Dearest

by Alethea Kontis

  “Magic,” said Conrad, not loudly enough to carry over the water.

  “Are you sure?” Thanks to the fey blood in her family, Friday had witnessed her fair share of magic spells being performed. But if Conrad hadn’t brought it to her attention, she wouldn’t have noticed anything out of the ordinary with the herb girl and the swans.

  Her squire nodded. “It’s . . . hard to explain. An old, sad magic.”

  His description sounded too much like the tendril of feeling that had burrowed into her. “Is it a curse?”

  “Perhaps,” said Conrad. “There is a dark, mud-brown magic that is not the girl’s. The girl’s magic is light blue.”

  Friday turned to him. “You see magic in colors?”

  “You don’t?”

  Friday shook her head. “I don’t know anyone who does. And I come from a rather extraordinary family.”

  Conrad smiled at her. “So I hear.”

  “Well, go on, then. What color is my magic?”

  Conrad leaned back. “A deep, blood red. Also odd.”

  Friday raised both eyebrows in question.

  Conrad cocked his head to the side. “Forgive me—this is difficult to explain. Blood-red magic to me has always been something dark and tainted.”

  Friday had the inclination to brood once in a great while, but she didn’t feel particularly dark and tainted.

  “But you are different,” Conrad said quickly. “Your magic is bright and pure. It almost glows with a . . .”

  “Light?” offered Friday.

  “More like love,” said Conrad. “As if your aura were the essence of love itself.”

  Friday blushed, hoping that her mysterious aura masked the red in her cheeks. “I’m flattered. And yet, you say that you have never before seen this sort of magic used for good works?”

  Conrad shrugged. “I do not have academic knowledge of magic. I only know what I see. What I have seen.”

  “Then may your eyes only ever alight on good works,” said Friday.

  He bowed his head to her. “You remind me a little of my Omi.”

  “I do not know your Omi, but I believe you have just paid me another compliment.”

  “She was also a woman of much love. Fierce love. Not kindness, like yours. But we did not live in a kind place.”

  Before Friday could ask him to elaborate, a series of sharp barks and honks erupted into the air beside them. In the pond beyond Conrad, a swan fiercely defended his territory from Michael, who was in turn being defended by a very enthusiastic Ben.

  “Is that a diaper?” Friday called to the boy. “I don’t think the swan wants you mucking up his playground with that.”

  “But they need to be mucked out and I’m the mucker. Again.” He pouted. “And what does he care? The swans don’t live here anyway. They live in the sky tower.”

  “I thought swans nested on the ground, in the brush,” said Friday.

  “They do,” said Conrad.

  “Not these swans,” Michael said. “These swans are fancy. They stay at the palace with the king and queen.”

  Since it was not safe for anyone else to inhabit the ruined tower that hid in the clouds, it made as much sense as anything for the swans to have taken refuge there. “Perhaps they got tired of you fouling their home. Who won the laundry races today?”

  “Carrot Kate.” Michael scrunched up his nose in mock disgust.

  “Michael,” Friday said warningly. “You know that’s not nice. Her hair is much more like gold than carrots. Why don’t you say that instead?”

  “Because we have a Gold Kate now. And then there’s Mean Kate, Smelly Kate, Little Kate, and Pickles.”

  “Pickles?” asked Conrad.

  “I wouldn’t let them call her Goblin,” said Friday. Once more, their conversation was interrupted by hissing and honking and barking. “Wilhelm and Jacob are digging out a new latrine on the far hill. Go de-muck the nappies up there.”

  Michael pulled another face and Friday raised a finger. “It’s not the mucking I mind so much,” Michael said before she could speak a word. “It’s the flirting. Flirting is worse than mucking.”

  “Jacob and Wilhelm are flirting with each other?” asked Conrad.

  “Noooooo,” said Michael. “With the Silly Twins. Elaine and Evelyn.”

