Revel: Twelve Dancing Princesses Retold (Romance a Medieval Fairytale Book 4)

by Demelza Carlton

  Bianca's invisibility might protect her somewhat, but it did nothing to hide the sound she made. Or her scent, if the man had a dog. And if he were to bump into her…but he wouldn't get close enough for that, Bianca resolved as she crept closer.

  She skirted Kun's cottage, heading to the yard where she knew the chopping block stood.

  The man wielding the axe was no villager, though. Unless he was the blacksmith. She'd never seen so much muscle on a man, and there was plenty to see, for he was naked to the waist, with sweat gleaming on his broad chest. A scarred chest, she noted. If he wasn't a smith, then he had fought battles against men instead of metal. Or some horrible accident had befallen him.

  The way he hammered the axe into the hapless chunks of wood spoke of some personal grudge he held against the tree. A section of trunk turned to kindling under his relentless strokes. He swept the spars up in his arms, stacked them in the woodshed, then grabbed another log to dismember. Whoever he was, he showed no sign of slowing. He must have asked for a really complicated spell from Kun, to do so much work in payment.

  Bianca settled on the grass to wait.

  Hours passed, but he did not slow. If anything, the furrows in his forehead only deepened as he continued to work. He allowed the timber to break into bigger pieces than kindling now before he stacked them in the woodshed, too.

  He circled the chopping block, giving Bianca a clear view of his equally well-muscled back. He had fewer scars here, though they weren't entirely absent. What did that mean? That when he fought, he faced his enemy head on, and never turned his back on them?

  Bianca felt the most peculiar urge to ask him. She could return to the road, dismiss her invisibility spell, and stroll into the yard as though she'd just arrived. She could offer him some of her provisions and introduce herself as Bianca. Not a princess, just…a maid from the palace. There. That would do. She rose to her feet, determined to put her plan into action.

  "You've been working hard. You must be hungry. Come inside. The noon meal is ready," Kun said.

  The woodcutter swiped his arm across his face, then grabbed a tunic he'd hung on the edge of the woodshed roof and pulled the garment over his head, hiding those delicious muscles from sight.

  Delicious? Bianca scoffed at herself for having such thoughts. Why would she want to lick the man's sweaty skin? It would be hard and salty and…definitely unpleasant, she told herself. She was just hungry, that was all.

  She rose, stretching the cramps from her legs from sitting so long, before heading back to the road in search of her horse. The mare stood exactly where she'd been left, with no sign of distress at being invisible. Bianca could see her, of course, as she could with anything she bespelled, but if she concentrated, she could also see what everyone else saw – nothing.

  She grabbed the first thing she touched in the basket and bit into it. The sweetness told her it was fruit, but that's all the attention she paid to food. Her thoughts were with the scarred man in Kun's cottage.

  Who was he?

  Thirteen

  With every limping step, Vasco reminded himself how much he hated archery. This hadn't always been the case, of course, for archery practice had been a required part of his training. He'd even been good at it once. Now, though…he hadn't been able to bring himself to fire an arrow at the enemy since he'd been wounded. Shooting someone from a distance was cowardly, especially if you couldn't give them a clean death. If they fell before you and you had a sword or an axe, it was a simple matter to deliver another blow if the first hadn't killed them. With arrows, though, it was much harder to hit someone who'd fallen. And no man, friend or foe, deserved to live with the constant pain he did. Wounds either healed or they killed you. They weren't supposed to torment you for the rest of your life.

  Yet he nailed the slice of tree trunk to a tree on the edge of Kun's yard, and it became an archery target. Because while he might never shoot another man, he would undoubtedly need to hunt for his dinner one day. If he could not shoot something for the pot, then he would go hungry.

  Besides, archery practice had always been his favourite part of army training. His thoughts grew clear and singular, focussed only on the target and the conditions that might affect his shot.

  As if carried by a breeze from the distant past, he thought he heard the bark of some long-dead training officer shouting the drill: Stance. Nock. Draw. Aim. Loose. All followed by a bellowed, "AGAIN!"

