“Oh!” said the prince apologetically. “It’s you, Scurvyhead! I was so lost in my thoughts that I didn’t see you there!”
Duncan ducked his head sheepishly. “It was my fault, your Highness. I wasn’t watching where I was going.” He, too, had been lost in his thoughts. “I’m very sorry.”
“Were you working in the stables?” Percy asked curiously. “I thought you were a gardener.”
“I am. I was just tending to my horse,” said Duncan. “Did you… need help in the stables?” he added reluctantly.
The prince shook his head. “No. I’m just on my way to see the stable-master. Bella said to send a messenger, but I thought I’d like the walk. I’m to leave this afternoon, you know.”
“You are?” Duncan blurted. It was the first he had heard of such a thing. Last he knew, Prince Perceval’s visit had been extended indefinitely, so well he got along with the royal family.
A troubled expression sat upon the prince’s face. “My parents have sent word for me to come home. It seems they found out my courtship of Princess Margaret was not progressing as they intended,” he added with a half-hearted laugh. “I suppose it’s only right that I go home, all things considered. Margaret’s nice enough, but I don’t want to marry her, so there’s no reason for me to stay here.”
“What about Princess Bellinda?” Duncan asked. He felt a terrible kinship with the hopeless expression that darted across Prince Perceval’s face.
“That’s all the more reason for me to go,” the prince replied, but then he looked up wistfully. “Isn’t she wonderful, though? For the first time in my life, I wish I had an older brother to inherit my father’s throne instead of me. Then I’d be free to pine after whomever I pleased. Well, I know my duty well enough. Did you ever resolve your feelings, Scurvyhead?”
Duncan was surprised that the prince recalled that conversation between them. “No,” he said. “That is, I tried, but… no. Mostly I just keep myself busy so I don’t have to think about it.”
Perceval clapped him on the back. “Excellent advice. I’ll be sure to follow it. Good luck in the future.”
Then, he left to find the stable-master. Duncan felt sorry for the prince. A better-natured young man he had not met. He thought Perceval’s abrupt departure would be hard on Princess Bellinda too, if she really was in love with him as Alberta had contended.
He also had a sneaking suspicion about how Perceval’s parents had discovered his failing suit for Princess Margaret’s hand. Alberta always got rid of the castle suitors in one way or another, didn’t she?
Duncan joined the rest of the servants that afternoon to see Prince Perceval off. They lined the way to the castle gates, many tearful at his departure. He had stayed far longer than most castle visitors, and his good humor had endeared him to the staff.
The royal family bid him farewell on the castle steps. King Edwin chattered amiably with him as Princess Bellinda forced a pretty smile. Princess Margaret was stoic as usual, but it was Princess Alberta’s aloofness that drew Duncan’s attention. He knew at a glance that she was behind the whole thing. A casual observer might have thought she was being her haughty self, but Duncan caught the faint expression of guilt that ghosted across her face when Princess Bellinda told Prince Perceval goodbye. The youngest princess did a magnificent job of maintaining her smile all through the farewell, until after Perceval had mounted his horse and ridden past the waving rows of servants to the castle gates.
Duncan thought that Alberta deserved to feel guilty. Her meddling had made two very nice people very miserable.
“She’s more than happy to run Perceval from the castle for falling in love with Bellinda,” he muttered bitterly under his breath.
The crowd of servants dispersed back to their duties. Duncan had a whole list of chores to accomplish that afternoon, but he was in no hurry to get to them. He felt more like sulking and contemplated whether to skip his chores and take Wildfire for a ride instead. Duty won his internal battle, of course, but when he trudged to the back garden where he was to work, he came upon an unexpected obstacle.
Princess Bellinda stood among the flowering bushes, a handkerchief to her eyes and her shoulders shaking. She had slipped away from the castle for some solitude. Duncan quietly turned on his heel to sneak away unseen, but he was not quiet enough.
Bellinda looked up. “Oh!” she cried, and Duncan froze.