  With every fiber of her being, Friday resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Michael’s habit of labeling things would be the death of her. She looked out over the field where the children were at play. When had her army of children grown quite so legion? Perhaps there was a method to Michael’s madness. Friday realized she could name them each herself, but it might take half a day.

  “Take these,” said Friday, and she handed the child a bunch of flowering vervain. “Give them to Elaine and Evelyn and tell them I said to take care of the nappies for you. They can muck and flirt at the same time.”

  A wide grin split Michael’s face; he grabbed the bunch of purple wildflowers out of her hand and sped across the meadow, Ben nipping at his heels.

  “What do you say?” called Friday.

  “Thaaaaaank yooooou!” echoed back to her as he ran.

  “There you are, sir,” Friday said to the swan. “Disaster averted. You’re very welcome.”

  The swan strutted in a circle, honked a bit, and then, curiously, seemed to bow to Friday before spreading his wings and launching high into another phantom gust of wind.

  Conrad shook his head. “Magic.”

  Friday stood and picked what grass she could out of her fine dress—a blue velvet with silver gilt weft from Sunday’s closet. It was far too fine for sitting in a meadow, but she would never refuse a gift from her sister the queen. Even so, she missed the full, patchwork skirts that she’d grown to love over the years. She’d already begun collecting items of clothing that were beyond repair in the hopes that she might fashion another one.

  “The sun’s gone down,” she told her squire. “Let’s start herding our flock.”

  Since the castle was already overflowing with refugees, John, Wendy, and Michael shared a pallet in the corner of Friday’s room. She didn’t mind at all, even when it sometimes took the giggling gaggle a very long time to settle down and succumb to sleep. Friday had surrendered a blanket and pillow to Conrad, who somehow made himself comfortable on the floor by the door.

  She wasn’t sure how Ben the Needy managed to wake her without disturbing any of the others, but there he was, pulling at her sheets, licking her hand, and whining into her palm before even a hint of sun had dispelled the dark from the sky. She rubbed her eyes and lit a candle so that she could see the puppy out to the courtyard. She probably should have woken some of the children and forced them into the role of responsibility, but she’d rather do it herself now than deal with grumpy faces all day.

  Silence met Friday in the hallway—not so much as a guard or well-seasoned farmer stirred to break the stillness. Not even Conrad awakened as she tiptoed over him and slipped through the doorway like a thief.

  The puppy bounded along in front of her. Where he should have turned right to make his way down to the familiar courtyard, he turned left and scampered away, his morning necessities apparently forgotten. Friday did not call after him for fear of breaking the castle’s serenity, so she gave chase, shielding the candle she carried so that she would not be lost in the dark.

  Down halls and around corners she went, farther and farther into the depths of the palace. Just when she thought she’d lost Ben in the shadows, there he was, nipping at her heels and sprinting away again. What was the fool pup playing at? Whatever it was, she hoped he tired of it soon, before someone caught her wandering about in her nightgown like a lost ghost.

  One more hall and two more turns and suddenly she was mounting stairs, up and up and up. When she hit the third landing Friday realized with dread that she was climbing the sky tower. Even before it had been ruined she’d never had a desire to do this, but there seemed to be no turning back. Far ahead of and above her, Ben let
out a sharp bark. She swore to scold the dog as she would an unruly child when she got her hands on him.

  Friday concentrated on the steps and the flame. She heard the cold wind whip around the tower and through the thin windows spaced along the stairwell, but the candle in her hand never gave so much as a flicker as she climbed. The stones beneath her bare toes grew slick as she reached the misty cloud cover, and then dry again as she rose slowly above it. She swallowed hard so that her ears would pop and tried not to think about just how far below her the rest of the world was. She took deep breaths, when she remembered to breathe at all.

  At the top of the stair lay an Elder Wood door, shut and latched from the inside. Softly, Ben yipped from the other side of it. Friday sighed. The room that the door had previously hidden had been completely destroyed. There was no ceiling here—just the brightest of the fading stars still twinkling in the rising dawn above her—and the walls were naught but crumbled piles. Of this room only the doorway and the floor remained intact.

