by Anna Mendell
“Tell me what is wrong.”
Rosa glanced over her shoulder and saw Mercurius sitting up straight, his eyes glowing eerily in the candlelight. Something about those glowing eyes impelled her to tell him everything, and, when she was finished, her throat felt raw and her eyes smarted hot with tears.
“What if I told you that you must go to the summer palace.”
“I would say that it isn’t fair and that I won’t go.”
Mercurius gave her his catlike grin. Then a cloud descended on his face, and there were many faces lying hidden in its depths, all with darting, quicksilver eyes. His face shifted into one of the many faces, and Rosa found herself staring at a stranger with a curling, brown head, mischievous smile, and glittering eyes.
Rosa collapsed in a nearby chair in shock.
“You are of faerie kind!”
Mercurius didn’t respond, but merely grinned wider. Rosa stared in consternation at his impish smile.
“Why did you become my tutor?”
He laughed. “So you could discover my gift, of course.”
“Are you one of my godparents?”
The faery fell silent, but his eyes were still laughing.
Rosa lowered her head. “Yes, of course you are. I am sorry, but I did not understand. Edwina did say that I learned very quickly. Is what I am studying so very important?”
The faery nodded. “But there is much more that must be revealed to you. And for that to happen, you must go to the summer palace.”
“But it isn’t right! Why should I listen to my parents, if they are going to lie to me? My mother shouldn’t have said she was coming with me if she wasn’t going to.”
The faery’s smile disappeared, replaced by a grave expression. “Yes, but that was her choice, even if it was the wrong one. You must go to the summer palace now on your own. Will you go?”
Rosa breathed a deep sigh.
“Yes.”
IT WAS WITH A HEAVY SPIRIT that Rosa watched the palace grow smaller and smaller from the jostling carriage window. She rested her head against Alice’s shoulder. At least she wasn’t entirely alone, she thought, though she did wish that Edwina was with her.
“They say misfortunes never come singly,” Rosa murmured under her breath.
“What did you say, princess?” Alice asked, craning her neck to catch a glimpse of Rosa’s downturned face.
“Oh, nothing, Alice.”
Rosa peered out of her window and glimpsed Neirin riding on horseback beside the carriage. He had been waiting for her earlier that day, when she had stepped into the courtyard in the cool, morning air. “I asked permission to join your party,” he had explained as they were departing. “I thought the princess would enjoy music on her journey, so the queen granted my request.”
Rosa was comforted by his presence and his sad but smiling eyes. A crowd had gathered to bid her farewell. Mercurius was missing, but only Rosa noticed his absence. No one seemed to remember him ever being at the palace. Rosa said her goodbyes to her mother and father, but avoided meeting her mother’s gaze.
They journeyed to the summer palace at a leisurely pace with many pauses for food and rest. When they stopped to make camp, tents arrayed with brightly colored flags, Neirin cheered them with his music. They traveled on for days, until they caught sight of the summer palace high on the cliff side overlooking the sea.
The carriage pulled to a halt, and the company admired the view of the gleaming white palace soaring up on the cliff above them. The sun was shining behind its brilliant, domed spires, and the waves churned white-crested against the rocks below. Rosa thought she could hear faint music drifting down from the cliffs, a piping high and melancholic that seemed to ride on seabird’s wings. She was about to ask Alice if she could hear the music as well, when the carriage started up again and the horses’ hoofs drowned out the sound. Rosa stuck her head out the window to see if she could still catch strains of the melody, but could hear nothing. She saw Neirin riding beside them. He also seemed to be straining after something, a yearning reflected in his face.
He heard the music too, she thought.
THEY arrived at the palace at midday and, passing the outer gatehouse, crossed the neck of land that connected the promontory on which the palace stood to the mainland. When she lighted from the carriage, Rosa was surprised to see her Uncle Stefan and Edmund waiting to greet her in the courtyard.
“Did not the king tell you?” her uncle asked. “Since neither he nor the queen could spare the time, I was happy to offer my services by joining the princess at the palace. You and my son will be pleasant companions, and I have often desired that we spend the summer together.”
