Chapter 1

The clock struck with a loud boom and the girl in the silver dress froze immediately. Her prince looked at her with concern as he saw the fraught emotions racing across her face.

‘Miss, what’s wrong? Are you feeling unwell?’

She didn’t so much as reply, she simply stared at him with a startled expression before dashing off, lifting her skirts off the floor with both hands, and exiting in the opposite direction from him.

‘Miss!’ The prince shouted after her. She was rapidly disappearing from his eyeline and into the crowd of guests.

Within a moment he chased after her. He hoped that he could oupace the woman in delicate glass heels, even though by now she was several paces ahead of him and she had the advantage of obscurity. Once he pushed through the crowd he saw those same heels again, and he called out a final time:

‘Miss!’

But, if she did hear him, she pretended not to. It was evident that she had no desire to be followed, by him or presumably by anyone else. He didn’t even know her name.

Tears were streaming down the girl’s face. She had maybe seconds until everything she had went up in a puff of smoke. She would not allow the prince to see her like that; it would be too great a humiliation, not in the least because she had imagined a thousand ways he might reject her because of it.

She ran like she had wings, she didn’t even give a second thought to the long staircase which had caused her such trouble on the way in. But, in her haste she tripped on her heel, and it almost fell off her foot before she shoved it back on stubbornly. She must have cut herself at some point when the heel dislodged itself, and she limped on down the stairs as the blood pooled in her shoe.

Once she reached the carriage she threw herself inside, then she crawled down and hid in a curled up position as it trundled away out of sight. It was only until later, when her clothes had turned back to rags and her carriage back into a pumpkin, that she realised she didn’t even know the prince’s name, nor did he know hers. Now her fantasy would remain just that, and nothing more. My name is Ella, she would’ve told him, not Cinderella, just Ella.

Chapter 2

The tavern was bustling with noisy patrons. Ted was busy serving a particularly roudy party in the far corner, they looked like they had just come back from hunting. Ella sighed quietly, she hoped it wasn’t too much of a bother to her husband.

She had seen the effect that a long, hard day’s work had on him time and time again. By the end of the day he could usually hardly bare to offer her even a smile, despite his usual good temperament. The customers couldn’t know the cost their behaviour had on those that were bound to but willing to serve, but a part of her couldn’t help but resent them all the same.

Maybe it was because they reminded her of her stepmother. She had left her home with her long ago, but she was still haunted sometimes by memories of her ill treatment of her. It was never easy to just let things go.

After watching a moment, she approached the table herself. Ted was walking back towards her. She put a hand on his shoulder to convey a confidence.

‘They want to order a lot.’ He said quietly to her. ‘It’s a good day.’ She smiled at him.

‘How much?’ She asked.

‘I think they might stay the whole afternoon. But, for now, eleven cups of ale. I’ll make them for you.’

She followed him back to the counter and helped him as he filled up each cup from the barrel. Then she loaded them onto a large tray, one on top of the other as Ted had taught her when she’d first wandered into the tavern looking for a job.

She smiled at him and then headed to the table of men.

‘Eleven cups of Ale!’ She called loudly. The men cheered.

She started passing each of the cups around the table and one of the men commented on how good she was at balancing the cups on her tray. She nodded.

‘Comes with practice.’

‘I wish my wife was like that.’ Another said with a loud laugh. The rest joined him.

Then one of the other men spoke, causing Ella to focus on his face for the first time.

‘Annalise hasn’t done a day of practical work in her life.’ He added with a judgmental but joking tone.

It was the prince, her prince, the one she’d met at the ball.

The fact that he was here, in front of her, startled her so much she nearly dropped her tray, although thankfully she recovered it before she made a spillage.

‘Gods, are you alright?’ He said when he saw her struggling with the tray.

‘Yes, see.’ She gestured to the perfectly balanced tower of cups. The prince laughed at her, then turned to his table.

‘You hear that, she’s a professional.’ Ella grimaced a smile at the party. Did he really not recognise her? She wasn’t dressed so finely of course, but there wasn’t anything so very different about her appearance, apart from the fact that her face was probably smudged with dirt and sweat.

It was only when he turned back towards her that she realised she’d been staring too long. She gulped when she realised she’d been caught and resumed her task.

‘You’re only saying that about Annalise because you’re still missing that anonymous Miss from the ball.’ One of his friends said to him with a sly smirk.

‘She was magnificent.’ The prince said.

‘So magnificent you forgot to ask her name.’ The friend teased.

‘I was very distracted.’ The prince laughed to himself.

Ella wished she could vanish. She emptied her tray and quickly mumbled ‘enjoy’ so she could slip out of view from her perhaps not-so-charming prince.

Then he said. ‘I wish I married her, she would’ve made the perfect princess.’

A wave of melancholy tightened around her, she was almost swept away by it.

But just as she had the seed of an idea to turn around and tell him that the girl’s name was Ella, she was Ella, she heard those last damning words, like a confession. ‘Still, better Annalise than a common drudge.’

And she didn’t bother to look back again.