Foretold (14 page)

Essylt wanted to throw up, but she hadn’t eaten all day, and she could only cough up bile, bitter and acidic.

The soldier behind the cage rode closer and banged his sword on the bars. “Don’t choke to death, Princess, we’ve a long way to go yet.”

The journey to the wild forests of the north took a week. There were two soldiers: one who drove the wagon, and one who rode behind. They gave her a bowl of water every night that she had to lap up like a dog, and once or twice the driver slipped her a piece of dried beef out of pity, but she was given no other food. Neither of the soldiers ever let her out, so Essylt was forced to relieve herself in one corner, humiliated by the stench that began to rise from her body.

She watched the countryside when she was awake, but as the days passed and she grew weaker, she slid into a half-sleeping doze in which she saw Sadiya’s face hovering over her, radiant and beautiful. She clung to those visions as tightly as she could, the memory of the last words that Sadiya had said echoing in her mind:
You are mad, my love. Mad, my love. Mad
.

Finally, they reached the pine-forested border of Anvarra. The driver drew the wagon to a halt in a small clearing in the woods and climbed down from his seat. The soldier riding behind dismounted, pulling a black iron key from the chain attached to his swordbelt. Inside the cage, Essylt sat stiffly with her arms around her knees, her bright green eyes wide in her pale face. The soldier unlocked the cage door, which groaned open on its hinges.

“Welcome to your new home,” he said, and laughed. “Time to get out.”

Essylt didn’t move until the soldier reached inside and clamped one hand on her ankle. Frightened, she kicked him in the face. He cursed as blood spurted from his nose, then grabbed both of her ankles, his nails digging into her skin, and dragged her out until she landed with a bruising thump on the ground.

“Never seen a man except your father, eh?” he said, and the tone in his voice made her skin crawl. He began to unbuckle his belt.

Essylt tried to scramble away, but she only banged into the wagon wheel behind her.

“There’s a reason you turned out wrong,” the soldier was saying, a horrible grin on his face. “You need to learn what’s right—”

“Shut up,” said the driver. He smashed a wooden staff into the side of the soldier’s head, knocking him to ground, unconscious. The driver shook his head and looked down at the princess. He had a sister her age, and he would never forgive himself if he let the soldier have his way with her. Even if she
was
perverse. He jerked his head toward the woods. “You’d better run for it, Princess. You’re on your own now.”

Essylt didn’t hesitate. She jumped up, her legs tingling as she stood for the first time in seven days, and she fled.

She ran over unbroken forest ground, her thin-soled court shoes doing little to cushion her feet from fallen twigs and upturned stones. She ran as the daylight faded and turned the forest into a land of murky shadows, and she slowed down only enough to prevent herself from tripping on the uneven ground. She found a riverbed where the trees parted to reveal a sliver of black night sky strewn with stars, and she knelt down and drank the water from her cupped and dirty hands, and then she kept going.

At some point she removed her whalebone corset so that
she could breathe more freely. She stripped off her encumbering underskirts and wrapped her torn shoes in the cloth to cushion her feet. When she was too tired to walk any farther, she made a nest for herself in a bed of fallen pine needles and slept with her head resting on her arms. When she awoke, she continued. She saw no one.

She was hungry, but she did not know what she could eat in the forest, and her book learning had taught her to be wary of unfamiliar plants. A few times she thought she glimpsed the shadowy movement of wolves nearby, and she prayed to the God of Safe Passage to watch over her. She did not know where she was going, but she knew she had a destination. With every step she took, even though her body felt weaker and weaker, she was more and more certain that she had something to live for. Sadiya.
Sadiya
. Someday, she vowed, she would go back for her. She would return to Anvarra City and save her, and King Radek would pay for what he had done.

One morning, after Essylt had walked in a stubborn, starving daze for hours through the dark night, she stumbled through the last of the pine trees into a clearing where she saw a little cottage built of logs. Smoke curled out of the chimney, and the windows were hung with cheerful plaid curtains. She dragged herself the last few steps into the clearing before she collapsed, her body giving up at last.

