Snow White and Rose Red Read Online Free

was startled into flight when the shadow-creature entered the water, and the ripples of the bird’s hasty leave-taking hid whatever traces there might have been of the shadow’s passing.

     

CHAPTER · TWO
     
    “Snow White was the quieter of the two girls; she liked to sit at home with her mother and read. Rose Red preferred to run through the fields and forests, looking for flowers. ”
     
    ROSAMUND AND BLANCHE DID NOT GO NEAR THE forest for a week. This curtailment of their rambles affected Blanche very little. She had always enjoyed her walks with her sister, but it must be confessed that at times she found Rosamund’s more adventurous spirit rather trying. Though she would not for the world have hurt her sister by saying so, Blanche was relieved to be spared, for a time, the necessity of curbing Rosamund’s whims. She was happy to he at home, polishing the treasured copper kettle and measuring out herbs for her mother’s simples.
    The Widow’s ban was far harder for Rosamund to accept. She loved the forest, and she missed it deeply. But more than the forest, she missed the sharp clarity of the air of Faerie and the sudden strangeness of its trees and flowers, the scents of a mingled spring and summer that never faded, the piercing calls of birds unseen and unafraid. She missed the care and caution that were necessary within that other land, and the feeling of triumph that came with a safe return. She even missed the long, sometimes fruitless search for the constantly shifting border of Faerie.
    Rosamund tried not to be foolish. She and Blanche had never traveled regularly in Faerie; they seldom visited more than once or twice a month in summer, and not at all during winter. Rosamund had often gone for long periods without so much as coming near the border of Faerie, for certain seasons were particularly hazardous for mortal dealings there. The weeks immediately prior to All Hallows’ Eve were among these dangerous times, and Rosamund and Blanche had always been careful to avoid the fringes of Faerie then. Deprivation had not bothered her before; indeed, she had thought nothing of it. But all Rosamund’s reasoning made no impression on the stubborn longing of her heart, and she continued to pine for the forbidden walks.
    The Widow Arden was not blind to her younger daughter’s difficulty, and she tried to help as best she could. She assigned Rosamund the more active tasks, especially those which would take her out of the cottage and away from the forest that brooded behind it. When there were errands to run in the village, she sent Rosamund; when a tincture or potion was finished, Rosamund delivered it. If all else failed, the Widow sent the girl to gather rushes for Blanche to plait into winter coverings for the floor.
    None of these measures did much to ease Rosamund’s mind. She could see what her mother was trying to do, and she was grateful for it, but struggling down the muddy path to Mortlak was not an adequate substitute for walking across the spongy moss that covered the forest floor. Nor was watching the swans floating on the river Thames a satisfying alternative to catching the merest glimpse of a strange, bright-plumed bird sailing through the forests of Faerie.
    Rosamund did not voice any of this. She gritted her teeth and went about her work with fierce determination, hoping all the while that her mother would relent before winter closed in and adventuring in the woods became impossible. She took to spending as much of her time as she could away from home; if her mother had no errands for her, she would wander through the meadow, gathering herbs and sometimes chatting with the laborers working in the fields. When the sun began to sink toward the west, she would find a footpath and make her way home, swinging her basket and humming with stubborn cheerfulness.
    Late one afternoon, Rosamund was heading homeward when she saw a flash of red among the branches of a hawthorn bush beside the path. She