April Queen, May Fool

by Jon Jacks

  ‘Naturally!’ the queen chortled. ‘To become a man, to take on his attributes of power, of selfishness; that was the best – the only way – of achieving success!’

  She whirled on the others, glowering at them accusingly.

  ‘Aren’t I allowed some small measure of enjoying the beauty you have all otherwise denied me?’

  ‘Denied you? How could we deny you your beauty?’ the Queen of The Fall protested

  ‘It’s just a matter of growing old! It’s unavoidable,’ the April Queen agreed.

  ‘And yet neither of you accepted it as such an unavoidable part of life, did you?’ the Hag Queen sneered in reply. ‘If you had, then maybe you wouldn’t have given something as ridiculously fleeting as beauty such a ridiculously high level of importance!’

  ‘We didn’t give it such high importance!’

  ‘That’s what’s expected of us, of women, isn’t it? To be beautiful!’ the April Queen added, nodding in agreement with the Queen of The Fall’s retort. ‘Or at least to be caring, to be nurturing.’

  ‘How easily you let the words, the rules, of others trip from your tongues!’ the Hag Queen said, walking amongst them, still regarding them all with accusatory glares. ‘Making yourselves subservient to their wishes, their demands; for, of course, it would be so unwomanly to resist!’

  ‘What else were we supposed to do?’ the April Queen jeered. ‘We can’t just change the way the whole world works!’

  ‘And so what of wisdom?’ the Hag Queen said. ‘That, once, was seen as a womanly quality; so that when they became like me–’ she pointed at herself disparagingly – ‘they weren’t seen as being no longer of any use; they were the one’s consulted for advice! And that – in your foolish acceptance of all this nonsense about the need to be beautiful – is what you denied me!’

  ‘We’ve given up nothing! We’re queens!’ the Queen of The Fall insisted vehemently.

  ‘Nothing?’ the Hag Queen smirked, pointing accusingly at the Queen of The Fall. ‘You would once have been seen as a seeker after truth, who risked her spiritual wholeness in that quest; but instead you’re falsely painted as a trollop. And so you wrapped your shame in your tears, tears that are misused and wasted, for they are from the only well allow a nurturing of yourself ’

  She turned on the April Queen.

  ‘And with you, my virgin queen, it all starts, apparently innocently enough; for you go along with the subjugation of the powerful sexuality that all men fear.’

  ‘But you’re the one who denied them a king!’ Crystine fiercely pointed out.

  ‘Oh, I did didn’t I?’ the Hag Queen replied coolly. ‘But only because they’d raised this idea of a king to a height were only he could reassure them that they were worthy of love.’

  With a mischievous chuckle, she looked towards the fool.

  ‘And for the sake of that, they’d put up with any fool; seeking his approval as a measure of their worth!’

  She stroked Crystine’s cheek tenderly once more.

  ‘To break that circle, we have to take on self-responsibility, to risk throwing away our sense of security: and you know, when people are put in that position, they really, really don’t want to make the sacrifice!’

  ‘At least your circle of false memories has been broken: things were different this time; it’s all changed.’

  ‘Broken? Changed? Really?’ The Hag Queen appeared genuinely surprised by Crystine’s pronouncement.

  With a dissolving, a whirling of form, she became a beetle once more, briefly fluttering in the air just before Crystine; then taking off to soar over the heads of the fool, the queen, the soldiers.

  The chaos of many futile attempts to capture the swiftly swooping and diving beetle returned, the scenes repeated endlessly within the infinite images of the mirrors.

  The images shuffled, like so many cards.

  And everything became confused, such that no one was sure anymore where they were; or even whom they were.

  *

  Chapter 39

  Crystine woke up.

  She felt sleepy but incredibly content.

  Even, yes, blissful.

  She was lying in the reassuringly strong embrace of the fool.

  They were seated within one of the large, comfortable chairs set a little back from the vast table that dominated the room. It was quite a dark room, of course, the windows and multiple wall mirrors all heavily veiled in the colours of The Fall: no wonder, Crystine thought, she had drifted off to sleep.