The cottage belonged to a retired knight named Bowen, who lived there with his wife, Nell. It was Nell who discovered Essylt later that morning, lying in a crumpled heap at the edge of their garden, and it was Bowen who lifted the princess in his burly arms and carried her inside, laying her down on their bed.

Essylt did not wake until evening, and the first thing she
saw was an older woman rocking in a chair nearby, knitting. Essylt was not frightened, for the woman had a kind face and reminded her of Auda, but she was disoriented, and she pushed herself up and asked, “Where am I?”

Nell put down her knitting and studied the girl, whose eyes were a remarkable shade of green. Her reddish-gold hair was disheveled and knotted up, and her face was dirty. In fact, all of her was so dirty that she smelled rather unpleasant, but neither Nell nor Bowen would turn away a girl who so obviously needed their help simply because she also needed a bath.

“You’re in the village of Pine Rest,” Nell told her, speaking with an unfamiliar accent. “I found you in our garden this morning. I am Nell, and my husband’s name is Bowen. He is outside. What is your name?”

Essylt stared at the woman, whose gray hair was wound up in braids coiled at the nape of her neck. She seemed kind, and Essylt wanted to trust her, but a knot of fear still held tight within her, and she did not wish to reveal her true identity. “My name is Auda,” Essylt said, and flushed slightly at the lie.

Nell nodded. “You must be hungry.”

Essylt’s stomach awoke at those words and growled so loudly that it embarrassed her. But Nell only smiled and got up from her chair. She left the little room and came back a few minutes later with a bowl of soup. “Something gentle for you,” she said, “while you regain your strength.”

Essylt took the bowl from Nell’s outstretched hands and inhaled the fragrant scent of broth and herbs. She drank every last delicious drop, and then lay down again in Nell and Bowen’s bed and fell asleep instantly, feeling safe at last.

In the morning she met Bowen, who was large and gentle and had lost all his hair except for the bushy white eyebrows
that seemed to speak long sentences on their own. She learned that the village of Pine Rest was just over the border from Anvarra in the neighboring kingdom of Ferronia. Essylt remembered from Auda’s geography lessons that Ferronia was rarely concerned with Anvarran politics because the Black Forest that separated the two countries was mostly impassable—and this Essylt could now attest to personally, having crossed it herself on foot. Bowen had been a knight serving the king of Ferronia, but after many years of service he had retired to the village where he had been born. Bowen and Nell’s son, Petra, was a swordsmith whose forge was in Pine Rest, and Petra drew much of his business from Bowen’s old knightly acquaintances.

As the days passed, Essylt regained her strength while Bowen and Nell fussed over her as if she were their long-lost daughter. They set up a pallet for her in the loft over the main room of the cottage, and Essylt began to help out with the chores. She grew strong from tending the garden with Nell and learning how to chop wood with Bowen’s hatchet. And though she came to know the other villagers and to love Bowen and Nell, she kept her secret. Pine Rest might be far from Anvarra City, but the news of Princess Essylt’s depravity had reached Ferronia via traveling minstrels who sang of her tragic lust for the queen. Essylt worried that Bowen and Nell would turn their backs on her in disgust if they knew who she was, so she grew accustomed to being called Auda, and swallowed her own feelings of shame and sorrow. Every day, she thought of Sadiya and her vow to return for her. Every night before she slept, she whispered Sadiya’s name to herself so that she might never forget how to pronounce it.

She spoke with Petra, who had traveled to Anvarra because of his skill as a swordsmith, and began to plot her own return journey. She laid aside a store of food, stealing as
little as she could. From the old trunks in the loft where she slept, she discovered a cloak that was moth-eaten but could still keep her warm at night. She felt guilty for taking these things from Nell and Bowen, but she promised herself she would return one day and pay them back if she could. She did not let herself think of where she and Sadiya might go. Was there a place in this world that would have them? She did not know, and it was easier to accept the emptiness of not knowing than to face the fact that she might rescue Sadiya and still fail in giving her a happy life.

One morning she awoke and her body felt ready. She was strong and healthy again, and she had finally stocked enough provisions to last for the several weeks’ journey to Anvarra. But when she went outside to pump water as usual, snow was falling from the sky. She stood on the doorstep in shock as white flakes tumbled down, thick and fast, from iron-gray clouds. How had the summer passed so quickly? She hoped that the snowfall was an early anomaly and that it would only delay her journey by a day or two.

