Chapter 34 Irena #2
“Of course, I have other foods as well—eating candy all day wouldn’t be good for me,” Dee-dee explains.
She opens the cooling unit and I see a gorgeous huge ham, studded with cherries and cloves as well as a block of cheese as big as my head.
There are other foods too, but that’s where my eyes linger.
Now that all the terror of being chased has died down, I realize that I’m really hungry.
The few illicit bramble berries I ate are long gone and my stomach is gnawing on itself angrily.
She gives me a sunny smile that seems to warm me right down to my toes. What is it about her? She just seems so sweet and kind and innocent—so very trustworthy.
“But…don’t you get lonely here all alone? I mean, if you are all alone,” I say.
“Oh, I am. And yes, I do get lonely. I’m so glad you’ve come to keep me company.” She smiles sweetly. “Would you like to clean up and then have some lovely ham and cheese? I have some freshly baked bread too,” she adds.
My stomach rumbles but I can’t shake the feeling that I shouldn’t eat anything, no matter how hungry I am.
After all, it was eating those bramble berries that got me into this mess in the first place.
And now look at me! But it can’t hurt to take her offer to freshen up—I’m an absolute mess and I need to tend to the wounds Old Man Oak’s thorns left all over me.
“You are so kind,” I say politely. “I’d love to clean up some, if you don’t mind.”
“Well of course not, silly!” Dee-dee smiles at me with genuine, melting warmth in her big brown eyes. “Come—let me show you to the bathing room.”
She leads me through the candy house—which is much bigger on the inside than it appeared on the outside—until we come to a sumptuous bathing room, all made of chocolate.
“Here we have a lovely bathing pool so you can have a soak,” she says, nodding at a deep, dark chocolate tub with a white chocolate faucet and taps.
“Er…the warm water won’t melt the chocolate?” I ask uncertainly.
“Oh, of course not! The magic keeps that from happening.”
She gives her delightful, lilting laugh and turns the taps, causing clear, hot water to rush into the tub. She directs me to a towel, which—thank goodness—appears to be made of fabric instead of candy, and bids me take my time.
“I’ll get a nice plate of food ready for you for when you come out,” she promises me. “Ham and cheese and apples and fresh bread and honey and, of course, all the candy you can eat for dessert.”
I try to tell her I’m not hungry, but she only laughs at me.
“Come now—of course you are! Now take your bath and come see me in the kitchen afterwards.”
When she closes the door behind her, I take a deep breath—the room has the rich, chocolaty smell of a candy shop—and decide to at least clean up.
I slip out of my shift and panties and do my best to wash off the blood stains in the sink—which is milk chocolate with white chocolate taps.
After wringing my shift out, I hang it over a dark chocolate towel bar and step naked into the chocolate tub.
The water is clear and warm, but the smell makes me feel like I’m taking a bath in a pot of hot chocolate.
It’s not unpleasant—just a little strange.
I take my time and wash my body and hair with chocolate-smelling soap and shampoo.
I even use a chocolate comb—which must be magically hardened—to comb out the tangles in my long golden-brown hair.
But the whole time I’m getting clean, my stomach is growling. I try to ignore it as I finally drain the tub and reach for the towel. My naked body is covered in scratches and furrows from the thorns, and my left nipple especially is tender where a thorn pierced it.
I hate having to put back on my still-damp shift, but I have nothing else to wear and I can’t walk out into my host’s house wearing nothing but a towel.
I shiver as the clammy fabric molds to my skin. It’s unfortunately rather see-through and I feel extremely self conscious about the way my nipples poke at the damp material.
I’ve just decided that I’ll take the shift off again and let it dry some more when I hear a knocking at the bathroom door.
“Hello?” Dee-dee’s sweet voice calls. “Are you all right in there, Irena?”
“Oh, er, fine—just fine. Thank you,” I say, pulling my shift back down again. I go to the door and open it partway, making certain to hide most of my body and just put my face through the crack. “Sorry, it’s just, my clothes are still wet,” I tell her.
“Oh, of course. Here, let me get you something.”
She hurries away and comes back a moment later, holding a simple green gown which I know at once will look good with my eyes. Still, I’m hesitant to accept gifts.
“You’re so generous but I don’t know—I don’t want to take any of your gowns,” I hedge, trying to refuse politely.
“Nonsense! It’s a gift—I’m giving it to you freely. I have plenty more like it,” she assures me.
Her words about how it’s a gift she’s giving freely, reassure me somewhat.
“Well…thank you.” I take the gown from her and duck back into the bathroom. I slip out of my clammy, damp shift and hang it over the towel rack. I leave my panties on so I’m not completely bare beneath the new gown and then pull it over my head.
It fits me like a glove and just as I thought, a glance in the chocolate-framed mirror lets me know that the gown looks quite fetching on me.
It hugs my curves in all the right places and even has support built in for my heavy breasts.
Unfortunately, you can still see where the thorn vines wounded me, but the scratches look less shocking now that all the blood is washed away.
They just need time to heal—I hope it won’t take too long because they are painful—especially my wounded left nipple.
