Read Online Except the Queen by Jane Yolen, Midori Snyder - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Jane Yolen, Midori Snyder
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earlier meal. Watching them work, I reflected on how useful it was to be able to speak the local dialect.
I entered the hallway and walked up the stairs. A door cracked open on the second floor and I got a glimpse of improbable caterpillar green hair and the ghost of a face.
A girl,
I thought,
not wanting to get into a mix with the young men.
Before I could say anything, the door closed.
Just beyond the second floor, I cursed my aged body for its trembling muscles and the breath that would not come easily into my laboring lungs. But I kept going up and on the third-floor landing, I stood in front of an oak door, a brass skeletal hand as a knocker and a heavy lock shaped like a mouth with teeth beneath the doorknob. I inserted the key, my pulse fluttering. What would I find on the other side?
Chairs of bones, lamps of skulls, pillows stuffed with the hair of the dead?
Standing on the threshold of Baba Yaga’s home, I was suddenly relieved enough to break into the tears that I had denied myself during the long day.
Then the door creaked open and I peered in.
No bones, no scent of decay or rot. Instead, the rooms were very neat and cozy if a bit small. The whitewashed walls had been painted with scrolls and flowers over the windows and along the edge of the ceiling. The oak floors gave off the sweet scent of beeswax polish. In the sitting room was a rug of finely knotted wool in a beautiful pattern of imaginary flowers. Two embroidered chairs waited by a little potbellied fireplace. On a side table, covered in a linen cloth finely cross-stitched with red silk borders, a candle flickered in its silver holder.
What I took to be the cooking place was small, but functional. A maroon oven rubbed shoulders with wooden cupboards whose doors were carved with acorns and oak leaves. Scrubbed plates and cups sat waiting in a rack above a basin. A table and two chairs occupied anarrow space by another window. I peered out, but could see nothing in back of the house except a large expanse of land and other buildings huddled around it.
The bedroom was almost entirely filled with a sturdy wooden bed, piled high with feather quilts. The pillows were covered in fine linen cloth made of the same stuff as the sheets and decorated with cutwork embroidery. At the foot of the bed, I opened the lid on a fragrant chest smelling of cedar and found more clothes, shoes, woolens, and scarves. A window opened to a small wrought iron ledge and I could just make out narrow stairs leading down to the ground below.
Off of the bedroom was an even smaller room containing a white tub perched on clawed feet. There was also a basin like a chair filled with water, and a taller basin with brass handles and a spout. I may have lived my immortal life Under the Hill and in the Greenwood, but even I had heard about these little rooms from brownies who often visited human houses. I turned the brass handles of the tub and basin, delighted as water spurted out, some hot, some cold. As for the chair-basin, I toggled the handle, until it too whooshed, drained and then refilled. I guessed at its purpose, confirming my suspicions when I checked under the bed and found no
pot de chambre.
I returned to the sitting room, kicked off the painful shoes and sat heavily in one of the generous chairs. Closing my eyes, I drifted into a light sleep, my body gratefully releasing the memories of my terrifying flight through the storming forest, the rattle of the dragon-train, and the terrible weight of all I had to learn in order to survive here.
A tap on my shoulder startled me and I lunged forward like a breached trout. A pair of hands—just hands and not matching either though they
were
right and left—floated in front of my astonished face, waiting for me to fully wake.
“Are you . . . are you Baba Yaga’s servants?” I asked.
Gracefully, the hands turned themselves over, palmsup in a gesture of supplication. One hand raised a finger to signal “
Wait,
” and then
I entered the hallway and walked up the stairs. A door cracked open on the second floor and I got a glimpse of improbable caterpillar green hair and the ghost of a face.
A girl,
I thought,
not wanting to get into a mix with the young men.
Before I could say anything, the door closed.
Just beyond the second floor, I cursed my aged body for its trembling muscles and the breath that would not come easily into my laboring lungs. But I kept going up and on the third-floor landing, I stood in front of an oak door, a brass skeletal hand as a knocker and a heavy lock shaped like a mouth with teeth beneath the doorknob. I inserted the key, my pulse fluttering. What would I find on the other side?
Chairs of bones, lamps of skulls, pillows stuffed with the hair of the dead?
Standing on the threshold of Baba Yaga’s home, I was suddenly relieved enough to break into the tears that I had denied myself during the long day.
Then the door creaked open and I peered in.
No bones, no scent of decay or rot. Instead, the rooms were very neat and cozy if a bit small. The whitewashed walls had been painted with scrolls and flowers over the windows and along the edge of the ceiling. The oak floors gave off the sweet scent of beeswax polish. In the sitting room was a rug of finely knotted wool in a beautiful pattern of imaginary flowers. Two embroidered chairs waited by a little potbellied fireplace. On a side table, covered in a linen cloth finely cross-stitched with red silk borders, a candle flickered in its silver holder.
What I took to be the cooking place was small, but functional. A maroon oven rubbed shoulders with wooden cupboards whose doors were carved with acorns and oak leaves. Scrubbed plates and cups sat waiting in a rack above a basin. A table and two chairs occupied anarrow space by another window. I peered out, but could see nothing in back of the house except a large expanse of land and other buildings huddled around it.
The bedroom was almost entirely filled with a sturdy wooden bed, piled high with feather quilts. The pillows were covered in fine linen cloth made of the same stuff as the sheets and decorated with cutwork embroidery. At the foot of the bed, I opened the lid on a fragrant chest smelling of cedar and found more clothes, shoes, woolens, and scarves. A window opened to a small wrought iron ledge and I could just make out narrow stairs leading down to the ground below.
Off of the bedroom was an even smaller room containing a white tub perched on clawed feet. There was also a basin like a chair filled with water, and a taller basin with brass handles and a spout. I may have lived my immortal life Under the Hill and in the Greenwood, but even I had heard about these little rooms from brownies who often visited human houses. I turned the brass handles of the tub and basin, delighted as water spurted out, some hot, some cold. As for the chair-basin, I toggled the handle, until it too whooshed, drained and then refilled. I guessed at its purpose, confirming my suspicions when I checked under the bed and found no
pot de chambre.
I returned to the sitting room, kicked off the painful shoes and sat heavily in one of the generous chairs. Closing my eyes, I drifted into a light sleep, my body gratefully releasing the memories of my terrifying flight through the storming forest, the rattle of the dragon-train, and the terrible weight of all I had to learn in order to survive here.
A tap on my shoulder startled me and I lunged forward like a breached trout. A pair of hands—just hands and not matching either though they
were
right and left—floated in front of my astonished face, waiting for me to fully wake.
“Are you . . . are you Baba Yaga’s servants?” I asked.
Gracefully, the hands turned themselves over, palmsup in a gesture of supplication. One hand raised a finger to signal “
Wait,
” and then
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