  Vasco marched to the other end of the yard in the pre-dawn light, and began to string his bow. He would shoot until he lost or broke all his arrows, or until Kun woke and he could start work on her cottage for the day.

  Stance. He positioned one foot, then the other, ready to move and fire in any direction.

  Nock. He'd seen men argue over the best way to do this, which side of the bow and whether to rest the arrow on one's knuckles or one's thumb. Vasco had never bothered to argue. His father had been a good archer, though he never shot an arrow in anger. And he had taught his son the only good way to do it. Vasco's arrows shot from the right side of the bow, over his thumb. He reached for the one of the arrows in the earth at his feet, and nocked it.

  There was no wind in the clearing where Kun's cottage lay. Not for the first time, he wondered whether it was luck or if she was a witch. Neither would surprise him. If she was a witch, though, all the more reason not to wake her before she chose to rise.

  Draw. Vasco sucked in a breath, held it, and drew the arrow back a little. The bowstring pulled as smoothly as a song.

  He sighted along the arrow, aiming for the target, as he drew the arrow back further.

  Breathe, he told himself. There was nothing else in the clearing but him, his bow and arrow, the target he intended to hit and the air separating him and his goal. Air he had to breathe.

  One…two…three. Vasco loosed his arrow at the target.

  It hit, but barely. He had aimed too low.

  AGAIN.

  Vasco reached for another arrow. It sped off into the trees, missing the target completely.

  Vasco swore under his breath.

  AGAIN.

  By the time Kun called him for breakfast, he had run through his store of arrows three times, but on the third round, he'd managed to hit the target on every shot. Tomorrow, he would do better, he promised himself. If he did not, better to give Kun the bow for firewood than carry it around any longer.

  His father's bow was the only thing he'd salvaged from his burned home. That and the goats, of course. His father had kept the weapon in the woodshed, the only building in the village that hadn't burned. Perhaps because it was full of green wood, not yet dry enough to burn, that Vasco and his father had cut the week before the attack.

  To burn it would be to lose the last link to home. To his family. To Dokia. Though they all walked with the ancestors now, he would carry their memories with him every day. And his father's bow.

  "If you don't come in now, I shall give it to the goats!" Kun threatened.

  A very real threat, Vasco knew. He'd let the goats out of the barn to munch on the fresh spring grass for breakfast, but they wouldn't turn their noses up at human food.

  He hurried to obey her summons. Tomorrow, he swore. Though to who, he wasn't sure.

  Fourteen

  After waiting most of the afternoon, during which the muscled man still didn't leave, Bianca reluctantly climbed back on her horse and headed home. It wasn't until she reached the palace that she realised she hadn't given Kun any of the food. Tomorrow, she promised herself, for the man would have gone home by then, surely.

  Yet when she returned on the morrow, he was still there, cutting trees and dragging them back to the cottage. He looked bigger and brawnier than she remembered, which only made her feel worse about forgetting to give Kun her basket the previous day. So today she watched and waited, telling herself she was looking for an opportunity to sneak into the cottage unseen so she could repay Kun for her kindness.

  Once again, the man did not leave
the yard for long enough. He had enough timber to keep him occupied well into the afternoon, when Bianca had to return home.

  Every day for a week she returned, and every day she found him still there. She wanted to resent him for keeping her from meeting Kun, but she couldn't. He took such care in his work, cutting the timber so precisely before using it to build Kun a completely new barn. Only when it was finished did she see him smile, and what a change it was. The brooding man seemed to light up from the inside. He took pride in a job well done. Something she had rarely seen in her father's palace, where servants held their positions for life and had no need to be good at their jobs to keep them.

  Oh, she'd seen musicians dedicated to their craft, and cooks who cared about what their kitchen created, though the staff under them might not be quite as enthusiastic about such exacting standards, but this? The way this man built that tiny structure to house Kun's goats made her wonder how the architects and builders of the palace in the capital had felt when they regarded their handiwork.

