The Wide-Awake Princess Read Online Free PDF

hundred years.”
    “And wake when the love of her life kisses her on the lips,” said the queen. “She said he has to be a prince. Won’t work otherwise.”
    “I can’t do much about the hundred years, but I can find a prince,” Annie said. “Maybe he’ll be able to help me with the hundred years thing.”
    “Go get Digby. He can kiss her,” her mother replied.
    Annie frowned. “I will if I have to, but that man is such a twit.”
    “Maybe so,” the queen murmured as her daughter took her hand away. And once again the only sound was breathing.
    Annie got to her feet and looked around the room. The ladies would have to stay where they were; she wasn’t about to take them all back to their beds the way she had Gwendolyn. Even her mother’s room was too far to take her.
    She was about to leave the room when she noticed the piece of parchment that her sister had dropped. Gwendolyn couldn’t read, so it was no surprise that she hadn’t even glanced at the parchment. Annie, however, had made a point of learning to read and write. In fact, she had tried to learn many things that Gwendolyn couldn’t do, mostly because she had no desire to compete with her sister in all the things she could do perfectly. Where Gwendolyn was as light on her feet as thistledown, and was the belle of every ball, Annie had crept away to learn dancing from the Gypsies, who didn’t care how gracefully she could twirl on her toes. Gwendolyn rode sidesaddle like a lady and wore beautiful clothes. Annie put on boys’ clothes and had the stable master teach her how to ride bareback. She had a groom teach her how to juggle, something Gwendolyn would never have considered doing. An old soldier taught Annie how to handle a bow and arrow. She made friends with the servants’ children and asked them to teach her how to swim in theCrystal River and catch fish from its bank. Every time she discovered something that Gwendolyn couldn’t do, Annie tried to learn how to do it.
    There were many things that Gwendolyn could do perfectly. There were many more that Annie could do very, very well. Unfortunately, reading the writing on the piece of paper wasn’t one of them. It took her a minute of scrutinizing the florid writing with all its curlicues and whorls before she was able to make out the simple message. Happy Birthday was all it said, but the writing was so fancy that it looked as if there might be more.
    Annie had been so worried about everyone in the castle that it hadn’t occurred to her to wonder who had sent the spinning wheel. She’d assumed that the evil fairy must have sent it, but few fairies were able to write, and she’d never heard of any sending notes. The note was on nice enough parchment, but it was the kind her mother might have had, certainly nothing fairy-made.
    She turned the note over, hoping there might have been some indication of who had sent it. When there wasn’t anything else on the parchment, she bent down beside the trunk and examined it down to the smallest detail. It didn’t look like fairy work. Although it was beautifully made, she saw a few places on the bottom where the marks of the adze hadn’t been smoothed away; a trunk made by a fey craftsman would have been flawless. The man who had delivered it had appearedhuman as well and not like someone an evil fairy might have sent. Whoever had sent the trunk had been human, not fairy, and that was the most puzzling part. As far as Annie knew, neither Treecrest nor Gwendolyn had any human enemies.



CHAPTER 3
    ANNIE STAYED IN THE CASTLE for the rest of the day. She made sure that everyone was safe and comfortable, from the highest nobles down to the boy who cleaned the pots for the scullery maids. She put out all the fires in the fireplaces, lifted the bucket from the well that was dangling from a sleeping groom’s hands, and tried, unsuccessfully, to close the drawbridge facing the town. The climbing roses kept the drawbridge from moving, so Annie walked