Rosa studied Edmund thoughtfully. It struck her as odd that, the second time one of her faerie godparents had sent her away, she had also run into her cousin.
“I also hope to be better friends,” she answered, and Edmund lowered his eyes under her serious gaze.
Rosa then went to her apartments, made bright by large open windows that overlooked the water.
“Alice, may I go outside for a while? I would like to look at the sea.”
The nursemaid, wanting a nap after the long journey, let the princess go without a protest. Rosa reached the cliff side, where the fresh wind whipped through her hair and wrapped her long skirt around her legs. Pulling her hair out of her eyes, Rosa peered over the edge and saw that the cliffs were not a sheer fall, but that there was a steep climb overlooking a white, sandy cove by the sea, and that the climb was riddled with natural trails which winded down to the bottom.
Then she heard the mysterious music she had heard earlier in the carriage, a piping, high and melancholic, that rode in the wind. The song stirred whispers of yearning within her, so she began her descent down the cliff side.
Rosa followed the ethereal music until she came upon the piper reclining against a tall, projecting rock that shielded him from the wind. The player had long, golden hair and his eyes were closed beneath a brow marble-white. Rosa stood enthralled at the beauty of the music and the beauty of the player. She no longer marked the passing of time, and the tip of the sun’s rays touched the sea’s horizon before the music stopped and the player opened his eyes. She saw that they were as serene as the sky in daytime and of faerie kind. His clear eyes gazed at her, and then, when he smiled, the sun broke forth from his face. Blinded by his brightness, the princess closed her eyes, and, when she opened them again, he had disappeared.
FOR the next few days, a certain listlessness draped over Rosa, and she would do nothing but gaze out the window toward the sea and the horizon. The same lethargy seemed to hang over Neirin as well. The minstrel would strum his lute in the corner of the room, but the smile had left his eyes, replaced by the yearning the princess had seen on his face during the carriage ride when they had first heard the melancholy piping. Rosa did not see much of Edmund and assumed he was avoiding her. Even though they sat together for meals, they remained uncomfortably silent. Rosa could never think of anything to say to her cousin, so she just let her Uncle Stefan and Alice chatter ceaselessly instead.
One afternoon, as the princess was walking down a corridor, she heard muffled voices from one of the rooms. She thought she heard Edmund’s name and peered through the open door and saw two servants making up the room.
“He’s such a dark and surly young man.”
“Rather nasty and unpleasant.”
“It’s in his blood, you know. He’s cursed. Per’aps he will vanish one day, like her.”
The floor creaked as Rosa shifted, and the two servants stopped speaking, aware that someone was listening. Rosa hurried away, feeling guilty for eavesdropping. Were they talking about Edmund? What did they mean by a curse? She was filled with an unexplainable foreboding and searched for Edmund throughout the palace. Finally, she spotted him outside in the garden and raced toward him, but then she froze, horrified by what she saw.
Edmund stood rigid, eyes fixed on a serpent coiled at his feet. T
he serpent was white, the color of pale underground creatures that have never seen the sun. Both the serpent’s and the boy’s eyes were locked on each other, and Edmund sank to his knees, his face falling closer and closer to the serpent’s flickering tongue.
“Edmund!” Rosa cried.
He jerked back, startled, no longer captivated by the serpentine gaze. The snake slid away into the underbrush, and Edmund rose to his feet, fear stamped on his features and in his wide, dark eyes. Slowly the color returned to his ash-white face, and he sharply turned away.
“Are you all right?” Rosa asked.
He kept his back toward her as he answered, “I’m fine. It wasn’t anything, only a garden snake. Who asked you to interfere?”
The princess flushed, but then she remembered the fear in his eyes, and the word “curse” floated through her mind. Edmund was walking toward the palace, but she called after him.
“Don’t go! I was looking for you. I wanted to ask you something.”
This time Edmund turned and crossed his arms, the familiar mocking smile traced on his face.
