Briar and Rose and Jack

by Katherine Coville

  “What is it?” cries Rose.

  “An imp!” answers Hilde. “It just hatched. And here I thought I had a griffin’s egg! We’ve got to get him out of here. Take these,” instructs Hilde, handing them each a net similar to her own. “See if you can catch him—but watch out if you do! That little tail can deliver a nasty sting.”

  Briar and Rose immediately station themselves at opposite sides of the table while Hilde takes a position by the door. After a few tense minutes and many near misses, Rose plops her net directly over the little creature and catches it in mid-flight, whereupon it immediately lets loose the loudest, most aggravating wail the girls have ever heard. The other creatures stop their mad race and freeze.

  “Hold that net down! Don’t let him escape. I’ve got to mix up a quick potion. Let’s see, angelica, wormwood, basil—where did the spotted thistle go? Oh, dear, is this the arnica or the henbane? I must find the garlic!” While Hilde quickly mashes the ingredients with a mortar and pestle, the girls examine the angry imp baby as he struggles to get away. He is rather adorable despite his disgraceful behavior.

  “You’d better hurry up, Hilde!” calls Briar. “I think he’s eating the net!”

  Hilde hurries over with a bowl of something, saying, “I hope this works. I had to use snail oil instead of snake.” Then she dribbles the substance liberally over the captive imp, while reciting,

  “Calm and sweet,

  Head to feet,

  Transformation now complete.

  Abracadabra!”

  The imp stops its noise and begins to gurgle happily. Hilde removes it from the net and tosses it out the window.

  “That should hold it for a few days, by which time it will be far away from here!”

  “But it was so cute!” Rose protests.

  “And you just threw it out the window!” cries Briar.

  “It can fly,” her godmother comments drily. “Make yourselves useful, and help me clean up this mess. Don’t touch the herbs! I’ll have to sort them all out again. And my alchemy experiment is ruined. I’ll never change straw into gold at this rate.”

  Rose and Briar stoop and begin the long, arduous process of picking up and setting things to rights. It is nearly evening before they have restored all but the scattered herbs to order.

  “I’ll have to replace half of these,” Hilde complains. “Perhaps tomorrow afternoon I can take the two of you out to gather fresh ones for my collection. Come to me after the midday meal. I will account for you to the queen—

  “Briar, you’re moving very stiffly,” sharp-eyed Hilde adds. “Have you gotten into trouble with Bishop Simon again?”

  Briar nods wordlessly. Hilde removes a small jar from a drawer in the cupboard, takes the lid off, and sniffs it. “Still good,” she announces. “Try this on your bruises—but sparingly! I calculate it might have certain side effects if used too liberally.”

  “Like what?” Briar asks, taking the jar.

  “It might turn your skin thick and leathery and could numb all feeling where you spread it too heavily.”

  “You mean permanently?”

  “That’s a good question. I can’t look it up in my book of spells. I invented the recipe myself.”

  Briar looks at the jar, thinking she might be willing to take her chances with the side effects being permanent, when Hilde continues, “Oh, and it’s got essence of pond scum in it. It might turn your skin green. And warty. Maybe for an hour, maybe forever. You’re old enough to decide if you want to take the chance.”

  “Thank you,” says Briar. “I think.” With that, the girls make their departure, and later, at bedtime, Rose asks Briar how much of the magic salve she wants spread on her back.

  “All of it,” comes the reply.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure. If I get the side effects, then Bishop Simon can’t hurt me anymore. That’s worth turning my back green. And warty. I’ll never be beautiful anyway.”

  “But your back—”

  “Go ahead. Make it numb. Make it green. Just do it.”

  * * *

  It is morning. Amber light shines through the solitary window of the small attic space where Briar and Rose rest, and it illumines their sleeping faces. Briar awakens and, giving Rose a poke on the shoulder, says, “Wake up, lazybones!”

  Rose’s eyes flicker open. Immediately she turns to Briar and says, “Roll over. Let me see!”

  Briar turns her back to Rose and lifts her hair. Rose peeks under her shift and sees bright chartreuse skin. With warts. She pokes Briar’s back and asks, “Can you feel that?”

  “Feel what?” Briar responds.