When I come out of the bathroom, Dee-dee claps her hands in obvious delight.
“Oh, look at you, Irena! You’re lovely in that gown—just like a princess!”
I start to tell her I really am a princess…and stop. That didn’t do me any good back at The Slaughtered Lamb and I have no way to prove it. Better to just be plain “Irena” here and accept her hospitality graciously.
“You’re very kind,” I tell her, really meaning it. “How can I ever repay you?”
“The gown is a gift—no repayment necessary,” she assures me. “Now come have a little something to eat—you look like you’re starving.”
“Oh no, I couldn’t possibly—” I begin, but she has me by the hand and she’s already leading me back to the dining room. There, on the chocolate table, a feast is laid.
I see the gorgeous plump ham and the block of cheese but also a huge, crusty loaf of fresh baked bread. Beside it sits a pot of golden honey and a small plate that has a square of fresh butter on it. There’s also a jar of fresh wild berry preserves and a pie that smells of cinnamon and apples.
All of it looks so good I can’t stop my mouth from watering, but I know I shouldn’t eat any of it. It simply isn’t safe. If I was a character in a fairytale I was reading, I’d be warning myself to get out now! Because nothing that looks this tempting can possibly be without a price.
I open my mouth to decline again, but Dee-dee is already pushing me into a chair.
“Have a seat, Irena dear,” she says, getting me seated in a chocolate dining chair with scrolled arms and a white marshmallow seat cushion.
“Really, I shouldn’t,” I protest weakly. But I am already being served food.
The platter with the ham has grown tiny feet and legs and it rises up and marches towards me.
A knife rises magically into the air to carve it and then delivers a pink, delectable slice onto my plate.
Then the other plates and dishes are marching towards me too, the magical silverware dishing out portions onto the plate before me which soon becomes quite full.
Again, I’m beginning to wonder if I’m in the middle of some vivid dream. Where else but a dream or a fairytale would I be served by magical plates and cutlery?
But though I’m tempted to succumb and start eating, the memory of the bramble berries and Old Man Oak are fresh in my mind. In this forest, you don’t take without paying.
“Let me give you something in return,” I say to Dee-dee, who is standing beside me, watching expectantly. “Maybe you’d like one of my hairpins,” I offer, pointing at the hairpins my mother gave me, which are holding my still-damp hair out of my eyes.
“No, no, no!” she exclaims, and do I detect a note of impatience in her sweet, musical voice? “No, you must eat!” she insists.
“But I’m really not hungry,” I protest weakly. It’s an obvious lie and it seems to upset Dee-dee.
“I said, eat!” Her voice is stern and angry and her big brown eyes are no longer quite so calm and kind.
Suddenly, the chair I’m sitting in starts to move.
Its scrolled arms twitch and then lengthen.
Before I can even gasp, they have wrapped themselves around me, holding me in place.
At the same time, the magical knife and fork are cutting a piece off the glistening slice of tender, pink ham on my plate.
The fork flies towards my mouth, as though it will force the succulent morsel between my lips.
“No!” I gasp and turn my face, which causes the fork to stab at my cheek. “No, please—I can’t!”
“You must!” Dee-dee’s voice is harsh now and when I glance at her, my eyes widen in shock.
No longer is she a lovely young girl with blonde hair and chocolate brown eyes. As I watch, she is transforming—becoming what I imagine must be her true self.
Her thick blonde hair turns gray and straggly and greasy.
Her eyes grow small and beady and her formerly straight nose develops a hump while a large, hairy wart grows on her chin.
Her lovely clear complexion is turning an alarming shade of green, and her clean white gown has become a tattered black dress and cloak.
My own new clothes have changed as well—they’re nothing but filthy rags with huge gaping holes in them.
The food on the table is no longer a delicious feast. The ham shrivels and goes rotten, and the apple pie withers to dust. The bread is moldy and the butter is rancid.
The wild berry preserves are a horrid mass of writhing maggots.
Even the furniture is changed. The table is no longer made of chocolate—it’s a rotten plank of wood and the candy chandelier above is nothing but a smoky torch.
“Eat!” shrieks the witch—for she must be a witch, just like in a horrible fairytale. “Eat, my pretty one! Grow plump for me!”
“No! No!” I gasp, moving my head from side to side to avoid the fork, which is trying to feed me a piece of rotten meat. “No, leave me alone! Please—I just want to leave!”
“You’ll never leave—you owe me!” she cackles. “You owe me for the taste of my house you had!”
“I never tasted your house!” I protest. Looking around at the rotting structure where all the candy has changed to rot and ruin, I’m glad now I didn’t give in to the urge to lick or nibble anything. Everything is now ten times as disgusting as it was appealing just a few moments ago.
“You did! You licked your hand after you used my doorknob—I felt the magic leave me when you tasted the peppermint on your palm!” she screeches triumphantly. “And now you must pay!”
“And what do you expect her to pay you, crone?”
The deep, resonant voice makes us both whip our heads around. Standing in the arched doorway of the dining room, is Valen.