Cinderella (Faerie Tale Collection) Read online

  The loud crash of thunder that followed immediately after shook the whole slick rock wall he was on. When another bolt of lightning enraged the sky, he looked down and saw the shuddering boy about ten feet below him, right within the crevice as he had assumed.

  He was drenched, his arms wrapped around himself.

  “Come here, boy!” he shouted to the child. “Come! And quickly too! This lightning is getting dangerously close.”

  He held out his hand and the boy stood up just as another crash of thunder exploded all around them. “Hurry!” he shouted again. “Grab my hand!” The farmer’s other hand was slipping from bracing himself in such an awkward position upon the boulder. “Now, boy!”

  The trembling child clutched his gloved fingers just as the farmer began to slide back down the sheer boulder between them. Another flash of lightning tore into the rain as it poured all around them and then the bang of the thunder immediately descended. In a show of superhuman strength, he hauled the boy up and over the rock as he slid down the other side.

  He balanced the small child against the boulder above them and continued to slip to his feet. Once he regained his footing, he quickly glided the child the last yard or so into his arms.

  The sky boomed and lit again as the farmer ran as fast has he dared in such a downpour. He clutched the boy to his chest and thankfully made it the fifty yards or so, into the waiting cottage without mishap. His young son met him at the door, and stared in great shock at the whimpering child in his arms.

  “How did you hear him over this storm?” he asked.

  “The Gods, son. They led me to him. They must have.” The farmer shook his wet hair as he set the boy on the table and removed his overcoat, handing it to his son. “Hansel, will you hang my coat up for me?” He slipped off his gloves and scarf and tossed them into a bucket near the door. They would need to be wrung out later. His clothes were soaked through. One look at the sopping boy and he knew this would be a rough night.

  The child was merely dressed in knee breeches and a simple shirt, with a worn wool hat atop his head. His shivers alerted the farmer to the great urgency needed to help him. “Hansel, fetch me a blanket for the lad now.” His son was quick to place the coat atop of the peg by the door and run to the bedroom.

  The father pulled the dripping hat off the child and gasped when a long golden braid plopped out. Its end tied with a battered green velvet ribbon.

  “You are no boy at all, child! You are a girl.”

  She nodded and looked away, her arms going tighter around her trembling legs.

  “Where did you come from? How are you to be out in a storm like this?”

  “I,” the little girl opened her quivering mouth to speak, and then her eyes darted to Hansel as he came back in the room carrying a thick blanket.

  “Yes?” asked the farmer as he took the blanket from his son and wrapped it tightly around her. “Who are you? How did you come here?”

  Her voice stuttered through her shivers, but he finally made out, “My home—it is gone. Th—they took it.”

  “Who took it? Who are you? Why is such a small girl left all alone in the woods?”

  “Father, let her speak. You ask too many questions at once. Cannot you see she is frightened?” Hansel smiled at the girl and asked simply, “Where do you live?”

  She took a deep breath and tried again, this time not so unsteadily. “I do not know where it is from here, or I would point it out to you. I became lost.” Her voice had a distinct accent.

  The farmer hissed and stepped back. “You are from the Larkein kingdom?”

  “Yes.” She smiled, not realizing what danger she put herself in by uttering such words in this house. “Yes. My father was the king.”

  “Your father was the—” Hansel gasped and looked at his father. “My word! What have we done?” he asked him.

  “If they knew we had the Larkein princess in this cottage, we would be hanged.”

  They both looked back at the little girl, her bright blue eyes blinked back at them. She was a very pretty child and clearly terrified. Hansel asked, “How old are you?”

  She put on a brave smile and sat up straighter. “I am six! How old are you?”

  “Ten.” He turned toward his father. “What should we do, Father? We cannot toss her back out, surely? She is too young.”

  His father stumbled back a few more steps and then slammed his palm forcefully upon the rocking chair. “We cannot keep her here! We cannot! Not with the king’s men invading her home this very day. If they knew—if they knew she was with us.”

  “What if they never found out?”

  His father nearly fell to the wooden floor. “What?! Never found out? Are you mad? How can we keep a child—a female child—with a distinct Larkein voice in our home without anyone being the wiser? Hansel! No. I must take her back into the night and allow the Gods to decide what is best to do with her.”

  “Father, please! I know they are a wicked kingdom, but please! It is not saying the girl will be too. We can hide her. We can. And she can learn how to speak properly. We will say that she is my cousin, an orphan—from your sister Claudine. Everyone knows she has just passed on and left a score of children. They will not think anything of it. Please, father. You cannot send her out there. She will die.”

  “Hansel! It better she die than us!” He pointed at the girl and she began to cry. “Take her outside this instant.”

  “No! I will not. For it is not right. She is a child, Father. She can be trained to be good. Let us keep her, please.”

  The farmer walked around and collapsed upon the rocking chair. “My heart is too soft,” he muttered into his hand. “It is too soft by half. Now what will we get ourselves into?”

  “I promise I will take full responsibility for her. I will see that she is safe and teach her our ways. Just do not let her go back out to meet her fate. Perhaps her fate was that she was meant to come to us? You, yourself, said it was the Gods who led you to her. It can only be good that she brings.”

  His father groaned and hunched over in his chair. “I hope you are right, my son. I hope you are right.” He folded his wet arms. “Fine. She may stay. Though it is with great trepidation and folly I agree to this.”

  “Thank you, father.” Hansel walked up to the little girl. He peered into her bright eyes and asked, “What is your name? What is it they call you in the castle?”

  She looked at him for a long time, her eyes full of tears, and then suddenly smiled big, showing a missing top tooth. “Gretel. My name is Gretel.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  JENNI JAMES IS THE busy mom of seven rambunctious children ranging from the ages of 2 to 16. When she isn’t chasing them around her house in sunny New Mexico, she is dreaming of new books to write. She loves to hear from her readers and can be contacted at: [email protected], or written to: Jenni James PO Box 514, Farmington, NM 87499. Jenni has several clean books for teens already published and many more to come, including:

  Faerie Tale Collection:

  Beauty and the Beast

  Sleeping

  Beauty Rumplestiltskin

  Hansel and Gretel

  The Jane Austen Diaries:

  Pride & Popularity

  Persuaded

  Northanger Alibi

  Emmalee

  Mansfield Ranch

  Prince Tennyson

  Cinderella

  Jenni James © copyright 2013

  All rights reserved as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

  StoneHouse Ink 2013

  StoneHouse Ink

  Boise ID 83713

  http://www.stonehouseink.net

  First eBook Edition: 2013

  First Paperback Edition: 2013

  Cove
r design by Phatpuppy Art

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to a real person, living or dead is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Published in the United States of America

  Table of Contents

  What People Are Saying about Jenni

  Title Page

  Other Books by Jenni

  Dedication

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  Sneak Peek of "Hansel and Gretel"

  About the Author

  Copyright Information