24. Gwen
GWEN
A s people poured out of the basement prison, the captive servants turned toward Gwen’s familiar face. Alma and Miriam pushed to the front of the group, and Gwen could have cried to see the smiles on their faces. She had been afraid they would resent her after her request had exposed them to the queen.
“I told you she’d come for us,” Alma said in a loud, satisfied voice, eyeing off the rest of the group.
“Thank you for your faith,” Gwen murmured, tears pricking at the back of her eyes. “I just hope you’re willing to have a little more because I have a final request for you.”
She led the way a short distance down the corridor, relieved again when the captive servants followed her, separating out from the rebels who had clustered around Charlotte and the count.
She raised her voice slightly so they could all hear her. “I came here to rescue you, and if you want to walk away now, I understand. You don’t owe me anything.”
“The mountain kingdom owes us !” a discontented voice shouted from the back.
Gwen nodded. “I agree. And that’s why if you walk away now, I’ll understand. But the reality is that while you’re freed from that room, you’re still trapped here in a kingdom controlled by Celandine. All of us are. If any of us are going to be truly free, then we need to remove her from the throne. And I’m hoping you’ll be willing to help with that.”
“So that you can sit on it instead!” another scornful voice called from the middle of the crowd.
Miriam whipped around, glaring. “You all know what she told me! The princess isn’t like her mother. She’s not only going to free us, she’s going to send us off with compensation.” She turned back to Gwen. “Right?”
“Absolutely!” Gwen said firmly, remembering the chests of gold in her mother’s hidden room. “I even have a way to get you home.” If she had to fly each of them across the mountains individually, she would do it.
Murmurs swept through the group at that, everyone turning to their neighbor and exchanging whispers. Gwen didn’t try to catch individual words, instead listening to the sound as a whole, tracking its mood. It had started with astonishment and a tone of disbelief, but as they conferred, she heard it change. A note of determination crept in before taking over completely. Alma had said they were waiting for their chance, and apparently she had been right. The captives were ready to seize the opportunity offered to them.
“How dangerous is this task you want from us?” Alma asked.
“Hopefully not dangerous at all,” Gwen said. “But it’s something you know best how to do. If I tried it on my own…” She grimaced. “The queen planned for this afternoon to be a grand spectacle of her power. We’re planning to turn it into something else, but we still need the grand spectacle. We need to show the courtiers and the people of the city that we are just as capable and powerful as the old queen.”
“You want us to set up the ballroom?” Alma sounded disbelieving.
Gwen nodded. “Down the corridor, you’ll see the rebels gathered. They’re going to keep the guards and the queen occupied, so I’m hoping there won’t be anyone to disturb your efforts. In fact, it’s likely the guards aren’t even keeping up with the constantly changing situation. If they see you working and preparing in your previous roles, they won’t even realize anything is wrong. I don’t expect them to harass you.”
“And after we’ve finished?” Alma pressed. “Will we be expected to prepare your evening meal when all of this is over?”
“If this day ends with me as queen, you will be free,” Gwen said firmly. “It will take a bit longer to distribute the compensation, and even longer to ferry anyone who wants to go across the mountains. But I’ll do it as quickly as is possible in the middle of everything else.” She drew a breath, feeling like she was taking a risk. “And if anyone wants to remain in the mountain kingdom—either in the city or in a paid role in the palace—I would love for you to stay. By choice or not, this has been your home for years now, and I won’t take it from you forcibly like your last home was taken. From this point on, each of you gets to choose.”
She gazed over the faces, reading in the expressions that she’d said the right thing.
Alma rubbed her hands together, her face setting into lines of determination. “All right then, we have work to do.”
No one argued.
“Well done,” Easton murmured in her ear, his approval warming her. “You sound like a queen.”
She threw him a grateful look, but there was no time for a proper conversation. The same was true with Charlotte, although from the look on her face and the brief squeeze she gave Gwen’s hand, everything had gone smoothly on their end as well. The captives were ushered out the back way, some of the rebels going with them.
When she walked through the door and saw the two guards back in position, her heart seized. But they grinned jauntily and gave her an elaborate bow, and she relaxed again. They weren’t the old guards but rebels wearing guard uniforms. Charlotte had even managed to find rebels who looked similar to the men who had previously held the post.
