Free The Kingdom of Little Wounds by Susann Cokal Page B

right to be and just a little bit (she heard her father say it) mad.
    For pleasure, Uncle Henri had filled a pool at his summer castle with quicksilver. It was a beautiful, trembling thing, reflecting each face with a giddy accuracy, but at such an angle that one had to lean over farther and farther to see beyond one’s chin and nose, to get a glimpse of one’s own eyes. Visiting ladies used to incline so far — Isabel did this herself — that their scarlet lips very nearly touched the surface that quivered under their breath. It made their faces ever more beautiful, their minds ever more dreamy. It was the marvel of the Loire.
    Until, that is, one dizzy baroness leaned so far that she tipped in and drowned. Her hat and hair tangled just under the fountain’s spray, her tawny dress floating on the surface.
    The spell, then, was broken. Uncle Henri’s advisers (fearing war with the baroness’s husband) forced him to pull the plug. A gardener waded in knee-deep and dug blindly through until he found the drain. With a deep shiver, all that beauty began to seep away.
    The child Isabelle watched as quicksilver slinked down the smooth rock walls; she listened to the drain as it slurped, guiding the precious mercury to the waters of the river. Saw the silver beads on the corpse of that silly baroness, glistening on her skin, puddling in the cups of her ears.
    Isabel mourns now as she did then.
    Exquisite memory, beauty lost.
    Sophia.

Fear make the Earth’s worst odor, whether in bottom of a ship or some silvered palace room. The nursery smell sour and dark with sweat of one prince, five princess, all so afraid, though we wipe bodies with perfume and put them in new linen twice today all ready.
    Six children cough like a family of dogs, but they sit in bed-thrones of fancier animal shapes, one yellow lion, five white swan. Every hair, every feather painted in, and each bed have a crown of crescent moon. Six moons under a ceiling of golden tree branch and leaves of colored glass. This be a poem-place for children, a set of extra chores for nurses. It be not easy to reach over wings to feed the Princess Gorma, but this is my task.
    Countess Elinor have come for children’s supper, and she likes all order to be held. All faces to be clean, all spoons a-moving like hands that feed time to a clock. Gorma try to spit out gruel, I scrape back in her mouth. She be five year old all ready but some time act a baby. She know full well that every prince and princess must empty one bowl before sleep.
    That new maid with the face of a rat pass me linens to dab the Princess’ face. Gorma’s fever gone high since Sophia died, and she whimper, though she know words well enough. She say them some times, like
Maman
and
thirsty
and
no.
And
Midi,
be cause that be my name.
Midi Midi Midi.
    Another task is keep her quiet, so I put my finger to her mouth, hiss,
“Shhh, shh, sh,”
hope she stop her noise before the Countess hear.
    Elinor sit now by Christian, the Crown Prince all most twelve. She feed him her self, for he favorite with her and she with him. He will be the King some day. He some time say he be much too old for feeding, but when
she
spoon the gruel, he relax. He is the most afraid just now, being all most so old as Sophia he think he must be next to die. Elinor murmur words to him, wave her sleeves, soothe his fears or try to. She act like a coquette who seek a husband, though she be married all ready to her wounded Count and also twelve years old times one-two-three.
    Gorma moan. I take another cloth to wipe her mouth.
    “I made that,” say the ratty maid.
    My eyes narrow. Some nurses gossip, but I do not.
    “That towel.” The maid point at my hand. She think I do n’t under stand. “I cut and hemmed and embroidered it. That particular carnation pattern is always mine. Until this week, I was one of the Queen’s needlewomen.”
    This girl is like a reed that scream a note each time the wind pass by. My eyes so slitty now I