Rose, Wilted: Book 1

Chapter 10 - Magic and Maps

You may call me Adam.

I stared at the sun spangled canopy above my head, letting the dream filter through my conscious mind over and over.

Assuming the Beast kept its word, not only would I be able to go home if I broke the curse, but Fabel would be forever free of the Beast and the King would return. The Beast would die.

I wonder if he knows that part.

The curse needed to be broken, that much was certain, but how to do it? Where could I even begin? Asking the Beast was out of the question, of course. He was probably under the same restrictions as the King anyways - punished by pain if he said a word of it. So what did that leave? Exploring to castle to look for clues? Maybe if I could find the library there would be some books on curses. Then I remembered the books on top of the wardrobe. There were other titles besides Le Morte D'Arthur, and maybe one of them would be useful.

I kicked off the covers and pushed myself out of the lavish bed. Shivering at the cold floor, I hurried to the wardrobe. I found a pair of dandelion colored slippers and a deep maroon dress with gold, embroidered, patterns across the skirt and slipped them on. My hair was still a bit messy, but for now I didn't care. I'd do that later.

There were only seven books total on top of the wardrobe, but it was hard to read the spines from my viewpoint, so I would have to take them down one by one. I reached up and snagged a book from the end of the row. I glanced at the title. It read, The Species Draconae and Other Magical Beasts. I raised my eyebrows. That could be helpful. I grabbed another one. This one was a gory mystery novel, not really to my taste, and not helpful. The next was a textbook on the politics of Arensland, which was our neighbor country to the west and one we were constantly at odds with. Then of course there was Le Morte D'Arthur and then another thriller. I reshelved all the books, then I took the last book off the shelf hopefully. It was a thick and well used tome with covers if black leather. The same foreign, loopy script I'd found on the mirror labeled the spine. A little thrill zapped through my fingertips when I pulled it off the shelf and carefully pried it open.

The majority of the text was in Fabelian, but every few pages a sentence or two, or even whole paragraphs would be in that same weird script. I flipped through it to see if anything jumped out at me, but besides a few illustrations it seemed that-

The creak of the door made me jump and snap the book shut. I whipped it behind my back. When I saw that it was only Rowena with breakfast, I blushed in a combination of guilt and embarrassment.

"Oh! I'm sorry I disturbed you, Miss. I can come back later if you like."

"No, it's fine Rowena. I just- I- um."

"Yesterday you were asleep when I came in to leave you breakfast. I thought you might be still in bed. Servants aren't really supposed to be seen..."

And the curse took that literally.

"Well that's okay. I don't mind seeing you. And I'm used to getting up earlier. Once we moved to the village I started waking at dawn."

I took the book out from behind my back.

Why was I so guilty about this?

I set it back on top of the wardrobe while Rowena set my breakfast on the bedside table. I ran my fingers through my hair distractedly and immediately they were caught in a snarl.

"Oh, wonderful," I muttered. I wrenched my fingers free and grabbed a brush off the vanity and tried to quickly comb it through, but it just got stuck.

"Here, let me help," Rowena said.

"There's really no need."

But she took it from my hand anyway. She guided me over to the vanity and had me sit on the stool in front of the mirror so I could see myself and her behind me. She began combing out the snarls in swift, short strokes with such skill that I barely felt a thing.