Once they were all out of the basement level, Miriam approached Gwen with a grin she’d never seen the captive woman wear before. Something had changed in her, and she was no longer tentative in Gwen’s presence.
“Come on, then, Your Majesty, we have lots of work to do.” She gave Gwen an exaggerated look of appraisal, running her eyes up and down her body and wrinkling her nose. Four women stood behind her, two of them chuckling.
“And you’re with us, Your Majesty.” An older woman and two men appeared beside Easton.
He looked at Gwen in alarm. “I’m happy to help with the preparations of the throne room in any way I can, but I’m staying with Gwen.”
Alma stepped up, tutting and shaking her head.
“The preparations you need aren’t in the throne room. If we’re putting on a show, don’t forget that you two are the star players. If you want to present an image of glory and power, it’s going to take a lot of work.”
Gwen flushed, wanting to protest, but when she looked down at herself, the protest died unspoken. She had slept the night in the stables and before that in her ruined room. She probably had feathers in her hair, and she couldn’t remember the last time she’d washed. It had definitely been before the manure. With horror, she looked across at Easton’s dirty, disheveled appearance. He hadn’t spent hours in a state of total panic and cold sweat in the recent past, so what did Gwen herself look like?
Easton looked back at her, his expression bemused but his eyes laughing. When she held his gaze, his look turned soft and loving, his message clear. He didn’t care what she looked like.
Her panic receded but only a little. Alma and Miriam were right. She couldn’t appear before the court and city in this state and claim to be their rightful queen.
She still hated being separated from Easton, but neither of them complained further as they were carried off in different directions. The servants didn’t need to be told not to take Gwen to her own room, instead easily locating unused rooms closer to the throne room for their purpose.
The women around Gwen came and went over the following hours, but Miriam was always with her. They prepared a bath, somehow producing fragrant soaps for both her body and hair and lotions for her to use after. And when they’d wrapped her in a soft robe, they began on her hair.
The woman who took the lead was one Gwen knew only a little, and she’d had no idea of the woman’s skill. It took a long time, but when she finished, Gwen’s hair was twisted into an elaborate pile on her head, full of curls and artful tumbles. Pearls and small flowers hid in the creases, and a tiara of silver and pearls nestled at the front. Gwen had never seen anything so elegant.
They helped her into the frothy layers of her wedding gown after that, and the gown was even more breathtaking than when Gwen had worn it for the final fittings. In the back of her mind, she couldn’t forget that Charlotte and Henry were out there somewhere, doing battle with the queen and her guards on Gwen’s behalf. But neither could she help losing herself in the moment, thinking of Easton, who was somewhere nearby being helped into the wedding outfit originally intended for Henry. Was someone desperately making last minute adjustments, perhaps sewing it while he modeled it for them? She had to stifle a laugh at the idea of poor Easton forced to stand still for hours or risk being poked with a needle.
She had thought the afternoon would drag, her worry making the hours interminable, but instead they passed shockingly quickly. When Alma appeared to say it was time, Gwen started and flew to her feet.
“What do you mean? It can’t be!” She looked out the window and realized the sun was lowering toward the horizon after all. “Did any guests arrive? Did they still come?”
Alma grinned with satisfaction. “We requisitioned those two rebels dressed as guards and added a few of our own to their number. We’ve had guards escorting guests from the edge of the palace grounds for the last hour. It looks like most of the courtiers had fled to their city homes—even they could tell something strange was going on in the palace—but none of them dared miss the wedding. The seats are full.”
Gwen drew a long breath, fear fluttering through her. But it was balanced by a sense of certainty. This was the role she had been born for, the one she was supposed to fill. Whatever happened next, she was doing the right thing.
She turned to Alma and nodded, face serious. But Alma just gazed at her before smiling in an almost motherly way. “You look beautiful, Your Majesty.”
Tears welled again, and Gwen quickly blinked them away. “Thank you, Alma. Thank you for everything. Your kindness meant everything to me in those lonely years after Easton’s banishment.”
Alma gave her another, sadder smile. “I always felt sorry for you, Princess Gwen. Some of the others thought it was foolish since you were the princess, but at least the queen didn’t keep any of us close by her side day after day.”
Gwen swallowed and nodded. “Just so you know, she isn’t my mother. She isn’t even my stepmother. She’s no relation of mine in any way, just a usurper. And it’s time for her to go.”
