The Goblin Cinderella by Lidiya Foxglove

Author:Lidiya Foxglove [Foxglove, Lidiya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2017-08-31T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fourteen

Ellara

“You thought you were special, dancing with the princes?” Gwyn kicked her slipper at me.

“You never deserved to be there!” Cerra was almost in tears. “Goblins don’t belong in the Palace of Waterfalls!”

“Goblins belong in dark hovels,” my stepmother said smugly. “Which is why you will be spending the rest of your life tied up in the basement with the spiders and mice where you belong. And we are leaving, so you might die there before you’re found.”

“You’re leaving?”

“We’re going to Cabria,” she said. “To reclaim my poor late husband’s saffron farm.”

I started to feel like maybe something really terrible had happened. Somehow, she had out-schemed my aunt and Mr. Hassari both. What if it was all true? What if my aunt really had been sold to be a ship’s whore, and my stepmother really was going to tie me up down here to die?

I could think of no more terrifying fate, and the trouble was, the only people who knew I lived here were impoverished deliverymen. If no one answered the door, they would just move on. Maybe if Ithrin issued a decree looking for a goblin girl…but then, if all of this took a few days…

I was scrambling—and furious. I would have to take a risk.

“You don’t want to do that,” I said, anger flaring in my voice. “You think goblins don’t belong in the Palace of Waterfalls? Well, Prince Ithrin thinks otherwise. He has chosen me as his bride, and if I don’t return to him tomorrow morning, he’ll come for me. He knows where I live.”

My stepmother laughed. “Oh, of course he did. The prince.” She started talking to me like you would talk to a baby. Well, if you really hated the baby. “The prince wants to marry poor little goblin. I’m quite sure. He probably said that to get rid of you.”

“He didn’t.” I took the ring out of my pocket. “He gave me this as a promise.”

“Let me see that.” She wrested it out my hand and inspected the royal seal. “You probably stole this.”

“I stole a ring right off the prince’s hand? If I was that good at stealing valuables, do you think I’d still be here?”

Gwyn and Cerra looked at it with horrified expressions; they believed me right away. Of course, they had seen Prince Ithrin holding me so close at the ball.

“Hmm. All right. Change of plans. Girls, help me tie her up.”

At this point, there was nothing left to do but fight for my life. I whirled and hit Cerra right in the nose. She shrieked, but she also hit me back. One could give my stepsisters that. The girls could genuinely fight. When they were younger, occasionally they were sent home from school for fighting, in fact. Once they realized I was going to fight back, they plunged into it, tearing at my clothes, jabbing me with elbows and stomping on my bare feet. I got in a few satisfying retaliatory blows, kicking Gwyn hard and ripping the sash of my stepmother’s dress.

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