Rumpelstiltskin (Timeless Fairy Tales Book 4) Read online

  “No, I can still enchant cheap knock-offs,” the mage admitted. “But they don’t hold on to the spells very long, and they won’t stand up for repeated use—the spells can only be used once.”

  Gemma lingered at the table to eat a pickled fish. “I find it surprising that all goods are growing less…perfect. Some countries are known for their craft exports.”

  “I suppose you are right,” the mage said. “It’s still reasonably easy to find high quality furniture and food items. Jewelry can be iffy; it depends on the jeweler who made it. The same goes for weapons. The true problem is clothing. Clothing—anything made of cloth really—is terrible. Even robes made for a king will rarely hold more than two or three spells or charms. Unfortunately, cloth is usually what most people want enchanted,” the mage said. In spite of his glorious voice, he sounded like a teacher scolding a miscreant pupil.

  “Why?” Gemma asked.

  “It’s easier to carry around than furniture; it can hold a larger variety of spells than weapons; it will take stronger spells than the ones that can be spelled on food, and it is less expensive than jewelry,” the mage said. His face was pointed in the direction of the spinning wheel. After watching it spin out gold thread for a few moments, he nodded.

  “But enough of my tribulations,” the mage said, his lips forming a handsome smile. “I want to hear about you.”

  Gemma picked up the last flax fibers and dumped them by the spinning wheel. “Why?” she said with a complete lack of enthusiasm.

  “Because you interest me,” the mage said, sitting down by the table of food. “So, from whom did you inherit your nobility? Certainly not your father.”

  “You’ve met him then?” Gemma asked. She hesitated and stood in front of the table, wondering if it would be terribly disrespectful if she sat and ate with the mage. Probably.

  “One could say that,” the mage, said, pointing to the cushion next to him.

  “Ah, my sympathies,” Gemma said, ignoring the gesture and folding her legs to sit across from him.

  “Your mother, then?” the mage asked, mashing a potato with the only knife that came with the food.

  “Nope,” Gemma said. She reached under her dress and slid her pilfered dinner knife out—the mage choked on his potato at this particular reveal—and used it to butter another piece of bread. “Do you want some bread?” Gemma asked when the mage finished coughing.

  “Where were you storing that?” the mage asked. He tilted his chin up and leaned forward, as if he were peering over the table at Gemma’s skirt.

  “Not telling. This nobility you keep harping about is probably something I learned from Grandmother Guri.”

  “Paternal or maternal grandmother?”

  “Neither. I’m not related to her.”

  “I see.”

  “I spent a lot of time with her when I was a child. She taught me how to sew, which is how I became a seamstress,” Gemma said.

  “You think she might have passed her character on to you?” the mage asked with a teasing smile.

  Gemma shrugged. “People say we say similar things.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We are borderline offensive.”

  The mage turned to hide his struggle to keep from laughing.

  “I’m trying to be truthful, Sir Mage,” Gemma said.

  “I can tell,” the mage said. “Perhaps it is something nobody can take credit for, and it is something that uniquely belongs to you.”

  “Sure.”

  “You still don’t understand what I mean, do you?”

  “Not at all,” Gemma said, finishing her bread. She dusted off her hands and picked up her blanket rope, fidgeting her way back into it.

  “I supposed if you reveled in your superiority, that would cancel the nobility of your character,” the mage said. “What are you doing?”

  “Making a rope.”

  “For?”

  “The future. You never know when you will need rope,” Gemma said.

  “I can make you rope if you want some that badly, you know.”

  “After what you just explained about cheap fabrics? I’ll pass.”

  “I didn’t mean I make things with shotty craftsmanship; I meant the general population. I’m sure you don’t either, of course,” the mage was swift to add.

  “Uh-huh.”

  The mage laughed. “You are quite a bit of fun.”

  Gemma raised her eyebrows. “I believe this is the first time anyone has thought so.”

  The mage grabbed the last slice of sourdough bread and, in one elegant motion, rocked to his feet. “Then everyone you know is blind,” he said, checking the tension of the spinning thread.

