by Anna Sheehan
Tears stabbed Will’s eyes and rolled into her ears. ‘Why’d she have to burn my book?’ she whispered. ‘Why?’
Ragi shook his head. ‘She doesn’t understand,’ he said. ‘She never felt the sacrifices her place has put upon her. She was willing to wed Dani because that was her place, just as she is willing to be queen because that is her destiny. She feels no sacrifice in spending her days studying history and diplomacy, does not feel it tedious to spend hours flattering visiting nobility, does not find any hardship in being the ideal figurehead for her people. Because she’s never felt any of it a sacrifice, she doesn’t realize that you do.’
Ragi shook his head. ‘It wasn’t until Ferdinand rescued her that she’s ever wanted anything besides what has been placed before her. As if she sat at a banquet with all her favourite foods, and only now has she had her first taste of a wine which might be taken from the table.’ He stroked Will’s hair. ‘All her life she’s seen you at the same banquet. It’s never occurred to her that you might have a taste for different fare. And therefore, have gone hungry. She sees only that your plate is full, and you’re even allowed your magic, this illicit treat under the table. While we frown on it, no one is threatening to take it from you. Politics is against her and Ferdinand.’
He understood very clearly. Amaranth was the one with faerie-granted Kindness and Wisdom, Willow thought, so why wasn’t she here making sense out of this? ‘So she burned the book out of envy? Of me?’
‘Yes. She sees that you still have everything, and all she wants might be taken from her. She doesn’t see that you’d be starving to death but for your magic. That’s why your mother and I haven’t forbidden it,’ he added. ‘We know it would hurt you too much.’
‘Mother knows?’
‘Of course she knows. She doesn’t understand it herself, either, but she knows.’
‘You understand it?’
He sighed. ‘A little. I never fitted in much, either. I don’t know where you got the gift for magic, though. It did not come from either your mother or myself.’
‘It’s not a gift like blue eyes, or Mother’s Honesty,’ Will said. ‘I just learned it. Like an instrument.’
‘And there are those who can’t carry a tune no matter how hard they try,’ he said. He touched Will’s nose. ‘I’ve got something for you. I used the poker. I couldn’t save much,’ he added, pulling a handful of singed papers from under his coat. ‘But some of it is still readable.’
The sight of the burned pages made Will tear up again. She’d only just remembered that she’d promised to lend the book to Reynard in exchange for his help with her spells. ‘Take it away,’ she sobbed.
Ragi nodded and slid the pages into the drawer of her bedside table. ‘You can decide what you want to do with it later,’ he said.
Will moved her aching hand in the snow. The parts of her skin which weren’t blistered burned with the cold. ‘Father?’ she asked.
‘Yes, Will?’ He was the only one of her family who had agreed to call her Will.
‘What am I?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What’s my purpose? Am I just a thread, useful only as a tie between us and Hiedelen?’
He pursed his lips. ‘Am I just the questionable son of a Hiedelen prince, useful only as a sacrifice?’ he asked. ‘We are who we are. I know, whether you are the final link between us and Hiedelen, or not, that you can do something amazing with your life.’
That was what Ferdinand said. Maybe that was what she liked about him, she thought. He reminded her of her father.
The door burst open revealing Lavender, her face glowing with happiness. ‘Willow!’ Lavender screeched. ‘Willow, Willow! Oh, are you all right?’
‘Ye-es?’ Will said carefully.
‘Oh, Willow, I can’t believe it! I’m so sorry for everything I said to you!’ She rushed forward and kissed her, again and again. ‘I love you, I love you! Anything you want, it’s yours. Anything. You want my rosebud silk gown? It’ll look beautiful on you!’
‘It wouldn’t fit me,’ Will pointed out.
‘Oh, right. Sorry. Well, anything. I’ll sew you a gown! Myself. With my own hands. And I’ll prepare your trousseau. I’ll embroider willow branches over everything. Thank you so much!’
‘Wait, wait,’ Will said, glad Lavender wasn’t still mad, but still feeling resentful over her book. ‘What are you thanking me for?’
