Rose and the Lost Princess by Holly Webb

Author:Holly Webb
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc.
Published: 2014-01-28T16:00:00+00:00

Ten

Rose was looking forward to asking Freddie and Mr. Fountain about the snow globe at her next lesson. She wondered if Mr. Fountain knew its strange creator—she had decided that the ice-eyed man must have made the globes because he had loved them so much. But although Freddie was fascinated by the toy and sat gazing into the wild snow for ages, Rose never had a chance to show it to Mr. Fountain.

“He’s late again,” Freddie murmured, gently shaking the snow globe and giggling as the skaters shook their tiny fists at him.

“I don’t mind.” Rose didn’t even look up from Prendergast, the magical primer that she and Freddie were supposed to memorize. She was trying to find out about weather magic, but the book was surprisingly cagey. Weather magic was apparently “dangerous, difficult, and inadvisable.” Which was not a whole lot of use. “I’d much rather read this than wash the windows.”

“What’s the point of washing windows?” Freddie asked. “They only get dirty again. Waste of effort if you ask me. Really, I think servants are quite unnecessary. Your job is just busy-work.”

Rose only sighed and ignored him. There was no point rising. Freddie would complain soon enough if the servants stopped running around after him.

Freddie sniggered complacently, and Rose yawned. She had built up the fire, and it was pleasantly warm in the workroom, despite the weather. She glanced out of the window to see if it was snowing again. Not yet, but the sky was leaden gray and heavy looking. There would be another fall soon. She gazed dreamily out at the black trees across the square—and then jumped. A face had inserted itself between her and the trees, shimmering in the glass.

“Freddie…” Rose whispered.

“What?”

“Mr. Fountain’s here…”

Freddie sat up suddenly and looked at the door in horror, then turned to glare at Rose. “No, he isn’t! Don’t do that sort of thing to me, Rose. It isn’t fair. Oh.” At this point, he finally noticed his master floating in the window glass. “Good afternoon, sir.”

“And to you, Frederick, now that you’ve finally deigned to notice that I’m here. Rose, you need to daydream more often. I’ve been waiting for you to stare at something shiny for over an hour.”

“I’m doing this?” Rose asked, looking worried. She couldn’t feel that she was. She had never made anything that could see her back before.

“Yes and no. I’m using your ability to do it, let’s say. Listen, I don’t have long. As you may have worked out”—here, the image eyed Freddie critically—“I am still at the palace. I’m so sorry to miss your lesson yet again, but I have no choice. Things are—difficult.”

“Are you all right?” Rose asked him shyly, and Mr. Fountain gave her a weary smile.

“Thank you, Rose. I’m perfectly fine. I haven’t slept, that’s all. I have been trying to obtain an audience with the king. He is understandably somewhat reluctant.”

“But you see him every day!” Freddie burst out.

“Not since he realized that a magician—or possibly a conspiracy of magicians—tried to kidnap his daughter,” Mr.

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