The Queen's Poison

2. Mother's Mirror

Oh, Mother, Mother…I thought that you loved me. All these years I so desperately wanted to believe that you did.

And because of this need to believe that my own mother loved me I now lie here as one dead. Dead at the hand of the very woman who gave me life.

She loves my brother. For a while she did love me—after his birth.

Come to think of it, that’s when it started.

Prince Wilhelm, heir to the throne of Grimm, was born shortly after I turned three. I remember the night—young as I was—because my nurse, whom I dearly loved, was required to give assistance. Despite being heavy with child herself.

Exhausted, she crept to our room late that night. On seeing me awake, she told me, “You have a little brother now your highness. Now go to sleep.”

Shortly before dawn, I woke again to hear the cries of my nurse giving birth. The chamber maid was making her rounds. She came in to assist her.

The birth was successful as I recall. But the baby died soon after.

“She never breathed. My baby girl. Just seven months. So small. So lovely. But she wouldn’t cry. Wouldn’t take in air. After we slapped and slapped her. But she wouldn’t breathe.” My melancholy nurse would weep in front of me.

These bouts of crying went on for a year or two after. Finally, she was sent home from the palace.

I continued to occupy the nursery suite with my brother but only he had a nurse. Instead, more maids were assigned to care for my wardrobe and appearance.

It was shortly after this, I believe, that Mother started to take more of an interest in me. She loved to brush and comb my hair for long periods of time. So gently it didn’t hurt. Style it exactly like her own.

Our hair was the same, I noticed. Glossy black tresses flowing past our hips. Our complexions were also the same. Just high colored enough to avoid ghostliness. For our skin was very fair and translucent. Even as a child my lips were ruddy. They promised to become as full and scarlet as my mother’s when I matured. Both with generous mouths. Oval faces with high foreheads, prominent cheekbones and pointed chins.

But different eyes. Hers are amber and slightly tilted. Mine are steel blue and set a little further apart.

“You have your father’s eyes,” she would say and frown. Sometimes she stopped combing and sent me away to the nursery despite my protests.

She had a number of outfits made for me. Identical to those she wore in all but size. Mother loved to show me off everywhere as a miniature replica of herself.

On my seventh birthday, Mother threw a lavish party for me. Unlike any she had given me before. The festivities lasted a full three days, so it ended after the date of my nativity.

What stands out most in my mind is not the party itself, but what happened on the evening of the first day. I was growing tired and cranky after all the hours of noisy play and too many sweets.

“Her highness wearies from the festivities,” Mother addressed the crowd. “Princess Eva is still a child after all. We shall put her to bed now. Our royal consort will lead the next dance.”

Father had grown healthier of late. His cough was infrequent and his color better despite his thinness. He gladly took the hand of a visiting princess, leading her onto the floor as the musicians struck another tune. Other couples followed suit.

I saw this over my shoulder as the Queen led me away by the hand. “Come along Snowdrop. There’s a special gift I have for you.”

To my surprise she led me past the nursery where my small brother already slept. “Do you envy little Wilhelm?” She whispered to me.

“No. Why?”

“Because he will inherit the throne. Not you. Because he was born you will never be queen.”

“Yes, I can. When I grow up, I will marry a prince. When he becomes king, I will be a queen too.”

Suddenly I realized I had contradicted her. But instead of a sharp rebuke Mother only groaned. Then sighed deeply. “It’s not the same, child.”

“Why not?”

“You will be his consort. Not a reigning monarch.”

“Are you a reigning monarch?”

“Yes, I am. I hold all the power and authority of the state. Your father is my consort. I’m the one who rules over Grimm. I wear the crown and royal robes as I sit upon the throne and hold court. Deciding cases. When troubles strike the people look to me for help.”

“Being a consort means you don’t have to do that stuff? That sounds good to me.”

She frowned severely down on me as we reached a large door of burnished oak. She untied her sash and pulled out a ring of chains, a little smaller than the one she made Father wear in his belt. One—a little silver key—was attached to a slender gold chain.

“This is my gift to you, dearest. Or rather it is a token of it. I had it copied from the key I always wear around my neck. Exactly alike.

“Now unlock the door, Snowdrop.”

I struggled to fit the key to the lock. Growing impatient my mother looked as though she would do it herself but pulled back. “You shall not receive the gift itself until you learn to manage the lock, Eva!”

Finally, I fitted the key to the lock and struggled to turn but my childish hands were weak. Sighing, Mother placed her strong white hands over mine and helped unlock the door.

She pushed it open, and we entered. Mother took a torch from the hallway to light the room. It was windowless. Dark. Even stuffy.

“Look, Snowdrop. See this?”

I gazed at it by the torchlight. Mother with her torch and a little girl about my age stared back. That girl was me. Two queens, two torches, two of me.

I drew away.

“Don’t be silly child. It’s just a mirror. A really good, expensive mirror. Of glass.”

