For three long, lonesome days Eleanor was left to herself in the attic. Each dawn Lady Tremaine came bearing a tray of hot food. One morning she was given a glimpse at her supposed breakfast: hot oats with a square of golden butter, and rich, dark sugar that hadn't yet been stirred in. Beside it was a small dish of sliced apples, and a poached egg. When Ella once again refused to be her slave, the whole lot was thrown out the window. Just the sound of ceramic shattering was enough to pull out tears. Were it not for the fruit and nuts the mice, birds and squirrels fed her she might have relented. The animals also looked tirelessly for Lucinda, but it seemed that the faeries were gone from the meadow.
"She'll come when I need her," Ella tried to reassure them as they nested in her hair. "Besides, the cook knows who I am. She might send someone to look for me," She stroked one of the squirrels beneath his chin, and ever so carefully broke the walnut it had brought to her in two. It gratefully took the other half and scampered into the eaves.
Even with the offered treats from the animals, her stomach was still an empty, aching pit. When, on the fourth day, Ella heard a commotion downstairs she was too weak to try and reason out the cause. Her stepsisters could be fighting again. Or Lady Tremaine was in a rage because she and her worthless daughters were still meant to cook and clean. Hugging her last shred of hope - a dazzling crystal shoe - ever closer, Eleanor tried to block the lot of it out.
"The Prince is coming here because he wants to marry me!" She heard Drisella screech. That certainly shook her awake. The Prince was coming? Now? She scrambled toward the door and pressed her ear against a hole in the floor. Around her the birds and mice quieted.
"You? You're nothing but a starving slob," Anastasia's snappy retort brought on a screech of its own. Most likely caused by a swift and brutal yanking of curls from her sister.
"And you're a sniveling child. Look at you! That's not something a lady would wear! Maybe Cinderella would like it," There was a smash of glass or crystal, and from there the fight only escalated.
"Girls, girls, no need to fight so. When one of you is married, we shall all live in the castle. Won't you like that, Drisella darling? You could have two rooms if you'd like. One for just your dresses, even if you aren't crowned Princess," Ella tried desperately to hear her stepsister's response.
"And Anastasia, darling, if you aren't wed then you will certainly have an entire host of servants for your every whim. Won't that be lovely?"
Hurriedly Ella moved to where she'd hidden the glass shoe and strode purposely toward the window. If Hunter was coming here, she had to be certain he at least suspected where she was being held. Ever so carefully she tossed the shoe from the window. Even if the glass broke, the glimmering golden heel would remain. She tried the door again, struggling against the firm bolt and slumped against the wall. "Please," She begged the heavens, clasping her hands as if in prayer. "Lucinda, if you can hear me, please oh please let Hunter find me,"
"Hunter, I will literally murder you if she's not here," Leopold ground out, his back so straight in the saddle it was a wonder someone hadn't forced it that way. For days they'd worked side by side through the homes. If the women were too old, or married, or too young, they could thankfully pass by. Leopold wore the crown with an air of confidence and quickly evaporating patience. The women screamed. Some begged. Others silently wept when the footmen or guards tried to force the shoe onto their feet. They'd left home after home disheartened and exhausted.
"Do you threaten your Prince?" Hunter murmured under his breath, only half joking. The two men rode side by side as usual. Hunter had Leo's sword strapped to his hip. So far he'd only needed it once, when a man got too loud and too angry after his daughter was turned away. If he didn't find Eleanor at the Tremaine home he might just fall on it...
"No, I promise. I don't know of a soul that appreciates the Tremaine household," Leo jerked his horse to a halt and dismounted, mimicked quickly by the half dozen riders accompanying them. A pretty white mare stood quietly at the rear, her golden saddle empty of burden or rider. She shook her mane and pawed at the earth just as a mouse scrambled toward a large hedge. Hunter watched it go.
"Announcing his Highness, the Crowned Prince!" One of the guards called out, while another summoned the Tremaine household with a trumpet.
"Your grace, we hadn't expected you so soon," Lady Tremaine said as she sank into a curtsy. Her emerald gown was garish and much too opulent for a widowed woman and two girls. It also looked like it was attempting to sever her in two. "Won't you come in? My daughters are in the sitting room,"
"No one else is here?" Hunter asked before Leo could open his mouth. "No servants?"
