The Wealding Word

by A C Gogolski

  Nell bobbed her head, “I… will try to listen. Thank you Lady Zel, for not being mad about the bracelet.”

  The sorceress smiled. Slowly she raised her arms for the spell. In another instant Nell was bouncing across the windowsill on bird feet. A wind rose up from all around, whisking leaves about in a great whirl. It lifted Nell in its invisible arms and she tried her wings for the first time. “Ah, my dear Wind,” said Lady Zel, as if greeting an old friend. “Please return this little dove safely home.” With a backward glance at the unicorn, the sorceress added, “And I think it’s time you see to my great-grandson too. He has wandered long enough. Goodbye Nell!”

  The last rays of sunset made everything golden like the light of the hermit’s tree. Nell soared over the shining marsh that had once terrified her, but now she was swift and light and fearless. The Wind kept her flying right on course, and helped her land safely in the garden behind her cottage. At once she was a girl again, and she was home, just in time for dinner.

  CHAPTER 6

  THE PARADE

  One spring morning, Nell woke to the insistent clap of the castle bells. They only sounded like that on holidays, or when something bad happened. She lay quietly, listening to the clamor and wondering which it was.

  “Nell,” her mother called. “Time to get up! There’s going to be a parade today!”

  When she came out for breakfast, Nell saw both her mother and father at the table, sipping steaming mugs of tea. It was a surprise, since her father was usually pounding shoes in his shop long before sunrise. She was glad to see him still home. “Why are you here Dad?”

  Chase laughed. “The royal fleet was sighted at sea several days ago. Seems the wind finally decided to blow the king home. In honor of his return, Queen Pharisij has declared today a holiday. No work!”

  As the family ate their porridge, they chatted about the wandering king. Nell’s mother said that King Reginald had been gone for so many years that he might not know his own son, Prince Ryan.

  “Prince Ryan!” Nell exclaimed. She remembered the pale boy to whom she gave the sorceress’ bracelet – he was called Ryan too. She wondered if they were the same.

  “Yes,” said her mother. “And we just might see him today. We’re all going to cheer for the king when he rides from his ship. I’m sure the prince will be there to greet his father.”

  Later that day, Nell and her family walked toward the wooden docks on the far side of the castle hill. The sea air was crisp, but the promise of spring made a small thing of the cold. It seemed like all the people of the kingdom had assembled to see their king again. Ten years had passed since his campaign began, and with no news of him during that time, many feared the fleet had met with disaster. Their faces pale with worry, it was easy to spot the wives and children of soldiers who sailed so many years ago. Many on the street murmured about what became of the other ships, since only a fraction of the fleet had returned.

  As the family neared the port, more and more people crowded about. The great vessels were already at anchor down at the docks below. “Come on,” Chase said, “I want to get a closer look at the king’s own boat.” He led them down a winding, cobblestone road packed with people, horses, and dogs. Armored knights rode through the crowd on their steeds, making sure King Reginald would have a clear path up to the castle when he came forth. The queen had already been driven down in the royal carriage, and now she waited for her husband before the ships. It would not be long before the king would take his first step back onto home soil, and ride from the docks with his lady.

  Deftly Chase guided his wife and two daughters all the way down to the edge of the water. Few could hope to get any closer. Nell craned to glimpse Queen Pharisij, but couldn’t see the carriage with so many people jostling in front of her. Instead, she stared up at the confusing mass of cables and cords stretching from the masts of the ship. How could anyone know what they were all used for? Men ran back and forth on the decks, readying horns and scarlet banners, making final preparations for Reginald’s appearance.

  It was then that Nell noticed an unnatural thing scurry behind the busy deckhands – a hunched smudge upon the afternoon light. From the back of the ship it crept, passing through sailors as though they were smoke. The specter stopped at the side rail and scanned the crowd, looking like a grossly fat child in a pig’s mask. Pincer-like hands snapped at the air before its belly, sifting through invisible strings. It surveyed the cheering masses, and slowly its eyes came to rest upon Nell.

  She at once felt something tug at her chest. Then, as if by some unseen filament, Nell was yanked forward to the edge of the road.

