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ELINOR

ONE DAY EARLIER

Birdsong.

I roll to my back and pull the thin pillow over my eyes. I do not like mornings. I live for the night when my dreams can thrive unfettered.

I hide from daybreak for a few seconds until a weight lands on my belly.

“Oof.”

A fuzzy paw bumps my nose. The bird noises get louder. Almost frantic.

I sit up in a rush.

“Tom! No!”

The cat sitting on my stomach leaps away—a punch to my softest parts that only adds to the trauma of having to get out of bed. I flail my legs in an effort to escape the twisted blanket and fall rudely onto the hard wooden floor.

A robin hops frantically inches from my face, trying to launch itself into the air. A juvenile, judging from its feathers.

I force my bleary eyes to focus on the orange tomcat twitching his rump with murder in his big green eyes.

“Oh, no, you don’t.”

I scoop the frightened bird into my cupped hands. Tom’s claws score the backs of my knuckles. I hiss. Furious that he’s been denied his breakfast, the cat stalks away, tail held high.

“I don’t appreciate you going after our flying friends.” Opening my hands, I peer at the trembling bird. “I’m not going to hurt you. Can I trust you to hold still long enough for me to open the shutters?”

I don’t expect a response, and I don’t get one. The poor little thing trembles violently but remains in place while I fumble the window latch open with my free hand and shove the casement up. I deposit the little creature gently on the sill. It opens its wings and leaps into the sky.

Watching it flit into the pale-blue sky, I call out, “Good luck! Watch out for cats!” Closing the sash, I sigh. “Wish I could escape as easily.”

As if on cue, the bell on a fraying velvet rope rings belligerently.

“Coming,” I grumble, as if anyone can hear me or would care that I need a few minutes to put myself together before attending to others.

I strip off my threadbare nightgown and hang it on a peg.

Then I pour cold water into a chipped porcelain bowl and drop a rag into the basin.

Folding a sliver of soap that once held the scent of roses into the rag, I wash the essentials and wring it out before hanging it up to dry.

In grand homes, there are servants to attend to the mortal needs of residents.

Here at Scinder House—known locally as Emmett’s Folly, thanks to my father’s unfinished project—there’s only me.

Once there was a whole suite devoted to the household staff.

Now, the attic quarters are empty but for the belongings I have cobbled together from castoffs.

A creaky chair, repaired an untold number of times, holds my patched dress.

I put it on, wiggle my feet into leather shoes with soles worn so thin I can feel splinters from the floorboards trying to stab through, and hasten down three flights of stairs, leaving my unmade bed for later.

The bell chases me insistently to the kitchen, where I bend to poke the banked embers in the stove to life.

I toss a log into its belly and close the door.

Tom slinks into the kitchen.

“Don’t you sulk at me for rescuing your breakfast.” He follows me into the yard, where I scatter handfuls of grain for the chickens and then wrestle with the ancient pump.

When my father inherited this estate, he began the process of installing indoor plumbing. He got as far as digging the well and installing a piping system to eliminate the drudgery of carrying water by hand.

I remember watching the workers with great excitement and curiosity. Lord Scinder loved solving problems, and he wanted a life of comfort for his wife and daughter.

A pang of loss, like a knife to the belly, forces me to set down the bucket and lean against the stone wall.

Revisiting these happy memories also means remembering his funeral and everything that came after, which is still more pain than I can bear, all these years later.

I usually let them simmer hazily in the back of my mind, but on this bright morning with dawn still painting the horizon in shades of deep-blue, grief slices right through me.

The bell screams again.

Tom winds around my ankles. I swipe the tears away and heft my bucket. Father died before he could finish the drainage system, and so, a decade and a half later his daughter hauls water for the vile man who replaced him. My father would have been furious if he had lived to see it.

If he’d lived, none of this would have happened in the first place, but there’s no use in dwelling on what might have been.

Inside, I put tea on to boil and whip together fresh griddle cakes, eggs, and bacon while Tom chases a mouse.

“Good Tomcat. Leave the birds alone and go after the mice instead.”

I’m practical about the mouse problem. I have to be; we hardly have enough food to feed ourselves, and any lack comes out of my meager rations. Rodents that venture indoors are fair game.

He flops down in a sunbeam to groom and nap while I carry a heavy tray up to the second floor.

