Cursed

Step-Sister

Beyond the shadowy trees of Barren Wood in the northern realm of Fairland, sat a vast castle; one that had once been used during times of war to stave off soldiers and threats that had spilled out from the mysterious, darker parts of the country. At the moment, war was not on the horizon but that did not mean relations were harmonious between the four kingdoms of Fairland. The High Emperor, who overruled it all, imposed many restrictions upon the citizens though the kingdoms, who each had their own rulers, remained independent in their day-to-day lives.

As the morning stretched toward noon, the beautiful raven-haired, Stephanie Thorne, sat in the kitchen yard of the Northern castle, the section of Fairland that was on one side dark and on the other side very green, with a bowl of cherries and a sharp, thin knife. The juices gushed over her hands and clothing with each pit she removed, soaking her apron in their blood-red stains. She'd finally reached the last cherry when a large cloud of smoke burst from the woods in the distance. A pain in her stomach twisted at the same instance. It mirrored the pain she'd felt the night she'd moved to the castle over five months ago, and the pain she'd felt the morning of Prince's Dominic's Rose & Slipper ball, and the pain she'd felt when she turned sixteen and every birthday before that since she was eleven-years-old. It came more often and erratically as of late. Stephanie watched the billowing smoke evaporating into the sky, waiting for the sharpness to pass and wondered if she'd been stricken with a kind of intuition about whatever happened in the woods that she didn't understand yet. It wasn't a place she'd often go. She wasn't like her younger sister, Helena, who didn't mind the trees and the earth. But the feelings were probably only bad stomach spells as many were wont to have. They passed, then they were gone. Age had probably increased their frequency. She'd be twenty in a few months time.

"You're wanted upstairs, milady," said a familiar voice. Stephanie turned to see the head kitchen maid standing in the doorway, brushing the back of her hand against her sweaty brow.

"I'm just Stephanie, Mary Oliver," she told the woman tiredly. She didn't seem to understand that Stephanie was no longer a lady, or maybe she did understand, but it was too much for the middle-aged woman to ignore Stephanie's true station.

She stood up with her bowl of cherries, handed it to Mary Oliver, then removed her apron to give it to the kind-faced woman as well. At that moment, the kitchen mutt with its light somewhat unclean fur and adorable but mischievous panting face, ran out of the backdoor, limping. Stephanie whistled for the dog to come back to her. She sat back on the stoop and put the dog in her lap, scratching it behind its ears and looking at its injured paw. "Has anyone looked at this?" she asked Mary Oliver.

"What? No, milady. We've been too busy."

Stephanie gave the dog another scratch, this time beneath its chin. "Well, Mr. Wallford," she said to the dog. "I'll just have to send someone to look after you myself."

"Milady," Mary Oliver cleared her throat.

"Yes, Mary Oliver?"

"Princess Ellinor wants to see you."

Ellinor. She sighed. Ellinor was the person she spent most time avoiding at the castle. Her step-sister, who'd been in her place once upon a time, was now royalty. It didn't seem right, but what could Stephanie do? "The cinder princess. Whatever for?" She watched the dog hobble over to its small bed set up for him inside of a wooden crate then stood to look at Mary Oliver directly.

"It's not for me to question," she replied, avoiding eye contact.

"But you know?" Stephanie asked stepping over to a washing bucket the maids used to clean their hands. She took a cup and scooped out the water, then watched it send the redness from the cherries with a splash into to the ditch in the kitchen's dirt packed yard. Stephanie took the small towel Mary Oliver had on her shoulder and wiped her hands with it before replacing it neatly. She gave the woman a pointed look. "Well then?"