A Heart as Red as Paint by Jennifer Kropf

Author:Jennifer Kropf
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Winter Publishing House

Chapter, The Twenty-Second

The sky was as clear as still water, the glassy stars twinkling against the navy ocean. Around the orchard, crisp pure-white apples clung to snow-dusted trees, their bark lightly frosted by the chilly night.

The long table in the middle was sprinkled with red butterflies like drops of blood, spreading out from the king’s seat that was warmed with a lush ivory fur as though he’d ended a polar bear’s life in that very spot.

I walked below the lanterns wrapping the party area, where white flames cast pools of light over the snow-bedded floor. I wasn’t trying to hide at the crease of the clearing, I just wanted to watch them—the kingdom’s highest-ranking nobles.

The king arrived, introducing a white-masked magician he’d hired for the party. The magician flicked his fingers and a pearl-coloured apple appeared in his palm, nearly blending into the suit he wore—also white from head to toe. The magician bowed to the applauding group, while I watched the palace’s back entrance for the princes.

The mouth of the doorway glowed a warm yellow, inviting me to return to the palace and leave this birthday party I was pretending to belong to. It was too cold to be outside anyway.

I nearly jumped to find the magician standing directly in front of me—arm outstretched, pallid apple resting on his palm. “A gift,” he said through his mask. We were both in the shadows, but most guests watched the magician, and his choice of whom to bestow his gift upon.

Blinking, I took the apple just to make him go away. But he lingered, a slow tilt of his head telling me he was studying me from behind that all-concealing white mask.

I shifted and glanced at the darkness of the orchard behind me. The trees formed a twisted labyrinth, not grown in structured rows. I’d get lost if I tried to sneak away into it.

But the magician turned with no gesture of goodbye and sprang upon the opulent table. He snapped his fingers and apples fell from the sky into his hands. He wound them into a juggle as he danced between plates and platters, never touching a single item on display.

I huffed as the princes began emerging from the palace—all coronets, jeweled buttons, and rich coats.

Prince Forrester came out first, moving like the cold breeze, barely making footprints as he swept to take the arm of a beautiful, dark-skinned girl off the path.

Prince Tegan emerged; a bulking frame of uncovered muscle even though it was freezing. His purplish stare travelled over the group, and he made a face into the trees at where the two youngest Red Princes crept through the shadows, one stopping to push the other up onto a branch before anyone would notice. Prince Tegan rolled his eyes and ignored them.

A flicker of red in the darkness revealed that someone else was slipping past the party towards the young princes. Suddenly, a guttural growl tore through the night, and both young princes screamed like girls. The one

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