Free Charm by Sarah Pinborough Page B

reached for the bottle of brandy on the kitchen table and took a long swallow from it. Only when she put it back down did she see Cinderella. She stared for a moment.
    ‘Help me,’ she said eventually, her words thick through the snot and sweat that covered her face. ‘I can’t quite cut it off.’ Tears came in a sudden rush, and the awful sobs broke Cinderella’s shock. She ran to her, and grabbed the knife. Blood gushed, thick and red from the wound and her stomach lurched as she saw the protruding bone. She moved quickly, grabbing a bowl and running outside. She flew up to the street, fell to her hands and knees and filled it with icy snow. Her hands burned with the cold, but she didn’t feel it. How could Rose do this? How could she have done this?
    Back in the kitchen, she thrust her step-sister’s foot into the bowl and held her as she shrieked with the pain. Then, while Rose drank more from the brandy bottle, Cinderella gently stitched her skin back up, coated it in medicinal salves and bandaged her two smallest toes together. She felt sick. Her family was crumbling into madness. And they were her family, she knew that in her heart, however much she sometimes felt separate from them.
    ‘There you go,’ she said, softly. ‘That should heal.’ Rose’s foot would never be pretty to look at, but hopefully she’d keep her toe. She was tired. Rose was exhausted. What a mess it had all become. ‘We should tell father,’ she said. ‘You probably need to see a doctor.’ The floor was still slick with crimson and Cinderella reached for the mop.
    Rose studied her, eyes glazed. ‘Your mother didn’t die, you know.’ She sniffed and ran the back of her hand across her nose. ‘You do know that, don’t you?’ Cinderella turned and the blood was forgotten as she leaned on the mop to keep herself standing. The world tilted slightly beneath her.
    ‘What?’
    ‘She didn’t die,’ Rose said, simply. ‘She ran away with a travelling man. They were going to the Far Mountain to find the dragons. That’s what she said.’ She sighed. ‘But she was a drunk. She said a lot of things, when she wasn’t shouting at you or your father.’
    ‘You’re lying.’ Unwanted images rose unbidden behind her eyes. Hiding behind bannisters. A woman laughing unpleasantly. Shouting.
    ‘She used to come to my father’s house and scream crazy things. She was wild, your mother. Wild and mean.’
    ‘That’s not true.’
    ‘We didn’t tell you because you were so little. We felt sorry for you.’ Fresh tears filled her eyes. ‘We loved you. You were like mine and Ivy’s pretty little doll. My mother used to scoop you up and read you stories and stroke your hair until you slept. Why do you think you want to marry a prince so much? Who do you think told you those pretty stories of castle life?’
    ‘No. No!’ The walls of Cinderella’s world crumbled, as Rose’s words jarred with precious memories. ‘That wasn’t her! That was my mother. My dead mother.’
    ‘We should have told you,’ Rose was staring into space. ‘We really should. Then maybe you wouldn’t have grown up to be such a little bitch to us all the time.’
    Cinderella turned and ran. She didn’t look back.



6
‘It finally fits!’
     
    T he sky was blue overhead and, although it remained freezing cold, the sun shone down on the street as the fanfare played and the procession of prince’s men pulled up in their street. Cinderella’s father refused to come downstairs. Even Esme was subdued as she and Rose waited in the sitting room, with Cinderella loitering in the background pretending to stoke up the fire. Rose, in her best dress, was sitting in an armchair. Her face was pale, no doubt she was in agony with her injured foot. Cinderella caught her eye and the two girls shared a wan smile. Esme didn’t look at either of them. Cinderella wasn’t sure she could bring herself to. The shouting had stopped when she’d seen what Rose had done, and