Once Upon a Winter's Night fs-1

by Dennis L McKiernan

  Taking up most of the free space, with a “ Whuff!” the Bear sat down and grunted as if in satisfaction.

  Shutting out the storm, the father closed and latched the door, though momentarily he peered out into the fury beyond, as if perhaps seeking more bears or mayhap thinking of bolting.

  With pale eyes, the Bear looked at Camille and the opened scroll and cocked his head.

  “He wants you to go on,” Aigrette whispered across the board.

  Camille nodded and peered at the scroll again and started at the beginning once more:

  To the parents of the girl who sings in the field: Greetings.

  Fear not the Bear, for he would do you no more harm than would I. Think of him as my ambassador, and offer him your hospitality ere reading on.

  That done… I am smitten by your golden-haired daughter, and I seek your permission to marry her -

  “Not fair!” cried Lisette, outrage honing her words as she glared with dark blue eyes at Camille. “I am the eldest, and I should be first to marry. And to a prince at that.”

  “And I next!” called out Colette indignantly, her own blue eyes ablaze. “And a prince for me as well.”

  The Bear swung his great head toward the pair and a growl rumbled deep in his chest, and with small yips the two fell silent.

  “A prince,” hissed Aigrette to Henri, her eyes narrowing in calculation. “A prince wishes to marry our daughter. Go on, go on, Camille; pay your sisters no heed. Go on, read the rest.”

  Taking a deep breath, Camille continued:

  … I seek your permission to marry her. If you accept, she will be the mistress of a grand estate, and my holdings in Faery are -

  “In Faery?” blurted Giles, and then began coughing again.

  Embracing the rail-thin lad, the father repeated, “In Faery? But therein dwell monsters most dire, and-”

  “Quiet, both of you,” snapped Aigrette. “Our daughter is to marry a prince. Read on, Camille. Pay no heed to your father and brother.”

  … my holdings in Faery are considerable. Too, if you accept, I will settle upon you a sizeable bride-price of gold as well as an annual stipend, enough for you and your remaining children to live in modest luxury.

  I await your answer. If it is yes, my ambassador will bear her to me.

  Until your decision, I remain,

  Lord Alain

  Prince of the Summerwood

  Now the Bear sat back on its haunches and glanced from fretting father to avid mother and back again.

  “Oh, but isn’t this wonderful,” said Aigrette, rubbing her hands together and beaming, her usually downturned mouth smiling for the first time in months. “Our own Camille is to be married to a rich-”

  “But, Maman,” protested Camille, “I don’t wish to be wedded to someone I have never met.”

  “Hush, child,” replied the mother. “You knew someday we would arrange a marriage for you.”

  Lisette shoved forward. “But you should first arrange a marriage for me,” she angrily snapped, “for I am the eldest, while Camille is the youngest of all.”

  A clamor arose from the other girls, each crying out that they were certainly older than Camille, and the twins began arguing with each other as to which of the two had been born first, Gai crying, “Me!” and Joie crying, “No, me!”

  “Be quiet, all of you,” shouted Aigrette.

  When a disgruntled silence fell, Aigrette said, “Don’t you see, the prince asks no dowry, but instead will pay us a bride-price and an annual stipend for the hand of Camille. By accepting this proposal, not only will we have wealth to escape this dismal life your father has visited upon us, we will also have dowries for each of you, wealth to attract suitors.”

  With sharp intakes of breath, the girls looked at one another, realization illuminating the face of each. And then, clamoring, they turned to Camille, and she in turn looked at her father, tears in her eyes, but he could not meet her regard. In that moment Camille wished that Fra Galanni were there to comfort and advise her. Again she looked at her father and whispered, “Papa.”

  Henri turned to the Bear and said, “We will sleep on it.”

  “What?” demanded the mother in shock. “Sleep on it? Henri, the one who made the offer is a prince!”

  Henri flinched, but then took a deep breath and gritted his teeth. “I said, we will sleep on it.”

  The great white Bear grunted, and lay down and closed his ashen eyes.

