Briar and Rose and Jack

by Katherine Coville

  Jack takes off the heavy knapsack and drops it, then flops down on the floor by the peat fire, which burns feebly in the center of the room. “Have you found anything at all to eat, Mother? For I’m about to perish with hunger.”

  “Lady Briar brought us a basket of food. I’ve saved out some cold meat and cheese and bread for you, and a flask of mead. Now tell me, Jack, where you’ve been all day, and what you’ve got in your knapsack.”

  Between bites, Jack tells her of his adventure, all about climbing the magic beanstalk, finding Lan, finding a friend in the giant woman. Then he tells her about the bag of gold that nearly pulled him down to his doom. At first she can hardly believe him, never having dreamed that her son was the heroic type, but then Jack opens the knapsack and she sees the gold, and her eyes widen.

  “What shall we do with it, Mother? It’s money the giant stole from the treasury. Should we return it to the king? He does nothing for the people!”

  Mother Mudge shakes her head. “The king has been playin’ us false. He has his own hoard of food and treasure aplenty, while we pay the Giant Tax and go hungry. We can’t trust it to him. And we surely can’t keep it all for ourselves.”

  Jack opens the bag of gold and runs his fingers through it. “There’s enough here to give some to every person in the village, Mother.”

  “Yes, I think that would be best,” Mother Mudge says thoughtfully, “but this is not the time. There is great unrest among the villagers just now, and things seem to be coming to a head. Best to let them, I think. This treasure should stay buried until we see what the king will do for all of us. Bury it right here, I say, until the time is right, then spread it among everyone.”

  Jack finishes eating and gets to work digging a deep hole in the corner of their dirt floor. He buries the gold, laying his straw mattress over it when he is done. Then, done in, he falls on top of it and goes instantly to sleep. His mother stands over him, staring at the contours of his sleeping face, noticing how he has grown lately and the strong line of his jaw. She admires his tranquil, intelligent brow, marveling at all that her Jack has done this day, sorry now that she did not trust him about the beans.

  * * *

  It is the evening of Rose’s sixteenth birthday. In the solar, the queen and her retinue and the young women of the castle are caught up in a whirlwind of preparations for the ball. Rose stands in the center of it all in her chemise, patiently putting up with the attention, occasionally forcing a vacant smile. She seems, in fact, to be off somewhere else, in another time and place. And so she is, back in the artist’s studio, bent over some project with Lan, imagining herself finally telling him how she really feels about him. Then she remembers that it is too late. She closes her eyes and, giving herself a mental shake, straightens her spine and stands taller. She is the princess, and she must play the role. She signals that she is ready for the ladies in waiting to robe her. They lift her resplendent dress over her head and settle it around her perfect figure. Lady Arabella and Elizabeth and Jane, each proudly wearing her own new gown, gasp and exclaim over the beauty of Princess Rose and her glorious dress.

  Queen Merewyn approaches her daughter with a servant by her side who bears a gold coronet on a velvet pillow. “Here is the finishing touch,” the queen says, picking up the coronet with both hands and placing it on Rose’s head. “The symbol of a royal princess of the realm and a token of your parents’ esteem.” Princess Rose is engulfed by the ladies of the court, all of them complimenting her at once and wishing her happy birthday. Everyone is lost in admiration for the princess, and everyone wants to be close to her.

  Indeed, by order of the queen, she has not been left alone once the whole day, and all but the young silently understand why. Who can forget the gray fairy’s curse? But there were gifts given to the infant Rose as well, and in the tizzy of excitement over the princess’s sixteenth birthday, they are all but forgotten. If anyone does think of the boons the fairies bestowed on her, no one wonders what has become of them. Beauty she has in full, and that outshines all the rest. If her voice is less than a nightingale’s, her dancing less than mesmerizing, her wit less than rapier sharp, or her strength less than Herculean, no one notices or cares.

