Dearest (9 page)

The children met Friday with hugs and kisses. Niall was tall for his age, with spiky blond hair and spectacles. Rhiannon was very much a child of the earth, with her cornflower-blue eyes and freckle-kissed nose.

“The woman sitting beside me is my sister,” Friday whispered to the children. Niall’s eyes got wide, and she gently turned his face from the meadow so none of the other children would see his reaction. “We have something very important to ask you, but I don’t want to cause a scene. Please greet her as my sister and not . . . anything else. Do you understand?” Niall, still stunned, nodded silently. Rhiannon, on the other hand, smiled broadly and jumped right into Sunday’s lap.

The resulting giggles made Friday’s heart soar. There were few ailments for which a child’s laughter was not a panacea.

It wasn’t in Niall’s makeup to be as unrestrained as his little sister, and Friday felt for the boy. “How may we be of assistance, my . . . er . . . miss . . .” He looked to Friday for help.

“Why don’t we call her ‘Aunt Sunday,’ for now?” Friday suggested.

“Oh, ‘Aunt Sunday’! I like that. Makes me sound all dignified.” Sunday proceeded to demonstrate her capacity for said dignity by tickling Rhiannon mercilessly.

“. . . Aunt Sunday,” finished Niall.

Sunday instantly sobered and sat with her back ramrod-straight. In her lap, Rhiannon did the same. “Thank you, Sir Niall. Yes, let’s get down to business. My problem is thus: Like a silly person, I have invited too many guests into my home. Now I need to find a way to feed them all. Aunt Friday here seems to think you two might help me with some ideas.”

“How many people?” Niall asked sagely.

Sunday pulled no punches. “The entire castle.”

Niall thought a moment, contemplating the true scope of the issue, and then shook his head. “Even if Mama and Papa still had their farm, we would never be able to feed so many people. I’m sorry, Aunt Sunday.”

But Sunday was not put off so easily. “Pretend the castle here—the palace and all the grounds—were your farm. How would you work it? What would you bring to market to sell?”

“Berries!” Rhiannon shouted jovially.

“That’s a good start,” said Sunday. “Do we have many berry bushes here?”

“There are quite a few along the creek that feeds the pond,” said Niall. “They go deep into the woods. We snack on them sometimes after lunch . . . but we’d need an army to pick them all.”

“I just so happen to have an army,” said Sunday. “What else?”

“There are apple trees back in the woods,” said Niall. “Some are just crabapples, but they’re all about ripe now.”

“Cook could work magic with those crabapples,” said Sunday. “She’s a very good cook.”

“There are also patches of wild onions,” Niall added, growing more excited about this palace-farm project. “I’ve taught most of the kids here about them, but not everyone likes to eat them raw . . .”

“A handful of the boys here love them,” said Friday. “You could pick them out of this crowd just by their scent.”

Niall was on a roll. “. . . dandelions, violets, clover, rampion root . . .”

“Ooh, ooh!” Rhiannon wiggled in Sunday’s lap. “I know! I know!”

“What is it, darling?” asked Sunday.

“Nettles!” shouted Rhiannon.

Friday froze.

Niall pulled a face. “Nonny, only Gran eats nettles.”

Rhiannon stuck her tongue out at her brother. “Just because you don’t like them doesn’t mean other people won’t.” She played with the ends of Sunday’s scarf. “Gran does all sorts of things with nettles. She makes tea and beer and mashes them up and eats them and everything.”

“You can make cloth from them, too,” Friday said in a daze. “Like flax. But . . .” she shook off the giddy dream the coincidence had sparked. It was too good to be true, too perfect to think that the answer to the swan brothers’ curse had presented itself so quickly. “But, Rhiannon, honey, we’d need lots of nettles for that. Bushels and bushels.”

Rhiannon hopped up and offered Friday and Sunday her hands. “Come. You’ll see.”

Niall hesitated until Sunday offered her free hand to him; he accepted it with a smile. The white pigeons followed, dancing on drafts of air above their heads. They rounded the pond and let Rhiannon drag them up the hill on the other side . . . all the way to Cook’s walled herb garden. The swans’ honking outside the gate caught Elisa-Rampion’s attention as they passed, and she followed the small party.