  Henri took to his bed; Aigrette, sissing angrily, followed him. The girls, too, retired-Camille and the twins sharing the lower bunk, Lisette, Felise, and Colette sharing the upper-and Giles took to his cot by the fire.

  In spite of the blizzard, the cottage was cozier that night, made so by the presence of the Bear, his huge bulk shedding warmth into the room. Yet at the same time the chamber was distressingly chill, for Aigrette seethed in frigid ire. Camille lay a long time awake in the angry whispers coming from her parents’ bed-Aigrette raging at Henri, her furious hissings muted by the storm rampaging without and the great sleeping breaths of the Bear within.

  The next morning dawned to quiet, for the blizzard had blown itself out sometime in the night. At breakfast, at the mother’s urging, once again Camille read the letter to them all, and over their gruel they argued, and only Camille and Giles were opposed to the proposal: Camille would not wed someone she had never seen, and Giles would not lose the one sister he had come to love, who made him laugh and played riddle games and taught him echecs and who sang so sweetly. Henri did not speak, his ears weary from Aigrette’s late-night harangue. The mother and sisters, though, clamored for Camille to quickly accept the fact that it was a prince whom she would wed.

  The Bear sat silent, though he did share a bowl of the porridge with Camille, who had no appetite at all.

  Finally, Henri said, “We must write a response unto the prince.”

  “Papa,” said Camille, sighing, “we have no parchment, no pen, no ink.”

  “And even if we did have such,” hissed Lisette, “how would we know what she had written on any note we would send?”

  At this the Bear growled, and Lisette snapped her mouth shut.

  “He seems to know what we are saying,” said Aigrette, nodding toward the Bear. “Simply tell him that we accept and send him on his way to bring back the promised gold.”

  Tears in her eyes, Camille silently gazed at her father. Henri once again could not meet her mute stare. He turned to the Bear. “Come back in a sevenday, for then we will have our answer.”

  Angrily, Aigrette glared at him.

  Grunting, the Bear moved to the door, and, before anyone else could stir, Aigrette sprang to her feet and opened the wooden-planked panel and led the Bear outside. ’Round the corner of the cottage she went with him, and there she said, “Come prepared to pay the bride-price and bear Camille away, for I shall see to it that she goes with you.”

  The Bear growled low-whether in ire or agreement, Aigrette could not say-and then ambled away from the stone hovel and toward the twilight border of mysterious and dreaded Faery, for therein strange and terrible creatures did dwell, or so it was said. Hugging herself against the cold, Aigrette didn’t blink an eye as the Bear rambled across a pristine white field of new-fallen snow, leaving heavy tracks behind, to pass into the silvery twilight and vanish; but inside the cottage, with an eye pressed to a chink in the back wall, Camille watched as well, her heart beating swiftly in fright.

  3

  Decision

  “But, Maman, hemaybeoldbeyondyearsandugly,” cried Camille.

  Pushing out a hand in a swift motion of disallowance, Aigrette said, “Camille, if he’s old, then you will inherit his fortune and estates more quickly”-she gestured at the letter on the table-“and he is a prince with a great mansion and considerable lands.” She glanced at Henri. “And as for ugly, it matters not. After all, look at what I got.”

  For his part, Henri merely sighed.

  “Papa is not ugly,” re
butted Camille, reaching out to touch her father’s sleeve.

  “But Mere is right,” said Lisette. “And if the prince had made the same offer to me, as he should have, I would have accepted without hesitation. Camille, he is a prince!”

  “It is not yours to choose,” said Giles, receiving a glare from Lisette in return.

  “Your frere is right,” declared Aigrette. “It is not yours to choose, nor, I add, is it Camille’s to choose. It is mine to say whom she will marry, or no.”

  “What about Papa?” exclaimed Camille, turning to her sire. “Has he no voice in this whatsoever?”

  Henri sighed and peered at the floor.

  “Would you not marry a prince?” asked Joie.

  “Aye, a prince, ” echoed Gai.

  “But he lives in Faery among monsters dire and creatures fell,” said Camille, “a place Humans are not welcome.”

  “ Pah!” snorted Aigrette. “As far as not being welcome, the prince invited you, and so you are welcome to travel within that realm, to travel to his principality of Summerwood, for he wishes you there as his wife.”