  The thing let out a long, belching screech, but nobody in the crowd seemed to hear except for Nell, who covered her ears in revulsion. Horses lining the road shied and bucked at the sound however, and riders everywhere struggled to retain their saddles. Distracted by the odd creature, Nell didn’t notice the blaring trumpets or the powerful voice of the herald. She didn’t see the cascades of royal color spill down the sails, nor King Reginald’s wan and frowning face look upon his people again.

  The crowd roared as their king limped down the ramp and onto the pier. Though the man was haggard beyond his years, his exotic queen, standing statuesque on a carpet of spun gold, smiled to see him just the same. She waited for her husband in a shimmering sapphire gown, her hand extended elegantly for a kiss.

  Nell had sorely wanted to see this woman from another land, but she couldn’t take her eyes off the pig specter lurking up on deck. After a long period its shape began to waver, and with a final snort it slipped like a wisp of silk into the gray water of the port. Nell felt the life return to her limbs as it disappeared.

  King and queen now reunited in their carriage, the horns played a fanfare and the parade back to the castle lurched into motion. A knight in dusky armor led the entire procession. Unlike the rest of the knights and lords, who practiced discretion before the common people, the black knight brandished his sword threateningly. “Make way for the king! Make way or I’ll have your head!”

  Soon the stately carriage was rolling right in front of Nell. She saw the queen smile and wave to the crowd, but the king sat motionless beside her, eyes closed. A fine horse prancing just behind the coach carried a boy only a year older than Nell. He wore a jacket of deepest red, with ten buttons running up the front, and three interlocking gold circles embroidered on his shoulder. A small, handsome sword bounced at his hip. Nell gasped. It was Ryan, her friend from the tower!

  Though no one was allowed on the street during the procession, Nell just had to see him again – to tell him he was wrong about the witch. Without stopping to think, she bolted into the middle of the grand parade. A horse reared to avoid trampling her, throwing the lord riding it onto the cobbles. People roared and hooves clattered all about. Nell dodged another horse in the confusion, and rolled between someone’s legs. A soldier almost caught her by her collar, but she ducked quickly beneath the king’s carriage, landing in a puddle of mud. What am I doing?

  As the carriage clattered past, a guardsman scooped her out of the muck. “You filthy scamp, a bath in the bay will teach you to run out before the king!” The king and queen rode on, but the many horses and soldiers following behind got clumped together, coming to an angry stop because of Nell. The guard locked her under his arm, and then stalked toward the edge of the pier to toss Nell into the water.

  “Ryan! I need to see Prince Ryan! Ryan! It’s me!” she called, waving furiously to the prince. The jeers of the crowd thundered in her ears.

  Ryan turned just in time to see the guard readying to fling Nell into the filthy bay. “Stop!” he shouted, and then cantered his horse over to the soldier. Motioning, he bade the soldier set Nell back on her feet. “You’re the girl from the tower. What are you doing out on the road?”

  Nell was out of breath from fear and excitement – all her thoughts rushed out at once. “I met the Witch of the Weald! Do you still have the bracelet? Can you talk to
cats too?”

  The young prince beamed, holding up his wrist to show the handsome silver bracelet. “Yes, and, er, no. What’s that about cats?” he asked, a little confused.

  Nell was suddenly aware that she was covered head to toe in mud. She tried to smooth her hair with a grubby hand. “The bracelet, I think it’s magic – it’s from Lady Zel.”

  “Really? Mother said that the sorceress wanted to give me a present on my birthday. The castle guards wouldn’t let her see me though. Maybe she meant for me to have it all along…”

  “I think she did!” Nell laughed, quickly covering her crooked smile with a dirty hand.

  The soldier cleared his throat. “You’re holding up the parade – er, your Highness,” he added hastily.

  “Tomorrow my father is expected to ride into the weald, Mother says he loves to hunt. I will be going with him,” Prince Ryan told Nell. “Perhaps you will join me? You can show me to the witch’s tower so I may ask her about the bracelet myself.” He looked behind him at the jumbled throng of soldiers. “Until tomorrow then.”