Cilla’s room is dark. Each morning, she yanks on the bellpull and then rolls over and goes back to sleep until I bring her breakfast. This morning, I kept her waiting long enough to set off her hair-trigger temper.

“You’re late, Cinder,” she snaps from deep within her curtained bed when I place the tray on her nightstand. “My chamber pot needs emptying. I cannot possibly eat with this stench!”

I cage my response behind my teeth and open the window. The smell of her own waste wouldn’t be so awful if she bothered closing the lid. I nudge the porcelain top closed, holding my breath and grimacing with distaste. I carry it down to the yard, where I toss the contents into the manure wagon.

Then I scrub everything—the chamber pot, my hands, and the apron I was wearing—with harsh soap that stings the scratch Tom gave me earlier, wincing.

When it’s done, I set the apron and porcelain container to dry in the sun, but I still feel disgusting.

Sweat trickles down my spine. I would give almost anything for a proper hot bath.

That, however, would mean drawing the water, heating it, and draining it myself.

I rarely have the energy to bother with all that.

Another bell rings. Anastacia’s. Sighing, I unlock the cabinet mounted to the wall and scan the empty vials stored inside. Witch hazel, elderberry, willow bark…

I select the last one and make a pot of willow bark tea.

The base of the apothecary cabinet contains a hidden compartment. This was once where strong medicines were kept. I push the button and slide it out, dismayed by the nine empty bottles I find inside.

Not a single drop of magic potion for my stepsisters to fight over.

Sighing, I close it up and carry Anastacia’s tray to her room. Her snores echo loudly from the high ceiling. I can’t help but smile. She’s as stupid as she is vain—extremely so in both cases—yet she’s the youngest of us three girls, and when she’s asleep, she’s almost sweet.

It’s only when she wakes up and begins fretting about her figure, her hair, her snub nose, her clothing, and everything else that goes into a lady’s appearance that she starts echoing her sister’s and father’s mean-spirited comments about me, to make herself feel better by comparison.

She’d never think of a clever insult on her own.

“Owww….” Anastascia moans.

“I’ve made you tea for your headache,” I say neutrally.

“Need a spell,” she whines.

“Your addiction to magic is what got you a headache in the first place,” I respond tartly. As long as we’re alone and she’s hungover from illicit magic, it’s safe to speak my mind.

“Bring me some.” Anastasia rolls up and places her chubby feet in her fluffy slippers, shuffling over to the table. “I need it. I can hardly stand to look at myself without it.”

“Can’t. We’re out.” She bursts into tears. “Try the tea. It will help.”

“You have to visit the witch and get more, Mouse. Today. Right now.”

“After I rouse your father, and only if he gives me money for it. We’re also low on flour, sugar”—Anastasia loves sugar—“and lentil beans. I also need seeds for the vegetable garden if we’re to grow enough to get through the winter.”

“But what about my new dress?”

“Talk to Tremaine.”

I take her chamber pot down to the yard and repeat the process of cleaning it, eyeing my roughened hands. Working hands. Not those of a lady.

For a split second I can see the appeal of magic.

Although the fae gods forbade humans to use it before they ascended to the sky, the land still holds pockets of the stuff.

Tainted, ruined magic that those with the right blood and talent can find, mix, and sell.

They can only make glamours, nothing permanent.

Nor does it change your insides. You’re still you.

The problem is that once the spell wears off, you return to an even more degraded version of yourself. At first the effects are slight. A little haggard. A bit worse for wear. You can recover if you only do it a few times. Many people experiment with it.

But Tremaine, my stepfather, dismissed the risks.

I don’t know when he became obsessed with enhancing his daughters’ marital prospects and ruining mine, though I suspect it was around the time my mother died.

He started giving Cilla and Stacia illegal magic potions and forced me to become the household maid.

In the years since, Tremaine has bankrupted the estate trying to keep up the mirage, and his daughters became addicted to magic.

Three lives ruined over a bit of petty jealousy, in hopes that his two favored daughters would land wealthy husbands and get him out of the hole he’s dug for himself.

I tiptoe to his study door and gently poke it open an inch. A waft of stale alcohol hits my nose. Tremaine lies slumped in a leather club chair with a tear in the back, his chin resting on his chest, arms flung wide, snoring. An empty whisky bottle rests on the floor beside his foot.

Cautiously, I edge the door a fraction wider.

A low growl freezes me in my tracks.