The elf laughed.
“You didn't frighten me, child. Come in! Would you like some tea? Well, of course you'd like some tea! Here, I'll put on the kettle.”
Edora stood at the door still, though the elf had already busied herself, turning and twirling through the kitchen. She poked at the fire, frowned once, poked it again and smiled as it roared in voluminous hunger. When she looked up and saw Edora still standing there in the door, she said, in her most welcoming voice,
“Please do come in! I'm Moira. There's a chill in the air, isn't there?”
Edora didn't know whether to agree or not. It certainly seemed like the question was poised at her. Truthfully, though, Edora had no idea if there were a chill in the air or not. Everything felt different in human flesh.
Edora didn't have time to worry about whether she was supposed to reply to the elf or not, for in the next instant the elf had already rattled on,
“We'll get you some nice scones to have with that tea. Blueberry or cranberry?”
Edora didn't have the slightest idea which she liked more, but the elf apparently was not talking to her anyway.
“Blueberry, yes.”
Swept inside by the elf, as though she were wind sliding under the door, Edora found herself cocooned in the warmth of the small house. Thankfully, the door allowed Edora to enter and she was not required to squeeze into the miniscule measurements of the doors that covered the tree trunks.
The tree stood, rooted into the ink-black earth. Its branches jutted out from its sides, as though it stood with its hands on its hips. Of course, a tree had no hips. Rose-hips did populate the vines that swirled around the bark though. The elves plucked them from the branches for their tea.
“Sifted through a melody, they made the finest brew. That's the official recipe.”
“Sifted through a melody? What do you mean?”
“The story, like many good ones, is an ancient one, child,” the elf said. Edora had thought that she would have to content herself with that as the only explanation, for the elf fell silent after these words. Then standing, the elf bustled around the kitchen, plucking two more warm scones from the oven and depositing them on the china plate in front of Edora. After she'd ensured that Edora's tea cup was full, brimming to the top and steaming lazily toward the ceiling, she resumed her tale. It was then that Edora was reminded that elves tell time differently than most creatures. Elves have all the time in the world. They can be slower, more deliberate in their stories. Tea, scones, and carrot soup though, or making sure that one is warmed beside the fire, these things are not to be waited upon. These must be accomplished without delay, with the promise of haste. Stories though ripened the longer one sat beside the fire. There was no need to rush them. For they were beautiful no matter when they began.
“An elf harp is a highly treasured possession. Have you seen one?”
Edora shook her head.
The elf nodded.
“I will show you one sometime. Remind me. It's a lovely thing, singing with notes that always tell the truth.”
At this, Edora smiled, her eyebrows crinkling in puzzlement.
“That means,” the elf elaborated, “That no note is ever out of tune. My people like to build beautiful words around our explanations, child. We do not mean to leave the other creatures out or to seem mysterious. It is merely our way.” Edora nodded, to show that she understood.
The elf took a sip of tea and gestured that Edora should do the same. She picked up the teacup tentatively. Still, it felt awkward to hold something in her hands and to sip slowly, so that she would not burn herself, and not to lap at the pool's edge.
“The perfection of the notes come from the construction of the harp itself. The strings are made of silver and gold, always spun on Rumpelstiltskin's spinning wheel.”
“Who is Rump— Rumpy— Rumpel—elstiltskin?” Edora said, tripping over the massive name as though it were a pair of boots left in the middle of the room.
“Who is Rumpelstiltskin?” the elf said, laughing with glee, “Why, he's the man who spins straw to gold and hay to silver!”
“And silver and gold are used to make elves' harps?” Edora said, trying to keep up.
“Aye, that they are,” the elf said, “And so my deer” – she said it for she did not know who Edora was – or rather had been – and that she should not say it any longer – “you see why we say the tea is strained with a melody. The leaves always filter through the leftover silver and gold strands from a harp.”
When they had finished their tea, Moira reached into her pocket.
“For you, child,” the elf said, pressing the tiny ball of silver and gold threads into Edora's hands, “A present, so that you will always ring true.”
Edora placed her hand protectively around the silver and gold threads, as she walked away from the forest. The sun was dipping low in the sky, like a diver into a pool of water and she needed to return to the palace. As she felt Moira's gift in her pocket, her heart pulsed with beauty.
Chapter Twenty
Philip
Philip didn't want to do it. His life was his own. That's what he had determined. Yet, here he was, walking step-by-step toward the tower where Aurora had been placed. He'd gone through numerous scenarios in his mind, trying to make some sense of it. Was there anything that he could do to save them all, by not doing this?
The shadows crisscrossed over the stairs, running circles around him. Philip's feet lumbered up the planks. Something prickled in the pit of Philip's stomach, as though he were being stung by poison ivy or nettles. It wasn't just about his love for Midnight. It was bigger than even that. Something had happened; it wasn't right. But, there was nothing logical that he could think of to convince himself why he had his gnawing doubt. Worse, he had no hope of believing his intuition, not now. For his intuition had never told him that he was a prince, that he was anything other than a groom for a horse.
Aurora had been placed in the tower, against Midnight's protestations.