“Sorry,” he said awkwardly. “I’m supposed to be pruning… those bushes.” He pointed vaguely to the row of flowering shrubs behind her.
She chuckled cynically. “I thought I was choosing such a private little corner. Don’t tell Bertie you saw me, all right?”
“I won’t,” he promised. He observed her closely, but there didn’t seem to be any malice from her toward her sister. Perhaps she hadn’t realized Alberta’s hand, or perhaps he had been mistaken in assuming that Alberta was the culprit.
“This hurts, you know?” Bellinda said abruptly. “I didn’t think it would hurt this much, but it does. I wish Alberta had written his parents two weeks earlier.”
That answered his questions on the matter, but it raised so many more. “You do?” he asked in surprise. “You’re not bitter at her?”
“Why would I be bitter?” asked Bellinda.
“Because she just—” Duncan was suddenly unsure of himself. “Didn’t she just get rid of someone you care about?”
A breathy laugh escaped her lips. “You really don’t understand anything, do you? It’s because I care about Percy that Alberta had to get rid of him.”
“I understand that,” he replied.
“No, you don’t. She had to do what I couldn’t. She had to remove an obstacle. Percy was sent here because his parents wanted him to court Mae. If Mae realizes my true feelings, she’ll marry someone else in an instant to remove herself as an obstacle between Percy and me. I’m supposed to be the obstacle to her getting married, not the reason she goes and does it.
“I’m not strong like Alberta is,” she added. “She can push everything she wants away for the sake of others. I give in too easily. If Percy had stayed much longer, my feelings would’ve become far too obvious. I’m glad she intervened. We’ve come too far to sacrifice everything just because I can’t keep myself in check.”
She had been right. He really didn’t understand anything. Again he had looked at things too simplistically. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled.
“You should be apologizing to Alberta,” Bellinda retorted. “You were thinking the worst of her, weren’t you?”
He stiffened. “She wants people to think the worst of her.”
To his surprise, Bellinda scowled. “Nobody wants that. She certainly uses it to her best advantage, but that doesn’t mean that deep down she really wants it. Do you really want people to think that you’re a hapless fool?”
“Yes,” he replied, but he understood what she meant. He played a fool out of necessity, not because it gave him any deep satisfaction to have others sneer down at him. Alberta was the same. It was part of what drew him to her.
“Maybe you really are a hapless fool, then,” said Bellinda. She swept past him, headed back to the castle. “Don’t tell Alberta you saw me crying,” she commanded him for the second time.
“I won’t,” Duncan promised, though he did not know whether she even heard him. Her request was unnecessary. He had no prospects even to see Princess Alberta, let alone speak with her.
The days that followed seemed dull in comparison with the previous weeks. Beyond his emotional woes a nagging worry persisted in the back of Duncan’s mind. Before, the treasure-seekers had always clustered every two or three weeks and forced Sir Goldmayne out of hiding for a skirmish. Goldmayne could not appear at present, though. The marauders often accosted travelers along the roads and highways of Meridiana. Some of them had been quite bold, even stooping to robbery as a side occupation to their treasure hunting. Without Goldmayne to distract them, there was no telling how their activities might esca
late.
He heard no rumors of them at all, though. He knew that King Edwin and his knights had arrested many, that the dungeons and prisons of Midd were brimming with their numbers, but there had been plenty enough to escape. Dame Groach had sent a small army across the border to track him down. It was strange not to hear anything of that army.
A month passed without incident, though.
Early one afternoon, as Duncan worked in the garden, some frenzied chirps interrupted his focus. A flutter of wings descended directly in front of him, and two yellow canaries alighted upon the ground. The one with the gray-banded wings hopped and chirped excitedly while the other chattered at Duncan.
His heart dropped into his stomach. He had glimpsed the canary-fairies any number of times since his nighttime visit to the forest glen, but they had kept their distance, merely guardians watching over him. Now, they seemed intent upon sounding an alarm.