  Gemma smiled for the merest moment. She glanced up at the mage to make sure he hadn’t noticed—he was still busy tending to the spinning machine—before she bent over her work with determination.

  It was just after midnight when Gemma hacked the last wooden bar covering the window apart. Her back and arms ached, and she was sweaty and growing chilled in the cool, fall air, but the window was wide open. and the crisp air smelled like freedom.

  “Well done,” the mage said. “But I fail to see what the open window will accomplish as you seem most determined to save your guards.”

  Gemma looked down at her hatchet and shrugged. “I felt like hacking at something,” she said.

  “That’s a useful way to channel your aggression,” the mage said, crossing the room. He leaned out of the open window and inspected the outside walls. He momentarily turned back in the direction of the spinning wheel before climbing onto the window sill with great ease.

  With elegance that was unnatural—considering how high up they were—the mage started to stand, molding his body against the castle wall when he passed the boundaries of the window frame. He jumped, and the buckles on his black boots glittered before he disappeared from sight, climbing upwards.

  Gemma leaned out of the window and watched the mage pull himself up over the edge of the roof, resting on the base ledge. The patch of roof spiked above him like an icicle, and snowflakes the size of Gemma’s head formed the lattice work around the triangle.

  “Care to join me?” the mage asked.

  Gemma pointedly looked down, where large torches posted in the courtyard were barely pinpricks of light.

  The mage laughed. “I won’t let you fall,” he said, scooting on the ledge so he could offer his hand.

  Gemma grumbled under her breath about nutty mages, but the lure of the cool, fresh air and the light of brilliant moon soon had her heaving her body onto the window sill.

  “There are so many carvings, it’s actually quite easy,” the mage said, gesturing to the caribou carving next to the window.

  “Right. Easy,” Gemma grunted as she planted a foot on the hooves of the caribou’s back legs and strained to grab his rearing front legs. Gemma grumbled more about crazy mages when her grip slid and her stomach rolled—making her regret the last few pieces of bread she had eaten—before she climbed higher.

  When Gemma clambered onto the caribou’s head, the mage grabbed her by the back of her dress and helped haul her onto the ledge.

  “It’s less windy here,” the mage said, motioning for Gemma to scoot further into the triangular shape. “Which is lucky, because I’m no weather mage,” he said, offering Gemma a grin.

  Gemma had nothing to say—the intimidating climb up to the ledge and her knowledge of everything she owed the mage kept her from speaking the insults.

  Instead, Gemma admired the beauty that lay outside the castle. The night sky was a deep purple with a screen of stars twinkling like diamonds sewn into lace. Fresler’s Helm—one of the tallest and surely the most famous mountains in the range that loomed around the royal palace like the train of a dress—glowed in the moonlight. Occasionally, long strands of emerald green and shadowed snow blue light swirled from the mountain and added extra color to the sky.

  The air chilled Gemma, freezing her cheeks and
nose, but it smelled fresh, with hints of leaves and smoky fires and—just the barest trace of what would soon come—snow.

  It felt amazing to be outside again. Her escape attempt had awakened Gemma’s longing to be out. Out of the castle, out of the black walls of the dungeon. Sitting on the ledge in the fresh air soothed her.

  “It’s beautiful,” Gemma said after several minutes.

  “It is,” the mage agreed, rustling around in his cloak. “Verglas is savage and wild, but also unbelievably beautiful. Here, take this. It will keep you warm,” he said, removing something from his cloak. He breathed on it before holding it out to Gemma.

  In his hands was a ruby. It was the deep red of blood, cut as thinly as a knife blade, and fashioned in the shape of a flame.

  “What is it?” she asked, reaching out to take it. Gemma jumped in surprise when she touched the ruby and felt heat flow into her finger tips and up her arm. She withdrew her hand and eyed the elaborately cut gem.

  “A heat charm. One of the more rare variety as it’s attached to jewelry,” the mage said.

