included documents to switch possession of the throne, and the accompanying note confirmed the details. It wasn't signed–yet.

I pulled my mirror from my pocket and flipped it open, whispering, "Leo," quickly before I set it on the desk. He appeared a moment later, and I held a finger to my lips to indicate he kept it down. He nodded and then asked, "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. I'm in the palace right now. Here, can you see this?" I flipped the mirror so it angled towards the papers. "It's documents that basically sign away rights to the throne. It was sent by my father–" I checked the date quickly, "--yesterday. She still hasn't signed yet."

Leo frowned. "That's...not good news."

"What's not good news?" Annabelle popped over the couch, far too loud, and Leo and I both shushed her. "Sorry," she added, more quietly, "but what's not good news?" I repeated the information to her, and she whistled softly. "You're right. That's not good news."

I picked up the piece of paper. "I'm going to take this."

"Nicole, I really don't think you should–" Leo began.

I raised my eyebrows at him. "What else do you want me to do? This gives us time. He'll have to have new documents made, and then send them over again–and we don't even know when Annalisa will notice. Probably, she'll just think she misplaced them, and won't even bother much about it. It'll annoy my father, definitely, but if Annalisa tells her she misplaced them, what's he going to do? He needs to stay on good terms with her, at least for now."

"I agree," Annabelle said. "Take them."

Leo shook his head. "Okay. It's as good a plan as any, I guess. Be careful." He made his hands into a heart at me, like the loser he was, and added, "I love you."

I rolled my eyes. "You're a moron. J'amouria te."

"I have no idea what that means, so I'm going to assume you just insulted me twice, but in a different language to mix it up." He looked at Annabelle. "Unless you know what it means."

"I do. But I'm not telling you."

"Great. I'll see you in a week or so, then," he said to me. "Stay safe."

I didn't promise him anything, just closed my mirror and slipped it back into my pocket, before I started to make the long climb back down. 

Word Count: 1,541