I basked in the joy of coming home. Dad's delicious meals, Mom's hugs and advice, and even the view of the pumpkin patch from my window brought tears to my eyes. It was all so unchanged.

My parents closed up shop early each day to spend time with me. I told them about Maud kicking goblins, Jessaline and Sloane's antics, and how Alfonso the frog had become Alfonso the naked prince. But their favorite story was the one about the pumpkin carriage, which made them laugh until they cried.

"You know, I wasn't thrilled about you going to C.A.F.E.," Mom told me one afternoon, as we entered her shop. "But I'm very glad you did. I couldn't be prouder of you."

"Mom, you're getting so sentimental!" I said, kissing her cheek.

She dabbed at her eyes. "Come take a look at what I've been up to since you left."

She certainly hadn't been idle, because the shop was cluttered with exquisite shoes in every color of the rainbow. They sparkled and shimmered and shone in the sunlight, fashion statements in their own right rather than just accessories to a gown.

"Mom," I said, picking up a pump so intricately carved that it resembled lace, "everything looks amazing."

"The shop has never done so well," she said, grinning from ear to ear as she adjusted a pair of peach silk heels. "Business has tripled. You'll have to thank the king of Irisia for me for throwing that festival. You're going, aren't you?"

"I'd like to," I admitted. "I've been thinking about taking Princess Cynthia there, if she becomes my client. And I actually have a shoe design in mind for the occasion . . ."

I explained about my idea and showed her the charm, though I didn't say who it was from. She was skeptical until I showed her the diamond glass and dragon fire, and the familiar gleam appeared in her eyes.

We spent three days working on the design. It was lucky that Fuzz had given me plenty of material, because we made a ton of mistakes at first. I had figured out a way to expand the dragon fire by shaking the pebbles onto the hearth and building a real fire around them. I blended the two fires with my magic wand and held pieces of glass over the heat.

Mom rolled these into a ball, which she flattened into the sole of the shoe. It took some practice, since the fragments kept solidifying. "Now we need a mold." But when I stuck out a foot, she refused. "No, that's too dangerous. We'll mold it around an already made shoe, then melt it down to make it smaller," she decided.

We ended up molding the softened glass around a sturdy pair of oak heels, and once it had taken on the basic shape, we quickly removed it and smoothed the edges. The magic wand helped speed the process and blend the edges seamlessly.

Once the heels had been melted down and attached, Mom spread a thin, even layer of sole-lution on the underside. "No one will see this because the woman's foot will be covering it anyway," she said. "The pumps need it for strength and support."

The shoes came together at the end of the second day, and they looked beautiful, but . . . a little boring. At first, we considered shaping little flowers out of the remaining glass and attaching them, but a better (and easier) idea soon struck me.

"How about we carve flowers into the shoes themselves?" I suggested.

Mom agreed right away, though we had a hard time at first. Using my magic wand was too hard and I was afraid I would ruin the shoes. In the end, we heated long pins over the fire in order to make the lacy designs.

At last, the shoes were complete. They glittered in the sun, the carved leaf-and-flower designs curving like fairy swirls on frost.

"And now, to test them," I said, removing my own shoes.

The dwarves hadn't been joking when they said that diamond glass was hard to break. Yesterday, I had knocked a piece off the table and it hadn't even been scratched. Impressed, Dad and I had spent hours trying to dent and smash it. We bashed it with hammers. We ran over it with the wagon. We even threw it against the brick wall of our house, but nothing happened except Mom yelling that sooner or later we would break regular glass.

So when I put on the slippers, I felt confident that they were completely sturdy.

"Comfortable?" Mom asked.

"Very," I said, surprised. I imagined dancing in them and realized how important it was that they fit to perfection. I spun around experimentally, waltzing without music, and then just stood in a patch of sunlight to watch the slippers sparkle like water.

"They look magnificent," Mom said. "Fit for a princess."

The day I kissed my parents goodbye and left home for the second time, those shoes were in my bag, wrapped in silk and cotton. I set out for Indigo Castle, hoping they would be on Princess Cynthia's feet when she danced at the King's Festival.

As I walked, I thought about the forgotten princess. What would she be like after having been cooped up in Indigo Castle for so long?

My first glimpse inside the castle gates was . . . actually pretty disappointing. After all the beautiful castles I had seen lately, this place looked shabby and dirty. Weeds and trash filled the gardens, which were badly in need of water. Everything seemed old and dusty and neglected.

I yanked on a cord by the drawbridge and a bell sounded from somewhere within. I waited for a long time before the rickety bridge creaked down, and when it finally did, I was astonished to find one little servant girl, panting by a wooden wheel fastened to a large chain.

I stared at her. "You didn't have to lower the bridge all by yourself, did you?"

She stared back at me with frightened blue eyes as big as saucers. "Why do you think it took so long? Come in. Hurry!" She practically dragged me inside and, panting, began to raise the bridge again.

"What's the problem?"

She wiped away sweat as she labored to turn the wheel. "It's just so big out there, so open. It's best to stay inside," she muttered. When the job was done at last, she turned to me. "What can I do for you?"

"I'm here to see the princess," I said. Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw some giant rats lurking in the shadows of the courtyard.

"Octavia's out shopping with her mother," she said, pushing aside a strand of grimy hair. "I'm the only one at home."

"You're the only servant?" I asked, shocked.

She nodded. "I've always been the only servant. Queen Ingrid fired the housekeeper six years ago."

No wonder the upkeep was so abysmal. One girl couldn't possibly take care of such a large castle all by herself.