‘For formalizing the engagement with Narvi!’ she cried. ‘Thank you so much. I know it’ll be strange being married to a boy, but Mother says we’ll send him to college, bring him back in half a dozen years. And you’ll get to see Hiedelen – ask them to take you to the seaside. I hear they have an ocean. You’ve never seen the ocean. I’ll be your maid of honour, I’ll do everything for you, you won’t have to lift a finger. You’ll be the most beautiful bride!’ She jumped forward and caught her in an extremely tight hug. ‘I can’t begin to thank you enough!’
‘Lavi,’ Ragi said, ‘what are you talking about?’
She looked to him. ‘Oh, Mother didn’t tell you? Willow and Narvi are to be married at Midwinters! Isn’t it wonderful! Narvi will be safely attached, our kingdoms will be allied, and I can have my Ferdinand!’ She kissed Will again. ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you! Can you ever forgive me for all the awful things I said to you this afternoon?’
Will’s hand closed in the snow. Her eyes shut tight to block out the light. ‘I forgive you,’ she whispered.
‘Oh,’ came Queen Amaranth’s voice from the door. ‘If you two don’t mind, I need to talk to Willow for a moment.’
‘It’s all right,’ Will whispered. Her voice wouldn’t come any louder than that. ‘I know all about it.’
‘Oh. Lavender, you didn’t!’
Lavender sounded flustered. ‘You mean she … this wasn’t her idea?’
Great. So now not only was Will still thrown to the fire, now she wouldn’t even get Lavender’s gratitude for it. ‘Please,’ she said, as loudly as she could muster, which wasn’t very. ‘Please could you all leave me alone for a while?’
Amaranth frowned. ‘I still think we need to talk.’
Ragi took that as his cue. He stood quickly, kissed Amaranth’s cheek, and then led Lavender out of the room. Lavender cast one last confused look back, and followed him.
‘Willow …’
‘You really don’t have to do this,’ Will said. ‘I won’t argue. I know why it had to be done.’
Amaranth sat demurely in the chair Ragi had vacated. ‘What you don’t know is how proud I am of you for taking this so gracefully. I know that your will is such that you could make this extremely difficult for everyone, if you didn’t understand.’
‘I understand,’ Will said. ‘Three weeks. Seven years. It doesn’t really make much difference. If it’s best for the country, I’ll do it now. I know we need the dragon gold Ferdinand brought as much as we need Hiedelen’s favour. I know. Can we let it go at that?’
‘We can,’ Amaranth said gently. She gently touched Will’s cheek. This surprised Will. Her mother was kind and loving, but she didn’t touch people very often. She wasn’t like Ragi, who used contact in ordinary conversation. Every time her mother touched her, it meant something. ‘Something you don’t know, though, is that I know how you feel.’
Will couldn’t quite suppress a scoff. ‘Thanks,’ she said, without feeling.
‘I know how hard this is for you. Do you think I really wanted to marry your father?’
Will blinked. ‘But … he rescued you.’
Amaranth nodded. ‘He did. And I spent a hundred years asleep, dreaming of my prince charming. And when I open my eyes, what do I find? A hulking, coarse-faced lesser noble, with a thick Hiedelen accent, looming over me, his clothes all rent and ragged from the thorns. I nearly screamed. I was only barely able to gather the dregs of my dignity and bring myself to request an introduction.’ She shook her head. ‘I ran downstairs as fast as I could. I found your grandparen
ts in the throne room, and told them point blank that I refused to marry that man.’ Will could imagine how well that went down. Her grandparents were old when Amaranth was born, and very, very old-fashioned indeed. They’d both died when Will was still a child. They would never have permitted defiance in anything. Amaranth shrugged, gracefully. ‘You know how that worked out. We owed Hiedelen our kingdom. And that meant I was destined for Ragi.’
Will sat up, bringing her bowl of melting snow with her. ‘Are you telling me you don’t love Father?’
‘No. I’m telling you I came to love him. Marriage isn’t so much a meeting of hearts as a meeting of minds. Ragi wasn’t sure he wanted me, either. He said he’d look a clod beside me on a dais.’ Ragi had a point, Will thought. ‘But in the end, he knew what was best for both our kingdoms, just as I did. And he is a kind man. It took less than a year before I came to love him.’
