The Stepsister Scheme

Despite the climb, Danielle still felt herself stumbling forward, as if she walked downhill. Her knees and thighs were beginning to ache.
    Eventually, they broke through the upper branches, reaching the very tops of the trees. Danielle gasped. The leaves to either side were a rustling sea beneath the stars. Flickers of colored light danced through the trees in the distance. Here and there, a few rogue branches broke through the canopy, stretching even higher. Behind them, the dark shape of the hedge curved in a great arc in either direction. Orange campfires marked the goblin camp, where the fruit trees were but poor, shrunken shadows of the woods now surrounding her. On the other side, in the distance, she could just make out the lacelike spires of the queen’s castle, as well as the dark shadows of the king’s.
    “How large is this place?” she whispered.
    “The last official census had the fairy population at just over thirty thousand,” said Snow. “Of course, their tallies are a bit peculiar. Intelligent animals are counted—that’s the beast caste, like our friend the fox—but not the dumb. The unnamed caste won’t show up on any census, but there are only a handful of them. Some of the bloodless, like that glowing ball, only count as a fraction. But the numbers still come out pretty close.”
    “Thirty thousand,” Danielle repeated. Yet so much of Fairytown was wilderness. “Where do they all live?”
    “Remember, fairies can spread through the land in any direction,” Snow said. “Trolls and kobolds burrow into the earth, while griffins and elves spread upward, into the treetops and cliffs. And don’t ask me how they count the cloud striders and their riders, who can touch the land only once each year.”
    “Do those numbers include mortals?” Talia asked. “Those who stumble into Fairytown and never make their way out again?”
    Snow nodded. “Most of them end up slaves. They were included in Appendix B of the census.”
    “You have got to find some other hobbies,” Talia said. She leaned against the branches as she dug through her bag, coming up with a paper-wrapped bundle. She unwrapped it and handed Danielle a thick strip of dried fish, wrapped in what appeared to be seaweed. “Trust me, it’s better than eating fairy food.”
    Danielle nodded, grateful for the rest. She hadn’t wanted to say anything, but she was having a hard time keeping up with the others. “Is it true that if you eat the fairies’ food, you can never leave?”
    “Not here,” said Snow. “We’re still in our world, changed as it might be by fairy magic. If you ever pass through the fairy hill, though, you’ll want to be careful.”
    “Then why—” she started to ask.
    “Because fairy cooking tastes like mud,” said Talia.
    Danielle tried a bite, then doubled over the railing, spitting and doing her best to keep from throwing up. The seaweed had a sharp, salty tang, and the fish tasted of hickory smoke and some kind of pepper. Her stomach convulsed again, then began to settle back down.
    “Maybe she would have been better off with the mud,” said Snow.
    Talia pressed a wineskin into Danielle’s hand. “I’m sorry, Princess. I should have realized nadif would be too much for you.”
    “It’s not. The taste is actually quite good, but the fish and the spice, I just—” The memory alone was enough to send her back to the railing. Several gulps of wine later, Danielle wiped her eyes and asked, “What is that?”
    “The spice is called nadif,” Talia said. “It’s a recipe from back home. The queen loves it, but it’s an acquired taste.” She took a huge bite of her own fish and grinned. “The food in Lorindar is so bland .”
    “But it doesn’t burn holes in your lips,” Snow said, snatching the wineskin from Danielle.
    Talia grabbed a strip of smoked lamb and handed it to Danielle. “Here, this one’s milder.”
    Danielle ate as she walked. “Mild” was still strong enough to clear her sinuses, but at least she didn’t feel like her head was on fire.
    “Look at that,” Snow said, pointing.
    Up ahead, a fallen tree leaned against the road. The branches had broken or been cut away, leaving only a great trunk. This was one of the giants among giants. By any logic, the tree should have smashed right through the road when it fell. While the road did tilt where the tree had fallen, it didn’t appear damaged. Merely stretched a bit.
    “Does that look like a tipsy oak to you?”