Fate, or What You Would Have Me Be
This is the story about a woman that finds herself with the life of an old age Cinderella. She may go along with her-step sister's absurd plan, or she may become her own fairy god-mother and save herself. But in this story there is a catch. Unlike in so many other stories of the type, Aurelie can control her own destiny, but not alone. She needs help, for all she has is her beauty, her words, and - occasionally - her manipulations to save her. Rated: PG-13

Chapter 1

(incomplete)

I don't wanna be like Cinderella
Sittin' in a dark old dusty cellar
Waiting for somebody, to come and set me free
I don't wanna be like Snow White waiting
For a handsome prince to come and save me
On a horse of white, unless we're riding side by side
Don't want to depend on no one else
I'd rather rescue myself

Stained Slippers
          I was ten when my world as I knew it changed forever. Before that year, my life had been simple and I had been happy. My mother had died long before I ever understood what the word meant, and my father had healed his pain over his loss with me. We lived a simple life, descendants of a once wealthy aristocratic family. Now we had only our land, our name, and our ties, but that was all we needed. But that was all to change.

          Soon after my birthday, a civil war broke out between our current King and another that longed for his crown. Blood soaked into our soil for the first time in nearly a hundred years, and, eventually the fact that my father had ties came back to haunt him. A friend revealed to him that any aristocracy that fought in the name of our King would be highly rewarded. My father left to fight, mostly out of loyalty for our King, but the idea of living richly appealed to him more than he would admit.

          But he would not leave me all alone without him. A week before he left, he married a foreign lady fleeing a death warrant for her family in her native country. Jenzabella and her daughter had already witnessed first-hand the effects of a civil war such as ours. We all knew, even I, that if the same events came to pass in our country, Jenzabella and her daughter would be out of options. For this reason, among others, her daughter hated me from the start.

          The day after my father left, I found a toad in my slipper. The next day, my comb was broken into tiny pieces and scattered across the floor. I knew it was Herazade, but I knew not how to stop her. We continued on this way until Jenzabella noticed me walking barefoot. Herazade had spilled black ink all over my only pair, and they were still quite soaked.

          “Aurelie, where are your shoes, nempa zes?” she asked me, calling me little darling in her own language.

          I blushed and dropped my gaze. I would not incriminate her daughter and make the girl hate me ever more. Besides, Jenzabella had been nothing but kind to me since she arrived and I could not stand to hear accuse me of lying. But Jenzabella saw enough and knew her daughter much too well.

          “Herazade!” she shouted, brushing past me in search of her troublesome daughter. I glanced up at the feel of soft material against my arms, the massive skirt of Jenzabella’s dress. She did not glance back at me once as she took the stairs two at time. It seemed that she found Herazade on the stairs and heated words spoken in a language I barely understood drifted down from the spiral stairwell.

          I walked away and sat silently upon a threadbare chaise lounge, listening to an exchange I could not begin to comprehend. The differences between Jenzabella and Herazade’s voices were subtle, but there none the less. Jenzabella spoke with a confidence that had been forged over her twenty-eight years. Herazade spoke with the intolerant ignorance of a fourteen year old girl. Both were determined in their individual causes, as I would come to understand, but none of us knew that Jenzabella’s passion was soon at an end while Herazade’s was just beginning to flourish. And none of us could even guess at the power I would one day wield over them and my own fate.

          Most of this would not be clear for many more years, but the first event that would shape our collective future happened as I neared my eleventh birthday. My father returned home, a battered and broken man, in spirit if not only body. He came limping into the once happy home, heralding the fall of our King. In the course of three months, nearly all the King’s soldiers had been killed or defected to the other side. The remaining men, my father included, could not protect the desperate King. So he had fled, leaving his few loyal men to face death. But they had not died, not yet. Our new ruler, a man calling himself Prince Tobriss, would hold trials for these men, and those that did not declare their loyalty to the Prince would be charged with treason. My father was destined to die, for he was too loyal ever to switch his ties.

          Poor Jenzabella could not tolerate this. She took to bed for days at a time, crying her tears dry at the thought of the certain death after my father was tried. Although she could not see it, this destroyed the last remaining part of my father that was left to fight. He wanted to reach out for her comfort, but the tears cried for herself and Herazade stayed his hand. Perhaps there had been some tears for us as well, but no one but Jenzabella shall ever know.

          After nearly a month, Jenzabella rose, dressed in her finest attire, and left. When she came back the following night, in her hand she clutched an order of pardon for my father and her eyes were devoid of any and all emotion. I did not know then what she had sacrificed for all our lives, but I would understand eventually. My father shunned her and turned farther inward upon himself. He ignored Herazade, rarely spoke more than a word or two to me, and had frequent outbursts whenever Jenzabella was in the room. The repeated verbal berating caused her to avoid him whenever possible, although we would all hear the occasional “whore” or “wench” shouted across even the largest of rooms.

          It seemed that we had suffered the worst and that only Herazade and I survived, but I soon found that my step-sister had other plans for me. The days of stained slippers returned, but this time, as part of elaborate outfits fit for a princess. I could only guess at what she intended them, and me, for. But the moment I found out, I wondered what would be better, to go along with her plans or to die. Both were the only options she ever offered me…

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