I shook my head. "Princess Cynthia is the one I've come to see. I'm her fairy godmother. Or might be, anyway."

The girl's eyes widened, and a tentative smile blossomed on her face. "Oh."

"Could you tell her Noelle Simpkins from C.A.F.E. is here?"

"She already knows," she said slowly, holding out a dirty hand. "I'm Cynthia."

I gaped at her. "Excuse me?"

"I didn't know you were coming today, or I would have cleaned myself up a bit more," she said eagerly.

As my mind struggled to understand this concept, I took in her appearance. She looked about eighteen and was roughly my height, but painfully thin. The strands of hair poking out from her head cloth might have been blond if they hadn't been so dirty. Her arms and face were splattered with grease, as though she had been rolling in silver polish.

"You're the princess," I sputtered, and she nodded. "You're Cynthia, the king's daughter from his first marriage? The heir to the kingdom? But . . . you're also the servant?"

Her laugh sounded pretty, like bells. "Well, who else is going to clean this place up? Come inside." She led me into a hall filled with the ghostly shapes of furniture beneath dusty cloths. Cobwebs and mold covered every surface. Only the stairs looked newly polished.

"Did you just start cleaning?" I asked, still confused.

"I clean every day. It's a big castle!" she said defensively.

"But why?"

"It's my home. And Stepmother and Octavia encourage it. They give me a list every morning, like polish the stairs or beat the rugs or do the laundry. It's helpful, but the list never seems to get smaller no matter how much work I do." She scratched her head, looking puzzled.

"I'm sure it doesn't," I said wryly. So the queen and princess were even more horrible than I thought. Had they been forcing this poor girl to clean for the past decade? "Is there a place we can sit and talk?"

She pointed at the gleaming stairs. When she sat on the landing, she left a smear of grease on the shining pewter.

"So, Your Highness," I began.

"Cynthia, please."

"So, Cynthia, I'm here because you made a wish. C.A.F.E. sent me to see if you need help." And you definitely do, I thought, looking at the girl's scratched, callused hands in her lap.

Without warning, she burst into tears. "I can't do it anymore! I keep fighting with myself. I don't want to stay, but I don't want to leave, either. All those people . . . and all the decisions I'll have to make . . . and all of that open space . . ." She shuddered.

I frowned. "You want to stay here?"

"Part of me does," she admitted, wiping her eyes with the only clean part of her apron. "But sometimes, I get so tired of cleaning. I start thinking about going through those gates and seeing the world."

"I know. I made the same wish that you did." I told her briefly about leaving Indigo to work at C.A.F.E.

Cynthia's eyes grew bigger with every word of my story. "Weren't you afraid?"

"A little. But the thought of never leaving scared me more." I watched her shoulders slump and felt desperately sorry for her. "This is no life for you, Cynthia. You don't want to clean this place forever, do you?"

She shook her head. "I want to go. At least, I think I do. And I want to fall in love." She blushed. "I read about it when I'm dusting in the library. Is it as nice as it sounds?"

I thought of Kit and blushed myself. "I think it's supposed to be."

"And I want to go to Irisia," she added. "Octavia won't stop talking about some party . . ."

"Well, that's good, because I'm planning on taking you to that party," I declared.

A huge smile broke out across her face, only to fade a second later. "But how can I leave when there's so much work to be done? Stepmother wouldn't be happy about that."

"Stop worrying about what makes other people happy," I told her. The words sounded familiar. "But I can see now why you never left. Everyone out there thinks you're too sick."

The princess nodded. "That's what Stepmother wanted people to think. She told me that the castle was the only safe place in the world for me."

"That does it." I got to my feet. "Cynthia, your days of being a servant are over. Pack a bag. We're leaving."

"Oh, Noelle, you're a lovelier fairy godmother than I ever imagined!" She threw her arms around me, leaving grease marks all over my clothes. "I'm going to dance and see Prince Christopher. Is he really as handsome as Octavia says?"

"I've never seen him myself, but I think he must be." I paused. "Cynthia, why didn't you ever just lower the drawbridge and run away? I would have."

"I thought about it so many times, but I just couldn't. Pulling the bridge down . . . and then walking across it . . . and then going through the gates . . ." Her hands trembled.

"So all this time, you could have left whenever you wanted? You weren't locked in the tower or anything?"

Cynthia scoffed. "Of course not! Who would clean the toilets?"

I looked around at the threadbare carpets and raggedy curtains. This poor girl needed my help more than I or Maud or anyone at C.A.F.E. could have possibly imagined.

"Cynthia, drop that rag," I commanded. "We're leaving in five minutes."

It was much easier said than done. It turned out that old habits died hard . . . really hard.

It took half an hour to convince the princess to cross the drawbridge, and nearly another just to get her through the gate. It seemed that my new client was only comfortable when surrounded by walls. As I dragged her by the apron, I wondered whether my main job would be persuading her to go places.

"My, you're strong, Noelle," Cynthia said, panting from the effort of clinging to the gate. "Do they have a fitness requirement for fairy godmothers?"

I wiped my forehead. "It's all those years I spent lugging pumpkins around. I never knew how handy it would be on this internship."

Although she climbed readily into the carriage at the station, it took another feat of brute strength on my part to remove her when we arrived in Irisia.

"You'll be glad you left, I promise," I said, tugging her through the village.

She clung to my arm. "Right now, the only thing I'm glad about is not being home when they find out I didn't finish scrubbing the stairs."