“It's for the best,” their mother had said, “It will allow her spirit to be nearer the sky, so that she can see her way back to us.” Midnight couldn't argue with that.
Philip didn't know whether he took much stake in that. The way he saw it, Aurora could find her way back easier if she weren't at the top of a tower of winding stairs. He moved a cobweb aside as he mounted the steps. His boots slipped. He looked up at the ceiling spiraling above him. A steady drip leaked from the half-timbered roof.
He'd have to fix that later. It was second nature to mentally assemble the hammer, the nails and the ladder that he would need to fix the room. But waking a princess, because he was a prince? This was nothing that he was used to.
His breathing caught in his throat, not from the steps, from the heaviness of this duty.
“Come on, Philip. This is bigger than you.”
Those words were enough to propel him forward. He put his hand to the door and pushed it open. A guard stood here. Philip blinked when he saw him, having forgot that he would be here.
“I – ” he began, not at all sure what to say. How did one explain that he was here to kiss the princess awake because it was his destiny?
“We were told to expect you.”
“Who's we?”
“The other guards. You were longer than expected.”
Philip nodded, suddenly ashamed that he'd shirked this duty. It wasn't like him. He'd never run from mucking out the stalls. He'd never questioned having less luxury in his life. But this was so utterly foreign.
“I'm sorry,” Philip said, trying to apologize, stumbling over the words.
“Doesn't matter to me,” the guard said, “I'm simply here to do my duty.” He turned at that and left the room. The words stung Philip. Did the guard have any idea just what Philip's duty was, as he taunted him with it? For that matter, did he even realize that he was taunting him?
The room was empty and the footsteps of the guard died down, as he descended the stair
case. All was quiet, eerily so. And then Philip turned.
She lay there, still, asleep and unable to move, free of judgment. Philip looked at her and whatever anger that he felt slipped away. How could he be mad at her? It wasn't her fault. She hadn't arranged their futures. How could he harbor ill feelings toward one who lay there so fragile? Yes, fragile. It was an odd word, one he never would have attached to the fierce Aurora who yelled at him for not catching Midnight from her horse. Though she was the younger sister, she was the protector— the protector. Yes, perhaps, Aurora and Philip were not so unalike after all. They both loved Midnight and would do anything to protect her. Was that reason enough for them to agree to marry, to follow through on the commitment made on their behalf and to protect all of them?
The ticking of the clock was the only sound in the room. He counted the ticks, biding his time, wondering if he could slip from this place. It'd be so easy. Turn and leave. That's all he had to do.
“Psst!”
Philip ignored the sound, convinced that it was only wind. Nothing shook the window panes.
“Psst! Over here,” a voice broke into the stillness of the room.
Philip lifted his eyes to locate the source of the words. Nearly hidden by the grain of the wood, Philip saw a woodland elf step from the shadows.
“You're real,” Philip said.
“You certainly don't sound surprised,” the elf answered, nodding with a smile, as though he knew that Philip would not be.
“I thought I dreamed you, but – ”
“Yes?” the elf said, encouraging him to continue.
“They told me you weren't real. I mean, Father told me, although he told me quite a lot that I no longer know to be truth. Anyway – all of that aside – I always felt –”
“Yes?” the elf said again. He never could understand this human habit of curiously breaking off sentences in the middle. With an elf standing before him, there was no need for Philip's hesitation. If anything, this ought to have convinced Philip to speak up all the more, especially because of this particular elf's identity.
“I thought that you were real. I felt it somehow or something, if that makes any sense.”
“Of course it makes sense,” the elf said, smiling, “You saw me in the forest.”
“I did?” Philip said.
The elf nodded.
“When your friend was following you.”
“But, you were so much... taller than... your coloring was all different.”
Fedderlin shrugged.
“Elves are like trees. We change with the seasons and with the surroundings. Not everyone recognizes us when they see us again.”
Philip nodded.
“I see,” he said, trying to make sense of it all, though really he didn't see at all.
“Besides, it makes sense that you would believe in me. I am after all Fedderlin.”
“Fedderlin?” Philip said.
“Yes, Philip?”
He blinked at that. The elf noticed.
“Ah, I see that I know you but you don't know me.”
Philip nodded, pretty sure that he knew what he'd agreed to and not yet entirely convinced.
“Fedderlin, at your service,” the elf said now, as means of proper introduction. He extended his hand. Being polite, Philip struck out his own hand. It dwarfed Fedderlin's. Philip didn't know quite how to shake an elf's hand, but Fedderlin took over all of that. He shook Philip's hand, with the slightest of touches so that Philip half-wondered if only air had tickled his hand and not the handshake of a new acquaintance.
“I am the one who brought you here,” Fedderlin said now.
“Here? To the castle?”
“To this moment.”
Philip shook his head.
“I don't understand.”
Fedderlin didn't answer. Instead, he walked to Aurora's bedside, showed no surprise that she was asleep and bent nearer to her. He listened to her breathing. The stillness of her breath was near impossible for human ears to detect, but Fedderlin's elf ears seemed able to hear it with ease. He drew a pocket watch from his checked waistcoat and took her hand in his own. Philip was deserted, with all of his thoughts turned toward Aurora as he took her pulse.