There was a dense thicket of golden grass behind the garden almost as high as Rhiannon’s head, but the girl waded straight into it, unafraid. When they emerged on the other side, Rhiannon spread her arms and held them up to the heavens in triumph. “Behold!”

Sunday cheered.

Niall groaned.

Friday smiled.

Elisa-Rampion said nothing, only crossed her thin arms over her chest and waited.

The field before them was full of nettles, their green stalks standing prickly and proud in the afternoon sun. They ran wild all the way from the walled garden to the edge of the forest that bordered the castle lands. The white pigeons took refuge in the brush behind the children instead of seeking a perch among the stinging weeds.

Apart from being extremely fortuitous, there was something odd about this meadow . . . Friday examined the field with the eye of someone who had tended many gardens in her young life. These nettles had been cared for, watered, and weeded around. They had taken over this field by design, not by luck at all.

Clever Elisa! She’d used the plant lore she’d learned from Cook to fashion the key to unlocking her family’s curse!

“Thank you, Niall. And thank you, Rhiannon, my little star.” Sunday caught up the small girl in a big hug. “This could work!”

Friday turned to Elisa. “This could work.”

Elisa covered her mouth, Friday knew, because she was too afraid to let the gods see her smile.

Friday was not afraid to smile. In fact, Friday smiled so widely that her whole body hummed with hope. If she succeeded in helping Elisa defeat this curse, perhaps the Sisters would find her worthy enough to enter their order despite her shortcomings!

The cheerful crew was interrupted by Conrad, who came tearing around the walled garden and through the high grass at breakneck speed. He took a deep breath. “Your—”

Sunday held up a finger, and Conrad was quick to catch her meaning.

“
Milady.
Your husband requests the honor of your immediate presence in the Great Hall.” He turned to Friday. “He wishes for you to come as well.”

Sunday began walking quickly back toward the palace. Friday followed, kissing the children on the cheek and sending them back to the flock. As they made their way across the hillside, she could still sense Elisa’s quiet presence behind them.

“Did he say why?” Sunday asked.

“Not in so many words, but yes, I know why,” Conrad answered. “He has found the yellow-eyed man.”

At that, Sunday lifted her skirts and broke into a brisk jog.

Friday had heard of this yellow-eyed man in tales told by her sister and Rumbold about their meeting. After Rumbold’s own enchantment was broken, he was helped home by a yellow-eyed man with a haycart. According to Conrad, that same man had come to Friday’s own rescue and aided Conrad in delivering her to the front steps of the palace. Both times he had disappeared into the night, which made Friday doubt the man’s sincerity, but he did have an uncommon knack for being in the right place at the right time . . . and in the Woodcutter family, such timing was rarely a coincidence.

Such a person would only be found if he wanted to be. Friday picked up her pace, wondering what fresh dire news the gods had sent this man to report.

Velius, Monday, and Rumbold were all waiting for them when they arrived. The rest of the hall was empty but for a lone, stout man in a long black coat. He had curling dark hair and a short dark beard and a very tall hat that looked as if it had been fashioned from a stovepipe. But despite his dark clothing and coloring, his yellow eyes smiled whimsically.

The man turned to the new arrivals and removed his hat, bowing with a flourish and revealing the thinning circle of hair on his pate. “I am Henry Humbug,” he announced, “and I’m sorry.”

“Why should you be sorry, sir?” asked Sunday. “You’ve saved the lives of some people who are very important to me.”

“I’m afraid there’s not much time.”

It was then that Friday realized Mr. Humbug was not addressing the queen. She and Sunday turned to see Elisa behind them, cowering in the shadows.

“We must be quick,” Mr. Humbug said to the herb girl. “Mordant is coming.”

6

T
HE IDLE NIGHTS
Tristan spent as his human self were normally long, but waiting from sundown until Friday arrived at the sky tower bordered on unbearable. It had been so long since he’d had anything to look forward to beyond the sight of his sister at the end of a long day—which was a damn sight better than his brothers’ bare bottoms.

He’d have to remember to thank Friday again for leaving seven sets of clothes on the tower floor to spare him that particular image again. The shirts and trousers had been thoughtfully folded in individual piles and laid out in a row by the door. There was no difference between them save one, the fifth pile from the left, on top of which rested a fading sprig of blue rampion. As his brothers stretched and dressed and fought and told the same filthy jokes they’d been telling for years, Tristan stared at the little bell-shaped flowers in his hand and waited. And waited.

