“Even if we wanted to dance,” said Eve, who looked crestfallen, “we couldn’t. We don’t have any dance slippers.”
This put a damper on everyone’s excitement. They couldn’t dance barefoot, not with a gentleman there, and they couldn’t dance in their old, heavy boots—their feet would get twisted. As if it could hear them, rain began pattering against the draped windows.
“Actually,” said Azalea, slowly folding her porridge with her spoon. “I think we might.”
She brought them all upstairs to the east attic, and among the dusty broken toys, the dripping roof, and ramshackle furniture, she unlatched a trunk. Before mourning, they had practiced dancing every day, so much that they had worn out the seams of their slippers. They even had a shoemaker who would bring the repaired slippers to the palace each morning. It was a luxury that Mother insisted on and the King reluctantly allowed.
Since mourning, they hadn’t been allowed to dance, but they had the slippers they hadn’t used on Christmas. Azalea pulled out a bundle and unwrapped it, revealing eleven brightly colored pairs of slippers. The girls ooohed.
They tried them on, right there in the dusty attic, and everyone was delighted to find that the slippers still fit. A little tight, but slippers never hurt the feet like boots did. Delphinium turned a graceful spin, sending puffs of dust about them.
“I feel like a princess,” she said.
That night they readied in a flurry of delight. Hair brushed, pinned, and braided; dresses buttoned, tied, poofed, and smoothed. Azalea produced dried flowers from a box underneath her bed, and the younger girls beamed as the older girls pinned the delicate crinkly blossoms in their hair and tied their slippers.
With the handkerchief and another burst of silver, the girls shivered as they passed through the billowing magic waterfall. Tonight the silver forest dripped here and there, though instead of raindrops, it dripped pearls. They reflected the light of the lamp as they fell. Azalea caught one in her hand, and it wetted her glove as a normal raindrop would, but left a pearly white spot.
Just before the bridge, Azalea set down the lamp and pulled the willow branches aside, revealing the glimmering white pavilion. The girls clasped hands and walked forward. Pearls rained into the water with soft ploops.
The Keeper stood at the entrance, cutting a sharp, smooth outline against the white silver. He dipped into a bow, so deep he fell to one knee.
“You came,” he said.
“Of course,” said Azalea, forgetting that she ever had doubts.
“Welcome,” he breathed. “My ladies.”
He extended his arm to the dance floor. With a squeal of delight, the girls bounded up the steps and onto the marble. Azalea smiled and followed after, her slippers so soft she could almost feel the marble veins. They looked about them, taking in the velvet, backless sofas on the sides for resting, the dessert table piled with chocolates and buns, the domed ceiling above them.
Azalea turned to see the Keeper at the entrance, folding his arms, his black eyes on her. She turned her head, feeling a blush rise to the tips of her ears.
“I do hope my ladies will enjoy their night of dancing.” The Keeper backed out of the entrance, onto the first stair. Delphinium gave a cry of protest.
“You’re leaving?” she said.
Mr. Keeper smiled. Even his smiles were sleek.
“I do not dance,” he said. “I am only the Keeper. I leave dancing to those who are more gifted than I.”
The white rain gusted in thick patters above them, and pearls dripped in sheets over the sides. A curtain of white masked the Keeper from the entrance. When the drops subsided and the bridge and rosebushes were revealed once more, he was not there.
“Wow,” said Hollyhock. “Wow!”
The blush still heated Azalea’s face. She turned to the girls, smiling as the invisible orchestra tuned and sprang into a lively melody.
“A schottische!” said Azalea. “Do you remember this? Mother taught it to us hardly a year ago—you’ll remember! Come along.”
They joined hands, and Azalea taught them the dance. Step-hop, hop, touch, hop. She taught them to turn their feet just so, and the girls learned it quickly. Even two-year-old Kale stepped on the right beats in the next dance, a spinner’s reel.
Quadrilles, gorlitzas, a redowa waltz, and more reels. The hours passed, the girls laughing as Azalea turned them in the steps.
She loved this. The feeling of stretching herself tight, releasing, spinning, falling breathless and feeling the air across her face. Seeing her sisters so happy, their pale cheeks pink with delight. It was magic.