Was that a scowl on the woman's face, or just her natural expression? "None, sir. We haven't found one yet up to our standards," She raised an eyebrow as Hunter sent men around the property: one toward the garden, others around the sides of the house and toward the backdoor. "Looking for something?"
"It's simply how we do things," He stated, deliberately leaving off her title. The older woman bristled and nodded before waving Leopold and two guards into the house.
It was Hunter who was truly looking for his beloved. He scoured homes and basements. There was not an attic left untended or a hole not thoroughly prodded. Yet still he hadn't found her. There were plenty of servants hidden out of sight, lest the shoe fit them. True to his word he brought each and every eligible woman to Leo and had the shoe attempted on their foot as well. Not one fit.
As he walked the perimeter of the home, he paused and looked around. Where had all these mice come from? They scurried this way and that, not quite acting like a swarm but certainly out of the ordinary. Making sure that he wasn't seen he crouched down and held out his hand. One mouse, the tiniest and a soft, dove grey came forward to sniff at his fingers. "Is..." If Eleanor could speak with the animals, why couldn't he? "Is she here? Is Eleanor hiding here?"
Suddenly the mice seemed possessed. They scurried this way and that, squeaking to one another as they darted up the wall and under the hedges. Hunter kept still as they settled down, and ever so carefully watched as together, a group of no less than fifteen carried over a glass shoe with a golden heel. He took the prize in his hands and straightened. "Thank you." He shoved the shoe in the satchel swinging against his hip and marched inside to find two girls roughly as old as his Eleanor, but with enough makeup they looked as done up as their mother.
"Ah, Hunter! Who do you think should try first?" Leopold inquired, gesturing to the girls twittering amongst themselves.
"The one in the pink," He said, nodding at Drisella. She let out a squeal and leaped to her feet, just as Lady Tremaine reached out a hand.
"Ah, sir, I must speak with my daughter momentarily. She'll have no problem wearing her slipper. I just can't believe she lost it!" With that she was dragging the girl by the hand toward the kitchen. Hunter leaned down to whisper in his friend's ear.
"She's here. I found the other shoe. I believe they've kidnapped her. Keep them as long as possible," With that he and the several of the guards began to scour the house. The cellar was useless. There was merely canned fruits and vegetables, and several dozen bottles of cheap wine. When he returned to the sitting room, he was just in time to be astonished.
"Hunter..." Leopold said, clearing his throat. "Drisella Tremaine fits the shoe," He pointed to where Drisella stood, somewhat shakily, with the shoe snuggly fit over her stocking. He felt his mouth open, but nothing came out.
"T-that's impossible. It's enchanted, I know it is," The Prince swallowed. "I don't - "
A pigeon alighted in the window sill and turned its head this way and that, staring at Drisella all the while. Finally the bird opened its beak and - Blood on the shoe. Blood on the shoe. It cooed. Hunter frowned and pulled at his ear. Had he heard right? Blood on the shoe. Blood on the shoe, it said again. Hunter now took a careful look at Drisella. Her color was terrible, and tears ran freely down her cheeks.
"No. It isn't her. There's blood on the shoe. She damaged her foot to force it in," It took everything in him not to demand Eleanor's location, but he was quite sure he would find her sooner rather than later. "Try her sister, and then we'll be on our way," For nearly ten minutes he tore through the house, moving chairs and tables and tossing out the contents of the pantry. If she wasn't in plain sight, then she had to be hidden.
"Who searched the tower?" He finally asked as the men assembled around him. Guilty faces exchanged looks, and it was almost a relief to hear the next statement.
"Sir...we...we can't find a way in," One of them finally said. "Not one of us,"
"Then that's where she is. Search the walls,"
Hunter heard a whimper from the other room, and Leopold's outraged accusations, but this time he ignored them. His fingers probed the walls until finally he pushed aside a large tapestry and discovered a door set into the wall. He tore the fabric from its hooks and tossed it in a heap on the floor. "Here, men! Here!" Although the panel was missing a handle, it wasn't hard to force it open with his sword. Although he took the steep stairs two at a time, he was hardly winded when he reached the summit.
"Eleanor!" He cried, yanking uselessly at the handle. "Eleanor! Are you there?"