  The whole effect was one of a great wood, with only the very slightest of the sun’s ray’s penetrating towards the lower reaches of the forest floor.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said to the fool lazily, ‘I must have drifted off.’

  ‘I don’t mind,’ the fool replied happily, kissing her cheek tenderly. ‘It was nice just seeing you smiling so contentedly as you slept.’

  Crystine smiled. She kissed the fool.

  She gasped in surprise, realising something was different.

  That something had changed.

  ‘My necklace! It’s gone!’ she declared, touching herself about her neck and shoulders, seeking reassurance that it had indeed vanished.

  ‘It must have fallen off!’ she said, glancing worriedly about herself.

  ‘I thought you wanted to be rid of it!’ the fool reminded her with a chuckle.

  Crystine turned back to the fool, her brow creased with worry.

  ‘But…that’s what made me beautiful,’ she sighed miserably. ‘You won’t love me anymore!’

  The fool held her reassuringly tighter.

  ‘Of course I’ll still love you!’ he laughed.

  ‘But…I’ll have no powers!’ Crystine persisted. ‘I can’t be April Queen if I can’t transform things into beautiful jewellery!’

  ‘We’ll, let’s see about that, shall we,’ the fool said calmly, reaching out for a branch forming part of a nearby display of autumn berries and golden brown leaves. ‘If the Queen of The Fall can put on an unseasonal show, then let’s see what you can do.’

  He handed her the branch, giving her a reassuring nod that he believed in her capabilities.

  As she touched the branch, it transformed into one covered in perfectly white May blossom.

  Crystine giggled joyfully, but her anxiety hadn’t been completely assuaged.

  ‘It’s not quite the same as turning them into gems, I suppose!’

  Noting that the fool’s jacket was in a sorry state, with loose threads hanging everywhere, Crystine began to tap each strand with the branch; and a May blossom bloom became a securely tied, glistening pearl with every gentle touch. Soon the whole jacket was more or less resplendent once more, bar a handful of severed cotton threads left hanging pearlless, as there was no more blossom left on the branch.

  Crystine stretched out to grasp another branch, enabling her to finish her work; but she stopped when she saw the remains of a partially eaten apple scattered across the top of the table supporting the display’s vase.

  ‘You ate while I was asleep!’ she chuckled, giving the fool a playful nudge.

  She gingerly picked up the pieces, turning the white flesh into fresh pearls, the leaves into emeralds, the stalk into amber, the red skin into a bloody-red ruby.

  ‘A shame to waste them,’ she declared gleefully as they both admired the now beautifully finished jacket.

  ‘The jacket!’ she said, grabbing him fearfully in sudden realisation. ‘You’ll need it, and more: I mean, once I’m queen!’

  ‘Do you mean that once your queen I won’t be allowed to share in your good fortune?’ the fool asked with a mystified laugh.

  ‘I mean I’ll no longer be able to see you, of course! The KingFisher; remember?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t fear him! I’ll marry you; things will be different this time around, you’ll see!’

  *

  Chapter 40

  Even as the fool comforted her in his arms, Crystine had enough sense to recognise
that what he had said wasn’t true; he would never be her king.

  It’s always easy to say something like that, even to believe it for a while.

  But the real world didn’t work like that, did it?

  They would never be free from fear, never, ever feel safe. Their lives would be ones of constant anxiety.

  She stroked the fool’s face tenderly, sadly, knowing that soon she would have no choice but to say goodbye to him

  On her finger, she noticed something glittering, something calling her attention.

  It was a ring, one made from a small segment of chain.

  Pulling her hand away from the fool’s face to take a closer look at the ring – which, bizarrely, she couldn’t recall ever wearing before – she realised that it wasn’t a true ring at all: it was just a loose piece of severed chain. Yet it had somehow wrapped itself tightly around her finger, snake-like in the intensity of its firm grip.