Fedderlin stepped back, a frown on his face.
“What's wrong? Is something the matter?” Philip jumped forward, leaping whatever boundary had psychologically separated him from Aurora. He needed her to be OK. Yes. He didn't just want her to be all right. He needed it, as assuredly as he needed to take his next breath.
“Not wrong,” Fedderlin said, glancing up at Philip and then returning his attention to Aurora.
“You look worried,” Philip said.
“Do I?” Fedderlin said, not bothering to shift his gaze from Aurora this time. He wasn't bewitched by her or captivated by her beauty. Rather, he was like a physician, attending to her.
“What's happening to me?” Philip said, eying Fedderlin suspiciously now. Elves were notorious for tricks.
“Whatever do you mean? Are you quite all right?” Fedderlin said.
“No. I am not all right. I – ”
But, he knew he could not finish the sentence. How could he admit that he knew something was wrong because he now cared for another? Genuine concern ought not to have elicited alarm. But, it had. The realization shamed his cheeks, as though with the pigment of Aurora's briar roses. Fedderlin did not notice the creeping color over Philip's cheeks and he was accustomed to that curious human habit of lopping off sentences and so he remained, bent over Aurora, without turning or prodding for him to go on.
“Here,” Fedderlin said, reaching into his pocket and then tossing something at Philip. He did so without turning. Philip stretched to catch a vial that fell into his hands.
“What's this?”
“What you need to revive you of whatever ails you.”
So, he had heard.
“Really, I'm fine. I – ”
“Drink it, Prince Philip. You'll feel better.”
Philip staggered backward, as though the words were metal rods prodding him into place and not mere combinations of letters.
“Yes, Philip. I know that you are a prince. I know that you are in love with another woman. And I know that it's your duty to wake the princess.” He clicked his pocket watch shut and turned as he spoke. Now as he finished his speech, he stood fully facing Philip.
“You? How do you know that?”
“Because, Philip – ” This time he dropped the Prince, his point having stuck, “As I said, I am the one that brought you here, to this moment.”
“You are behind all of this? You are the evil power?” Philip said. His voice shook slightly as he said it, not in fear, but as if he did not trust that he was actually asking this question.
“Philip, listen to me. This is important. I am not your enemy. I never have been. If you want out of this, you have to trust me. Now, hurry, we haven’t much time.”
“So, something is wrong then,” Philip said, annoyed that Fedderlin was toying with him, but even more so, concerned for Aurora's well-being.
“Not wrong,” Fedderlin said, “simply ahead of schedule. We have lost time to make up for. Now, come along, quickly. No more dawdling.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Edora
Edora sank into the book. That was the only way to describe it. As if the pages had arms that reached up, enveloping her, she fell through the words. The ink, dried for centuries from the hands of the monks and scribes or later from the printing presses, sang to her. It was the most intense music that she'd heard, the greatest melody to exist and Moira's gift in her pocket seemed to buzz in agreement. Breathless, she devoured them.
“More,” she'd say, as she lay aside a book and picked up the next. Adam would laugh at her, not out of cruelty, but in admiration, in sheer delight. He'd cock his head to the side, not so unlike the birds of the forest,
“You are charming,” he'd say and he meant it.
“I thought the prin
ces were the ones meant to be charming,” she said, looking up just briefly from the book. It was important that she learn all of this.
“Ah, so it's fairytales you're reading,” he said with a smile.
“Fairytales? Are they like elf stories?”
He chuckled at that. She was amusing. Edora knew that he found her to be, even if she were not sure why, even if she didn't understand that it was the angle of the light falling over the wave in her hair and the touch of her hand that sent his pulse racing. These were the things that delighted him, which he found insatiable as she consumed the books.
She'd thought that she would have to learn to read. When he'd plucked a book, carefully chosen, from the shelf and deposited it in her hand, she'd been thrilled and she'd also been terrified. For she couldn't open the book. If she did, that would mean reading it. And she couldn’t read it. She'd never learned. How could a deer have learned such a thing? But, she was an adult human, not a child, and just as she had known how to walk, how to eat, how to speak, reading too was something that her new form acquired naturally.
“Where is it?” an elf burst through the door that had long been concealed in the library.
“Fedderlin?” Edora said.
She recognized him instantly and just behind him was Philip.
“Edora? Is that you? Gracious, child, you look – ” Here, he employed a habit of the humans and cut himself off abruptly. She looked more human and less like a deer than when he'd seen her last. He looked from her to Adam and then to the book in her lap. Perhaps, there was a good reason that she looked so different and so human.
“You look lovely,” he continued, “How have you been?”
“Good,” she said, catching his eye to confirm that she meant it. Yes, he knew that she'd transformed and yes, she really was all right. The bond sealed between them, he turned his attention to Adam.
“You must be the new librarian,” Fedderlin said, turning to Adam.
“Not exactly new,” he said, not wanting to argue but wanting to be exact, “I have been here five years.”
“Yes, how lovely to be a part of a new job!” Fedderlin said, every inch the elf.
While Aurora Slept- The Complete Trilogy Page 15
