Fairy Tale: Winter's Bite

Chapter 26: The Fall (Part 1)

Cassie followed Canis Major to her old chamber in the North Tower with her head hanging compliantly low.

She waited silently as he opened the door with the key she knew all too well. Even though she had never held it, never carried it in her pocket because she was never granted the freedom to come and go as she pleased, she could have drawn it from memory.

She knew it was a bulky, heavy thing from the way her keepers used to handle it. It was iron, with elaborate curves inlaid with rubies. It was morbidly beautiful, befitting its purpose—to entrap a disobedient princess. The key was ancient too, the gems dull with time. Cassie supposed she wasn't the first child to lead a life at its mercy.

Once inside her chamber, Canis Major hovered into the air, skimming past the broken glass on the floor as if he didn't notice it or remember why it was there. More likely than not, he no longer cared. 

He set the torch he was holding into the empty sconce on the wall and pulled over the only chair in the room. He waited for her there, his head held high, no doubt in his mind that she would bend to his suggestion without the need to waste his breath.

Cassie, with one bare foot, had to be more cautious, but she managed to cross the room and lower herself into the seat he arranged. And though he could have said many things to her, he made only demands and expected them to be met without any further delay.

While he paced around authoritatively, she cowered before him and soon broke down, with tears and over-the-top apologies for her many sins against the city of Pyxis and for being so foolishly seduced by the MacRae brothers.

Then lies spilled from her tongue with more plausibility than the truth—names, directions, landmarks, hotels, and room numbers for the Jokuras. And then, after a long pause and a gulp for courage, she invented a rhyme—"Protect us from the dead of night, lead us from the dark to light"—as the password for Scott MacRae's tunnels. If Canis believed her, she had just handed over to him the King of the Unworthy and the Kāne Army. And she had some time. Some of the facts would check. It was the outcome that would leave him wanting.

As he marched around, this time in deliberation, she leaned her elbows on her knees and shielded her eyes. She let her emotions escape in sobs that shook her whole body. It was a catharsis, one that she hoped Canis would accept as regret and remorse rather than for what it actually was—despair so deep it was nauseating. And fear so profound, she was hot one second and cold the next. She was shaking so hard, she felt physically ill. 

Every step Canis took—the ones that lifted into a flutter, and the ones that remained grounded—all made her wonder if there was anything left to fight for. Just when Cassie believed she'd be banished to the dungeon again or killed immediately with the sheathed sword bouncing at his leg, Canis set his fingers underneath her chin and lifted her face until their eyes met. "Pack some of your old things. I've arranged a new home for you. Your escorts will arrive momentarily."

"A new home?" she murmured. She widened her teary eyes and her chin quiver was hardly by accident.

"Dear sister, you needn't worry," Canis answered, his tone as patronizing as ever. "The Banker has offered to employ you again. You will be his responsibility from now on. And he'll carry your papers, so you must stay with him this time. It's for your own protection."

"If that's what you feel is best."

She forced a contrite smile. Canis took it in. Believed it. He simply nodded once to confirm her defeat and left her there, alone. Although there had been moments in her past where there was conflict, where someone was better than no one, where she had begged him to stay . . . those days were long over.