“Well?” he asked after a few, silent moments of Rosa shifting about searching for the right words.
“You see,” she began, “the servants were whispering. And I wondered if you would know what they were talking about… if you know something about a curse?” She whispered the last word, and the smile disappeared from Edmund’s face.
“I think they may have mentioned you…”
“What, that I am cursed?” Edmund spat out.
Rosa was startled by the vehemence of his reply. “No,” she said, shuddering, “only if you might know something about it.”
“You really don’t know anything, do you, princess? Protected behind castle walls and spoiled by your faerie godparents. You don’t know what everyone else knows.”
“What does everyone else know?” she whispered.
Edmund took a step forward, and Rosa stepped back, but he came nearer and brought his face next to hers and hissed in her ear.
“I’m cursed. It runs in my blood. And if you are not careful, I will curse you too. You never know how it might happen. I could touch you or whisper in your ear, and then you would wake up one morning with fire running through your blood. Or even worse, you could disappear, just like my—” he stopped and bit his lip. Rosa fearfully stared at him. Edmund grimaced and then walked away, leaving Rosa alone in the middle of the garden.
Rosa was confused and frightened. Edmund had always been mean to her, but never before had he mentioned a curse. Did he really have the power to do that? She thought of his ugly smile and the image of a forked tongue splitting through his lips came unbidden to her mind. She banished the thought quick ly and fled to the edge of the cliff side to clear her head. The white palace rose majestically behind her, and the strong wind against her face drove the mysterious curse and Edmund’s threats from her mind. She closed her eyes and drank in the wind for a long time, but just as she was ready to return to the palace, she heard the sound of a clear piping, a melody carried over the wind.
Rosa went searching down the cliff’s winding path and found the golden-haired faery once again among the rocks. Settling down on one of the rocks, she closed her eyes to listen to his music. The piping stopped. When she opened her eyes, she saw that the faery was regarding her intently.
“Your heart is troubled,” he said at last, “you cannot sing with me if your heart is so restless.”
“There is so much that I do not understand,” the princess said.
The faery put down his pipes and began to sing. Rosa could not understand his words, but his clear voice took her over the cliffs on the back of the wind and into the sky, and, when his song was finished, she found that her restlessness had disappeared. Then the faery held out his hand to her, and on his outstretched palm were three luminous pearls that shone a different color, a soft blue, a pale pink, and an ivory.
“Take them and keep them with you,” he said. “They are a gift from my sister, young and fair as the moon.”
Rosa took the three pearls and gently brushed her fingers over their smooth surfaces.
“May I meet your sister? Are both of you my faerie godparents?” she asked.
The Golden Piper nodded and said, “Yes, but I believe that my younger sister is the last among us you will meet. But know that, even though you have not met her, you receive her gifts.”
He then reached beside him and picked up a small harp and handed it to the princess. “Learn to play this,” he said, “and then we will sing together.”
Rosa gazed at the harp in wonder. Its rosewood frame was light and intricately carved, and, as she delicately plucked the strings, the purest notes rang forth.
The Golden Piper spoke, “Go back now to the summer palace, or you will be missed. We will meet again.”
Rosa stumbled up the cliff side, carefully sheltering her gifts in the crook of her arm. She went directly to her room and found a small silver pouch for her pearls and tied it on a string about her neck. Then, still carrying her harp, she went in search of Neirin.
She found him tuning his lute in one of the many small, solitary rooms in the palace. “Can you teach me how to play this harp?” she asked.
“Where did you get this?” he asked in amazement. As he plucked sweet sounds from the harp, Rosa saw the yearning return his face.
“He gave it to me,” she said. “The piper whose song you heard on the road.”
“You heard it too?” His large, mournful eyes held hers. “I feared it was a dream and yet, at the same time, hoped it was a dream as well. No earthly creature can hear such music and not go searching for it.” His glance fell reverently on the harp. “I will teach you how to play, though I am not worthy to touch such an instrument.”
