The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making - Catherynne M. Valente [36]
She shook her head, with much sadness. The shoes were so beautiful.
“I am only trying to help you, child,” said the little girl. She set the shoes gently on the gleaming floor and ran her hand along the cat’s spine again. This time, the Marquess drew up a silver plate piled high with wet red cherries, a wedge of black cake crusted with sugar, swollen raspberries and strawberries, several lumps of dark, dusty chocolate, and a tall goblet of steaming hot cider.
“You must be so hungry. You’ve come so far!”
September swallowed. Her throat was dry, her stomach empty. But this was certainly Fairy food. The worst kind, the kind that never let you go, if you even taste it once. “Is that Queen Mallow?” she said instead, nodding toward the portrait and forcing her voice to be friendly.
The Marquess looked up at the great painting and scowled. Her curls shivered and went deep blue, the color of the sea. She sighed and snapped her fingers. The rich plate disappeared.
“You would think that new management would have the right to redecorate. But some magic never bends, not even if you tear at it with your own teeth. No matter how I tear, the portrait stays. She was never that beautiful, though. The painter must have been a loyalist.” The Marquess turned away from Queen Mallow’s sweet gaze and focused on September again. She smiled. “But she is dead, my child. I promise you that. Dead as autumn and last year’s apple jam. We haven’t come all this way to dish gossip about ancient history. How have you been enjoying Fairyland, September?”
“How do you know my name?”
“You filed papers, of course. You have a visa. What in the world do you think all that is for, if not to make certain that I know everything?”
September didn’t say anything.
“Well, I do hope everyone has been nice to you, and hospitable in every way they can think of. It’s important to me, September, that you’re treated well.”
“Oh, yes! Everyone has been terribly helpful and kind--except the Glashtyn, I suppose. I had heard that fairies were nasty and tricky and cruel, but they’re not, not really.”
“Oh?” said the Marquess with arch amusement. She stroked the panther with her small hands, covered in jeweled rings. “But they are, truly, September. Just the worst sort of folk. You’d never believe how wicked! They’re nice because I make them nice. Because I punish them if they are not nice. Because I put them on the Greenlist if they are not nice. Before I came, Fairyland was a dangerous place, full of brownies spoiling milk and giants stomping on whomever they pleased and trolls telling awful, punning riddles. I fixed all that, September. Do you have any idea how difficult it was to invent bureaucracy in a world that didn’t even know what a ledger was? To earn their submission, even to the point of having their wings locked down? But I did it. I fixed it for children like you, so that you could be safe here and have lovely adventures with no one troubling you and trying to steal your soul away. I do hope you didn’t think you had charmed them all with your sparkling personality, child.”
“Why do you keep calling me a child? You’re no older than I am.”
“Really, September. You’re going to have to be a bit more discerning than that if you expect to get along here. I suppose I shouldn’t expect any better from a Midwesterner. They teach you such frightful things about the world.” The Marquess paused. The tips of her hair grew silver and shining. “Do you like my Panther? He is called Iago. I love him very much, and he loves me. I used to have a Leopard, but she ran off some time ago. Could not change with the times, I suppose.” The Marquess nodded toward