Iron Hearted Violet Read Online Free Page A

of an ancient chocolatier, which Violet and Demetrius were able to find only four separate times in their young lives, each time during the waning moon, and each time in the four farthest corners of the castle, starting in the west.
    Also, there was a hallway that bent in one direction in the morning and quite another in the afternoon. The cause of this was unknown, but it was generally believed that the hallway itself was terribly vain and wanted nothing more than to display itself to its best advantage, depending on the light.
    A castle, you see, is more than the sum of its stones.
    It lives, my dears. It
breathes
.
    So just as we could not expect your face to remain static and unchanging over time, nor could we expect your bodyto never grow, so too would it be ludicrous to assume that a castle remain fixed forever.
    Imagine, then, young Violet and Demetrius set loose among those breathing stones. It is my belief that, even as children, they learned more about the castle than anyone in the history of the kingdom—and still, that knowledge comprised a mere fraction of the castle’s secrets.
    One particular discovery was a secret passage that led into a network of tiny corridors, its entrance in the farthest cupboard of the pantry—the one so far back that it was never used. Once inside, they had to lean against the panel until it quietly clicked open.
    Violet found this passageway at the age of six when she was nearly caught stealing sweets. It was particularly curious because of its small size (even as a very young child, Violet still had to duck and crawl, lest she smack her head on the polished ceiling) and its intricate fashioning. The marble floor had been covered with a thick rug of the softest wool, and the walls and ceiling had been inlaid with thousands of tiny interlocking lengths of wood that gleamed in the low light with a fresh application of oil and wax. The passage was always impeccably clean, never given to smells of dampness or must.
    It was well known in our country that most homes had floor plans fitted with alternate walkways for the Hidden Folk—though, to my knowledge, no one had ever seen these rooms, nor had they been inside. No one save Violet and Demetrius.
    Sometime in the months that followed the unpleasant conversation about the thirteenth god, Violet and Demetrius found themselves in an unfamiliar passage. It was far dustier here, as though the small residents who maintained the hidden corridors had simply run out of time or inclination. It happens.
    But it was dingier, too, and in terrible disrepair. The wood was cracked and gray, and the swirling patterns on the marble floors were crumbling to bits.
    “Is this passage getting smaller?” Demetrius asked, though he already knew it was. With each wriggle forward, the walls became closer, then touching, then tighter on his shoulders.
    “It must be your imagination,” Violet said, though her voice wavered and caught in her throat. Both children had the same thought running through their heads:
What if we get stuck?
The thought was itchy and shivery and made them want to crawl out of their very skins.
What if we get stuck? What then?
They shook the thought away.
    Fortunately for the pair of them, they did not get stuck.Eventually, the passage widened somewhat and then opened into a space not large enough to stand in but large enough to sit up comfortably. There were small chairs and small tables and small bookshelves covered and crammed with hundreds of very small books.
    And it was dusty. Terribly dusty. Dust coated every surface. It heaped in corners, skittered across the floor in hazy puffs, and hung in the air like dull stars. Demetrius sneezed.
    “I don’t know how long I can stay in here,” he said.
    “It’s light in here,” Violet said. “Where is the light coming from?”
    And indeed it
was
light. There were small round holes cut into the ceiling and the walls, each fitted tightly with a piece of glass, and the glass glowed and