Alma held out her arm. “In that case…”
Gwen took it, allowing Alma to lead her out of the room, Miriam coming behind to fix her train. She would have liked Charlotte beside her, but she knew she was working out of sight to clear the way for Gwen and Easton’s moment. And it felt fitting, somehow, that it was just the three of them.
When they reached the door of the throne room, she heard the gentle swell of music from inside as the doors ponderously opened. She gasped at the sight before her.
Rows and rows of white seats ran down both sides of a long velvet carpet. Greenery and the first of the spring flowers had been woven into the chairs closest to the aisle as well as around the columns that lined the room. Gauzy white material, like the top layer of her dress, hung from the ceiling in graceful folds, and at the end of the aisle stood Easton. His messy brown curls had been tamed for once, a golden circlet holding them in place, but his eyes were the same as ever as they stared back at her, blazing with love.
“Ready?” Alma asked softly, and Gwen nodded, unable to speak.
A rustle of movement filled the large room as Gwen stepped in on Alma’s arm. She heard the faint murmur of query and alarm—presumably coming from the loyal courtiers in attendance. They had been expecting her to enter on the arm of Queen Celandine, not a woman most of them wouldn’t recognize.
But Count Oswin himself—a noble who had been a close advisor to both King Isander and Queen Celandine—stood at the front of the room with the man they all assumed to be Prince Henry. And false guards stood in ceremonial positions between each pillar, their spears straight and their faces serious. The crowd settled.
The aisle felt simultaneously long and short, the moment stretching on too long and then over too soon. Alma put Gwen’s hand into Easton’s and the sense of homecoming was overwhelming. Trouble was coming for them—it might be almost at the door—but still this moment was exactly what it should have been.
The count began to speak, his measured voice serious and unhurried as he said the traditional words. Gwen wanted to whisper for him to hurry, but she only smiled at Easton instead. It was their wedding, but it was also a drama being enacted for the people of the kingdom, and they had to play their parts properly.
Part of her remained tensed, watching the double doors of the throne room out of the corner of her eye. Someone had closed them, but they had no bar or key.
But the other part of her still managed to lose herself in the moment and in Easton’s wonder-filled eyes. He gave no outward sign of remembering their precarious situation, his heart apparently full of Gwen and their marriage.
At one point, she glanced at the audience, and her eyes caught on Lydia and Jett, standing at the back of the room. She smiled at them, glad they had managed to leave the rebels to be present at their son’s wedding. And surely it was a good sign about the success of the rebels’ mission.
She didn’t falter when the count instructed them to face each other and weave their right arms together, circling three times with their joined arms at the center. Her eyes remained fixed on Easton’s the whole time as the count spoke of the joining of their lives and futures.
Her voice didn’t waver when the count asked her if she promised herself to this man as her husband and had her repeat a series of vows. She had attended plenty of court weddings, but the words had never hit her so forcefully before. And she had never been so glad that tradition dictated their names were used only at the end. Most of the audience still believed they were watching her marry Prince Henry.
When two people each carried a washtub onto the dais, she almost laughed aloud, however. In the past, she had accepted it as part of the tradition, but now all she could think of was Natalie’s scorn. The girl was right. Even as a princess, Gwen had never worn such a beautiful dress. It wasn’t what she would have chosen to do laundry in.
With exaggerated care, she bent over the tub, Easton mirroring her to her left. Had Easton washed his own shirts in the long years of his banishment? Gwen was relying on the hasty lesson given her when Miriam dumped several shirts into Gwen’s bathwater and showed her how to scrub them.
Gwen tried not to splash her dress, even as she scrubbed as quickly as possible, her eyes on the horizon. The sun was creeping lower and lower, and at any moment, the queen might appear and ruin everything. Gwen couldn’t bear if all this led to nothing, the wedding interrupted before the marriage was official.
Finally, she held up the dripping shirt that apparently belonged to Easton. It was white and clean. Easton also held up hers, and the crowd cheered. They let the clothes drop back into the water and stood, turning to face each other and clasp hands.
They were close, so close.
“You have woven your futures together,” the count said, his loud voice echoing through the room like a proclamation. “You have made your vows, and you have washed each other clean, I therefore—”
Both doors crashed open. “Stop!” The queen’s scream rent the room.