  She plucked the chain free of her finger, dropped it into her palm, sensed it nestling into the curves and creases.

  It was far too plain to be a leftover from her vanished necklace.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said as she rose from the fool’s embrace, heading over towards one of the mirrors, feeling herself strangely drawn to it, ‘I’ve just got to see…’

  ‘What’s wrong,’ the fool asked.

  Crystine couldn’t answer; she really didn’t know what it was she’d ‘just got to see’.

  She briefly stood by the mirror.

  She began to pull aside some of the draping veils.

  *

  Within the mirror, of course, she could see herself.

  Herself alone.

  Of course, the fool was still seated out of view.

  He was puzzled.

  ‘Are you all right?’ he asked concernedly. ‘I’ve never seen you act this way before!’

  ‘Yes yes,’ Crystine reassured him. ‘I’m just trying to remember something; but I can’t remember what it is I m supposed to remember!’

  ‘Well, naturally!’ the fool laughed.

  ‘Yes, naturally…’ Crystine replied less surely, turning around, heading over towards the facing mirror.

  ‘If you’re thinking of heading back, these are different mirrors–’ the fool began to explain as he watched Crystine set to uncovering the second mirror

  ‘Which means a different time,’ Crystine said distractedly as she fished pulling the veils aside. ‘I remember you telling me?’

  ‘Did I? I can’t recall telling you that.’

  Crystine wasn’t listening.

  The severed piece of chain was writhing in her hand.

  She raised her hand towards the silvered glass.

  She placed the severed links against the mirrored surface.

  Within the mirror, the reflection naturally completed the circle, transforming it into the semblance of a complete chain once more.

  The light in the mirror flickered, like the flowing of brightly sun-dappled streams, the reflection of perfectly blue skies in clearest water.

  She sensed an increase in weight in the chain.

  She pulled back on it tentatively, trembling in astonishment as the chain began to come away from the glass whole once more.

  The fool hesitatingly made a step forward, reaching out to stop her, as if suffering a fleeting premonition of what was about to happen; then instead he came to a halt, grinning sickly.

  ‘Crystine… I do love you…I mean; please, you won’t forget me will you?’ he pleaded resignedly.

  ‘Of course I won’t forget you,’ Crystine chuckled curiously. ‘How could you even think of something as crazy as that?’

  The last of the chain pulled free of the glass; and on its end, there dangled the most wondrously blue crystal, one as perfectly round as the moon.

  *

  Chapter 41

  Deep within the crystal, Crystine saw the babe in the womb that she had first seen when the doctor had handed it to her

  There was no glimpse, however, of the Fisher Queen, whom she had flattered herself she had seen as the crystal had been taken back.

  It was a sphere containing the heavens themselves, the sparkling of the stars like so many glistening tears falling in a darkened room. And the more those tears caught and threw back the surrounding light, the more the dark blue of night became a shimmering silvery blue, such that the crystal was now a dangling moon in miniature.

  The mirror reflected the light of the moon; but it reflected it once only, not countless times in an endless repetition.

  She too, Crystine realised, was now only reflected the once, not forever and ever.

  It wasn’t a clear image, either.

  It quivered, altered; nowhere near as definite, as well-defined, as she would have expected.

  Circular ripples were spreading out across her reflection, their source the point where she had pulled the crystal from the glass.

  Only now it wasn’t glass, it was water.

  A stream.

  A flowing stream.

  Now it was Crystine who had a fleeting premonition of what might be about to happen next.

  She turned towards the fool.

  ‘Wait, I just remembered; you never told me your name!’

  But he wasn’t there.

  Neither was the room.

  Crystine was kneeling on the banks of the stream.

  *

  The stream flowed into a river, into meandering, wide and rapidly raging courses of water.

  It was a labyrinth of water courses, dividing the land into little more than reed-conquered, swampy islands.

  Crystine glanced back at the reflection in the shimmering water.