  The prince gave her a quick smile, and kicked his mount forward. None-too-gently the soldier shoved Nell back toward the crowd, muttering, “Don’t you ever…”

  Shocked that she knew the young prince, Nell’s parents forgot to be upset at her for interrupting the procession. Only Lexi scowled. “Everything always goes right for you,” she sneered. “Anybody else would have been trampled on sight.” Nell merely stuck her tongue out at Lexi, safe behind her father.

  It was the cry of a hog wild for its meal that jarred Nell awake that night. She wasn’t sure if she had dreamed the eager squealing or if it was real. Whatever the case, it didn’t come again, but she was left feeling isolated and alone in the darkness. Heart pounding, she put her arms around Rawley’s neck and waited a long, long time before sleep came to her again.

  PART 2

  UP IN SMOKE

  CHAPTER 7

  CURSED

  The next morning, Nell was out of bed even before her busybody sister got up. Prince Ryan and the king might pass by at any moment, and she needed to be ready. She gulped down last night’s leftover bread for breakfast, and then ran to sit on the cold stone wall in front of the cottage. Ruddy streaks scarred the blue face of dawn overhead.

  As Nell waited, she considered the stone dragon that sat beside their gate. Serpents were said to guard over entries and doors, but this carving wasn’t quite as imposing as those at the castle. The tiny sculpture arched, half buried with a funny cone of snow on its head. Nell kicked at it absently, wondering when the king would come.

  Some time passed, and Nell’s father kissed her forehead before heading down to his shoe shop. The sun broke over the castle hill, bringing no additional warmth. Rawley came and sat with her for a while, and then wandered off. Neighbors strolled by carrying water buckets or leading goats.

  “I’m riding with the king today. Prince Ryan is taking me into the weald,” she told anyone who would listen. She couldn’t help but feel proud. Her sister was right: she was different, much different than the simple people around her. She could speak with animals. She knew the sorceress. She was friends with the prince.

  And she was cold. It was almost mid morning when Lexi opened the door, unceremoniously shouting: “You think you’re a princess, but you’re just a dumb girl who almost got killed in a parade. Get in here and do something useful.” Nell bit back tears, feeling ice creep into her heart. It was a deeper cold than she had ever known. But she knew Lexi was right again: no one was coming to take her riding.

  The rest of the day she spent moping, avoiding her sister, and wondering why the prince didn’t come. She even avoided Rawley and Sola. The stories they shared all winter seemed childish and unimportant now. Why didn’t the prince keep his word? Doesn’t he like me? The same melancholy thoughts kept whispering in her mind.

  Weeks passed in this way, though the hurt of her disappointment began to fade. Nell longed for summer, for the full light of the sun. But it seemed that her carefree days of playing in the woods were nearing an end. Her mother had been bringing her to the castle to clean almost daily, and she knew she needed to do her part to help her family. She tired quickly of the endless complaints and pettiness of the other women though. I had tea with Lady Zel, she would tell herself. I spoke with a unicorn! I flew over the weald! But compared with the dull reality of beating drapes and scrubbing floors, the events of the autumn belonged to another life entirely.

  Heart heavy, Nell walked through a late season squall. It was dinnertime, and she was back from another tedious day of cleaning. As her home came into view, she felt the urge to run into the forest and get away from everyone – as she used to do when she was younger. She wanted to simply listen, all alone, to the sleet clatter-tap against the trees, and pretend things were the way they used to be.

  Gossamer snowflakes replaced the ice as she approached the cottage. Striding toward the door, a bit of unexpected color in the snow happened to catch her eye. Three purple crocus flowers had sprouted that day, just below her window. They looked so fragile, yet brave against the big white flakes. Nell wanted them to grow strong. She wanted the green to return, for the monotony of winter to melt away. Kneeling on the ground, she brushed crystals from the tiny petals and remembered the care Peter took when planting the golden acorn. On a whim, she leaned close and whispered in her gentlest tone, “It’ll be alright. You’re safe, you can grow. Warmer days are ahead.”