  “But what of the peril?” asked Giles. “The monsters and other dire creatures of Faery? Ogres and Trolls, Bogles, Dragons, and Goblins like the Redcaps, who dye their hats in the blood of Humans, or so Papa says.”

  Although the other girls blenched, Lisette glanced at her brother, and then at Henri. “ Bah! As for things of peril, Camille will have the Bear for protection, and a finer guardian none could want.”

  Camille touched Giles’ hand in thanks, then looked at her mother. “Then answer me this, Maman: what if this Lord Prince is not right in the mind, a simpleton or other such.”

  “He would have to be a loon to have chosen you,” gibed Felise, her blue eyes dancing, her sprinkle of freckles wrinkling ’round her nose as she grinned.

  “This is no laughing matter, Felise,” said Camille, though she grinned at the light-brown-haired girl in return.

  “If he is simpleminded,” said Aigrette, “then you will command his wealth all the easier.”

  Camille sighed. “Then what if he has the deadly plague or some other spreading ill?”

  “All the better,” said Lisette, glancing at her mother, “for as Mere says, it means you will inherit sooner than late.”

  Camille glanced about the table. “What if the prince himself is a monster dire, a terrible thing to behold, perhaps even a murderer of women?”

  Even as the sisters’ eyes widened in alarm at this newly imagined possibility, Aigrette again pushed out a hand of negation. “Then you can merely run away, Camille, but only after we get the gold.”

  “Is that all you are interested in, Maman? The bride-price, the gold?”

  Aigrette gestured at the room. “Would you have us live in destitution, when wealth is within our grasp?”

  “Oh, Camille,” said Colette, turning to her sisters for support, “would you deny us dowries to attract suitors?”

  “Aye, dowries,” chimed in Gai, glancing at Joie, who added, “Would you have us be old maids?”

  “Do none of you think of aught but yourselves?” asked Giles in anger. “Camille is the only-” But the boy began gasping for air, leaving the rest of his words unsaid.

  Camille embraced the lad as he wheezed, and Aigrette’s eyes narrowed in cunning. “With the gold we can afford a healer for Giles, Camille. Would you deny him such relief?”

  Tears welled in Camille’s eyes, and she did not answer her dam.

  “Yes, a doctor for Giles,” said Lisette, following her mother’s lead. “We could afford the medicine needed to make him well.”

  “D-don’t pay h-heed,” panted Giles, but he could say no more.

  “With the gold, we could have a bigger and better house,” declared Aigrette. “One of warmth and light. One where Giles could escape the draft and damp and dust of this hovel.”

  “And warm clothes,” added Felise. “Something to keep Giles cozy.”

  Catching his breath at last, Giles said, “Oh, Camille, I don’t need doctors that badly. You shouldn’t go off to an unknown fate, no matter the count of coin.”

  Camille smiled at the entirely too-thin nine-year-old, but she knew in spite of his bravado that he was truly ill.

  And thus did the arguments and harangues go for the full sevenday: the mother harping that she deserved a better life, the one her failure of a husband had promised her when they first were wed, “… but look at what he gave me instead”; the father looking everywhere but at Camille, though often tears ran down his cheeks, for he knew that his achievements as a provider had never amounted to much, and whatever spirit he might have once had as a young man had been nagged into abject submission; the sisters’ eyes lighting up at the thought of rich dowries and the suitors to come; and all the women arguing that with the gold they could afford a doctor for Giles, even though Giles denied that a doctor or medicine or other such was needed, that he was healthy enough.

  … And so, all told, did a sevenday pass.

  And late in the evening of the seventh day, just as the sun was setting, the great white Bear came padding across the snow and to the stone cottage plank door, where he gave the panel a heavy knock. Rushing to the entryway, Aigrette flung it wide. “Come in, Monsieur Bear, Ambassador of the Prince.” Aigrette moved aside. The Bear swung its head this way and that as if seeking, and then he stepped inward, making straight for Camille. ’Round his girth was a harness on which were affixed bundles, several on each side. The Bear presented a flank to the girl and looked over his shoulder at her. “ Whuff, ” he breathed, and nuzzled the pack-roll at hand.

