Free The Rose Bride by Nancy Holder

wound, but Rose still remembered how it had gotten there.
    By the time the candle was burned halfway down, she had finished the cloak and moved onto one of Desirée’s petticoats. Her eyes were scratchy with fatigue and her shoulders throbbed. She tried not to think of the past, when she had spent long hours embroidering beautiful flowers and patterns just for decoration.
    A harsh rap on her door made her jump. On the other side, Ombrine said, “We’re going to bed. Clear the table and wash the dishes.”
    “Oui, Stepmother,” Rose called.
    She draped the petticoat over her arm and tookup her candle. The floorboard creaked as she passed Elise’s old room. No one slept there now
    She walked down the stairs to the dining room. Something skittered in the darkness, and Rose guessed it was a mouse. Perhaps it had enjoyed a fine feast off her plate.
    Neither Ombrine nor Desirée had lifted a finger to carry anything to the kitchen. Desirée’s plate sparkled as though she had licked it clean. Ombrine had finished off the decanter of cheap table wine.
    Rose scraped the leavings on her own plate into a dish for the pigs, wondering if there were any survivors in the pen. After she washed and dried the tableware and the cooking pots, she blew out her candle to conserve the wax and left it in the kitchen. By the moonlight, she carried the dish to the pigpen. Grunting shapes moved in the darkness; Rose smiled faintly at the evidence of life. Rather than dump such a pitiful amount of food into the trough, she pushed the bowl through a hole in the fence.
    Taking a glance over her shoulder, she stole to the rose garden. Her breath caught as she spied another rectangle of white at the base of the statue of Artemis.
    This time there were two coins.
    Ma belle chérie,
    I received your rose
. Merci, ma belle.
I haven’t dared to write you again until now, for I feared itwould go badly for you if Madame Marchand discovered our correspondence. The villagers speak of her worsening temper. But there is talk of a sickness at the
château and I am very worried about you. The coins are for medicine. Use them.
    There is a man, known only as the Pretender, who has stepped forward claiming to be the oldest son of King Henri. That he is the son of Queen Isabelle, Henri’s first wife. Those who have seen him swear that he could pass as Henri when a young man. He swears that a loyal palace guardsman spirited him away at birth because Henri planned to strangle mother and child and replace Isabelle with his mistress, Marie—Jean-Marc’s mother. Isabelle could not be saved and the court was told that she had died in childbirth. The Pretender says not. That she was murdered.
    They say that it is only a matter of time before the Pretender raises an army and marches on the Land Beyond. Families are sending their men and boys into hiding so that they will not be forced to fight for either side.
    The château stands on the road to castle and it may be that such men, coming upon a house of three women without a male relative . . . I need not go on.
    So take the coins and buy medicine and if you must run . . . run.
    I pray to the goddess that things will changeand soon. I never dreamed such a fate would befall you, and it is so very hard to not to be able to comfort you. Never forget that you are loved.
    Ever yours,
    Tante Elise
     
    “Merci,” Rose whispered. She folded the letter and buried it as before. Then she plucked another purple rose, kissed it, and left it at the feet of the statue.
    She put the coins in the apron she wore and hurried back to the pigpen to retrieve the dish. It had been emptied, which gave her hope that in the morning, they would have a pig or two left.
    When she reached the dark kitchen, she found her flint and relit her candle. The yellow light threw her silhouette against the kitchen wall. She pumped a bit of water over the dish, planning to wash it with the next batch.
    As she set it on the counter, a larger, blacker shadow