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Cinderella could hear what the little birds were saying, she pretended to herself.
She pretended she could understand what the mice and the rats and all the little creatures that crept through the halls of her stepmother's house asked her. She heard them say hello in the morning and she heard them beg for little snacks out of the kitchen.
Of course, she snuck them some, what else was there to lose?
Over time, she learned that they liked other foods more than the cheese she originally saved for them. (The children's stories from when she was young had lied to her, evidently.) Sweet foods, like crumbs of the cookies she baked or the edge of a sweetened pie crust. were liked by quite a few of the little rodents she talked with. Some of them liked vegetables too, or bread. It was evident that they enjoyed food as a whole and not so much individual types.
That perspective made sense to her.
After all, she had to watch her stepmother and those horrible stepsisters enjoy the meals she cooked while only what she remembered to set away was hers. In fact, her stomach rumbled just thinking about it.
Logically, she should have eaten like a king (she was in charge of the food after all). The problem lay in her stepmother's rules, as it always did. If she took too much food (and the number seemed to change day to day, much of the time Cinderella was sure her family only enforced such things because they were bored) there would be punishment.
Sometimes it would come in the form of re-mopping the whole mansion. Sometimes she had to stand on her toes in the corner of the room while they all ate dinner (her calves had grown very strong from the repetition of this specific punishment). There were other ways her stepmother enforced this particular rule as well, but just thinking about them made her blood boil.
In the beginning, this new family hadn't been so bad.
She had always wanted siblings, and her mother's passing had been very difficult to get over. Around her father, her stepmother wasn't cruel and her stepsisters were well behaved. She had even managed to bond with one of them, the ginger one who never watched her as she struggled to stand on her toes in the corner of the room.
But after her father passed away (she still suspected poison), things had changed fast.
The new ruler of the house was the woman her father had married, and things got dark quick.
Soon there was no more reading fairy tales with the red-haired stepsister (she refused to call any of them by name). Instead, chores upon chores upon punishment became her only pastime. That was about when she discovered she could talk to animals, not that she could really say anything back, but it was when she learned to listen to them.
And as her life got more difficult, her stepsisters were given no duties around the house. Cinderella watched the raven-haired one bring over some friends and trash the living room, and then scheme to blame it on her. She couldn't even do anything about it, her stepmother never believed her and she wasn't planning to step out of her hiding spot and tell them off- that would only bring worse trouble.
Though the sister with the red hair did not do such things so outwardly, in fact later that same day Cinderella watched her sneak into the kitchen. She followed her and hid outside the door, peaking just in.
But instead of making a mess, the stepsister looked around nervously and began to bake.
By the temporary mess she made of some of the ingredients and by the order of the steps, she had no idea what she was doing. But it was the thought that counted, and it warmed Cinderella's heart. People didn't do nice things for her very often.
The plate of tiny cookies (if you could call them that) was placed outside the door to her attic room, and as soon as the girl's footsteps disappeared down the stairs, Cinderella opened the door and picked up the platter of treats. There was no note to go with it, and the cookies had an oddly cake-like texture, but they were good anyway. Cinderella shared them with some of the mice who liked to stay in her bedroom and then hid the evidence.
Her stepmother wouldn't notice just one plate gone and she didn't have time to sneak it back down to the kitchen before her and the black-haired stepsister got home from their daily shopping spree. (They were wasting money that had once been her inheritance.)
As she imagined, she was called down to the kitchen soon after. (In theory, she was not permitted to leave her room once all of her chores were done and her stepmother did not trust her to begin cooking until she was home. It wasn't like she was worried about her burning herself, or even poison because she never watched her cook. It was just another one of the annoyingly stupid rules that she had to follow.)
It only registered as dull amazement that her stepsister had cleaned up after herself because her stepmother was there barking orders at her. A salad with the expensive English dressing she had bought from the merchant by the waterway, and slices of ham with the new seasoning from the seller who supplied the royal kitchen.
The meal went quicker than it could have and she was sent back up to her room without any punishment. (She had cleaned up the mess which had been left behind from earlier and her stepmother was none the wiser.)
As she passed by the stepsister who had given her the treats she shot her a smile which was very hesitantly returned.
Hesitant or not, it made her grin like a maniac once she reached her room.
Cinderella hadn't had friends in years because she was kept on the manor's property all day. If this could mean friendship, or a sisterly bond even, she was beyond ecstatic. There was always the danger of her stepmother being mad at it for some reason, but honestly that was something she was willing to risk.
She had risked it in the past and since the rules were so hard to discern, she always ended up getting in trouble no matter what she did.
In the following weeks, then turning into the following months, she and the red-haired stepsister (who she now called by her actual name- Anastasia) grew a little closer. They still didn't talk much, but mutual tolerance led to Cinderella gifting Anastasia a plate of cookies in return for the treats she had been given, along with a thank you note.