Ella thought she was dreaming. Certainly that wasn't Hunter's voice on the other side of the door. Certainly that wasn't his fists beating against the wood. "H-Hunter?" She murmured, stumbling over her own feet. "Hunter is that you?"
"Yes! Yes! Men, arrest the ladies of the house! Eleanor, I'm here my love! I'm here!" She heard the door crack as something was thrown against it, and stepped back twice. Splinters of wood flew across the room as the door was brought down and Hunter swept her into his arms. "My lovely, lovely Eleanor. You're safe now. You're safe," He lifted her into his arms and fairly ran down the stairs with her, just in time to see shackles on the wrists of Lady Tremaine and her daughters.
"How dare you! She is my servant, and I can do with her as I wish!" The woman screeched as Drisella and Anastasia wailed. Puddles of blood surrounded their feet.
"What on earth did you do to them?" Ella demanded, horrified, as the bloodied glass slipper was taken for a thorough washing.
"She ah, she lopped off part of each foot. Her heel is gone," Leopold said as he pointed to Drisella. "We bandaged it, but she'll always have a limp. That one is now missing her entire big toe," Anastasia was sobbing grotesquely.
"Lady Tremaine, you are hereby stripped of your title and your property," Hunter said, setting Ella on a chair. Her stepmother could barely put words together to sputter. "You will be tried for attempted murder and insanity,"
"Who do you think you are? Rising above your station! Trying to -"
That was Leopold's cue to step in. Already horrified at what this mother had done to her daughters, he swapped Hunter's crown for his sword and stepped between the Prince and the deranged woman. "You will not speak to the Prince in such a manner! Am I understood?"
"B-but are you not the Prince? You...everyone thinks -"
"Everyone thinks exactly as I want them to," Hunter said, taking the cleaned shoe from Leopold and kneeling in front of Ella. The young woman felt her heart pounding as he slipped the shoe back onto her foot...and then pulled the second from his bag. "There you are, my lady. Your property is returned,"
Lady Tremaine let out a senseless cry and fell to the floor in a faint. The guards carried her from the house and gently escorted Drisella and Anastasia away as well, leaving only Leopold, Hunter and Eleanor. The three sat quietly in her father's old sitting room, allowing silence to claim them once more.
"I've spoken to my parents, Eleanor. They encouraged me to find you, and say that it doesn't matter if you're royal or not," Hunter reached out to take her hand. "You'll never be hurt again. We can, we can call the gypsies back! We can make this home a home for them, so that they always have somewhere comfortable to come back to,"
"Ella," She said, pushing her blonde hair behind her ears. She lifted her eyes from her lap and met his, although it was difficult to see through her tears. "If I'm to be your wife, then just call me Ella,"
The wedding was a full week later.
Lucinda made an appearance with a wave of her wand and a smile, and many of the birds that kept her company when she was a child worked with the fairy to clothe her in a gossamer, white gown. Her hair was brushed free, to shimmer and shine around her shoulders, and as the procession made its way from the castle toward the chapel, the birds alighted on her shoulders.
So it was when her stepsisters rushed her, they quite easily pecked out one eye apiece. Drisella and Anastasia howled and screamed as they vanished back into the crowd, somehow disappearing from sight. When they rushed at her again, and lost their other eyes, they fell in a useless heap of moaning and despair.
Later Ella would learn of her the fate of her stepfamily. She would learn that her stepmother was employed in the castle laundry, dying linen purple and green and blue. Her stepsisters, she discovered, were kept under close watch in a nunnery some hundreds of miles away where they muttered only to one another, forever lost to the darkness that had become their world.
As for Cinderella and her Prince, they lived a long and happy life. They ruled fairly, and welcomed the gypsies for many a holiday. The animals of the kingdom were more highly regarded, and gifts for fairies became as common as shining teeth for the Tooth Mouse. They surrounded themselves with children, and passed the story of Cinderella and her glass slipper to them. Who passed it along to their children. And their children's children. Who have passed it now along to you. Although the story may have changed for them, one thing remains ever the same.
THEY LIVED HAPPILY FOREVER AFTER
It's done! I hope you enjoyed it. I start my move on Monday, so I don't know when I'll start the next story. Please favorite me to keep updated!