‘But Narvi is nine.’
‘And you are eighteen, and your blood runs as hot as mine did. You have the urge to explore, and the courage to try anything. But that was my undoing, in the end. If I hadn’t been so keen to learn, I’d never have touched the spindle.’
Will swallowed. The fated spinning wheel was on display in the Great Hall, surrounded by glass and iron. The spindle had been removed, destroyed, but the wheel was viewed by visitors to the palace, and was kept under twenty-four-hour guard. It was the only spinning wheel left in Lyndaria. Will could easily envision herself being fascinated by the whirring wheel, the spinning thread. She’d have touched it, too, she realized. Particularly if, like her mother, she’d never seen such a thing before. Lavender would have sat demurely and let the spinner continue, not wanting to get in the way. But Amaranth and Will, they both liked doing things.
‘You’ve already said you’ll do the right thing. But I want you to know, you aren’t abandoning your dreams. Narvi is a good boy, and will grow to be a good man. We’ll send him to a college of our choosing, so that he will learn how we rule here in Lyndaria, and not the kinds of practices Lesli prefers. Part of the arrangement is that you spend some of your time in Hiedelen, but I’m negotiating your own estate, so you won’t have to live at court with Lesli. All it takes is patience. And in the meantime, your life won’t have to change very much unless you want it to. We’re all very proud of you.’
‘Mother?’ Will asked. ‘Could you … just leave me alone? I know you mean well, but … I just ….’
Amaranth nodded. ‘I understand,’ she said. ‘You rest and get used to the idea. I do have to tell King Lesli that there will be no difficulties in this.’
Will nodded. Amaranth stood and kissed her forehead. ‘I’m so proud of you, Willow. Everything will turn out right.’ She slid like bright shadow out of the room.
Will lay there trying to grieve for her dream of lost freedom, but her snow melted, and her hand felt on fire. She tried to tough it out, but she couldn’t bear it. She climbed out of bed to the windowsill and gathered more snow. She did this three times before all the snow on the windowsill was gone, and she was left clenching her teeth at her burns. She needed more snow. She could have just rung the bell and asked a serving maid, but the idea of getting it herself appealed to her. And since she was getting dressed and going downstairs anyway, why not keep her appointment with the Reynard? The Ages of Arcana was burnt, but she had other books.
She dressed in a winter dress, unwilling, while King Lesli was here, to again be caught in men’s clothes in what was essentially a court function. So long as there were visiting dignitaries, she had to be ready to receive them at any moment.
Which of course meant that sneaking out after first curfew wasn’t the most prudent of actions, but she was feeling rebellious.
Will kept her books behind a panel in her closet. This led to a secret tunnel, entirely disused, except by Will. The secret passages were only known about by the royal family. Keeping them clear was the one chore they had to do themselves. Ragi had performed the spring task of setting rat poison and clearing out the spiders, until Will had turned thirteen and offered to help. He’d left the tunnels to her care since then. They allowed hidden access to some few rooms of the palace, such as the royal bedrooms, the antechamber of the throne room, the library. Yet the routes were narrow, chilly, dark, and generally spooky. They had once had access to the outside, but in that aspect they were now entirely useless. Except to Will.
They were useless in the sense that they were now death traps, leading directly to the briars. Will couldn’t bring The Ages of Arcana, but since Reynard had said the two of them should work on her thorn spell, she grabbed the book on green magic she’d found that particular spell in. Then she wrapped herself in a cloak and headed out into the night.
Chapter 7
* * *
When the bell sounded first curfew I made my way towards the Monument for the Fallen Princes. The Monument had been constructed by King Ragi just after the end of the interregnum. It was a solemn testament of gratitude for the generations of fallen Hiedelen princes who had sacrificed themselves to the thorns. I found it rather amusing.
I hadn’t been very aware when the first so called ‘sacrifice’ had stupidly walked to the thorns, but Da had told me what he remembered. Prince Alexi disobeyed his father and ran off hot-blooded to earn his manhood. His father had intended to annex the kingdom without sacrificing his son. Alexi must have had some sense of honour, because he disliked the idea. He had flung himself full onto the thorns expecting them to simply part for his royal greatness. They hadn’t. They’d drained his blood very quickly.
