Chapter One
"And would you believe Mister Daniel has to shimmy down the side of the house so the girl's father wouldn't find out!"
Hilda laughed at the end of the tale. "I wonder it was for his reputation or the girl's family's?"
"I doubt we'll ever know." Beatrice replied as she tossed the end of a sheet. Hilda caught it deftly and with the air of long practice the two sisters pulled the sheet out so they could begin to fold. "But I enjoy hearing the stories."
"You enjoy hearing Papi's stories of our homeland. Of the queens with glittery faerie wings, magicians that wield both swords and wands, and gypsy trains roaming about with or the next adventure."
"I like stories, they speak to people. There is a link between the storyteller and-" Beatrice frowned seeing Hilda's mocking her words. "Now you're being childish," she said shoving the folded sheet in her sister's arms. She slumped against the rail. "You're making fun of me again."
"I am," Hilda said neatly placing the sheet onto the pile. "Because you need to start growing up and give up on such dreams." She joined her sister staring down at the busy streets below. While Meade Hall was well in elite embrace of the rich of the city, people loved to be seen by other people around the majestic gates and gardens. The Mistress of the estate the infamous Claire Meade whose public image was at one time tarnished by scandal, loved to entertain those were wished to rub elbows. Given both her children, Mister Daniel and Miss Alexandra had yet to wed, suitors came as well. All these factors meant a never ending series of callers and never-ending pile of chores for them to do.
"If I can't dream than how can endure all this?" Beatrice bemoaned casting a hand to the laundry. "Mistress Slater is coming once again to the estate, and she and our mistress have the sort of relationship that involved the finest of all the Meade Hall has to offer and barbed insults behind smiles."
"Yet Christina wondered why we haven't asked to get her latest cleaning spells."
"You spoke with her?" Beatrice said growing interested at the mentioned of her friend. "I haven't the chance to go by her spell shop. Is she doing well?"
"Justin spoke with her. He was sent on errand yesterday and none too eager to return back I tell you." Hilda rose to her feet and pulled off the next sheet off the drying line. "Christina is doing well enough for a witch with only simple goals in mind. She's trying to pay passage for her husband to come over."
"He's traveling a great deal of the world, venturing into the Feywood, and speaking with the Dragon Lord himself!"
"Dragon!" Hilda said alarmed. "I thought dragons went extinct centuries ago!"
"It's just a title," Beatrice said moving to help, "but I can't wait to hear more stories, and what new spells Christina is cooking up!"
"I did manage to wrestle on bit of news from Justin." Hilda added, "Christina it getting an apprentice."
"Apprentice? She said she couldn't teach anyone."
"I don't know any details, but I heard the student likes to know all the facts about anything. He's suppose to be in town for five months."
"Then," Beatrice added sourly, "We'll see if he sensible as well and doesn't get all excited when a Prince arrives."
Hilda let a sigh, clutching a hand to her chest. "A prince from the east! Prince Giovanni who the people say will arrive by the aircraft!"
Beatrice ignored her sister folding the rest of the laundry, "They're throwing a ball for him in his honor, and he's even lodging in the old Sommers house. When people keep talking about someone in a fawning manner it means he isn't that wonderful."
"It's a real life prince, Beatrice," Hilda said amused, "what about all your dreams and fantasies? If you go to the ball you might fall in love, he'll marry you, and our family will be saved from this life of drudgery!"
"The Meades treat us fair," Beatrice replied loyally, "and why do I have to marry a prince, you can. You're much more beautiful than me. Anthony," she teased, "certainly said so in the love letters I found."
"Why you little sneak!" Hilda exclaimed tossing a sheet into Beatrice's face. She added a bit more mockingly. "It has to be you, Beatrice. No one will marry someone with a bastard son."
"Surely-"
"No we're not talking about this, we have a pile of laundry to bring back downstairs, and you need to make sure Papi isn't-"
"Mixing spells with spices again, I know. I wish he would let us buy him glasses."
"Wouldn't wear them anyway," Hilda remarked as the two women picked up the basket and descended the stairs back to the main house.
"There you are!" Amanda exclaimed hurrying towards them. "I need you to help me with Miss Alexandra!"
"Miss Alexandra," Beatrice said startled as the older girl dragged her down the stairs. "Has she gotten upset again?"
Opening the servants' door, they missed being reamed with a glass bottle.
"This was the wrong one!" Alexandra screamed in the midst of the shambles of her rom. She clutched her hair which instead of her beautiful blond locks was a noxious green shade. "You got me the wrong bottle!"
"Beatrice please, go get another!" Amanda cried avoiding an oil lamp being thrown at her., "I think it's affecting her mood as well. She's always been too mild mannered."