  She would never know, for the palace was completed before she was born, and definitely before she discovered she could use her invisible talents to escape the harem and roam about the palace. She fancied that she was the only princess who had ever entered the kitchens, and watched the soldiers at training in the guardhouse yard, when neither was deemed a fitting place for the king's daughters.

  She could have watched the scribes and calligraphers for hours, though, for their painstaking work was akin to art. Only the knowledge that her mother would miss her and know she had escaped sent her back. Otherwise…Bianca fancied she might have joined them. If she had not been born a princess, she would have liked to choose the life of a scribe. Locking up words and whole stories in a series of symbols, so that people miles away or a hundred years into the future could see them and know what had happened. It was a kind of immortality, she supposed.

  Now if she could immortalise Kun's carpenter in art, capturing the bulge of his muscles as he hefted the axe, or lifted a new beam into place, or that look of calm concentration he wore when he practiced archery in the early mornings. She'd only caught him at it once, but his makeshift target, a round slice of tree trunk, bore the signs of increasing accuracy as the week progressed.

  She imagined him returning home to his lovely, loving wife – for a man like this could not go unloved – carrying fresh meat he'd caught on the point of his arrow on the way home after finishing work on Kun's cottage. His own cottage would be immaculate inside and out, for a man who took such care on Kun's house would lavish even more attention on the home of the woman he loved.

  And at night, beneath that perfectly crafted roof, he would use those skilled hands on his wife, in all the ways they'd whispered about in the harem. Bianca sighed at the thought. She envied the man's wife, for she knew a joy Bianca herself would never know.

  Movement sighted out of the corner of her eye roused Bianca from her daydream, and she sat up to find Kun's eyes on her. The old woman beckoned her over, as if she could see the invisible princess as clearly as anything else in her garden.

  Bianca glanced around, not seeing the man, so she dismissed the spell and hurried into the house.

  "You've been so busy watching Vasco that you've forgotten about me," Kun remarked as she set some water boiling for tea.

  Bianca opened her mouth to protest, but the old woman's sharp look silenced her. Instead, she said, "How did you know?"

  "I recognise the smell of your magic now, having seen you cast it so often. There is more to this world than what the eyes can see," Kun said. "Though you've been using your eyes more of late, I see."

  "What sort of spell did he ask for, to repay you with a beautiful new barn?" Bianca asked. "It must be something difficult. Healing for his wife, perhaps?" The man she'd watched all week would do anything to make his wife well, if she fell ill, Bianca was certain of it.

  Kun laughed. "Not all want a spell. And not all men have wives. This one shares a bed with my nanny goats every night, which might be why he built me such a stout barn. He is a soldier, injured in battle, who now wanders while he looks for work. He had thoughts to apply at the Summer Palace."

  Bianca's hopes, which had soared at the thought that the man had no wife yet, plummeted to earth at the realisation that he was another adventurer. "So he will appear at our table next, swathed in ill-fitting silk, as he tries to wheedle secrets out of my sisters?"

  "He had thoughts to work as a guard, but I have kept him busy here. He's not like the others. The others barely had two words for me before they hustled themselves up to the palace. Vasco is a good man who has no wish for fame and wealth. Not like the others, who would thrust a blade through my body without a second thought if the reward asked for my heart and not the palace secret."

  Bianca wet her lips. "So he does not want a bride or a palace?"

  Kun's forehead furrowed, then smoothed. "He is a man who keeps his feet solidly on the ground, who might look at the stars above, but will never reach for them. A man who happily shares a barn with goats knows a palace and a princess are far beyond his reach."

  "What if he had help?" The words left Bianca's lips before she'd really thought them through.

  Kun eyed her suspiciously. "Are you offering to help a man you do not know, and betray your sisters in the same breath?"

  Bianca gaped. She, a traitor? Never. "I meant…if you mentioned the king's offer, and told Vasco what you know of the mystery so that he might have a better chance than his predecessors, and maybe encouraged him to try…"

  "Do you know what happens to the men who fail to solve the mystery?" Kun demanded.