  Gemma slowly reached out and took the charm, her shoulders relaxing from the hunch she had pulled into when the heat spread through her body. “Is this an example of a charm that could be put in cloth—or clothes?”

  The mage nodded. “My cloak has the same effect as the ruby. Most gems and precious metals can hold a large amount of magic. They are merely much harder to procure. That heat charm would go for the same price as, say, hmm, a matched team of four horses with good bloodlines and excellent confirmation.”

  “What?” Gemma said, her eyes bulging.

  The mage shrugged. “It’s why royals can afford such charms for themselves and but cannot afford to outfit their armies. Which is just as well.”

  “Is it really that hard to find good quality cloth goods?” Gemma asked.

  The mage gave Gemma a quirk of a smile. “You have no idea. I’ve wanted a carpet for ages—there’s an old spell I found that will make it fly—but I haven’t found a good enough carpet yet for a price I can pay,” the mage sighed.

  As Gemma watched him, she slowly changed her mind about the mage. Originally, she thought he had to a century old—even if his lips and chin were fine and young-looking. Magic preserved its wielders longer than the human lifespan, anyway. But the more the mage talked, Gemma saw the impatience, the language, and the gestures of a younger man. Was he, perhaps, possibly half a century old?

  “What’s wrong?” the mage asked when he caught Gemma staring.

  “Nothing,” Gemma said, looking back at the sky. She cupped her hands around the heat charm, relaxing as its warmth worked its way all the way down to her toes.

  “I was going to ask you this earlier, but I hope you have something stuffed in your dress as payment?” the mage asked.

  I will need to thank Lady Linnea. I had forgotten about the payment, Gemma thought. “Yes, but I’m afraid it will hardly be any better than the previous payment,” she said. She clenched the ruby in one hand and slipped the gold ring out from under her hair-band—which had held it strapped to her head.

  Gemma held out the plain gold ring, and the mage took it.

  “What do you mean?” he asked.

  “I still cannot see the logic in giving a mage who can spin flax into gold a gold ring,” Gemma said.

  “Magic is often hard to understand,” the mage said.

  Gemma shrugged and held the heat charm closer to her chest, almost hitting her head on a decorative snowflake carving.

  “In a few minutes, I will have to go indoors again. I trust my spinning wheel to go for hours, but I don’t know about this one the palace is lending us,” the mage said.

  Gemma nodded. “Thank you for the heat charm, and for helping me up here.”

  “It was my pleasure,” the mage said, his voice soft with sincerity.

  The sky was pink with the promise of the sun as Gemma sat at the table and ate the last baked apple. It was cold, but still tasty with the zing of cinnamon.

  “Finished—and just in time,” the mage said, winding up the last length of gold thread.

  “I imagine you must be very popular with royalty thanks to this trick?” Gemma asked.

  “No—not many know I can do it. Those that do know belong to the magic community, and they hardly care. Gold is used like a cheap spice by those in positions of power,” the mage snorted. “Here,” he said, handing Gemma a wad of fibers.

  When the pink light of dawn hit the fibers and they glowed, Gemma saw that although they hadn’t been spun into thread, the fibers were gold. “No,” Gemma said, passing the fibers back.

  The mage smiled—amused by Gemma’s refusal. “Why not?” he said dropping the wad of fibers on her lap.

  “I’m a seamstress. I can’t do anything with gold,” Gemma said, picking the fibers up and holding them out.

  The mage shook his head. “It’s too late to add them to the thread now. Take them. I would rather you have them than that murderous king of yours.”

  “I can’t,” Gemma said.

  “Why not?”

  “This has to be at least equal the cost of the gold ring I gave you,” Gemma said.

  “So? How is that a problem?”

  “It just is,” Gemma said, sliding away from the small table. “Here, take it.”

  “No,” the mage laughed.

  “You are insufferable,” Gemma glowered.

  The mage grinned and leaned closer. “And you are quite fetching,” he said before playfully tapping Gemma’s nose.

  If Gemma had been any less prone to emotional outbursts, her jaw would have dropped at the harmless flirtation. Instead she stared straight ahead, slightly dumbfounded and as enthusiastic as a block of ice while the mage withdrew.