  “It’s happened! The side effects. Just like Hilde said!” Covering Briar’s back quickly, as if someone might see, Rose asks, “How are you?”

  “I’m just fine!”

  A short while later they take their places in the chapel. While Bishop Simon conducts the morning service, Briar tries to suppress a smug little smile. During breakfast, Rose reminds her in hushed tones that they don’t know how long the effects will last. Briar thinks only that she has become invulnerable. She is almost tempted to try to provoke Bishop Simon into another beating, just to enjoy the fact that he cannot hurt her. She sits through the morning’s lessons, itching to call out the answers to the questions the clergyman poses to the class. Finally, thumbing through a book on geometry, he calls on one of the older pupils with a difficult question, hoping to embarrass the boy when he’s unable to answer.

  “Calculate the area of a triangle with a base of seven cubits and a height of three cubits, and state the formula,” he demands.

  Briar, who makes it a habit to listen in on the more advanced lessons to the older students, knows the answer immediately. Without thinking, she blurts out, “The area is half of the base times the height! Half of twenty-one is ten point five square cubits!”

  Bishop Simon looks down at the book to check the answer, then slams the book closed and looks up at her wrathfully. “There is nothing so terrible as a cheat!” he thunders. “What manner of trickery or magic is this? Admit your guilt now, quickly!”

  “But I’m not guilty! Honestly I’m not,” Briar says. “I just . . . I just spent a lot of time studying last night.” Briar knows that it sounds like a lie, and in fact it is. But she hopes it sounds more believable than telling him she is really the smartest person in the class, which is the actual truth.

  “Cheat!” he bellows, getting red about the face. “Was yesterday’s chastisement not enough for you?”

  Briar, all too aware that the effects of Hilde’s magic salve might wear off at any moment, decides that there is no safe answer to this, and she keeps silent. She cannot bear to think of getting another beating, and she immediately regrets her outburst. But Bishop Simon is relentless. Picking up his cane, he flexes his arm and snarls, “You will observe, class, what happens when people are caught cheating! Come here and take your punishment, wretch!”

  Briar knows that she has no choice but to obey. Immediately, Bishop Simon lifts his cane and rains down blows on her back. But as he strikes her, her back feels nothing. All she feels is the humiliation and injustice of being struck and punished for no reason, and that is painful indeed. But she does not cry, and she does not cry out. Bishop Simon, getting no satisfaction from his futile exertion, finally slows to a stop, and glaring at her with his small, piggy eyes, he banishes her from the classroom.

  Only too glad to leave, she stands outside the door and makes an effort to calm herself, closing her eyes and breathing slowly in and out. She waits there until school is over and Rose emerges.

  Not sure whether to offer her friend sympathy or congratulations, Rose asks, “Did it work? Did you feel anything?”

  Briar does not want to explain her feelings, so she merely says, “No. I didn’t feel a thing,” and quickly changes the subject. “Let’s go eat!”

  “Absolutely!” replies Rose, and they take a detour to the great hall, where a sumptuous midday m
eal is being served. The harvest has been a good one this year, and the giant has not yet come to make his demands, so for a short time, meals are plentiful. The girls share a trencher heaped up with beans, squash, and carrots, until, well satisfied, they excuse themselves and make their way up to Hilde’s aerie.

  “Ah, here you are, my dearies,” she greets them. “We’re to go herb picking today. Come. Everything’s arranged.” Hilde furnishes each of them with a wicker basket and leads them back down through the castle proper, out through the gatehouse. They make their way through the village, where Princess Rose is lovingly watched over by the villagers, who are proud of her beauty and enchanted by her sweet innocence. Once free of the castle and village, the girls’ mood lifts, for the air is fresh and sweet and there is no one to observe or hamper them. It is an idyllic afternoon. As they proceed down an overgrown lane through the forest, Hilde leads them in a number of choruses of “The Maid and the Goose.” It is a charming old ballad in which a goose falls in love with a maid and argues with her through thirteen verses that she should marry him rather than cut his head off and have him for dinner. In the end he fails to convince her, and in three-part harmony, they cheerfully sing the final chorus: “And she choked on his meat and died, tra-la. She choked on his meat and died.”