  The tower swayed in another gust of wind, and Friday began to pray. She knew that nothing could happen here. The evil giant king had half destroyed this place, but Wednesday had healed it. She’d come up here every day and used her magic to bind the stones together so that they would never fall. Like the tower that supported the Woodcutters’ own humble cottage, this tower would be standing long after the rest of the castle had rotted into memory. Taking a deep breath of the thin air, Friday lifted one leg over the rubble closest to the Elder Wood door and entered the room.

  There were naked men everywhere.

  Friday realized she’d stopped breathing again.

  Before her on the floor lay one, two, three . . . seven young men about the age of her brother Peter. The great Elder Wood door shadowed the men from the pinks and blues of the awakening sky. A few threadbare blankets were scattered among them, but the sight was mostly skin and hair. They were all quite fit, with leaner muscles than her woodcutter brother’s, but well-defined all the same. The colors of their hair varied, but each was so pale it seemed as if they’d never seen the sun.

  Ben sniffed and scampered around the men, but they did not wake. Friday found herself stepping into the room, one foot after another, not realizing what drew her until she was at his side.

  Here slept the most beautiful of them all. His hair was long, perhaps shoulder length, dark blond with shocks of white. His features were at the same time sharp and beautiful; in sleep he looked the way she imagined one of Lord Death’s angels might. She could not help glancing into the shadows to see if he had wings of feathers or fire. It was almost impossible for her to turn her gaze away.

  Friday could not name the strange power that held her; she only knew—with complete certainty—that she was supposed to be here, at this time, in this place, with this man. She felt as if she knew his name, but the word would not bloom on her tongue. Was she supposed to help him somehow? Judging by the state of him, he and his comrades were considerably lacking in the three basic necessities. She wanted to give him shelter. She wanted to bring him a hot meal. She wanted to tailor his favorite shirt.

  She wanted to kiss him.

  Gods help her, she’d fallen in love again. She whispered another prayer to the goddess to guide her hopeless soul, while also secretly wishing to know the color of his eyes.

  As she leaned down toward him in the dawn’s early light, her wish was granted. Three drops of wax from her unwavering candle fell onto his pale, unblemished skin, and with a sharp gasp he awoke.

  Blue. His eyes were deep blue and white, like the caps of the waves on Saturday’s impossible sea. Blue . . . and angry. Or frightened? Confused? For once, Friday could not discern the other feelings that washed over her. She only knew they were powerful, and that she’d been caught in their net. She wasn’t sure if she was supposed to hug this man, hide him, or present him to the king. All of those things were at odds with what her instincts were brazenly suggesting.

  The young man did not move or speak, nor did she. She was paralyzed, frozen in his gaze.

  “What is this?” another man bellowed. “Who are you?”

  Friday turned her head ever so slightly. Her eyes reluctantly followed soon after, adjusting in the light to focus on the three very large, very awake, and still very naked men now standing between her and the Elder Wood door. These men were angry, there was no doubt.

  “Answer me, girl,” said the darkest and the strongest, but Friday could not find her voice. She backed slowly, begrudgingly, away from the young man on the floor. She forced her tongue to speak an apology. Then a high-pitched yowl broke the silence.

  She had stepped on Ben’s tail.

  With a gasp she took another quick step back, realizing only too late that there was no more of the room left behind her.

  And so, gracelessly and in her nightgown, Friday plummeted from the sky tower.

  4

  A Bevy of Idiots

  TRISTAN DIDN’T STOP to think before he dove off the tower after her. He was aware of the time, less from the light in the sky and more from the itching of quills beneath his skin. It was morning, he knew. He just hoped it was morning enough.

  He could see her face as she fell ahead of him, fast, too fast, a fluttering blur of warm brown hair and white fabric and eyes, those eyes, gray as dark ice, wide with fear and piercing straight into his soul. He spotted movement in the corner of his vision: good. His brothers had been stupid enough to follow him down. Despite sheer will, and assuming this worked, he wouldn’t be able to bear her weight alone.