The next, Prince Tenni, was a simpleton. Truly a simpleton, he drooled and sucked his thumb, his mind barely more than that of a toddler. He’d learned to ride but never to read. It was likely someone who did not have his best interests at heart had suggested he try for the Princess of Lyndaria. Either that or they had exhausted every other hope of finding him a royal bride, and he had braved the thorns in a kind of desperation. He’d expected brute strength and an axe would be enough to hack his way through the thorns. He was probably the only true innocent to ever die upon them.
The third ‘sacrifice’ had attempted to kill his older brother for the heirship. He had failed and was offered the choice of standard execution, or the chance at freedom and a kingdom as a sacrifice to the thorns. He’d chosen the latter, and died rather honestly.
Then it was King Lesli’s generation. Lesli had clearly taken a lesson from the last sacrificed prince. Lesli was the second of three brothers, and had not been originally destined to be king. According to one story, Prince Lesli and his eldest brother had ridden to the thorn hedge at the palace at Lyndaron, with Lesli saying he intended to try his luck at it. He and his brother had gotten quite drunk, and Lesli managed to persuade the crown prince that he was no man if he did not brave the thorns at least once. The crown prince swallowed the bait and committed suicide by stupidity, leaving ‘poor Prince Lesli!’ to mourn his brother’s corpse all the way to the kingship.
Then, at a time when Lesli needed soldiers for his armies and Lyndaria was again wondering why they kept honouring a monarchy who wasn’t really even theirs, Lesli had known it was time for another sacrifice. He had sent his youngest brother’s possibly-not-really son to get rid of the poor lad, and Ragi had made it through the thorns. Lesli was likely very peeved about that.
There were some interesting things about ageing five times slower than most everyone else in the country. You knew the truth behind all the old legends.
The Monument for the Fallen Princes was a dome held by four pillars. In the centre was a fountain of pure drinking water, which did at least lend the monument one useful aspect. Each of the four pillars represented one of the fallen princes. Only the last two held much resemblance to the princes’ actual faces, and the simple Prince Tenni’s face was a total fabrication. He looked strong and proud, and they’d omitted the drool.
In the winter the fountain froze, and the monument was fenced in by removable walls. I
knew it was full possible to sneak around them, and clearly the princess did too, or she wouldn’t have suggested we meet there.
I fingered my poisoned spool of thread. My aunt used a better spindle, with a real spinning wheel, rather than the rough wooden thing I was forced to spin with. I was sure she had had fine flax, or even an exotic silk to spin for her curse. I was left with the waste wool I could pluck from the hedges during the summer, following the sheep. Still, I was rather proud of my Sleep. I wasn’t being cruel. My aunt had tried to spin a death. I was only spinning a reminder. If I still had to suffer for my aunt’s transgression, the Lyndal line should as well.
I waited until rather later than an hour after curfew sounded. I was freezing. I had no wool left to spin up a warmth spell, and I was tired from spinning up the Sleep. Sleep. I yawned. My prison of a burrow seemed comforting at that moment. She wasn’t coming. I should go home, keep the kit warm. So much for my revenge.
The smell of roses caught my nose. One of the false walls warped at the edge and a figure richly bundled up scrambled through the small opening. She hoisted herself upright and tripped over her own feet. Perfect opportunity to get my hands upon her. I darted forward and caught her by the shoulders. ‘Well, well,’ I purred into her face. ‘The little hen has left the coop.’ She shivered in my arms, and I flashed her a sly grin in response. That made her shiver again. I let her go. ‘You’re looking lovely this evening,’ I added for good measure.
She started and looked at me. I realized that was probably the wrong thing to say. I hunched, hoping she wouldn’t notice the extent of my height. I could do nothing about the length of my fingers except keep my hands closed. Hopefully she wouldn’t notice the size of my eyes. The proportionate smallness of my head and the length of my neck, not to mention my pointed ears, were all concealed beneath my russet hood. I did not like her looking at me. I felt on display. Finally she looked down at her own fine woollen dress and absently brushed her hand down it, as if embarrassed.