But the snow continued to fall, and it stuck to the ground, and the air became colder and colder until, weeks later, Essylt had to admit that winter had come early and hard, and she would not be able to journey to Anvarra until spring.

It was Nell who found her, weeping silently at the woodpile, her tears turning to ice crystals on her cheeks. “My dear,” Nell said, “whatever is the matter? Come inside and be warm.”

That night, exhausted from the subterfuge, Essylt told her the truth. “I am Essylt,” she said, and speaking her own name out loud broke a dam inside her and she sobbed. Nell gathered her into her arms and stroked her hair and rocked her back and forth as if she were a baby. “I am Essylt,” she said again and again. When at last her tears were spent, she
told them of growing up in the West Tower, and the unexpected joy she had felt when she met Sadiya, and the anguish of being forced apart. She told them of her plan to rescue Sadiya, and finally, her voice diminished to a tentative whisper, she said, “I will leave if you will not have me here any longer. You have been so kind to me, and I have only defiled your home.”

Bowen had sat silently in the corner as Essylt confessed her truth, but as Nell’s hands stilled on Essylt’s hair, he said, “It is never a crime to love someone.”

Essylt looked at him in surprise.

Anger darkened Bowen’s face. “The king of Anvarra is a bastard. In the spring you shall ride to Anvarra City and save your true love, and we will help you.”

“But—but why?” Essylt asked.

Nell had drawn back a little, and Essylt saw that tears streaked down Nell’s face as well. She shook her head. “My dear, we love you like a daughter. That is why.”

As Essylt looked from Nell to Bowen, she felt as if her heart might overflow with gratitude and love for them. “I have never felt like anyone’s daughter,” she said, “but I will do my best to make you proud.”

All winter, Essylt trained with Bowen. “You will need to learn to fight,” he said to her, “for the king will not give up his wife without a battle.”

Bowen took down the old tools of his trade from the attic: his broadsword, which was so big that Essylt had to carry it with two hands, and his armor, which was now darkened with rust. During the days, he forced her to run through snowdrifts with the sword strapped to her back until sweat streamed down her face. At night, she helped him polish the armor until it gleamed. It was too large for her, but Bowen
said that Petra could adjust it to her size. And so she began to visit Petra at the forge, where he fitted various pieces of steel to her, muttering under his breath about fashioning a special breastplate.

Essylt could not understand why Petra was willing to do this for her. She knew that he knew who she was now, for he called her Essylt instead of Auda. She thought perhaps he was simply his father’s son, and would not speak out against anyone his father loved. It wasn’t until well past midwinter when she noticed the way Petra spoke to the blacksmith who shared the forge with him: Markus, a broad-shouldered, black-bearded man who sometimes came to supper at Nell and Bowen’s home. There was a certain angle to Petra’s body as he approached Markus, and then Essylt saw him reach out and smooth his hand gently over the man’s shoulder: a caress. Essylt realized with a jolt that Petra did not merely share the forge with the smith; he shared a life with him. She felt a great sense of wonder steal over her, and she had to turn away as tears came to her eyes.

From that day on, she felt as if she had found her family. She would hate to leave them in the spring, but she could come back. She could come back with Sadiya, and they could be happy here.

Petra finished the full suit of armor in late winter. It was light and well balanced, but when Essylt put it on she felt the strength of the steel close against her muscles, and she knew that it would protect her. To her surprise, Petra also presented her with a sword, forged specially for her height and weight, and the first time she swung it in an arc, it sang in the cold winter air.

She spent the last month of winter parrying with Bowen, and sometimes with Markus, who had been a knight’s squire in his boyhood. She learned how to ride a horse in full armor,
her red-gold hair braided and coiled beneath her helm. She learned how to force back a man twice her size with her sleek, elegant sword, her gauntleted hands gripping the beautiful hilt that Petra had designed. And she thought of Sadiya, as she always did, keeping her face alive in her memory, as fresh as the first day she had seen her, standing behind the oak door to the West Tower, swathed in azure scarves.