No matter how hard she scrubbed the stubborn stain just would not let up.  Cadence had been at this sink for over half an hour, scrubbing the same dish.  The head of the castle’s kitchens had made it entirely clear that not a single stain was to be let on any of the pots or dishes.

            Rumor had it that the last time the King saw a stain on his dish, he had ordered the execution of the dish washer.  Cadence didn’t really believe that anyone would be so cruel, but the lie still did its job. 

            With one last grunt, she finally scrubbed the plate of its last stain.  She held it up for inspection, and upon seeing it sparkle in the low lighting, tucked it away with the others.

            After putting away the scrubber and soap, she picked up her own dinner from where she’d stashed it under the sink, locked up the kitchen, and headed down to the servant’s quarters.  She had made sure to take a little extra of the biscuits and gravy.  They were her little brother’s favorites, and she wanted to make sure he had enough to feel happy.

            She finally reached the servants’ quarters.  It was a dark and dingy hallway, located directly in the basement of the castle, where the only thing that separated them from the prison dungeons was a thin brick wall.  It was unnerving to think that some on the kingdom’s worst criminals were less than a few feet from where they lay their heads down at night, but she tried not to let it bother her.  There were hidden one-sided panels that would allow entry into the prisons, but the servants were the only ones who knew of it.  Thankfully.

            She reached her room and pulled out the key from her apron.  Jiggling it into the lock, she opened her door to find her little brother on the bed, reading a book of fairy tales. 

            “Sis!” Irvine exclaimed with a grin, “You’re back!”  He tried to get up from the bed and walk to her, but she could clearly see that he was too weak to do so.

            “Don’t get up,” she said, rushing over to him.  She placed his food on the bedside table and helped him into an upright position.  When he was situated properly, he flung his thin arms around her and hugged her tight. She could practically feel his ribs poking her, but she didn’t say anything.

            Fatigue and bony ribs were simply a side effect of having an expiration date.

            “I missed you,” he said when they parted. 

            She smiled.  “I missed you too.  Kitchen work is just not the same without you beside me little brother.” She ruffled his hair and asked, “Are you hungry?”

            “Starved,” he said, dragging the word to emphasize just how hungry he was.  Cadence laughed and shook her head.  “What’d the cook make for dinner today?”

            She reached over and pulled the napkin off of the dish she’d brought in.  Irvine peeked at the plate, and all the hours of hard work she poured into the kitchen today paid off when a big grin spread across his face.  “Biscuits and gravy! Sis, I knew there was a reason I loved you! Come on! Let’s dig in.”

            “I’m not that hungry, Irvine,” she said with a smile, even though it was a bold faced lie.  “But I will take just one biscuit.  You can have the rest.  You need it if you’re going to get better, right?”  She picked up the smallest biscuit on the plate and began to munch on it as she watched her brother eat.

            The truth was, that she hadn’t gotten an extra time to eat dinner today.  Furthermore, the rule was that if you were not present at work, then you didn’t get dinner.  It was simple as that.  And since Irvine wasn’t working at the moment, she couldn’t grab an extra plate for him.

            She watched with slight amusement as he scarfed down the plate of food.  But then, sadness immediately washed over her.  He was a thirteen-year-old boy, but now, he looked like a frail eight year old.  He was so skinny and looked so tired.  It just wasn’t fair.

            A few weeks ago, he was fine.  He worked in the royal stables, making sure the horses were fed and got rubbed him down.  She was so proud of him, but then one day, he just collapsed.  And since then, it was a downward spiral.  She’d used a good portion of their savings to visit a doctor in the kingdom, only to be told that her only kin had less than half a year to live.  No other explanations.  She was simply told that her brother had a disease that would slowly rob him of all of his life and energy, and that there was no cure.  She’d visited some of the families who’d experienced the disease, and they told her the same thing.  Her brother was going to die, and there wasn’t a single thing she could do about it.

            Don’t get her wrong.  She was still so very proud of him.  She didn’t know of any child who would take such tragic news as well as he did, but it just wasn’t fair.  After the news, he couldn’t work in the stables with the horses anymore.  The physical labor was further deteriorating to his health.  So, instead, she pulled him in to work in the kitchens with her.  He did little things like peeling potatoes and scrubbing pans, but two days ago, he began a fever and was bedridden since.

            “Hey sis,” he called to her, breaking her train of thought.  “Nathan came to visit me with some news.”

            “Oh yea? What about?”  Nathan was a young boy who worked in the stables.  He and Irvine had become close friends, but the boy was always telling her little brother all kinds of fantastical stories.  Lies, all of them, and she had half a mind to tell the boy to stop spreading them.  They could get them in all sorts of trouble.