  “I had best be off. It would be most embarrassing if the King opened the door and found me here with you. I will drop by your cell later today to hear whatever good news has been bestowed upon you,” the mage said, striding for the door.

  Gemma uncomfortably cleared her throat.

  “Yes?” the mage said, turning to face her.

  Gemma ran a hand through her wavy, brown hair. “I, I don’t think I’ve properly thanked you yet…for everything.”

  “Everything?”

  “The gold thread, the bad bargains, the food…” Gemma said.

  “Of course,” the mage said, blessing Gemma with a soft smile.

  “And I’m afraid I have done you a great discourtesy, but I am afraid I might also offend you, so if you would prefer not to answer, please don’t.”

  “Yes?”

  “What is your name?”

  The mage’s soft smile cracked into a grin so pleased and handsome Gemma had to briefly shield her eyes from the sight. “You can call me Stil,” he said.

  “Then, craftmage Stil,” Gemma said. “Thank you, for saving my life,” she said, curtseying.

  Stil returned the gesture with a deep bow. “It has been my pleasure.”

  Gemma could only nod and self-consciously fix her hair band.

  Stil left, and Gemma had just enough time to secure the wad of gold flax fibers in the sleeve of her dress before the door clanked open.

  King Torgen brutishly pushed his way in, almost knocking over one of his guards to do so. He claimed the spindle of gold thread and held it above his head so it glowed in the morning light.

  “Gemma Kielland,” he said when he was finished gazing at it. “You are a treasure.”

  Although the words sounded nice, the look on the king’s face made Gemma shift uncomfortably. His eyes were no longer lit by mild greed, but by a ravenous appetite. His smile was more of a snarl. He looked as if he wanted to eat Gemma—or at least roast her alive.

  “Take her back to her cell!” King Torgen snapped at the guards before he returned his attention to the gold thread.

  “Come, Miss,” the captain of Gemma’s guards said, grabbing her by the wrist and pulling her out of the room as quickly as possible. She
barely had time to bow to Prince Toril, who was kicking up his heels in the hallway, before her guards hurried her away at a trot. They slowed only when they reached the stairs.

  “What was that for?” Gemma asked.

  “It is not wise to place you near the King when he is in such a mood,” a guard said.

  Gemma glanced at her escort. “What mood would that be?”

  “Madness,” another guard grimly said.

  They were silent until they reached the dungeons. Gemma thought they would lock her in her cell without anything further to say, so she was surprised when the guards stopped some feet away from her cell.

  “Yes?” she said when she realized they were all staring at her.

  “We never thanked you, Miss Kielland, for coming back,” the captain said, snapping a salute at Gemma—his men mimicked him.

  “Oh,” Gemma said, awkwardly clasping her hands together. “You’re welcome.”

  “Is there anything at all we can do to repay you for your kindness?” the captain—and apparently the spokesperson said.

  “No,” Gemma said, somewhat bemusedly. All the strange and uneven deals she had been involved in the past few days were increasing. She couldn’t give Stil anything of worth; the guards couldn’t do anything to help her, and Gemma’s only useful skill was sewing. “Unless,” Gemma said, brushing her skirt to feel the pack of sewing needles from Grandmother Guri bump her skin. “There is something,” she said, pulling the puff of gold fibers out of her sleeve. “If I give you this, could you have someone purchase fabric for me?”

  The captain took the golden flax with wide eyes. “This is from—,” he started before breaking off and shaking his head.

  “We could melt it down,” the guard Gemma recognized as Foss said. “I have a brother-in-law who is a goldsmith. He’ll keep his mouth shut so the King doesn’t hear about it.”

  “We could trade for the fabric if it wasn’t so recognizable,” another soldier said.

  “What did you have in mind?” the captain asked.

  Gemma’s forehead furrowed as fabrics and patterns flipped through her mind. “I will need silver thread—black thread too. A lot of it. And I think…black wool and dark blue silk.”