  He flattened his arms against his sides, forcing himself to fall faster. The familiar pinch on the bridge of his nose and the pull between his shoulder blades seemed to take an eternity as the ground rushed to meet them. He curled his feet in beneath his body as his tail elongated, and resisted naturally curving his neck as it stretched, keeping his beak down.

  Somehow he managed to pass her in the air; having done so, he spread his arms wide, slowing down as the brute wind pushed them upward. His massive wings shuddered as he strained his muscles to the breaking point.

  Bit by bit, he felt his burden lessen by degrees as his brothers caught her gown in their beaks and pulled hard, their outstretched wings humming against the rush of the wind. Had he been able to, he would have cried in relief and joy.

  Too quickly they met the overgrown rubble at the base of the tower. A sharp rock sliced along his chest, deep beneath his left wing. The girl rolled limply off of him as his brothers released her. The candlestick in her hand skittered across the ground. Tristan summoned the last of his strength to waddle over to her unconscious body. He burrowed himself into the crook of her arm, stretched his long neck out over her shoulder, and died.

  “Tristan, come on. You’re not dead.”

  Sebastien was growling at him again. It really was too bad they’d been cursed into swans. Sebastien would have made a much better bear.

  He had been growling at his younger siblings for years, long before they had migrated to this pretty little palace in Arilland. It hadn’t been so bad just after their escape from the islands and over the endless sea, but somewhere among the ice and snow north of the Troll Kingdom, their eldest brother had taken it upon himself to fall in love with a real swan. The rest of them had been paying the price ever since.

  “No,” Tristan replied. “Pretty sure . . . dead.” If the fire lancing through his breast didn’t usher him into the hands of Lord Death soon, the aching emptiness that lingered beneath might. He had not seen the girl since that morning, since his sister had carried his swanself away from the rock pile at the base of the sky tower. The girl lived, but would she return? He had seen the fear in her eyes, followed her down all those stories, willed her to believe in him.

  Somehow, though, he knew she had believed. He didn’t know how, but he knew.

  He sucked air in through his teeth as Elisa attempted to scour his gaping wound with a damp cloth. He could say this for his little sister: all t
hese months of toiling under the orders of the palace cook had made her stronger than ever. Tears of pain leaked from the corners of his eyes.

  They had all learned the hard way—well, all but François, who was smart enough to let his idiot older brothers learn on his behalf—that transforming each night back into a larger human body meant whatever wounds they had sustained as swans would grow proportionally larger as well, and vice versa. This particular gash might still yet usher him into the hands of Lord Death, especially if his sister kept on the way she did. Idly, he wondered which of the lord’s angels would come for his poor, tortured soul. He wasn’t worried. In fact, his soul was calmer and more alive at the moment than it had ever been his whole life.

  Were there people who actually existed in states of such bliss? How did they function?

  Elisa’s ministrations sent his body into paroxysms of pain; this time he did cry out. The twins grabbed him—one clamping a hand over his mouth and one holding his shoulders down as Tristan tried to squirm away from his sister.

  Bernard adjusted his hand over Tristan’s face to get a firmer grip. “No giving us away, brother dear.”

  “It’s no less than you deserve,” said Rene.

  “What possessed you?” asked Christian.

  “He’s finally gone mad,” Philippe said in low tones. It wasn’t a question.

  Tristan’s almost-twin was the only one of them angrier at the world than Sebastien. Philippe was born angry at everything: his life of privilege, his inability to be the oldest or the biggest or the smartest or the strongest among his brothers, and now the curse, on top of everything else. What few words escaped Philippe’s lips dripped with spite. Tristan remembered being a young man full of fire in the days before their lands had fallen into the hands of their enemy, but that was nothing like Philippe’s tempered rage. And yet, Philippe had followed him off the edge of the tower without question and worked just as hard as the others to save the falling girl.