  Only Briar, the possessor of those four gifts, stands ignored on the sidelines, looking on. She too is lost in her thoughts. This is one of those things, she tells herself—one of those things that Hilde has taught her about, that cannot be changed and must be lived with. This happy flurry and commotion is for other girls, pretty girls. Not for her. No one would even notice if she were not at the ball. She would far rather go to Hilde’s room, where she knows she will always receive a loving welcome.

  She turns to leave, when Lady Arabella puts a hand on her shoulder and says, “Where are you going, Lady Briar? You must get ready for the ball!”

  Briar, trying to get over her surprise, is temporarily speechless. She looks into Lady Arabella’s face, struggling to tell whether she is serious. Lady Arabella smiles warmly, and Briar wonders if perhaps the young woman is growing up, genuinely trying to make amends for her past slights. While Briar is trying to decide how she feels about it, Elizabeth and Jane show up and echo Lady Arabella’s coaxing tone, urging Briar to turn herself over to their tender ministrations to prepare her for the ball. They link arms with her in a friendly way, but Briar realizes that she can’t disentangle herself without making a scene.

  “I don’t think this is such a good idea,” she objects. “Besides, I don’t have a dress.” She says this without self-pity, but the fact remains that no one thought to make her a new dress for the ball.

  “Well, that doesn’t matter,” Elizabeth says. “My last year’s green dress should just about fit you. I’ll go get it, and you can have a look.” Before Briar can object, Elizabeth disappears into the fray, and Lady Arabella and Jane enthusiastically tell her how good Elizabeth’s green dress will look on her. She is torn, reluctant to go along but wanting to believe they are offering friendship. Before she knows it, the two girls are helping her off with her dress and unbraiding her dark hair. “I think you should wear it loose,” Lady Arabella says, “with maybe a wreath of flowers on your head. Don’t you think so, Jane?”

  Jane agrees, and soon Elizabeth is back with the green dress. The girls slide the dress over Briar’s head and down over her chemise. The sleeves are a bit short, but Lady Arabella assures her that no one will notice.

  By this time, Rose is ready for the ball, the blue and gold embroidery on white silk making a perfect foil for her blue eyes and golden hair. Every woman in the room stops to admire her, but she is used to that and pays no attention. She looks around and, spotting Briar amid the other girls, makes her way over to them. She looks at Briar in the green dress and says, “So, you’re coming to the ball, then?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t think it’s such a great idea.”

  “Of course you’re coming!” say the other girls in chorus, and Briar sighs deeply.

  “I think you should come,” Rose says a bit stiffly, and Briar wonders if that means that their fight is over, that all is forgiven. It occurs to her that Rose may have asked the other girls to be nice to her. She decides that it would be churlish of her to refuse to go to the ball now. She tries to arrange her hair so that it falls down over her heavy brow, and she allows herself to be led down the stairs to the great hall.

  * * *

  Hilde stands at the window of her tower room, gazing out beyond the castle wall to the far fields, golden in the waning sun. This is the day, she thinks. The twins’ sixteenth birthday. But only one of them will be honored and acclaimed. Only Rose will be admired and adored.

  What of Briar, the firstborn? Because of the face she was born with, she is denied her birthright. She will be passed over and brushed aside like so much dust. In a few weeks, if Hilde reminds everyone, maybe they will celebrate the false birthday the king and queen assigned to Briar as an infant. There might be leftover dessert from the kitchen and a few forced con
gratulations. Or, like Hilde’s own sixteenth birthday, no one would notice at all. Her eyes grow moist. Her hands tighten into fists. She has known from the time of Briar’s birth what to expect, yet she still burns with the injustice of it. Briar couldn’t be more dear to her if she were her own child.

  And now either of the young women might succumb to the gray fairy’s curse and fall into a deathlike sleep. Hilde thinks it would serve the king and queen right if their cherished daughter fell down, insensible, in the middle of their party. What of their celebrations then? As for Rose, surely one among all her admirers would be able to waken her anyway. Hilde shakes her head and turns from the window, pacing agitatedly in circles around her cluttered worktable. She idly sprinkles some dried mustard powder into a mixture she has been working on. She stirs it with a wooden spoon and mutters a brief incantation over it, but it does not turn into gold.