Chairs scraped and heads twisted as everyone turned astonished faces to the furious woman in the doorway. Guards streamed past her, racing for Gwen and Easton. Easton’s fingers tightened on Gwen’s, and he tugged her toward him.
“Stop this treason instantly!” the queen shouted again.
Count Oswin met her eyes across the distance of the room and shouted even more loudly into the shocked silence of the crowd.
“I therefore declare Princess Gwendolyn, daughter of King Isander, married to Easton, of the mountain kingdom. What is done cannot be undone.”
As he spoke the traditional words—the ones that made the marriage final—several things happened at once.
Celandine screamed her anger, the shrill cry cutting through the crowd and making Gwen shiver. The guards along the walls sprang into motion, pouring forward to block the path of the queen’s guards. The sun slipped all the way below the horizon, and Gwen looked into Easton’s eyes—the eyes of her husband.
The familiar tingling itch began, but she barely felt it, her heart welling with love for the man who had stood by her through everything. The man who had just promised to stand by her forever.
And the tingling faded, dropping away into nothing. No tearing started, and no transformation followed. Night had fallen, but Gwen was still a woman.
The arrival of the queen and disruption of the wedding had shocked the crowd into silence. But nightfall sent the courtiers surging to their feet, shouting and calling. Gwen turned her head and saw people falling on each other, tears streaming down faces as they embraced or collapsed from shock and relief.
The count called again in the same booming shout.
“The enchantment is broken! All hail Queen Gwendolyn and King Easton! All hail!”
“No! No!” Celandine screamed, still in the doorway, but louder still came the roar of the crowd.
“Hail! Hail! Hail!”
Gwen turned fully to look out at them, her earlier certainty and strength returning in response to their cries.
“Hail! Hail! Hail! Hail!”
The shout seemed to swell and grow impossibly loud until Gwen realized the voices inside the hall had been joined by a roar from outside. A mob of people burst in behind Celandine, Natalie at their lead. They streamed around the queen, who stood alone, like an island in the rippling sea of people. The crowd from the city filled every spare space in the room, their enthusiastic cries of support filling the air with a thundering noise.
The grappling of the guards had been swept away by their arrival, and Gwen was relieved to see none of Celandine’s guards attempted violence against the new arrivals. They had already been confused by their unexpected opponents—dressed in identical uniforms which made it hard to tell friend from foe—and the roar and unity of the growing crowd appeared to have provided the final piece of intimidation.
Gwen held up her hands, and the shout slowly faded, expectant silence slowly gripping the crowd. Celandine still stood straight, however, her eyes spearing into Gwen’s.
“This is treason!” she cried, her words whipping over the distance between them.
“No,” Gwen said back, her voice projecting across the room. “Yours is the treason. You stole the throne, enchanted my people, and abused me. It ends now.”
“How dare you speak those words to your mother!” the queen cried, and a soft murmur reminded Gwen that Celandine still had supporters in the crowd.
But other voices murmured back, hostile and defensive. Celandine might have her supporters in the room, but Gwen had more.
Her eyes hardened, her hands clenching. “You are not my mother. Neither are you my stepmother. If you had been, you would have given me my throne when I came of age, as the law requires.” Another murmur, and this time there was only sympathy and approval for Gwen. “I was with my father every moment until his dying breath. He never married you. He never even met you. You are nothing but a usurper, and your time is finished.”
A shocked cry rose at her words, heads turning between Gwen and Celandine. Brows lowered and voices raised as the mood in the room turned ugly.
Celandine fell back one step and then another, horror twisting her face as she surveyed the angry crowd. Gwen stood steady, not removing her gaze, and Celandine was the first to look away. Turning, she fled.
Gwen looked at Easton, wishing Celandine’s desertion was the end. If only the woman would run and not stop running. If she disappeared into the mountains, it would all finally be over.
But Gwen knew her too well to believe she would give up so easily. Celandine’s guards and position had not been her only source of power. She had one last move to make.
“She’ll go to her objects,” she said to Easton. “We have to stop her.”
He nodded, the same anxiety she felt showing in his eyes. It wasn’t over yet.
Gathering up her skirts in both hands, Gwen leaped down from the dais and ran after Celandine.