  A flat voice startled her from behind. “What are you doing? Everybody’s waiting for you at the table.” Lexi stood on the front doorstep wearing her apron and a cross expression. Nell wondered how long the older girl had been watching. She didn’t get up until her sister went back inside, worried that Lexi would trample the flowers, just to be mean.

  The next day Nell woke to the hiss of her father’s cursing. Slipping out of bed, she wandered into the main room where Chase was ramming his shoulder against the front door. “It won’t open,” he breathed, giving the door another push. Nell went to one of the shuttered windows and found it too was locked tight from the outside.

  They went through the kitchen where Lexi was just getting up, and tried to force the cottage’s back door. Chase was able to open it wide enough to push through, and Rawley squeezed past next. Pulling her boots on, Nell followed them outside, eager to solve this mystery.

  Her hair stood on end when she saw the cottage. Green vines had grown up around it overnight, entwining her home in a thick netting. Worse yet, the oaks and maples towering on either side had all somehow bent their trunks inward, forming a cave of limbs over Nell’s house. The sight of the old trees cloistered together at such an unnatural angle made her mother gasp when she came out to see. “How could they grow like that – and in one night?”

  The family walked around the tree-domed, ivy-shrouded house, only to find something even more bizarre: intertwined with the vines were several ridiculously large crocus plants – directly outside Nell’s window. They were the very plants she had tended just yesterday. Now they sagged against the thatched roof, huge purple blossoms rimed with frost.

  Nell’s father set to work at once cutting the strange vines, but the task was difficult and long. It was as if the ivy on the cottage had been growing unchecked for twenty years. And as for the way the trees bent over the house… there was no explaining that at all. Neighbors assembled, gawking at Nell and her family. None offered to help Chase chop the thick cords: no one wanted to go under the great leaning oaks, or touch the freakish flowers.

  The unwanted attention was too much for Lexi. She reared on Nell, exclaiming, “She did it! She put a spell on the house!”

  Chase set down his axe. “What’s this rubbish, Alexandra? It’s not Nell’s fault that spring’s sprung on us all at once.” He tried to laugh, but the sound was forced. Like everyone else, the man had been shaken by the sight. What’s more, while the rest of the village had a light layer of snow on it, the grass aro
und the Shoemakers’ cottage was thick and green. It looked as though some wellspring of warmth had enveloped the house overnight. He didn’t understand why this had happened any more than the others, but he wasn’t blaming Nell.

  “Well I say she’s cursed!” Lexi shouted. With a dozen other villagers standing just beyond their gate, she leveled her finger accusingly at Nell. “I saw her whispering outside yesterday. She used a troll’s charm to make the flowers grow!”

  Nell’s mother gave Lexi a dark look. “Alexandra, that’s enough.”

  “And she thinks she can talk to dogs too!” Lexi cried.

  If anyone would accuse Nell of witchcraft, it would be her sister. All winter Lexi endured Nell’s whispering to Sola and Rawley. She would pretend not to hear the secret little conversations, but the way Nell spoke to her pets made it almost believable. The cat and dog would sit motionless, staring at Nell all the while. It infuriated Lexi – who knew it was all a lie, of course. Nell had found a sure-fire way to annoy her, but that was over now.

  Villagers wandered away from the peculiar vegetation, muttering and shaking their heads. “Lexi, go inside,” Chase commanded. He pulled the last tangle of vines from the roof and piled them behind the cottage, but some of the cuttings were already taking root again where he set them. “Both of you, go back inside. I have to get to my shop, and your mother is going to the castle by herself today. I want you to act like sisters while we’re gone.”

  Lexi wore a mean grin as soon as they were alone.

  Nell was carrying a steaming pot of water to wash clothes when her sister’s anger flared. She came upon Nell suddenly, yanking at her hair, “D’you make a deal with the trolls? Hmm?” She ripped downward again. Nell winced as hot water spilling from under the lid scalded her hands. Despite the rough shaking, she managed to keep her grip on the heavy pot. “No one will buy from father if they think we’re cursed!” Lexi shouted.