  The imp, who has been bouncing around the ceiling, flutters down to buzz above her head, but she waves it off, lost in contemplation. She knows she is expected at the ball; the king and queen will want her there in case the worst happens, though what they think she can accomplish with her feeble powers against the gray fairy’s magic is a puzzlement. She is far more concerned about Briar, knowing that no one else will be looking out for her. She had hoped that the girl would come to her to spend the evening, but she must have found some other haven. Hilde stops her pacing and says out loud, “I should go down,” but she shakes her head again and continues her pacing, unable to get past her own wall of resentment.

  * * *

  That evening, Jack wakes up from his nap with a sense of a heavy weight bearing down on him, though there is nothing there, and then he remembers that he promised Lan he would return. He must go back up the beanstalk tonight, with only his wits to keep him alive. Upon rising, he sees that his mother is nowhere around. Knowing that he needs some quiet time to think, he climbs to the loft and makes himself invisible in the hay. Then he closes his eyes and replays the morning’s adventure in his mind. He needs a plan. He tries to imagine how things will go tonight, and in what way he could finally destroy the giant. Imagining the difficulty and danger of escaping down the beanstalk, he realizes how much more difficult it would be for one as big and heavy as the giant to trust his weight to the precarious vine. Jack sees a possibility. It comes to him in a flash. With a new sense of purpose, he gets up and walks all through the village, giving the Giant Killers’ sign wherever he goes. Before long, every young person who is free to do so is quietly heading toward the thicket. Jack meets them there, and after waiting to see that most everyone has arrived, he tells them that Lady Briar is probably at the ball and they must proceed without her. They all murmur in agreement, and Jack, assuming leadership, reveals his desperate scheme.

  “Everything depends on you. If I can get the giant to chase me down the beanstalk, our only hope is to chop it down while he’s still quite high in the sky, and that’s going to take all of you. Arm yourselves with axes and wait at the foot of the stalk until you hear my signal. Arley, your father is a shepherd. Can you borrow his horn for me? I wouldn’t ask, but it’s dreadfully important that you all hear me from some distance away. By the time I’m within shouting distance, it may be too late. You’re to chop the beanstalk down on my signal, even if it means that I fall too, understand?”

  There is dead silence. A few of them say, “I couldn’t do it, Jack,” and he pats them on the back and sends them home. The rest nod quietly, their expressions grief-stricken but determined, and they quietly disperse.

   Chapter Three

  MOTHER MUDGE IS IN THE TOWN SQUARE, surrounded by angry villagers. They are wielding rakes and hoes and shovels, and they mutter and grumble as they listen to her impassioned speech and shout their furious responses at each pause.

  Mother Mudge raises both hands to quiet the crowd. “We’ve worked all our lives on the king’s land, haven’t we?” she cries.

  “Yes!” exclaim the villagers, shaking their fists.

  “Clearing the land, tilling and sowing, weeding and harvesting! It’s backbreaking work!”

  “Yes!”

  “We’ve harvested the king’s crops while our own lay rotting in the fields! We’ve raised him crop after crop of good, wholesome food, and yet we go hungry! Why?”

  There are calls from the crowd: “The Giant Tax! The Giant Tax!”

  “All these years, years of sweat and toil, the king has ordered us to pay his Giant Tax!”

  “Yes! Yes!”

  “Unfair!”

  “Unfair!”

  “Then the giant comes and steals the fruit of our labor—while the bishop tells us it’s our own fault! So the giant robs us blind, but he’s not the only one! Who else is robbing us blind? Eh? Who else?”

  The crowd erupts with shouts of “The king! The king!”

  “Our own king!”