            “He says the King has a special prisoner in the dungeons.”  Irvine’s eyes were wide as he spoke about the mystery.  “There’s a rumor going around the castle that it’s a dragon.  A dragon, Cadence! In this castle! How amazing is that?”

            Cadence hated being the one to break the excitement in his eyes, but, “There’s no such thing as dragons, Irvine.  For the last time, they do not exist.  There are cows and sheep and horses and lots of other critters.  But no dragons.”

            He frowned at her.  “Just because you don’t believe in them doesn’t mean that they don’t exist! Nathan brought me this book from the library.”  He picked up the book he’d been reading earlier off the bed. The book she had believed was his old fairy tale book.  “It’s all about dragons and-”

            She snatched the book from her little brother and stared at it in horror, then looked back it him.  “He said he got this from the where?!”

            Her brother’s countenance immediately fell.  “The library… it’s no big deal, sis-“

            “It is a big deal! You know fully well that servants aren’t allowed to take books from the royal library.  It’s stealing, Irvine!”

            “No.  It’s borrowing.  I’ll return it in the morning, it’s not a big deal.”

            Cadence placed the book beside the empty plate on the table, closed her eyes and inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly.  She did this a couple more times to calm herself down.  It was a practice she’d inherited from her mother.  Every time her mother got worked up on something or another that her children had done, she’d close her eyes and breathe just like how Cadence did just now.  It worked wonders.  She didn’t want to get upset at her brother over minor things like this, especially when they had such little time together left.

            “Irvine, it is stealing,” she said evenly.  “I will take it back in the morning, myself.”  If anyone was going to get caught replacing the book, it was going to be her.  She couldn’t let her brother be the one to do it when she was supposed to be responsible.  “And next time Nathan comes around with any more rumors, I hope you will set him straight.  Nothing good comes out about these things.”

            “But, dragons are real,” he insisted, as if he hadn’t heard a single word that escaped her mouth.  “And what if the King did capture one?”

            She let out a tied sigh.  “Nathan, if you want to believe that dragons are real, then you can do that.  I’m not going to stop you, but I don’t want you to grow up believing in such things.  And if the King did catch a dragon, then the whole kingdom would’ve known about it, and seen it.”

            “But-“ he tried to say, but she firmly shook her head and said, “No buts.  That’s the end of any dragon talk tonight, okay?   Now scoot over so we can both get some sleep.”

            Irvine looked at her with the most sorrowful, brown eyes in the world, and for a moment, Cadence felt as if she had kicked a puppy.  But she had to remind herself that she didn’t do anything wrong.  It was her job to watch over and protect him even if that meant that she had to nip his nonsensical beliefs in the bud.

            He shuffled over to the side of their shared bed and before she got into bed, she changed into her nightdress.  Once she was properly situated under the covers, she pulled her brush from out of the bedside table drawer, and began the process of untangling her curly hair.

            Mid stroke in a rather gnarly knot, she looked over and caught her brother peering at her.

            “You’re not mad at me, are you?”

            She smiled gently.  “I was never mad at you, Irvine.  I just want you to be safe and out of trouble.  I do love you.”

            He smiled back.  “I love you too, sis.  Sleep tight, and dream of dragons tonight.”  He added the last part quickly, snickering as he turned his back to her, and she playfully shoved his shoulder.  The little scamp!

            After she finished battling with her unruly hair, she managed to assemble it in a thick braid and tied it with a leather tong.   Irvine was sound asleep, soft snores drifting from his side of the bed, and she was about to blow out the oil lamp, but the book she’d confiscated from her brother seemingly beckoned out to her.

            It was rather large.  She didn’t know how she could have missed the details when she’d first seen it, but there was a large golden dragon embellishing the entire cover.  Its wings spread out over the width of the book and there was golden flames shooting from its toothy mouth.  Just looking at it sent shivers down her spine.

            With a gulp, and against her better judgment, she picked up the book and hefted it into her lap.  She told herself that it was just curiosity.  She was just curious about the thing that her brother had become so engrossed in. 

            And that’s where she found herself for the rest of the night as she thumbed through page after page.  She read about the realm of dragons, hidden from the human world at the peak of a mountain.  About the dragons, their customs, and their many abilities. 

            She remained stuck on one particular chapter, however.  It told of a well within their realm; an extraordinary well that contained water with the capability to heal any illness.  She told herself that all the information was simply folly, the writings of a very good tale weaver.  However, before she finally did blow the lights out for the night, she found her heart secretly yearning for such a thing to be of existence.