  "They have three days. If they fail, they leave," Bianca said.

  "Have you ever seen them leave?"

  Bianca shook her head. "No, but they must. They are no longer at the palace."

  "Are they?" Kun's eyes were sharp. "There are many cellars beneath the Summer Palace, much like its grander cousin in the capital. It would be easy to turn one into a dungeon to imprison them."

  "But why? What would Efe have to gain in imprisoning such men? I don't know how you could imagine such nonsense." Even as she said the words, Bianca didn't believe them. For under her bed, she still had the first adventurer's sword. No man would leave without his sword, the means to defend himself. Yet…why would anyone imprison the man? He had committed no crime. But the sword…

  Kun's look was knowing. "Ah, you suspect there is more than nonsense in it. I see it in your eyes. Why should I throw a good man to the wolves? It seems to me he can do a lot more good in his life than try to solve some mystery not even the king knows the answer to. Have you solved it yet?"

  Bianca forced herself to admit that she had not. Vasco – if that was indeed the man's name – had distracted her from asking her sisters about it. But if she asked them… "I could help him," she offered eagerly before adding, "Not to betray my sisters. But to stop the flow of beggars and braggarts Efe sends to our table. It is not right. He dresses them like noblemen, but beneath the veneer, I fear that they have few principles. It is only a matter of time before one of them threatens us with violence, or invades our sleeping chamber at night, or…" Bianca shuddered. She didn't want to think of anything worse, but the images crept to her mind, unbidden. She had heard stories of the things men did to unprotected women. There was a reason she hadn't left the palace grounds alone.

  "If you help him, the man may stand a chance," Kun admitted. "But you will rob me of my servant, before he has fashioned a complete new cottage and furnishings for me. A project he seems to enjoy. It will take all my powers of persuasion to make him believe he wants to leave my employ for the uncertainty of a job at the palace. It will cost you more than a basket of food this time, princess."

  Bianca recognised the steely look in Kun's eyes. That very same look had made her climb on the cottage roof to see her own handiwork. "Very well," she said. "What would you ask of me in payment for such a service?"

  Kun sho
ok her head. "You would not last a day in a village marketplace, let alone the wide world, girl. You should offer a very low price, not let me name mine. That isn't how bargaining is done."

  Bianca's lips lifted in a smile she did not feel. "I cut my teeth on politics. The bargaining at court is very different to a common marketplace. Both parties ask for all that they desire, before negotiations commence to whittle down the lists to some sort of compromise where neither are happy, but each gets some of what they wish for. Name your price, and then we shall bargain in earnest."

  Kun's eyes widened. Perhaps she had underestimated Bianca, the girl mused. She wagered the witch did not make that mistake often. "A new cloak that is so beautiful, so stunning that no man can look at its wearer and truly see them, but nothing is hidden to the wearer."

  Bianca nodded slowly. "You wish me to make you a cloak which will render you invisible, yet able to see the invisible, like I do."

  "You're quick, girl."

  "Would you like a cloak made of silk, wool, or something else?" Bianca asked.

  Kun looked thoughtful. "Silk seems a little too grand. And besides, I already have the cloak. It is your magic I want." Her gnarled finger pointed at the hooks behind the door. Beside her own faded, worn cloak in earthy brown hung another one, much longer and thicker than the first. Dark as a raven's wing, the blackness of it seemed to steal some of the room's light.

  It almost seemed alive, for it certainly held its own magic. If Bianca bespelled it so that it made the wearer invisible, it would be a valuable thing indeed.

  "We have a bargain," Bianca announced. "I will cast an invisibility spell on that cloak that also works on its owner, and you shall send your servant to the palace to solve my mystery."

  Kun eyed her. "Most would hesitate before making a bargain with a witch, girl. Are you sure?"

  Bianca almost laughed. "But we are both witches, and you are the one asking me for a spell, in exchange for a trivial favour. Shouldn't I be asking you if you are sure?"