  The blue glow of the dangling crystal had been joined by that of the glittering ruby, like the spheres of the Moon and Venus coming slowly together.

  The babe about to be born in one. The hag in the other.

  They crossed, they partially merged, the spiritually blue waters of conception mingling with the blood of life.

  And within that almond of perfectly luminous lilac there appeared a queen of queens.

  ‘Crystine,’ came a cry as if from nowhere, startling her.

  The cry came from an approaching almond shaped boat, one draped in sheer veils of that gloriously wonderful lilac.

  And in its very centre, there calmly stood the Fisher Queen, holding out a hand to invite and help Crystine aboard.

  ‘You’re taking me back?’ Crystine asked hopefully.

  ‘No, of course not,’ the queen replied, ‘you’re leading me back to where I belong!’

  *

  Chapter 42

  Behind the Fisher Queen, the land was of the very deepest red, as if it were all illuminated in the bloody glow of the descending evening star. The meandering, intertwining streams ran like veins between what could have been so many small islands.

  The waters flowing around the boat raged forcibly. Directly beneath the hull, they seemed at first to Crystine to be foaming in a particular urgency of movement, until she realised it was a writhing shoal of wild salmon fighting their way upstream.

  As Crystine took the seat offered her by the Fisher Queen, a brightly coloured beetle landed alongside her. Crystine shied away from it in panic; but the Fisher Queen nonchalantly reached across her to let it innocently clamber onto her hand.

  ‘I could transform her into something less ugly and frightening, if you preferred,’ the queen said with a kindly smile. ‘A butterfly, maybe? What do you suggest?’

  Crystine recalled the Hag Queen’s lament that she wasn’t recognised for her wisdom.

  ‘Doesn’t a butterfly only live for a day?’ she asked.

  ‘A fleeting beauty; that’s true,’ the queen agreed.

  ‘An owl then,’ Crystine declared resolutely. ‘Not the brightest of plumage; but the brightest of all in terms of wisdom!’

  In an instant, the beetle had become an owl, one staring about itself curiously, its eyes wide and taking everything in.


  With a flick of her hand, the queen sent the owl rising up high, its wings gloriously smooth in the confident strength of their beating of the air.

  It flew across the silvery blue orb of a moon, one that strangely seemed to be spinning a little to the left.

  ‘Night time already?’ Crystine said, puzzled by the moon’s abrupt appearance.

  ‘Yes; because it’s time, I think,’ the queen coolly declared. ‘Time for your conception.’

  *

  The waters stretching off on every side of the boat were calmer now, bluer, apparently lit by the moon’s own wonderfully silvered hues.

  It was a sea that curved away from them no matter which way Crystine looked, giving the impression that they were floating on a miniature planet completely enveloped in water.

  ‘Conception?’ Crystine repeated curiously.

  With a graceful motion of an elegant hand, the queen directed Crystine to peer over the edge of the boat.

  Below her within the clear waters, Crystine saw a foetus, growing until it was at a point due for its appearance within the world; but then it would fade away to nothing, until with a swirl of mingling fluids, the child began to form yet again.

  ‘Who…who is she?’ an awestruck Crystine stammered, her breath taken away by the beauty of it all.

  ‘It could be you,’ the queen replied, ‘about to be born; or maybe, even, about to be conceived.’

  ‘But…I’ve already been born: I’m here!’ Crystine declared worriedly.

  ‘Yes, here you are,’ the queen agreed, ‘but the child we see here is still you, waiting to be reconciled with her temporarily absent spirit.’

  ‘Me?’ Crystine said, recognising that this was exactly what the queen’s unwavering stare implied.

  With her own eyes, Crystine asked permission to dip a hand into the waters.

  The queen acquiesced with a slight nod of her head, a pleased smile.

  As Crystine’s hand lowered into the water, she shivered with the sensation, one of impulses of endless movement, a sign that the waters themselves were alive.

  The slumbering child opened her eyes, grinned; then drifted back to sleep immediately on Crystine withdrawing her hand.