Almost without him realizing it, the season had grown late. Foreboding lurched within him. “The counter-curse is breaking, isn’t it,” he guessed, and the two little birds hopped energetically. From their enthusiasm, he surmised that Dame Groach was already on her way. The crazy little fairies, with their limited understanding of danger and death, had no cause to fear an encounter with the old witch. Duncan, though, was terrified.
It wasn’t terror enough to paralyze him. Instead, it instilled in him a subdued determination. He could not avoid his approaching doom, so he would have to meet it with at least an attempt of courage. He strode resolutely to the castle. He had steered clear of Princess Alberta as much as possible in the past few weeks, and she him, but he hoped he would be able to find her in time now.
Halfway up to her bedroom, he remembered that, as it was after noon and an odd day, she would be in the north tower attending lessons with her sisters.
All the better, he thought grimly. Emboldened by the circumstances of the day, he entered her bedchamber after only a cursory knock. As he had suspected, it was empty. The interior of her closet was much larger than he had imagined—it was another room entirely, truth be told—but he located his pack of armor fairly easily. She had stowed it in the far corner and covered it with a row of hanging dresses. Duncan quickly checked to make certain everything was there. Then, he hefted the bundle onto his back and carried it out the door.
“I should’ve done this ages ago,” he muttered as he went down the stairs, but he knew that only the impending arrival of Dame Groach had given him courage enough to breach the sanctity of Alberta’s room. Necessity was a funny motivator in that respect.
He had been careful that the gold-tasseled helmet lay concealed within the bundle, but he needn’t have bothered. In the scant time since he had left the garden, the castle grounds had broken out in a flurry of activity. Soldiers sprinted to and from the stables, while servants darted toward the gates to reach the city proper. No one gave Duncan a second glance as he passed among them toward Wildfire’s stall.
He caught enough conversational fragments along the way to understand the sudden panic, though. An army had appeared along the horizon to the north of Midd, and it was marching forward to conquer the city.
Dame Groach’s mercenaries had not given up their trouble-making. They had simply gathered together under her command for a much more organized attack.
Duncan felt oddly calm about all of this.
“She gave you back your armor,” Wildfire said in relief the moment he saw him.
“I went and took it,” Duncan replied. “She doesn’t know.”
“That’s probably for the better. Hurry up and get me saddled. We won’t have much time at all.”
“You don’t seem very surprised,” said Duncan as he set the pack on the ground. He regarded Wildfire suspiciously.
“I thought I felt something breaking last night,” the white horse admitted. “It’s been falling away in cracks ever since. How did you find out?”
“The canary-fairies.”
As if in answer to this, the two yellow birds fluttered through the chaos of the stable to land on Wildfire’s stall door. They both chirped some vigorous encouragement and then flew away again.
“They really don’t understand that we’re probably going to die, do they?” said Duncan sourly.
“They’re fairies at heart,” Wildfire replied. “They can’t understand something like that.”
Duncan swiftly worked to secure Wildfire’s tack in place. When he hoisted the bundle of armor behind the saddle, though, the horse gave him a startling command.
“Don’t do that. Just put it on here, quickly.”
He gaped. Even in their secluded little corner of the stable he wouldn’t escape notice if he donned a suit of armor, especially one with that telltale golden tassel atop its helmet.
Wildfire read his misgivings perfectly. “What, you want to ride out to the old abbey and put it on there? There’s no point and even less time! Just crouch down in the stall and put on your armor here! The first wave of knights is already leaving!”
Indeed, shouts for the king’s knights to rally rang out across the stable now.
“Most of them will be gone by the time we’re ready,” Wildfire continued. “We’ll take the back gate from the castle and head the long way ’round Midd. You don’t have to worry about getting caught—they’ve plenty enough else on their minds right now.”
Reluctantly Duncan carted the bundle of armor to the most shadowy corner of the stall and began to unpack it. Something shiny fell from the helmet and hit the floor with a heavy thud. He recognized the bottle of goldwater, but its presence surprised him nonetheless. He had almost forgotten its existence entirely.