Rosa laid her hand on his arm. “Neither am I, but a gift freely given must be as freely accepted.”
“Sometimes I wonder at you, princess. You are such a child, and yet have wisdom beyond your years.”
Rosa ducked her head as she felt herself blush. “No, not I. It is just that I am surrounded by the wisdom of faerie kind.” Then she laughed, “I am glad to learn even the smallest of things from them.”
THAT night was the first night Rosa heard music in her dreams. Otherworldly and deep, it ebbed and flowed like the rolling waves outside her window. She would wake sometimes in the moonlight, draw down her thin sheets, and go to her window seat overlooking the sea. Watching the waves violently crashing on the craggy rocks below, she could almost hear strains of the song that disturbed her sleep in the swelling tumult. Sometimes she watched the waves until her eyes grew heavy and she would go back to bed, her feet pattering against the cold marble floor. Other times she would stay up till the dim in-between time, the sky tinged green just before the sunrise. Then she swore she could hear the melody awake, different from the piping, but still familiar. But then the glory of the sunrise, both in the sky and reflected in the water, would dispel her troubled night.
Rosa’s lessons with the minstrel Neirin began. Her fingers felt at home among the strings, and she discovered that she had a gift for music. The minstrel and the princess spent many evenings together, and Neirin’s eyes smiled again when he sang with her. During the day, she went down to the coast with Alice and danced to the music of the waves. She felt a humming on her breast and could hear the pearls singing along with the mysterious song of the ocean. Her dance was as entrancing as their song, and Alice never grew tired of watching her.
Another pair of eyes would also follow the princess from one of the windows in the palace. They would shine bright, and Edmund would swallow back unbidden tears and leave the window. But he almost always returned to watch the princess dance, and, sometimes, he would let the tears stream silently down his cheeks.
THE DAYS grew into weeks, and for Rosa the sea melody became a waking dream. During the daylight hours she could only hear the music faintly, but by dusk the music grew and grew, until one summer’s nig
ht it was no longer enough to stare down at the waves from her window. The song possessed her, and she left her room, left the palace. In a drowsy numbness, she floated through the garden under the full moon. The heavy incense of sleeping flowers hung on the boughs of silhouetted trees as she made her way down the winding cliff trail to the cove. The melody rode low and sweet on the undercurrent of the waves and guided the princess’ feet over the uneven and slippery ground where the waves lapped and pooled among the rocks.
Rosa knelt down, her hands plastered against the damp, dark rocks, and peered into the water. Under the dark rolling surface, a white face appeared, a strange woman’s face with strange solid eyes and coral lips. The otherworldly music embraced Rosa and pulled her toward the face under the surface of the waters. The sea-green eyes beckoned, and, eyes and ears entranced, the princess slipped closer and closer to the waters. A white, luminous hand stretched out, then snatched the princess and pulled her head first into the salt sea.
ONE DAY IN EARLY SPRING, Queen Sigrid was alone in the wood gathering toadstool, hemlock, nightshade, and other plants that grew in the deepest shadows. She spied movement in between the trees and stole upon the Erik casting Ninny Nanny’s sticks in the middle of the forest. The prince was obscured by mist, and she sensed the whisper of a secret. She quietly stalked the prince through the wood as a hunter does his prey, but lost him as the forest gloom swallowed up his winding path. She lay waiting for him many an early morning from then on.
The queen knew how to walk softly amid the trees without making a sound, and Erik did not know that he was being hunted, but the queen always lost the prince in the mist of the forest. She came to understand that the prince could not be followed and that the mystery must somehow lie in the sticks.
Queen Sigrid of Lothene knew how to bide her time and wait for the right moment, like one waiting for the slow change in seasons, and her relentless patience became wholly absorbed by the prince and his enchanted sticks. Before, Erik had barely been above her notice as she grandly glided from room to room in her flowing furs, tall and imposing. She might call on him to fetch her things or silence him with a sharp word, but mostly she had simply ignored him. Now she invited him to share a drink or play a game, in which she always beat him soundly.
