Read Online Bryony and Roses by T. Kingfisher - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: T. Kingfisher
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appropriate. It is a very pretty room. It’s just…well…”
It was pink.
The walls were pink, the floor was pink, the bedding was pink, even the furniture was rosewood and, while quite attractive, came perilously close to pink. There was a wallpaper border of pink floral designs, and the crown molding across the ceiling was white with a pattern of pink spirals, and the candlesticks were thorny black iron brambles, topped by iron roses with the candles rising out of them like stamens. There was a tapestry on the wall showing a bluebird perched among pink flowers and the dark pink carpet was broken up by a round rug in the shape of an enormous dahlia.
Which was also pink.
Bryony took several steps forward, around a decorative pink urn—House apparently liked urns—and gazed in dismay at the canopied bed. It stood on a little raised platform, like an altar or a stage. It could have held Bryony and both her sisters, and they could have slept the night through without ever encountering a stray foot or hand from one another.
Lace foamed over the bedskirts and pillows and down from the canopy like pink lianas. The bedposts were carved with climbing roses. There were silk hangings about the bed embroidered with more flowers, all in shades of red and pink and vermilion.
Bryony had never before had occasion to contemplate what it would be like to find oneself inside a uterus, but she suspected that sleeping in the bed would be rather like that. Except with more flowers.
She tried to find someplace to rest her eyes that was not pink and rose-filled, and settled on the bluebird. The splash of blue was her only anchor in the room.
“Right,” she said aloud, to the house, or possibly the bluebird. “Um. Yes. Very…err…kind.” Perhaps there would be some hangings elsewhere in the house to tame the intensity of the walls. She’d have to look. “Very…pink. Yes.”
Two steps up onto the platform brought her to the bed. She looked dubiously at the space under it. The bedskirts hid the space underneath, but she had never liked beds with too much space under them, even when she was younger and had slept in a carved bedstead instead of on a straw-tick mattress. There was too much room for things to lurk. Merely because nothing had, in seventeen years, reached out and clutched her ankles didn’t mean that it wouldn’t happen someday if she let her guard down.
She dropped her satchel on the bed. The brown leather was another comforting spot in the sea of pink. Perhaps she could navigate from spot to spot, bluebird to brown satchel to the window on the far side of the room. There had been some celadon urns out on the landing. Possibly she could appropriate one or two.
She sighed. When the initial shock of the pink had faded, the grandness started to overwhelm her. There had been a time when she would have fit in such a room, but that time was long ago and very far away.
She trudged to the window. Normally, grandness would not have bothered her so much—Bryony had learned to be grimly proud of her relative poverty, because the alternative was to be crushed by it—but there was something about the Beast’s manor that made you feel as if there was almost certainly dirt under your fingernails, and perhaps something unpleasant stuck to your boots.
She checked her nails, sighed again, and tucked her hands under her elbows. Very well. She was a gardener, after all, and there was no shame in dirt under your nails. None whatsoever. If the house was going to be judgmental about it, it could go hang.
The window beckoned. Bryony peered out and felt her sprits lift a little, because it overlooked the birch tree. The bare branches had not yet leafed out, but they were a shape that she understood, and which did not make her feel small and grubby and out of place. Birch trees were the same tree no matter who you were. Even the very rich did not get better birch trees.
“I wonder if I could set some
It was pink.
The walls were pink, the floor was pink, the bedding was pink, even the furniture was rosewood and, while quite attractive, came perilously close to pink. There was a wallpaper border of pink floral designs, and the crown molding across the ceiling was white with a pattern of pink spirals, and the candlesticks were thorny black iron brambles, topped by iron roses with the candles rising out of them like stamens. There was a tapestry on the wall showing a bluebird perched among pink flowers and the dark pink carpet was broken up by a round rug in the shape of an enormous dahlia.
Which was also pink.
Bryony took several steps forward, around a decorative pink urn—House apparently liked urns—and gazed in dismay at the canopied bed. It stood on a little raised platform, like an altar or a stage. It could have held Bryony and both her sisters, and they could have slept the night through without ever encountering a stray foot or hand from one another.
Lace foamed over the bedskirts and pillows and down from the canopy like pink lianas. The bedposts were carved with climbing roses. There were silk hangings about the bed embroidered with more flowers, all in shades of red and pink and vermilion.
Bryony had never before had occasion to contemplate what it would be like to find oneself inside a uterus, but she suspected that sleeping in the bed would be rather like that. Except with more flowers.
She tried to find someplace to rest her eyes that was not pink and rose-filled, and settled on the bluebird. The splash of blue was her only anchor in the room.
“Right,” she said aloud, to the house, or possibly the bluebird. “Um. Yes. Very…err…kind.” Perhaps there would be some hangings elsewhere in the house to tame the intensity of the walls. She’d have to look. “Very…pink. Yes.”
Two steps up onto the platform brought her to the bed. She looked dubiously at the space under it. The bedskirts hid the space underneath, but she had never liked beds with too much space under them, even when she was younger and had slept in a carved bedstead instead of on a straw-tick mattress. There was too much room for things to lurk. Merely because nothing had, in seventeen years, reached out and clutched her ankles didn’t mean that it wouldn’t happen someday if she let her guard down.
She dropped her satchel on the bed. The brown leather was another comforting spot in the sea of pink. Perhaps she could navigate from spot to spot, bluebird to brown satchel to the window on the far side of the room. There had been some celadon urns out on the landing. Possibly she could appropriate one or two.
She sighed. When the initial shock of the pink had faded, the grandness started to overwhelm her. There had been a time when she would have fit in such a room, but that time was long ago and very far away.
She trudged to the window. Normally, grandness would not have bothered her so much—Bryony had learned to be grimly proud of her relative poverty, because the alternative was to be crushed by it—but there was something about the Beast’s manor that made you feel as if there was almost certainly dirt under your fingernails, and perhaps something unpleasant stuck to your boots.
She checked her nails, sighed again, and tucked her hands under her elbows. Very well. She was a gardener, after all, and there was no shame in dirt under your nails. None whatsoever. If the house was going to be judgmental about it, it could go hang.
The window beckoned. Bryony peered out and felt her sprits lift a little, because it overlooked the birch tree. The bare branches had not yet leafed out, but they were a shape that she understood, and which did not make her feel small and grubby and out of place. Birch trees were the same tree no matter who you were. Even the very rich did not get better birch trees.
“I wonder if I could set some
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