by Alex Bell
‘Perhaps you can show me your wedding album some day,’ Ben replied, in a tone of voice that suggested he’d rather see himself drowned at the bottom of a lake first.
‘I asked my mother to send you some photos,’ I said. ‘She said she was going to.’
‘They must have got lost in the post.’
‘Well, if you ever find them I’d like them back,’ I said. ‘There’s . . . something wrong with mine.’
‘I’ve never seen any photos,’ Ben said abruptly, massaging his left shoulder with his right hand. ‘Your mother never sent—’ He broke off suddenly, eyes narrowing. Slowly, he lowered his arm and said quietly, ‘What did you just say?’
‘I said . . . if you find the photos I’d like them back.’
‘Because there’s something wrong with your own?’ he said, a strange eagerness in his voice.
‘Yes,’ I replied, now wishing I hadn’t mentioned it.
‘What’s wrong with them?’ He still spoke quietly but I was startled by the sudden eager, bright look in his eyes and the way he had gone utterly still as he watched me.
I thought about lying. I could say I spilt coffee on them or something . . . But I could tell by the way he was looking at me that, somehow, he already knew it was more than that.
‘The woman in the photos,’ I said reluctantly, ‘isn’t me.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘She’s . . . not smiling. There’s something wrong with her face. And I know I didn’t stop smiling all day. I think Jaxon must have done something to them. It’s the only explanation I can come up with.’
To my surprise, Ben gave a sort of disbelieving laugh and then smiled at me, his whole face transformed by it, his brown eyes suddenly genuinely warm for the first time since all this began.
‘The same thing happened to my photos,’ he beamed.
‘Oh,’ I replied stupidly, unable to think of anything sensible to say. His reaction puzzled me for it hardly felt like something to celebrate. If anything it was something to be worried about for it seemed unlikely that Jaxon could - or would - have broken into Ben’s flat too. ‘What do you think it means?’
He shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I don’t think it was Jaxon. I think it’s something else. But I’m glad I’m not the only one. Aren’t you?’
‘I suppose. I’d just like to know why it’s happening at all.’ I wished Ben hadn’t told me the same thing had happened to his own photos, for then I could have gone on trying to believe that Jaxon was responsible. I turned my head to look out of the window and was taken aback by how heavily it was now snowing. ‘It’s really coming down out there.’
‘Yes,’ Ben replied. ‘We’d better not go out while it’s like this, we don’t have any chains for the car. The roads will be too dangerous. Hopefully they’ll be clearer by this evening so we can still go to Neuschwanstein. We’ll wait until after dinner and then we’ll go.’
‘Okay,’ I said, wondering what I was going to do with myself until then. If I’d been there with anyone other than Ben I would have suggested we go to the bar, have a drink, try to relax and talk of other things for a while. But that seemed pointless under the circumstances, so when we got up from the table I parted from Ben on the second-floor landing, leaving him to go up to his own room and I to mine, saying that we would meet again for dinner. Ben usually gave the impression that he found being with me a bother and was relieved to be on his own again whenever possible. I wasn’t particularly offended by it for I knew he was solitary and antisocial and thought he’d probably be much the same whoever he happened to be with.
I automatically went straight to my violin when I got into my room. There was no black rose this time and, for a moment, I just looked at the beautiful instrument in its case. Of course I had a normal violin too but it just wasn’t the same. I could never have played it in the middle of the night for fear of waking Liam up or disturbing the neighbours. I certainly couldn’t have played it in a hotel. And the Violectra was so much more beautiful with its skeletal blue and silver frame and its haunting, mellow tone. Everything about it was perfect and - just like a normal violin - the quality of its sound only seemed to improve the more I played it.
I was probably being overly paranoid but I had packed two sets of spare strings because the thought of one breaking while I was abroad made me feel almost panic-stricken, like a smoker suddenly finding themselves without cigarettes. But that afternoon I didn’t much feel like playing. I found I wanted company instead.