  By this time they have reached a wide glade, a perfect place to look for herbs. Hilde sets the girls to hunting for the little daisylike flowers of chamomile while she searches for mint and mugwort and anything else of interest. When they have examined the whole glade and collected what they can, they move on through the forest to a broad hillside meadow by a rock face riddled with small caves. From there they can see the castle and most of the village. At this distance the village appears tranquil and charming, with no hint of the terrible toil and struggle of its people; their cottages have become more dilapidated, and they seem to grow thinner and more ragged as each year passes. But for this lovely afternoon, such thoughts are far away. The girls are engrossed in their tasks of looking for herbs, happy to be free of the castle and all its constraints and cares.

  “What do you use mugwort for?” Rose asks Hilde after a while.

  “It repels insects and wild animals. It must be boiled slowly into a potion.”

  “Can we help you make it? I’d rather learn that than more etiquette or needlepoint.”

  “Oh, yes, dearies. I’d say a basic knowledge of herbs and their uses should be part of a royal education. Even a queen should know that sage wards off evil. You never can tell when you’ll need such knowledge.”

  “What is chamomile for?” Briar asks.

  “It induces sleep. Comes in very handy sometimes,” Hilde says, putting her arm around Briar and giving an affectionate squeeze. Briar takes in these lessons as naturally as food or drink or sunshine, for she looks up to her godmother and wants to emulate her in every way. Hilde is the one adult in Briar’s life who acts as if she adores the girl exactly as she is, and that makes for a powerful bond indeed. Even Rose has noticed that Hilde has a soft spot in her heart for Briar, but she tries not to resent it.

  The three make their way slowly across the hillside, foraging and talking desultorily under the cobalt sky. Their fingers are stained green from picking. Their baskets are slowly filling up. The hot sun shines down on their heads while they listen to birdcalls and swat away insects. Finally, Hilde signals them to halt, cocking her head to one side and putting her finger to her lips for silence. Suddenly she looks up. “It’s too quiet! The birds have stopped chirping. Even the insects are silent.” She pauses, then exclaims, “The giant’s coming! I hear his footsteps! Quick, we must hide! Into a cave! Over this way!”

  Briar and Rose do not move at first, frozen with fear, but Hilde gives them each a push, and then another, until they start to run. She shoves them into the first cave she comes to, and, seeing that the cave is quite deep, she takes the girls by their hands and goes back as far as there is light to see. They hear the footsteps more loudly now. The two girls can’t tell if the earth is quaking or if it is their own bodies shivering with fright as they imagine how easily the giant’s feet could trample them. His steps come closer and closer, and then his feet, in his cuffed boots, are visible just in front of the opening of the cave. They hear loud sniffing noises, and the giant, talking softly to himself, says, “I smell human! Cursed if I don’t!” Then, louder, “Come on out, you! Come out and face your doom! Ha ha ha!” He gives a mighty stomp, shaking the earth and causing small rocks to come loose around the terrified girls. They huddle together and stifle the urge to scream.

  “Lily-livered, eh?” the giant bellows, and he stomps once more for good measure. There is a prolonged, tense silence. Then, crouching down on the side of the hill, he begins to sniff among the rock formations.

  As he sniffs, Hilde and the girls inhale his odor, which is so noxious as to suggest that he left off bathing in the previous decade. Hilde and the girls are barely breathing. As they hear the giant’s sniffing coming closer, they inch farther and farther back into the darkness and crouch down behind a large boulder. Finally, the entrance to the cave is blocked by the giant’s nose and mouth, and he thunders, “Aha! I smell you now, and I’m going to squash you till your guts come out! Ha!” He sticks his hand into the entrance of the cave and reaches back as far as his arm will admit him, his fingers curling and uncurling, grasping thin air. Briar smothers a gasp as one of his fingers grazes her shoulder. The three all back up even farther into the utter darkness behind them, fearing at any moment that they might step into a hole or fall into a pit. Hilde whispers to the girls to stop. Setting down her basket, she draws something out of the leather pouch attached to her waist. It is a black powder, which she rubs thoroughly all over her hands. “Stand back,” she commands, and she clears her throat and pronounces an incantation.

