Free Fairest of All by Serena Valentino Page A

wondered this very thing for the next month, while she still had the King with her. But on the twenty-third day of January, the King left again.
    “Papa, I’m going to miss you,” said Snow.
    “I promise to come home to you soon, my Snow. I always do, don’t I?”
    The little girl nodded.
    “I love you, and I will miss you, dear,” the King said with a deep sigh.
    “I love you too, Papa!”
    The King kissed his daughter and spun her around, which made her giggle. “I will miss you both with all my heart. You’ll both be with me.”
    The Queen and Snow stood in the courtyard and watched as the King and his men ventured over snow-covered mountains on horseback. Their torches glowed in the dark winter afternoon, and the air was the kind of cold that glassed your eyes over—a type of cold you can practically see. The King’s army grew smaller and smaller, like ants climbing piles of sugar.
    Then they dipped below the horizon and the King was gone.

T o the Queen the days felt like months and the weeks like years while the King was away. The castle was so quiet. She missed the days when it was filled with Snow’s joyful laughter as she was chased by her growling father, who was pretending to be a dragon or a warlock.
    Soon, she told herself, soon he will return and with him life will once again fill the stone walls of the castle.
    But for now, the castle might as well have been lifeless. The Queen sat in a comfortable throne alongside the fireplace in her chamber, lost in one of her favorite manuscripts, The Song of Roland . But everything about it reminded her of the King, and so she set it aside and called upon her servants to draw a bath for her.
    Far more quickly than she had anticipated, a rap was upon her door.
    “Your Highness, Your Majesty…” said the timid, quivering young girl in the doorway. The Queen had not seen her before and realized she must have been a new servant.
    “Calm down, dear, I am a Queen, not a witch,” the Queen said, smiling.
    “Yes, well, this here”—the girl held out a large, wrapped package that was nearly as tall as she was—“this arrived for you here today. The guards have examined it, and it appears to pose no…no danger….”
    The girl put the package down and stared at the Queen, who looked at the package skeptically.
    “From whence does it come?” the Queen asked.
    “It arrived with this note,” the girl said, holding out a rolled parchment, which twitched like a windblown leaf in the girl’s shaking hand. “I am not…not privy to what it says herein, and so I am not aware of its…its origins.”
    The Queen quickly grabbed the parchment and unrolled it.
    The parchment was much larger than necessary, and contained the note:
    FOR YOUR HOSPITALITY
    The Queen raised an eyebrow.
    “You say you do not know what it contains?” the Queen asked.
    “I do not, Your…Your Majesty,” the girl said quietly, “but the guards have confirmed that it is harmless,” she reminded the Queen.
    The Queen paused for a moment, then continued, “Very well, then, bring it in.”
    The girl struggled with the large package, which was wrapped unevenly in ragged linens, making it impossible to determine the actual shape or size of whatever was inside. A few men rushed over to assist her, and it took four of them to get the package into the Queen’s chamber.
    “Will there be anything more, my…my Queen?” the girl asked.
    The Queen shook her head, and the girl curtsied and quickly left the room, followed by the men.
    The Queen paced before the package. It could have been from any one of the guests who attended the solstice celebration. A token of gratitude and good will. The guards had checked it, after all.
    So why was she so hesitant to open it?
    The Queen stared at the awkwardly wrapped gift. She reread the parchment. Then she steeled herself and tore the linens open at their seams.
    “Good morning, my Queen,” the face in the mirror said, staring out at her from behind a