I was just thinking about taking a book and going down to the bar to while away the afternoon when there was a knock at my door. When I went to answer it, Ben was standing on the other side with a wooden box in his hands and a slightly uncertain look on his face.
‘I . . . wondered if you might like to play a game of chess while we’re waiting,’ he said. ‘But . . . if there’s something else you’d rather do by yourself . . .’ His eyes flicked to my open violin case and he said, ‘Never mind, it was a stupid idea. I expect you just want to play your violin.’
He was already walking away without even waiting for me to reply.
‘Hang on,’ I said. ‘Do you have a chess set in there?’
‘It’s just a travel one,’ Ben replied, turning back in the corridor.
‘Are you any good?’ I asked with a smile.
‘Good enough to while away an hour or two,’ he said.
‘You’re not going to get stroppy if I win, are you?’
Ben hesitated, then said, ‘Heidi’s told me that I’m a fair loser but a smug winner.’
I smiled, for that was just how Liam had been - laid back if he lost but insufferably smug if he won. Clearly it ran in the family.
‘I’ll try especially hard to beat you then,’ I said.
We went back into my room and sat down on either side of the coffee table with the chessboard on the table between us.
‘Is she clever?’ I asked, making the most of Ben’s apparent good mood to indulge my curiosity.
‘She’s extremely intelligent,’ Ben replied as he set out the chessmen.
I found it hard to imagine someone who was called Heidi being intelligent but that was probably because I had been bullied mercilessly by a girl called Heidi at school and - even now - the name brought to my mind the image of a bimbo with a cruel tongue.
‘White or black?’ Ben said.
‘What? Oh.’ I realised he was talking about the chess pieces and I looked down at the board, wondering how good he really was.
‘I’ll take black,’ I said, a surge of sudden competitiveness making me want to beat him without any advantages.
He twisted the board around so that the black pieces were on my side.
‘Is she pretty?’ I said.
‘She’s the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen in my life,’ Ben replied.
‘Incredibly clever and beautiful,’ I said with a smile. ‘What does she see in you, I wonder?’
I half-thought he might take offence at the remark, for all that it had been spoken in jest, but he just looked up with warm amusement in his eyes and said solemnly, ‘One of life’s great mysteries, I suppose.’
‘So are you going to invite me to the wedding?’ I asked. Suddenly the thought of a wedding seemed incredibly appealing. It would be nice to overlay Liam’s funeral with a happy church occasion.
‘Sure,’ Ben said. ‘As long as you give my mother a wide berth. She hates you, you know.’
‘Yes, I know!’ I said, actually glad to hear someone admit it rather than try to convince me that it was all in my head. ‘Do you know why?’
‘I do.’
‘Why?’ I prompted impatiently when he didn’t elaborate.
‘She didn’t want you to marry Liam.’
I knew he was right but there had to be a more specific reason. She had seemed very fond of me right up until a couple of weeks before the wedding when she had abruptly turned icy cold for no apparent reason.
‘Is it because I’m an
albino?’ I asked, the question tumbling out of my mouth without my really meaning it to.
‘What?’ Ben said, frowning in what seemed to be genuine puzzlement.
‘Did she resent me marrying Liam because of the way I look?’
He stared at me and I cursed myself for bringing up my appearance. Without glancing down I tried to remember what I was wearing and how I must appear to him . . . Jeans and a pale-blue top - nothing too bad there - but my hair was down, streaming loose over my shoulders, and I wished that I’d tied it back, put on a hat, done something to try to disguise it a little.
My mind went back to an incident that had taken place during my last year at junior school. I couldn’t remember how it began but, somehow, the gang of bullies - Heidi amongst them - who regularly used to torment me decided to find out whether or not I could bleed. It was as if - on some level - they really believed that I might not. It was during a PE lesson and a small group of us were standing to one side with our hockey sticks, waiting for our turn to play.