Beatrice picked up the bottle, and rolled up the label that got folded in half. "There is a good reason Miss Alexandra," Beatrice said calmly as her young mistress threw the contents of her vanity at her, "that you have servants to buy potions and spells for you. We know exactly what's suitable for a lady of your degree and we don't buy them from the cheapest vendor." She pocketed the bottled and smiled thinly at Amanda. "I'll go run out and buy it. In the meantime." Beatrice picked up a vial. "Give this to her."
"Will it make her calm down?"
"She'll faint," Beatrice replied.
"Isn't that a bit cruel?" Amanda said with wide eyes.
The two servants ducked as a chair was flung at their heads.
"I'll do it." Amanda said turning to brace the storm that was brewing.
Beatrice picked up her skirts and hurried down the servants' stair, emerging into their quarters.
"Aunt Bea," Justin said as she burst into the room she shared with him and Hilda. Her nephew was in the midst of practicing his arithmetic the chalk dangling from his hand. "Where are you going? Mistress Slater is about to arrive. I heard that everyone will be needed when she arrives."
"I have to run an errand."
"Like when Mister Daniel had trouble with enchantress."
Beatrice shrugged figuring even at twelve he was too young to fully understand what happened. "Something like that." Beatrice flung a cloak over her clothes and grabbed her basket.
"Grandpa said it was going to rain, you need to hurry," Justin called as she ran out the room.
Beatrice never went out to market by herself. Usually Hilda went with her, or, if he wasn't pursing something in skirt, she could convince Nicholas to be an escort. But today wasn't the case. Hilda was busy doing both her and Beatrice's chores, and Nicholas and the rest of the male servants were tending the garden under Mistress Meade's careful eye.
Sneaking out the estate wasn't hard, and she was barely noted as by the overdressed bootlickers in the streets. Christina's wasn't that far away, she recalled as she dodged horse drawn carriages as her shoes beat against the cobblestones. And it was fairly safe as well; she wasn't likely to run into trouble.
Skipping aside to avoid running into a baker with large wedding cake in a wheelbarrow, she ran into a man carrying a large glass bowl.
Instead of rain of glass splinters, white fluff came pouring down upon her head. Snow, she thought touching her clothes in bewilderment, "Where on earth did this come from?"
A loud sigh of relief brought her attention upwards. "Thank the gods," the stranger said nervously pushing up his glasses. "I never preformed a spell that fast before. Are you alright?"
"You're a wizard?" Beatrice relaxing once she found a reasonable excuse for the extraordinary experience. "Why were you carrying glass around?"
That was the wrong question to ask. The man, brown eyes lit up and excited smile crossed his face. "I was going to use it for a star gazing spell-"
"Never mind," Beatrice said trying to hurry to Christina's. "Just be careful, it's dangerous when spells go awry."
"Wait," he called as Beatrice hurried down the street. "Do you know the way-"
Beatrice already turned the corner and headed through down the street. Halfway down it she began to wish she took the shortcut despite the obvious risk involved. A fancy carriage had stopped in the middle of the street. Unlike like most of the rich who rather flaunt by merely ignoring the common people and splattering them in mud as they passed, this noble had to arrogance to stop market traffic for him.
Beatrice nudged her way to the closer fringes, craning her head to see over some people taller than her. She didn't recognize the coat of arms on the door, with Mistress Meade being a prominent member of society Beatrice was quite sure she could recognize every rich and noble family in this city. But she didn't know this one.
Which meant…
A trumpet sounded as the doors of the carriage sprung open. A young boy lowered the horned instrument calling clearly to the crowd.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, I grant you his Highness, Crown Prince of the Eastern Isles, Giovanni Rossi of House Panino!"
The prince, Beatrice groaned rolling her eyes while cheers filled the crowd. Will there nothing more important that some self-centered fop making his name known?
Not even wanting to catch a glance, she pushed her way through the crowd and ran rather unladylike towards Christina's shop.
"Well hello love, what brings you here?" The warm accent always calmed Beatrice, because Christina had answer to everything even the most strange. Her shop was just as warm, cluttered with spell books, leaflets describing major spell effects, and map pinned on the wall of her home, the tiny country where the beer was green. Getting out the way of a broom sweeping itself across the floor, Beatrice replied:
"Trouble as usual."
Christina looked up from stirring her cauldron. "Trouble you say? Hop behind the counter then."
"What do you have brewing," Beatrice said momentarily forgetting her worries as she lifted the countertop coming to the back part of the store. "music that you can carry in your pocket, a spell that allows you talk to people far away, something to make your breath under water?"