  Camille loosened the thongs holding the bundle fast and set the whole of it on the table.

  “Untie it, untie it,” demanded Gai, jittering from one foot to another.

  “Yes, do,” added her twin, fidgeting at Gai’s side.

  Inside was clothing, all of it sized to fit Camille. First revealed was a splendid dark green, all-weather cloak, made of a woolen cloth. Then came soft leather trousers and a leather vest and boots and cotton socks, all of these dark brown. Next revealed was a jerkin, made of pale green silk, and green silk full-length hosiery. Lastly came undergarments, made of green silk as well. Father and mother and sisters and even Giles ooh ed and ahh ed over the richness of the attire.

  Camille sighed. “Travelling clothes.” Then she turned to the Bear. “But, O Bear, I have not said I would go.”

  The sisters gasped, and Felise whined, “Oh, Camille, but you must, else we will be without dowries.”

  “Nonsense,” snapped Aigrette, stepping to Camille’s side, but addressing the Bear. “She will go.”

  “I have neither said yea nor nay, Maman,” replied Camille, glancing at her father, but Henri merely hung his head.

  Now Joie and Gai broke into tears, and Lisette ground her teeth in fury. Felise plopped down in a chair and moaned, while Colette cried out, “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!”

  Of a sudden the Bear gave a great roar, shocking them all into silence, all but Giles, that is, for he began wheezing and gasping, desperately struggling for breath. And then his eyes rolled up in his head and he collapsed to the floor, falling slack as if slain. Camille was the first to reach him, and though the lad was unconscious, his lungs yet fought for air.

  “See what you’ve done, Camille,” hissed Aigrette. “Had we gold we could make him well.”

  With tears in her eyes, Camille embraced Giles, and weeping, she whispered, “You win, Maman. I will go.”

  That night in her bed, Camille was awakened by someone slipping out the door, and by the glow of an ember or two yet remaining on the hearth, she could see that the Bear was gone. She eased out from the lower bunk, and only the harness and the remaining bundles lay where he had been. And she thought that perhaps even Bears needed to relieve themselves. After reassuring herself that sleeping Giles breathed peacefully, Camille crawled back under the blanket with Joie and Gai and quickly fell aslumber. She did not stir wh
en the door opened again, but awakened later to see the Bear once more lying nigh the center of the room.

  The next morning Henri found a small wooden case on the table, and when he opened it he gave a great shout, for it was filled to the brim with gold coins. “The bride-price!” he called out. “The bride-price has come, and, oh, what riches we have!”

  Aigrette leapt from her bed and rushed to the board, while daughters scrambled up and to the table as well, Joie and Gai scuttling over Camille to do so. Camille sat up and glanced at Giles, to see him looking at her. He smiled his quirky smile and rose from his cot and made his way to the table, too, where he found Aigrette testing each coin by biting down with her teeth.

  The Bear merely sat and watched.

  “But wait, Maman,” said Lisette to her mother, glancing at the Bear, “what if this is merely a glamour and nought but fairy gold, to turn to dross in the light of the sun?”

  At Lisette’s words a low growl rumbled in the Bear’s chest, but Aigrette’s eyes flew wide. “Here, here,” she snapped, grabbing up the wooden case and scooping the gold from the table and within. She hied past the Bear to take it outside and into the sunlight, and he made no move to stop her.

  Moments later she came dancing back in, holding the case of coins on high and crowing, “It’s real. It is truly gold,” for in the direct rays of the sun none of the coins had changed to iron or lead or other base metal or slag, or to rubbish of any kind.

  The Bear sniffed as if to say, “You doubted?”

  After a breakfast of gruel, the Bear sharing Camille’s bowl, with father and mother and the sisters all chatting gaily and the gold heaped on the table, Camille sighed and looked about at her family. Only Giles seemed pensive, and tears stood behind his eyes, for he would not lose his dear sister. Wiping her own brimming tears with the heels of her hands, Camille smiled at her brother and murmured, “It will be all right, Frere.” He grinned his crooked grin at her, but his heart wasn’t in the smile.