Of course there was a teacher there, but she was refereeing the hockey game and was not sparing any attention our way. Usually Liam was with me but as this was PE he was on the other half of the field playing football with the boys. He wasn’t that far away but he wasn’t close enough for me to get his attention by shouting. Besides which, I cringed at the idea of screaming for help like some sort of helpless victim. I should be able to stick up for myself. But there were five of them and I couldn’t prevent them from wrestling me to the grass and holding me down so that Heidi could dig her long nails into the white skin of my upper arm and scratch me hard enough to draw blood.
I don’t know how he realised what was happening for there was too much noise going on from the football and hockey games for Liam to have heard me but, suddenly, some muddy, dirty thing crashed into Heidi, knocking her over on the damp grass and pulling her blonde plaits until she squealed and the teacher came rushing over to drag him off. Liam got into a huge amount of trouble. He was put into detention for pulling Heidi’s hair and then into another one for refusing to apologise to her afterwards.
It had always been that way - snow princess to Liam, freak to the rest of the world. Of course, my family loved me and accepted me because they saw past my looks. But with Liam it had been as if he really liked my white hair and white skin and pale-blue eyes. That he wouldn’t change them even if he could . . .
Now I wished I’d never brought it up because I didn’t like the way Ben was looking at me. Finally, he said, ‘I don’t think my mother dislikes you because of the fact that you’re an albino. You’re not unattractive. Liam could have done worse.’
He looked back down at the chessboard and reached out to move his first pawn. I suppressed a sigh. ‘Not unattractive.’ I supposed that was the best I could hope for now. I wished I didn’t care. It seemed vain and stupid. But it mattered to me anyway and there was nothing I could do about it.
13
The White Lady
We spent most of the remaining afternoon playing chess. We played mainly in silence because we were both concentrating hard on beating the other. Ben won the first game and I won the second.
‘You’re almost as good as Liam was,’ I said, as we packed the chessmen away.
‘Liam?’ Ben repeated, raising an eyebrow. ‘I didn’t realise he even knew how to play chess. I’d have thought he’d be more of a checkers man.’
His voice dripped with scorn and I scowled at him, irritated. ‘Why do you do that?’ I demanded.
He looked at me in surprise. ‘Do what?’ he asked.
‘Take every opportunity to make some snide comment about him. We’ve spent a perfectly pleasant afternoon together - are you deliberately trying to spoil it?’
He was silent for a moment before saying, ‘You’re right. I apologise most sincerely.’
He didn’t sound sincere. In fact he sounded blatantly ironic, but at least he was going through the motions so I let it drop. He closed the lid on the chess box and then lifted his arm to rub his left shoulder. I’d noticed him doing it a couple of times that day so I asked him if he’d hurt it. He dropped his hand at once, as if he hadn’t realised what he was doing, and said that he had just got a little stiff being hunched over the coffee table for so long.
Shortly afterwards, we went downstairs for dinner and at about eleven o’clock we wrapped up warm before going out to the car to head back to Neuschwanstein. I found it strangely exciting . . . driving to the castle in the middle of the night. There was a lot of snow around still but the roads had been salted by then and were safe to drive on. From a distance, Neuschwanstein looked blue and ghostly set against the dark mountains in the cold, crisp silence. Ben ignored the no entry signs and took the car as far up the mountain as he could before the road petered out and we had to get out and walk the last few steps.
‘Do you think Lukas will turn up?’ I asked, keeping my voice hushed even though it seemed unlikely that there was anyone around to hear us.
‘Why should he?’ Ben said. ‘If he was telling you the truth then he won’t want to get in the way.’
‘I don’t understand why he said we should go to the castle. You’d have thought he would have told us to go to the lake. Maybe we should go down there afterwards.’
‘I don’t think that’s a good idea,’ Ben said at once.
‘Why?’ I asked in surprise. ‘You said you wanted to retrace Liam’s footsteps - surely the lake is the most important location of them all. And if there really are swan princesses down there then I want to see them for myself. Don’t you?’