The only mirrors I had seen before were made of polished metal. Slightly better than the buckets of water which my nursemaids used to arrange their wimples. This did an amazing job reflecting back the world. It made me nervous.

Mother lighted a candelabra with six candles and placed them before the mirror. “More light,” she told me.

She showed me a number of books. Many looked and smelled mysterious. Then she showed me a number of bottles and some strange instruments.

“Do you know what these are?” She asked.

I shook my head.

“The gateway to power for a woman. The power of magic. Beauty fades. Charm only gets you so far before the man sees through. But the Dark Arts will keep you strong forever.

“I can’t help it that your brother, the second born yet first son I bore, will inherit the throne instead of you, Snowdrop. But I can educate you. Teach you to harness the power that can help you rule by wielding a magic wand from the shadows even though you never wield a scepter.”

She embraced me affectionately. Taken aback by her display of love I’d seldom felt before I was overjoyed.

“Thank you, Mama. Thank you so much.”

In the days ahead she hired a tutor who taught me reading, writing and a little arithmetic. Another taught me to dance. Another gave me lute lessons.

The stable master taught me to ride a small, dappled mare. A gift from my father. He began spending more time with my brother and me. Never in my life had I seen him so healthy and strong.

Soon Wilhelm started his lessons with me. I discovered from our tutor that as he grew, my brother would be taught many things I would not. In addition to French, he would learn Latin. In addition to arithmetic, he would learn astrology and the other sciences. In addition to the history of Grimm, Wilhelm would learn about the laws of the land.

“For his royal highness is to be the king,” our tutor said.

I gazed upon my little brother, only five years old. A beautiful boy with a cherubic face. Full and rosy—with a touch of gold like a ripe peach—he was plump but not fat. Loose curls the color of antique gold. Dimples near his cupid’s bow mouth when he smiled or laughed. And he always did both.

I remembered Mother’s words on my birthday. Something dark bit into my heart. But my little brother came up to me. “Want to go riding, Eva? Hans said you could come along when I asked.”

We raced each other to the stables. Envy forgotten in love and joy.

I also took comfort that I was being taught things my brother was not. Things almost no one in the kingdom knew. The queen continually told me. Praising me. Saying I had the Gift. That my bloodline was right.

Her words filled my soul with pride. And I soon developed an insatiable thirst for more knowledge of the Dark Arts.

This went on for four years. Mother started with the lighter stuff. Love charms and potions. Chants to ward off bad things and attract the good.

Later she taught me the arts of poisoning one’s enemies. I tested poisons I concocted myself on rodents around the castle and the stables. Or charming their minds till they were no longer masters of themselves and I could use them as puppets once I had properly learned the techniques.

She showed me—using a smaller mirror of highly polished steel—how to use certain liquids and incantations to spy on others without their knowledge.

When I asked her if that was eavesdropping, she merely laughed. I decided that it was okay to do certain things by magic that weren’t moral when done by other means. Including drinking the blood of others to absorb their youth and beauty.

But I knew the greatest secrets were hidden in her mirror.

This fixture intrigued me even as it scared me a little. It contained a golden plate at the bottom of its frame (it was a three fourths mirror) that contained words neither in French nor German. From what I overheard of Wilhelm’s lessons I decided they must be Latin.

Ego mio modo.

When I was eleven years old, Mother turned against me. She showed me too much.

“Want to see how my mirror works, Snowdrop?” Her voice was full of teasing affection.

“I’d rather not. Not today,” I begged.

Growing visibly angry—my timidity at other experiments in magic and increasing squeamishness with her familiars had been trying her patience—the queen dragged me before her mirror and made me watch.

“Mirror, mirror on the wall. Who is fairest of them all?”

A series of images of the most beautiful women in Grimm flashed before us. Then came the shock.

Mother’s own image came back, but my own was not there. And the image moved independently of the queen.

“You are most beautiful, oh queen,” her mirror image murmured back.

This terrified me more than anything she had shown me. I’m not sure why, but the fact that her reflection could take on a life of its own after absorbing someone else’s produced a ghastly sensation.

With strength born of fear, I broke away from the queen’s hold. Tearing off the chain holding my key to the room, I flung it to the floor.

Then I fled to my room. Feigning sickness, I remained there for three days.

When I came out things were never the same. Disgusted by my “weakness” my mother turned the rest of the household against me.

It did not help that my father was dying. Once he was gone, few of the servants waited on me as was befitting a member of the royal family. Mother fired them within a fortnight.

Those who remained knew they would be in trouble if they took my side in front of the queen. But when she was not around, I humbled myself and talked to them as equals, offering to help wash dishes in the scullery and dispose of the table scraps.

They let me do some of it and, taking pity on my condition, allowed me to eat there as one of them. This was better than eating at a small, isolated table in the great hall or keep to my room all the time as the queen wished.

Seeing me among the domestics seemed to anger her still more. Yet because the castle was large, I managed to avoid her. Sometimes for more than a day at a time.