Kissing the Witch Read Online Free PDF

side was green, the other red. She bit into the green side and swallowed and smiled. I took the apple from her without a word, bit into the red side, and began to
choke. Fear and excitement locked in struggle in my throat, and blackness seeped across my eyes. I fell to the ground.
    It was all white, where I went; like warm snow, packed into the angles and crevices of my body. There was no light, or noise, or colour. I thought I was treasure, stowed away for safe
keeping.
    When I came to I was jolting along in an open coffin. Sunlight stabbed my eyelids. The woodsmen were bearing me down the mountain, out of the woods. I gagged, coughed, sat up. How their eyes
rounded; how they laughed to see me breathing. But lie down, one said, you are not well yet. Until you were poisoned we had been forgetting who you are, said a second; now we’re taking you to
another kingdom, where they’ll know how to treat a princess. Lie down and rest, little one, said a third; we have a long way to go.
    My head was still swimming; I thought I might faint again. But my mouth was full of apple, slippery, still hard, vinegary at the edges. I could feel the marks of my own teeth on the skin. I bit
down, and juice ran to the corners of my lips. It was not poisoned. It was the first apple of the year from my father’s orchard. I chewed till it was eaten up and I knew what to do.
    I made them set me down, and I got out of the box, deaf to their clamour. I stared around me till I could see the castle, tiny against the flame-coloured forest, away up the hill. I turned my
face towards it, and started walking.

In the orchard, I asked,
    Who were you
    before you married my father?
    And she said, Will I tell you my own story?
    It is a tale of a handkerchief.



V
The Tale of the Handkerchief
    T HE REASON I would have killed you to stay a queen is that I have no right to be a queen. I have been a fraud from the beginning.
    I was born a maid, daughter to a maid, in the court of a widow far across the mountains. How could you, a pampered princess, know what it’s like to be a servant, a pair of hands, a
household object? To be no one, to own nothing, to owe every last mouthful to those you serve?
    All our queen loved in the world was her horse and her daughter.
    The horse was white, a magnificent mare with a neck like an oak. The princess was born in the same month of the same year as I was. But where I was dark, with thick brows that overshadowed my
bright eyes, the princess was fair. Yellowish, I thought her; slightly transparent, as if the sun had never seen her face. All she liked to do was walk in the garden, up and down the shady paths
between the hedges. Once when I was picking nettles for soup, I saw her stumble on the gravel and bruise her knee. The queen ran into the garden at the first cry, lifted her on to her lap and wiped
two jewelled tears away with her white handkerchief. Another time I was scrubbing a hearth and stood up to stretch my back, when laughter floated through the open window. I caught sight of the two
of them cantering past on the queen’s horse, their hands dancing in its snowy mane.
    My own mother died young and tired, having made me promise to be a good maid for the rest of my days. I kissed her waxy forehead and knew that I would break my word.
    But for the moment I worked hard, kept my head low and my apron clean. At last I was raised to the position of maid to the princess. Telling me of my good fortune, the queen rested her smooth
hand for half a moment on my shoulder. If your mother only knew, she said, how it would gladden her heart.
    The young princess was a gentle mistress, never having needed to be anything else. The year she came of age, the queen received ambassadors from all the neighbouring kingdoms. The prince she
chose for her daughter lived a long day’s ride away. He was said to be young enough. The girl said neither yes nor no; it was not her question to answer. She stood very still as I tried the