The Secret of the Seven Princesses

Suspense Chapter 16

But it wasn't so. They didn't want to draw attention to themselves by removing me forcefully from the town, so they lay in wait. I attempted to escape their surveillance by passing through the forest path to Elensar, and it was on this road that my former master's band caught up with me at last.

Rosetta paused, seeming to be overcome with emotion for some reason or another. Ty sat back, allowing her a moment to compose herself.

They overpowered me quickly and forcefully. I had had a taste of freedom for a day at most, but now I had been subdued and browbeaten once more. One the way back to the camp, however, something far worse happened—something that I would give anything to be able to forget. For though I had lived with thieves and murderers for the majority of my life, I had never before witnessed the true extent of their depravity until now.

The leader called his men into action upon hearing an approaching carriage. They took their places, hiding in the bushes until the vehicle had come into view. It was bejeweled and ornate, causing the thieves' hearts to beat with greed. They seemed neither to notice nor care that the royal crest was blazoned upon the door.

The murderous marauders made quick work of the plunder. Trussed up on the forest floor, I could only watch in horror as my master and his men slew every attendant, every guard, and even the tragically beautiful queen herself.

"The memory will haunt me forever," she murmured, gazing at her hands where they lay clenched in her lap. "If I had not tried to escape...if they had not found me on that path at that time, then they wouldn't...she wouldn't..." she trailed off, seemingly unable to go on.

She glanced up at Ty. "Nothing they found in that carriage even came close in value to what they killed." Rosetta turned her attention back to her hands, holding up the object that she'd had tightly clenched in them: the ornate, engraved locket that Ty had been puzzling over merely an hour ago. He glanced back towards the surface of his desk where he'd left the trinket, but it was, obviously, gone. How had she—? But never mind. It wasn't important.

He examined the locket hanging from her fingers. He would never underestimate the power of a laundress again. It was surprisingly clean and pristine, considering its former dirt-caked state, and he was now able to see the familiar etching on the front: a blooming rose atop a spinning wheel. The royal crest of the Sleeping Beauty. He couldn't count the number of times he'd seen this very symbol—even this very locket—in Queen Meleprene's painting hanging in Gustave's chamber.

"I escaped eventually," Rosetta softly continued, drawing Ty's attention back to the washer woman and her story.

My fervor for freedom increased tenfold after I'd witnessed this senseless tragedy. I spent every spare moment planning opportunities and methods to escape...but it didn't happen when I planned. It was the work of a desperate impulse. Not even a week after Meleprene's death, I received a severe beating that—though not unusual or new in itself—was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back. In the dead of the night, I stole from the chamber. I knew that I wouldn't be able to slip past the sentries at the front entrance, so I decided to tempt fate by escaping through the back tunnel—notoriously a "dead end."

But Fate was kind to me.

"Fourteen years ago, the trapdoor opened for me," Rosetta said humbly. "It gave me my freedom, as it gave the princesses theirs. But you and I have both seen the price it asks. Though I read it nearly a decade ago, I still remember the warning, mercifully written in a language I understood. You cannot imagine my feelings when I realized the danger I had been facing while in and out that chamber for so long."