Anastasia bought her a book of fairy tales and Cinderella made her a pair of very nice gloves.
It was nice to have a friend, even if they still barely talked.
Her other stepsister, who she still refused to call by name, was just as nasty as ever. She was a year older than Anastasia and therefore two years older than Cinderella but she acted like she was an adult already when she was not. According to the rules of marriage, she was old enough to get a husband but she was still not what Cinderella would call an adult.
She was too immature.
Too petty.
And then a message was sent out from the royal family.
There was to be a ball and the prince would choose one lady to be his wife. He had no siblings and no living uncles, so securing the position as his wife was a promise to be the queen eventually.
As anyone could guess, the women of the town went absolutely ga-ga over this news. Dressmakers' sales must have gone up by at least seventy percent and all the hairstylists in town were forced to learn new techniques for hair lengths they had never dealt with before.
Cinderella's stepmother was too old to go to the ball as a potential wife, but her daughters were the right age. (Of course, she didn't permit Cinderella to prepare for the ball, yelling at her when the very idea was brought up, but Cinderella wanted to go anyway. Maybe not even to marry the prince but to just get out for once.)
So she worked to make a dress out of the fabric she had kept in her room since her mother's passing.
It was old and worn, but somehow that made the colors shine brighter. A beautiful pink and violet piece, with good shaping techniques she had learned from helping her stepmother dress on some busy mornings it would be wonderful. Not fully in fashion, but good enough.
As usual, she was going to have a hard time finding shoes because she feet were really quite small, so the skirt swept the floor dramatically. Almost all skirts for dances and the like were such lengths, but she made very particular measurements to make sure her worn out shoes would not be shown. If the royal family saw them, they would probably take offense.
But when she walked downstairs in her gown, her stepmother only laughed at her and the stepsister she hated even threw some food at her, because she presented her outfit during dinner. She narrowly avoided the piece of chicken and the bit of mashed potatoes that followed it before turning tail and racing back up the stairs to her room.
She didn't know what she had expected, and she hadn't expected a good response.
But it still hurt to be turned down like that.
She could hear her stepmother and stepsisters getting ready, but she hadn't been called down to help them dress. Somehow, it felt merciful, even though it meant she was stuck in her room.
Splayed out on her bed, still in the beautiful gown she had sewn for an occasion she couldn't attend, Cinderella cried. She cried for her father even though he was gone. She cried for the mother she had lost so young, and for the future it seemed she would never have. She cried because her work was going to waste, and she cried because she couldn't hope for anything.
And then she heard a knock on the door.
Cinderella froze. Was it her stepmother who came to destroy her dress? Was it the stepsister who had thrown food at her? Her throat seemed to close up around itself.
But the door opened, and Anastasia stood in the small space.
Her hair was done up and her dress was beautiful, if out of fashion just as her own. Cinderella even saw the powder and gloss on her face, the pink tint on her cheeks that was definitely faked.
Anastasia tentatively stepped into the space, surveying the leaking ceiling and the stacks of old books and fabric in the corners, her hands clasped in front of her. Cinderella didn't know what to say or why she was there, just stared back as Anastasia looked into her face.
“I'm sorry for my sister,” she started awkwardly.
Cinderella sniffled, trying not to seem too surprised. They had been friendly as of recent, it shouldn't have been unbelievable. (But she still expected only insults.)
“For- for what it's worth,” Anastasia took a step towards her, “I think your dress is beautiful,”
“Thank you,” Cinderella sniffed, “I like yours too,”
Anastasia gingerly sat down on the edge of the bed, her huge skirts laying out around them next to Cinderella's slightly thinner outfit. She hummed, “I don't think the prince will marry me,”
Cinderella looked at her, “Why not?”
Shrugging, Anastasia pursed her lips. “I think it's unrealistic, my dress is pretty- sure. But it's out of fashion and old. I don't know how to act around royals, not like my mother,”
“Ah,” Cinderella responded. “I'd like to think he'd marry you though, not your sister,”
Anastasia laughed weakly, “That would be something. I wonder what she'd do,”
“Probably throw food at me,” Cinderella tried to joke, and Anastasia giggled.
No one spoke for a moment, but Cinderella felt comforted.
“You should go to the ball anyway,” Anastasia said slowly. “Sneak out, avoid my mother. She won't see you,”
Cinderella whipped to her, “What? Are you crazy?”
“I think you should, it stinks that you've been kept in this house for the past few years- you deserve a step-mother who cares about you,”
Dumbfounded, Cinderella looked back at the floor. “She wouldn't ever let me, she'd be so angry if I snuck out,”
“I'd tell her I told you to,” Anastasia offered, but Cinderella shook her head.
“She wouldn't believe that, and I'd get punished anyway,”
Anastasia looked down at the floor too, clearly thinking hard. “What if you wore a veil? And some of my jewelry?”
“You'd let me do that?” Cinderella asked hopefully.