  “Our own king,” shouts Mother Mudge. “And who is using innocent Princess Rose’s sixteenth birthday as an excuse for gorging this night? Feasting with all the other kings and nobles while our babes are going to bed hungry?”

  “The king! Our own king!” comes the clamor.

  Mother Mudge pauses, gathering her strength, her purpose, her outrage. Then she screams her challenge: “What are we going to do about it?”

  “Revolt!” comes the cry.

  “Revolt!”

  “REVOLT!”

  * * *

  Briar finds herself descending to the great hall with one arm held firmly by Lady Arabella. She is already making plans for how to evade the other girls and leave the party early, but Lady Arabella does not let go, and now Jane has her other arm and they are guiding her to a spot where the young people of the castle are clustered together and they can all stand and watch the proceedings.

  The hall is lined with dozens of richly clad strangers. They have come from afar, all breathlessly awaiting Princess Rose’s arrival, hoping for a chance to dance with her. The king and queen sit on a raised dais at one end of the room and smile benignly on their guests.

  Suddenly the horns sound, and though darkness has not yet fallen, all the torches are lit in order to illuminate the much-anticipated arrival of the princess. The king stands up, grandiosely extending one arm toward the staircase, and says, “Your Highnesses, lords and ladies of the court, I present my daughter, the incomparable Princess Rose.” Rose steps lightly down the stairs, her mind in turmoil. She knows that she is about to face a great room full of suitors, but she can think only of Lan, of the sparkle in his eyes and the way his hair fell down over his forehead. The way his strong, gentle hands maneuvered the most delicate brush. Lan, who was so brave, and by now had surely paid for it with his life. She swiftly closes her mind against the thought before any telltale tears can start. Summoning all her willpower, she puts on a dazzling smile and enters the hall. There are gasps of admiration, and the assembled guests all bow and curtsy to her. Then they crowd in closer to get a good look, until the king takes her by the hand and leads her to the head of the table, where a chair has been placed for her next to the queen.

  By order of Queen Merewyn, a heavy guard has been posted on Princess Rose to ensure that the gray fairy’s curse has no chance to come true, and so a soldier takes his place on each side of the princess, and three more behind. Rose notes this with some irritation, already looking for an opportunity to dismiss them.

  Briar, meanwhile, suffering pangs of acute self-consciousness, is grateful that everyone’s attention is focused on Rose. She keeps her own head down so that her hair drapes over the side of her face.

  Soon it is time for the many foreign suitors to be presented to Princess Rose. Though the king has already secretly chosen a favorite, the others must be given their opportunity to change his mind. Perhaps an even better candidate will present himself. This goes on for quite a while, as names and titles are announced one by one, and Rose greets each of them properly while the rest of the crowd stand at attention or murmur their own comment
ary on the proceedings. Briar steals glances around her to see who is nearby and notices that most of the boys from school are present, including Lord Henry, all of them dressed in their finest doublets and hose, many wearing hats with turned-up brims or decorative feathers. Everyone, in fact, is looking their finest, and after a while she dares to hope that with her borrowed dress and her face half hidden, she looks as if she belongs in such company.

  After all the introductions are over, music begins to play and couples form lines to dance. As those around her pair off, Lord Henry comes up and whispers in Lady Arabella’s ear. She grins and turns to Briar. “Lord Henry says that someone wants to dance with you!” she says. “Over here, come see!”

  Briar is torn. She wants to believe that there is someone here to be a partner for her, but she is nearly choked by shyness, and she fights a strong feeling that she wants no part of this. Elizabeth and Jane hustle her forward, giggling. In front of her stand Lord Henry and a small crowd of other young men of the castle. Everyone seems to be delightedly waiting for something. Finally, Lady Arabella says, “Yes, we’ve found the perfect partner for you! Just look!”

  She gives Lord Henry a nod, and he moves to one side as the crowd of boys parts down the middle to reveal what was hidden behind them: a dog dressed up in a fancy doublet and feathered hat. He is brought forward on a leash.