  “When circumstances grow too frightening,

  Change this powder into lightning!”

  With that, a mighty clap of thunder is heard, and lightning bolts shoot out of Hilde’s hands, striking the giant’s grasping fingers with a jolt of searing white heat, filling the air with smoke and the smell of singed flesh. The giant lets out a yelp that is heard all the way to the castle, and he pulls his hand out of the cave so fast that he falls on his backside.

  Purple with rage, the giant scrambles to his feet and cries out, “Sting me, will you? Canker blossom! I’ll teach you your last lesson!” He stomps his foot down on top of the cave opening until he has dislodged a landslide of stones and boulders over its entrance. “Now you can starve, slowly, in the dark! Ha ha ha!” he bellows, and inside the cave, they hear his muffled voice.

  In the sudden darkness, Hilde’s hands, still glowing from the just-released lightning, give off enough light for them to see dimly.

  Terribly frightened, Rose asks, “What do we do now?”

  “Yes, what?” cries Briar.

  “Calm down, dearies,” comes the reply. “Let us be still and breathe deeply and think. Thank all the saints I had my lightning powder with me for emergencies. My hands will glow for maybe half an hour now, so we’ve got some time. Let’s see . . . We can’t get out the way we came. There may be another entrance somewhere in the other direction. Now, if we can only look for it without getting lost.” Hilde stoops, picks up a charred stone, and draws a big X on the cave wall. “Here, dearies, place your left hands on the wall of the cave, like mine, and keep them there no matter what, unless I say otherwise. We’re going to follow this wall and see where it takes us. Come, quickly.”

  Outside the cave, the giant, his burnt fingers in his mouth, kicks the rocky hillside once more in a rage, then cries, “Aargh!” and becomes twice as angry about the self-inflicted pain in his toes. He stomps away toward the castle, looking for something to smash. He easily uproots a tree taller than he is, breaks the branches off the trunk, and drags it along behind him.

  High in the castle watchtower, Jerold has spotted the giant and rings the massive warning bell. King Warrick takes
a moment to stand behind his throne, his face in his hands. His counselors will be waiting for him, and he will have no choice but to climb up to the wall walk, try to negotiate with the rapacious giant, and give in to his demands. Of course, the king will never surrender his secret cache of food and money, but still it pains him to have to give away so much that could otherwise have made him so rich. He even spares a little pity for his peasants, who have been so poor for such a long time. His counselors have told him that the villagers grow increasingly restive about the Giant Tax, and ominous murmurings have been reported in the streets. The king shakes his head. He will not think about that now. He straightens his crown and mounts the stairs to the wall walk.

  At that very moment comes the furious giant, thirty feet high and looking to unleash his pent-up wrath. He steps into the moat and, lifting the tree over his head like a cudgel, slams it down onto the castle wall. Stones and mortar crumble and fall into the courtyard, raining death and destruction on those below. Though the king is unharmed, two men lie crushed by the rubble, and many more are injured. It’s all the king can do not to turn and run, but instead he calls for aid for the fallen men, then commands that the usual offerings be brought forth—and quickly! Below, in the courtyard, men come with stretchers and bandages to tend to the injured and evacuate the area. The giant, peering through the ruined wall, snorts and says, “Peasants! Bah! There are always plenty more!” He throws his bag and his purse over what is left of the wall and cries, “Fill them! Hurry, before I smash something else!”

  Soon parades of people come with sacks, wagons, and carts of goods, loading them into the giant’s bag. Their faces are lined with grief, for they know their own families will go without. A dozen of the king’s men drag chests of gold from the treasury and dump them into the giant’s purse. The three bravest villagers deliver three frightened head of cattle to him, then turn and run away. Meanwhile the giant leers through the hole he has made in the wall, shouting, “More! More!” as people scurry around in terror. As has become his habit, the giant’s last demand is for the king to give him his crown. He has learned that the king will offer some special prize from him in trade rather than give it up. This year he is not disappointed, for King Warrick offers him a very special hen—a hen that lays golden eggs! The giant demands a demonstration before he agrees. He knocks down more of the castle wall so that he can put his head in and watch. The king on the wall walk shouts, “Lay!” and the hen complies with a pure golden egg.