Ben shrugged and said, ‘I don’t have anything against magical princesses frolicking about naked in the lake, but if they’re real that means the swan knights are probably real too and we’ve already established that they’re very territorial and protective. I think we should exercise a little more common sense and self-restraint than Liam did and have some sort of plan before we go down there rather than just blundering blindly in, don’t you?’
I hated to admit it but Ben had a point. Still - it wasn’t like we were going to try to steal a swan. We only wanted to look and we could take care to be quiet about it. I let it drop for the moment. We had now stopped beneath the shadow of the great castle looming above us. The floodlight turned its white bricks blue and made it appear phantasmal and . . . lonely somehow . . . all alone in the mountains when the man who had built and loved it was long since dead and lay far away. It was utterly magical being there in the middle of the night, with no one around for miles. And it was timeless. Surrounded only by snow and pines and mountains and stars, there was nothing whatsoever to distinguish the view from the way it would have looked a hundred years ago. Even the silence was complete and the mountain air was still.
We stood there for some moments, just looking up at the tall castle. It had been majestic during the day but at night - lit up with that pale-blue light and its turrets iced with snow - it would have put any fairy-tale castle to shame, and I remembered what Ben had said about Walt Disney basing his own castles on it. How strange to think that - on this occasion - the real thing had inspired the fairy tales rather than the other way around. It was almost difficult to believe that this was real in a real place - and we were not in storybook-land after all. Neuschwanstein was perfect - flawless in every detail. Remove one stone or alter the height of one spire a single foot and there would have been diminishment.
Suddenly, the idea of swan princesses and lonely kings and enchanted voices and aggressive knights did not seem quite as preposterous as they had by the light of day . . . I tore my eyes from the castle and glanced around at the surrounding trees, picking them out in the darkness. When a branch rustled somewhere close I turned my head sharply, for a moment genuinely expecting to see a huge, ornate sleigh come around the corner, complete with black horses and swans . . . But there was nothing there and, in another moment, everything was still.
Seeing it like that, I almost felt that I didn�
�t want to ever leave Neuschwanstein - not when it was like this. Magic hung all about it like tinsel on a Christmas tree. It was beautiful and silent and lonely and I could see why Ludwig had loved it even more than his other castles. It had been stunning during the day too, of course, but then there had been other people traipsing about all over the place - something Ludwig had expressly not wanted - and now it was quiet and deserted and silent once again, a brief reprieve before the morning and the next batch of the seemingly endless supply of gossiping, gawking, garish tourists.
I thought it couldn’t possibly be any more magical, but was proved wrong a moment later when large snowflakes started to fall thickly from the sky, painted silver in the starlight but turning pale blue as they settled softly on the castle’s floodlit spires, and all I wanted to do was stand there and stare at it. The lake could wait, answers could wait, the mysterious object could wait . . . But then I remembered what Lukas had said and shook myself. If he’d been telling the truth then it couldn’t wait. None of it could. If we didn’t find the thing Liam had hidden then someone might die. And I might be left with that horrible sense of nameless loss for the rest of my life.
‘We should go down to the lake,’ I said reluctantly. ‘There isn’t anything here.’
‘There’s someone in the castle,’ Ben replied evenly.
I looked at him sharply, and then followed his gaze to a lit window in one of the turrets - standing out sharply since all the other windows were cold and dark.
‘Perhaps they leave it on at night—’ I began, but then cut off abruptly as a woman appeared at the window. A woman with long white hair and ghostly pale skin.
It was me.
14
Swan Princess
In another moment, she was gone - slipped past the window like a ghost, leaving me with my heart hammering wildly in my chest as I stared up at the castle.
‘Did you see that?’ Ben said, in the same tone of voice as if he had just noticed a deer between the trees rather than a woman who appeared to be my double gazing down at us from the window of the castle.