"Even better." Christina picked up her spoon revealing a sopping wet garment. "Take an ordinary dress cast a bit of magic," she waved a hand sending sparks flying in the air, "and poof a beautiful ball gown!"
Beatrice glanced at the gray dress. "I wouldn't wear that to the ball."
"It's a work in progress," she pulled down her sleeves, causing the bangles around her wrists to jingle about. "You came here for reason? Mistress Meade needs another spell to keep her gardens lovelier than Mistress Slater's?"
"No, it's for Miss Alexandra. She used the wrong hair spell. Her hair is green."
"Oooh," Christina said wincing as she pulled as a lever. "A bad temper as well."
"How did you know?"
"A good guess." The various spells and potions circled around her head as she looked at them closely. "This is one making you seem taller, that's one for lying extremely well, this one for pretending your insane, here we are." She lifted the lever back up as she plucked the bottle up.
"The essence of toad, the hair of a unicorn, and a fragment of a great sea-turtle's shell." Christina said, "her hair will turn back to blond and she act normal again. Are you going to pay me three silver marks or it goes on credit?"
"The usual," Beatrice said, picking up the bottle.
"I wish they would just give you the money?" Christina said leaning on the counter. "Credit always gets paid at the end of the year. And I wanted to buy Stuart's passage long before then."
"Hilda said you had an apprentice coming, surely he could help draw in more money for the shop."
"That's right," Christina said snapping her fingers, "he was suppose to be here, an hour ago. But I suppose he got lost. He seems like the brilliant sort, but rather scatterbrained."
"I'm sure it will all worked about. But I must be going." Beatrice said hurrying out the store, only to have the door swing open for her.
"Hey you!" The man exclaimed with surprised smile on his face.
Beatrice blinked realizing this was the eccentric man she ran into earlier on the street.
"Apologies Mistress McKinney," the man said to Christina.
"I told you to call me Christina." She said. "And it's about time you showed up, Henry Grubstick. I gave you a map, how did you get lost?"
"That," Henry reached into his pocket, he pulled out cards, a dog-eared book, string, and finally a clear stone. "It was inverted. I ended up going around in circles."
"Oh bother," Christina muttered, "transparent stones are so hard to work with."
"I think its glass actually," Henry mused. "Convex or concave, it's hard to tell."
"Doesn't matter." Christina turned to Beatrice. "Come again, Beatrice, we have to have a nice long chat about what your sister is doing being with a married man."
Beatrice nodded waving at Christina and her new apprentice. Hurrying down the streets she found to her dismay that it was raining. So much for heeding Justin's warning.
"Lovely," she said pulling her hood over head, knowing the material couldn't hold back all the moisture. "Couldn't it wait before I got back?"
"Rain doesn't often wait for anyone."
Beatrice looked about, expecting to see the owner of the voice lurking about around a shop, but saw no one.
"Over here."
A man's face peered out a familiar obstinate carriage.
"Oh no," Beatrice groaned aloud. "You, go away."
The prince frowned. "That's not the usual response I get."
Beatrice slapped a hand over mouth realizing she had spoken to an noble, a royal no less, so rudely. Dear Gods, she was going to lose her head or something. If she ran she would be even more disgrace to the Meade Family. Clutching her arms across her chest to hide the Meade coat of arms, Beatrice tried to look away at the ground and master the urge to flee as the carriage rolled slowly next to her.
"Would you like to get out the rain?" The carriage door opened and the held out a hand towards.
Beatrice stood up tall as if she had stepped on particularly painful spell. This was what happened to Hilda, she took shelter from rain and… and…
"No thank you!" Beatrice said loudly enough to start the shopkeeper drying his wares, and ran nearly all the way back to Meade Hall.
Furious at the prince as well as herself, Beatrice pushed her way passed the group of the usual well wishers. She heard angry cry.
"Who do you think you are?" a chillingly familiar voice called.
Beatrice froze as she turned slowly around. Before her was a woman draped elegantly in white with her servant holding umbrella over her. There was a spot of rainwater on her shoulder.
"I don't take kindly of this, I am Wilhelmina Slater and I don't get wet." With a gesture to her servant, they walked towards the main gate. "Your mistress shall hear about this. This way, Marc."
Beatrice looked up at the gloomy sky and had the odd feeling the day was just about to get worse.
A/N: As you may noticed I altered some names, because some names (ie Betty) are too modern souding for the time I wanted to emmulate in the story. So if you haven't guessed by now.
Beatrice Betty
AlexandraAlexis
Nicholas Nick Pepper
Giovanni Gio (It's his real name, I'm sure if many viewers know that or not)
Anthony Tony "Coach" Diaz