“You don’t have time to fiddle with that,” Wildfire hissed. “Get your armor on, quickly! There’s no telling how long before Dame Groach will attack!”
He shoved the bottle aside and started to buckle the plates of armor in place. Out in the stable, another set of knights mounted their horses and galloped away toward the city. In the tumult, he failed to hear a set of approaching footsteps until it was almost at the stall door.
“Oh, good, you’re still here!” Alberta said breathlessly to Wildfire. She looked as though she had run all the way from the north tower. “I thought for certain—” Her voice caught in her throat as she recognized Duncan standing in the back corner. “What are you doing?” she demanded in growing alarm.
He didn’t have time to worry about incurring her anger. “What’s it look like I’m doing?” he retorted. “I’m putting on my armor.”
He thought she might scold him for stealing the bundle from her room, but Alberta had other more pressing worries. “You don’t really mean to go up against Dame Groach, do you? She’ll kill you!”
He grimaced. “Very likely,” he agreed, though, and he kept buckling things in place.
Alberta turned her attention upon Wildfire. “You’re not going to let him do this, are you?”
“It’s our responsibility, Alberta,” the horse replied. “Stay in the castle with your sisters—keep yourselves safe. Duncan’s insult to Dame Groach is far more recent than your fourth great-grandfather’s. The moment she sees us, she’ll very likely turn from her assault on Meridiana and chase us instead.”
“She’ll kill you in an instant and return to us again,” Alberta argued. “How does that solve anything?”
“She’s bound by a charm against Duncan,” said Wildfire. “She can’t use magic to get to him. All of her power is wrapped up in that staff of hers anyway, so as long as we can stay out of its reach, we’ll be fine. Maybe we ought to use the goldwater on your armor, Duncan,” he added to his quickly dressing rider. “It would make you impervious to magic.”
“It would make it impossible for me to move, too,” Duncan replied sourly. “This armor’s heavy enough as it is without turning it into gold. Just do your little magic trick as usual. I’m as ready as I’m going to be, and I don’t think Alberta will mind watching it.”
She tilted her head
to one side in confusion, but before she could reply, Wildfire obeyed.
“Fayet-thu-hwit,” he said to the suit of armor. It blazed a blinding white. “Fayet-mec-hwit,” Wildfire said then, and the same snowy brilliance blossomed across his coat.
Alberta flinched at the sudden brightness. She wedged open her eyes. “You’ve been white before,” she said, and then she curiously asked, “What other colors can you do?”
“Just black, white, and red,” said Wildfire. “Those are the three phases of alchemy. They’re the only colors that respond to magic.”
She shook her head. “You’re both fools, you know.”
“That’s true enough,” said Duncan.
“Can’t you use the goldwater on Dame Groach?” she asked.
“I don’t think there’s enough to do much damage,” he told her morosely. “At most she’ll end up with a gold nose or something.”
“A single drop spreads farther than you’d think,” Wildfire said. “You might very well have enough to defeat her, providing you don’t get any of it on yourself in the process.”
“Provided I can get any of it on her,” Duncan replied sarcastically, but he tucked the bottle away in his armor anyway. His nerves were almost shot, and he hadn’t even left the stable yet. “I really don’t want to meet that crazy old bat again.”
“Then don’t do it,” said Alberta, a sharp edge to her voice. “Father’s army should hold her off for a little while. You can go the opposite direction, get as far away from here as you possibly can. And don’t look at me like that! It’s a very logical thing to do!”
“I’m not going to run away while she attacks the city!” Duncan cried angrily. “How could you even suggest such a thing?” He snatched the sheepskin wig from atop his head and shoved it into one of Wildfire’s saddlebags.
Before he could cover his golden head with his helmet, Alberta spoke. “You’re never coming back here again, are you,” she said quietly.
Duncan glanced toward Wildfire. In the unlikely event that he survived this day and they were somehow able to break the horse’s curse, he might have returned. The probability of that outcome was so miniscule, though, that he could answer quite decisively.
Goldmayne: A Fairy Tale Page 35