When neither Elisa nor the princess appeared, Philippe was the first to voice his uneasiness. “Something is wrong.”

“Nothing is wrong,” said Rene.

“Elisa is probably just helping Princess Friday up the stairs with an overly large basket of food,” Bernard said dreamily.

“It’s going to rain,” said François.

Twilight had abruptly darkened the sky, and what stars had begun to make their presence known disappeared one by one beneath the clouds. The wind picked up without Elisa there to rein it in, whipping through the ruins and making them glad to be clothed. Tristan shivered. On the breeze he caught the scents of earth, wood smoke, and unwashed humans. Many humans.

It had been a long time since it had rained, since he and his swan brothers had watched the creation of the impossible sea from their perch on high. This rain would be welcome; it did not seem the sort of storm brewed by magic. This land—and its refugees—could do with a shower. Tristan, however, spent half his day in water and could happily live without it. He hoped his sister arrived in time to spare them—and their new clothes—what threatened to be a very cold drenching.

His wish was quickly granted. The handle of the Elder Wood door turned and Elisa came through with a basket large enough to set Rene and Bernard drooling. Friday followed with three empty picture frames. Elisa disappeared back through the barely-open door and returned with a bulging sack. Who else was out there that had helped them carry all these things? After all these years, how was it that their curse was now so visible to others?

“Conrad doesn’t have to stay,” Friday said to Elisa, and their sister hugged the princess tightly at her words. “Yes, I can hear you again.” Friday turned to the brothers, as if about to speak, and then paused.

“Something
is
wrong,” repeated Philippe.

“What is it?” asked Rene.

“Who’s out there?” asked Bernard.

“It’s Mordant, isn’t it?” said Christian.

Elisa pointed to Christian and shook her finger wildly.

The twins jumped to their feet. “Mordant is out there?” said Bernard. “Let me kill him.”

“Not if I kill him first,” said Rene.

Elisa shook her head.

“
Is
Mordant here?” Tristan asked her.

“Who is it outside the door?” asked Rene.

“Whoever it is, we can take him,” said Bernard.

“Is Elisa safe?” asked Philippe.

The cacophony of their overlapped voices battered his own ears; Tristan couldn’t imagine what Friday heard, what with Elisa’s inside voice trying to shout above them, on top of the rising tension of the room, and whoever else’s mind was outside that door . . .

Friday paled and stepped back toward the door. Tristan was annoyed that the bond between them did not force her magic to work both ways—he could not feel what she felt. But he could sense that she needed protection, and that he would gladly give.

Tristan closed the short distance between them and took the princess into his arms. Her body trembled beneath the emotional onslaught. He gently put a hand on either side of her head, as if he could make a helmet to shield her sensitive mind from the mess of his siblings’ thoughts vying for attention.

“Stop it,” he ordered his brothers and sister. He tried his best to make the words strong, but not loud enough to damage Friday further. “It’s too much for her.”

As soon as he spoke, her trembling stopped. “I’m fine,” she said from inside the circle of his arms.

He immediately let her go.

She looked at him curiously. “How did you know how to do that?”

“Do what?” Tell his siblings to hush? Surely she had her own experience with that sort of thing.

“Make it . . . quiet.” She tapped her head. “In here.”

Tristan had no idea what she was talking about, but he was happy to be of service, whatever service that had been. “I’m not sure. You just looked like you were . . .” He didn’t want to insult her by calling her helpless. She had that air about her, soft and kind and without malice, but he knew better—Friday Woodcutter was one of the least helpless people he’d ever met. However, she did look “. . . tired.”

“Thank you.” Her tone was full of such sincerity, and her eyes were filled with . . . Tristan turned away. He had never before experienced anything like this—this pull against his heart like the pull of a tide against the full moon—and it was not a conversation he was prepared to have in front of his brothers. Everything he could think to say in response sounded arrogant or condescending, so he opted for silence, bowing slightly to her and backing away even more. He didn’t want to crowd her—the bond between them seemed to tighten the closer they were together. He moved to a spot between her and the place where she’d fallen from the tower.