PART ONE:
The Curse of Gold
THE FIRST TALE
God-mothers
Once upon a time, on the coldest night of midwinter, in the darkest heart of the forest, Death and Fortune came to a crossroads.
They stood tall and unfathomable in the glass-smooth snow, Death in her shroud of pyre smoke and shadows, and Fortune in her gown of gold and bones. More than that cannot be said, for no two souls see Death and Fortune the same way; yet we all know when we meet them.
On this night, a woman had come to do just that: meet them. Her dull carrot-colored curls twisted from under a woolen cap, her wind-burnt red face as worn as the threadbare cloak over her shoulders. One hand clutched a dimming iron lantern, which smoldered just bright enough to catch the snowflakes flitting by like fireflies before they melted back into the dark.
Her other hand was locked around the ragged mitt of a little girl beside her.
“Please,” the woman said, shivering in snow up to her shins. “We’re stretched thin to feed the twelve other mouths already, and this one— she’s ill luck. Wherever she goes, the milk spoils, the wool tangles, the grain spills. Whatever she touches falls to ruin.”
The little girl said nothing.
“She’s only . . .” Fortune tilted her head, and the wreath of coins about her brow shimmered and flipped, changing from copper to coal to silver to gold. “Three? Ten? Forgive me, I never know with you humans.”
“Four,” Death said in her soft, dark voice, for Death always knew. Fortune wrinkled her nose. “Young. The proper age to be spilling grain and breaking things.” “She’s the thirteenth,” the woman insisted, shoving the lantern higher as if to drive her point home like a stubborn cow. Weak firelight
caught on Fortune’s coin wreath, on the wispy hem of Death’s hood. “Like me. That makes her the thirteenth daughter of a thirteenth daughter. Her luck’s rotten to the core.”
“You told your other children you’d take her into the woods to seek her fortune.” The Low God plucked a coin from her wreath and let it dance about her fingers, flashing copper and silver, gold and black.
“In truth, you were seeking me,” Death finished in her dark-velvet voice, and the woman’s features crumpled with shame. “Yet here you have found us both. You have come far, through the dark and through the frost, to ask our favor.”
“Asking a blessing of the Lady of Luck. Risky. No way to know what that would be.” Fortune’s face slipped between cruelty and sympathy as her coin slipped through quick fingers, flashing day and night, red and white.
Death, on the other hand, did not stir. “You know my gifts, and so you know though there is plenty I can take, little can I give. But I will tell you: Only one of you will go home.”
The woman drew a sharp breath.
Fortune smiled, and her coin flashed like the sun and the snow, like shadow and like blood. “You sought Death in the woods. Did you think the way back would be easy?”
The woman said nothing. The flame in the lantern burned lower.
“Ask,” Death commanded. “What will you have of us?”
The lantern shook in the woman’s hand, her knuckles cracked with callus and cold. “I want what’s best for—for everyone.”
“Choose,” Death commanded again. “Which of you will return?”
The woman let go of her daughter.
Fortune lifted the girl’s chin. She found two eyes of sharpest black in a pale, freckled face, two braids the color of the lantern’s flame tied off in bits of rag.
“What is your name?” Death asked as the woman turned and fled the crossroads, stealing away the last scrap of firelight.
“Vanja” was the first thing I said to my godmothers, “my name is Vanja.”
CHAPTER ONE
Card Games
It has been nearly thirteen years since Death and Fortune claimed me for their own, and I have come far enough through winter and cold that almost no one calls me Vanja now.
Thump- thump. Two raps of gloved knuckles against the carriage roof. The driver’s muffled voice carries down to me inside. “Almost there, Prinzessin.”
I don’t reply. I don’t have to; I learned long ago that princesses don’t owe their servants answers.
And for most of the last year, that’s the face I’ve worn: the princess.
Or to be precise: Gisele-Berthilde Ludwila von Falbirg of the Sovabin Principality, Prinzessin-Wahl of the Blessed Empire of Almandy. Soon to be Markgräfi n Gisele you-get-the-idea von Reigenbach of the empire’s largest territory, the border march of Bóern, once its mar
grave gets around to a wedding.
Though not if I can help it.
(We’ll come back to that.)
I squint out the gilt-trimmed carriage window, studying the timber-and-plaster blocks of Eisendorf Manor as the horses draw us closer. Shadows pass behind the first-floor windows, turning them to rosy eyes winking into the frosty twilight gloom. It looks crowded already, even for a Sunday-night party. Good—a princess ought to be the last of the von Eisendorfs’ guests to arrive. There was a reason I dawdled in my bedroom at Castle Reigenbach: to make sure we hit peak Minkja traffic when we left an hour ago.
But I have more motive to survey the manor’s scenery than just making sure the Prinzessin arrives fashionably late. Lit windows are fewer on the third floor, but I still spot two bracketing the double doors where the master bedroom lets out onto its telltale grand balcony.
The real question tonight is whether it’s the only balcony.
It is not. Balconettes frame it on either side. Lamplight gilds only one of the balconettes, spilling from an adjacent room that looks to share the fat main chimney with the master bedroom.
That chimney is currently chugging smoke into the dimming sky. One might wonder why the von Eisendorfs would keep a fire going up in their bedroom when they’ll be busy entertaining guests downstairs all evening.
I’d bet three solid gilden that they’re heating the guest chambers next door instead, in case I—well, in case the prinzessin needs a respite. An opportunity to suck up to the margrave’s bride-to-be can’t be missed.
One also might wonder why I care about chimneys, balconettes, and suck-ups. It’s because tonight, the von Eisendorfs are handing me an entirely different sort of opportunity.
And I would loathe for either of those opportunities to go to waste.
The faint reflection of my grin cuts across the glass. A moment later it vanishes as my breath clouds the pane in the late-November chill.
I should play it safe, settle back into my seat, resume the serene, graceful façade of the prinzessin.
Instead I size up the remaining distance between us and the first guard we’ll pass, and quickly draw a simple, distinct set of curves in the fogged glass. Then I sit back and smooth my grin down to a placid smile.
When we pass the first guard, I see him do a double take. He elbows the guard beside him, pointing to the carriage window, and I’m pretty sure I hear: “. . . an arse!”
“And no one will ever believe you,” I hum under my breath as the fog melts from the glass.
The jingle-stamp of the horses stops when we draw even with the manor’s stout oaken front door. I sneak a look under the opposite seat and confirm my satchel, an unassuming toilette bag, is still stowed away. For now, it will stay there.