“Sure,” Anastasia bit her lip, “I want to be… a better person than I have been,”
Cinderella smiled, “Thank you, really,”
“So you're going?”
“I'll think about it- do you think you can bring up some of your jewelry?”
She ended up sneaking to the ball.
With the help of a boy driving a carriage with his sister in it, she was dropped off at the castle. She thanked the boy and his sister, who were both dressed in much less than she (the king had invited every girl in the kingdom after all), and headed inside.
The veil felt like a lie as she passed her stepfamily, but neither of the people she was worried about noticed her. Anastasia did shoot her a thumbs up though, which she appreciated.
Out of everything at the ball, the food was her favorite. The royal cooks really knew what they were doing!
After that, dancing was something she enjoyed much more than she had expected. In her free-time, Cinderella sometimes practiced dance steps, although she had no one to practice with. But now, she was dancing with other people and it really was something!
To her grand surprise, the prince ended up dancing with her.
In theory, he was supposed to dance with everyone, but there were so many people there that such a thing was clearly hard to keep track of. She didn't know him, of course, but she liked how awkward he acted around the girls insistent on marrying him.
Somehow, such a reaction made her trust him more.
“I like your dress,” he told her as they were swirling around on the dance floor, “It's very… different,”
She blushed under her veil, unsure of how to talk to a prince. “Thank you, um, your Highness,”
He chewed on his lower lip, “You don't have to use that title, when my father's not around,”
“But your Highness-”
“Please? Just talk to me like you would to someone else.”
“I don't really want to have this ball,” he confessed to her as they walked through the gardens, arm in arm.
Cinderella looked at him, Anastasia's expensive jewelry clinking together as she moved. “Really?”
They had grown more comfortable talking to each other over the past few nights, there were three nights to the festivities so that the prince would have enough time to properly choose a wife. Most of the people coming to the ball had a dress for each night, but Cinderella only had two. One was the first dress she had made specifically for this and another was a modified gown of Anastasia's that she didn't wear anymore.
“Yes,” the Prince said, “I don't feel ready to get married,”
“If it helps,” Cinderella said, “My s- friend, doesn't feel ready either, but her mother sent her anyway,”
“I feel like a lot of people here are in a similar boat,” he nodded, sighing. “But my father is insistent, and I can't disobey the king,”
Cinderella hummed and gently squeezed his arm.
They fell into silence as they walked through the beautiful gardens, the moon glinted off the little pools of water and the fountains, and some flowers were still open to the night sky. Cinderella didn't know what the garden looked like during the day, but it was beautiful at night.
“Are you… ready to be married?” the Prince asked her, a layer to his voice that she couldn't quite place.
She looked at him, “I don't know, I've never been married before,”
“Me neither,” he swallowed thickly, “But… I could be. If it was with you,”
She nearly tripped over her skirts in surprise, “W-what?”
“You're nice to talk to,” the Prince said, apologetically. “And it doesn't seem like you're only after me for my fortune- but we could stay friends, maybe, if I marry someone else,”
Her mouth had fallen open in surprise, head spinning. “But what about all the other beautiful girls?” she denied the thoughts of this actually happening, it couldn't be real. Nothing good even seemed to stick with her.
…But she wanted it to be true.
“Sorry,” the Prince apologized, “It's… okay if you don't want to- I could find someone else,”
“No, no,” she said quickly, “It sounds alright, you're much nicer to me than most people I have to talk to, I was just surprised,”
“Surprised? I'd think a lot of people would want to marry you,”
She laughed, “I don't get out much,”
“Is that why you have to go home before midnight?”
Cinderella chewed her bottom lip nervously, glancing up at the sky and seeing that the moon was not quite at the center of the sky. “My step-mother would be angry if she found me gone,”
“Why?” he implored, emotion suddenly filling his voice. Worry, he sounded worried for her.
Cinderella shrugged, “I… I don't know, it's just always been like that since my father passed,”
The Prince looked down at the stone path they were gliding over, gently and poised as if everything was in their control. “Can I… can I at least see your face? So I can find you again?”
She looked at him, veil trembling as she breathed. “You want to find me again?”
“Tonight's the last night,” he offered, “And I want to marry you,”
Cinderella blushed, “Okay.”
“Really?” he asked, looking at her in surprise. Did he expect her to deny him? “Can I lift your veil?”
Her face flushed, “I'm… I'm not wearing any make up,”
“That's alright,” his voice sounded tight with excitement. She had to go soon. “I just want to be able to recognize you,”
He led her out of the garden as soon as the clock struck eleven, knowing that she walked home every night and the trek was a struggle in her long skirts.
“I'll find you,” he promised, “And then we can get married,”
“Just make sure my step-mother doesn't kill you first,” she joked. Why did this feel like a final goodbye?
The Prince smiled, “She won't.”
And with one last bow and one last curtsey, Cinderella headed down the stairs and off into the night.