The Winter Prince

by Elizabeth E. Wein

  “Like yourself, I am not in such matchless physical form,” I answered.

  “True,” he sneered. “You’ve been nursing a raging fever since our first night in the open.” A breathless little laugh escaped him. “To think it is you who have taken chill, not I!”

  “But I’m not hallucinating,” I said softly. “No matter which of us is in control when we reach Camlan, we both need to get there quickly.”

  Lleu stormed reluctantly in my trail as we walked away from the road. We climbed through the bare forest, and covered several more miles. At dusk we were close to another stretch of empty hilltop, and we stopped among the trees to make camp: this time only a small fire, and the furs and blankets spread next to it. Lleu unpacked the little dried fruit and cheese that was left, and heated wine. At first he would not let me help, but in the midst of his preparations he gasped in wonder, “My hands are bleeding.” He held out a hand, palm up, gloveless. “Look: blood running between my fingers, staining my sleeve.”

  I could scarcely bear to listen to him. “Put your gloves on,” I said. His sleeve was unspotted.

  After that he let me deal with the food. He avoided touching anything lest it change shape before his eyes.

  When we had eaten he took off his cloak and folded it double, and wrapped it around his shoulders that way beneath the blankets and furs in which he huddled. He was nearer the fire than I, yet he was still shivering. I could not imagine being so cold; I could not feel the cold even in my hands. I sang under my breath from the dark story of Lleu’s shining namesake:

  “Grows an oak on upland plain,

  Darkly shadowed sky and glen;

  Nine score hardships had he suffered

  In its top, Lleu Llaw Gyffes.”

  “Ah, shut it,” Lleu said.

  “Even now you remind me of your namesake,” I said gently. “You can no longer rely on the strength of your own body, the integrity of your own mind. Think of Lleu enchanted, imprisoned in another form! Think how it must be to look at your hands and see an eagle’s talons, clawed and cruel.”

  Lleu interrupted with a wordless cry of horror. He slammed his hands over his ears and said furiously, “That tale ends with order restored and justice done. You know that. Lleu is rescued and healed; his lands are returned to him, and he is revenged.”

  “And in truth, his punishment seems little worse than the visions you are enduring,” I said. I drank some of the wine without heating it, and rubbed a fistful of snow over my forehead. “What makes you shiver so?”

  He stared at me with hatred and derision. He sat with his knees drawn up close to his chest, his gloved hands in tight fists beneath his chin. “Come,” I said, an1D; had held out an arm so that he might sit against my shoulder.

  He muttered, “I don’t want your cold.”

  “I offer you my warmth,” I said.

  Reluctantly, resentfully, he curled himself into the hollow between my arm and chest. I murmured low,

  “Grows an oak upon a steep,

  The sanctuary of a fair lord;

  If I speak not falsely,

  Lleu will come into my lap.”

  Lleu sighed and closed his eyes, but soon forced them open again, mistrusting me. He stared at the fire as it burned lower and lower.

  But I was tired beyond endurance in my own right. Before long we were both dozing. I did not have the energy to struggle with Lleu, and let him sink into the deep, sound sleep of utter exhaustion. Finally I folded the blankets around us both and slept also.

  I woke because I was cold. The fever had peaked and broken while I slept, and I sat up in the dark, thirsty and chilled. The fire had gone out, but the night was not completely black; the clouds had cleared, and the sky through the bare trees blazed with starlight. The moon was new and had already set. I could see Lleu in the dim light; he slept profoundly with his dark head muffled in the dark leather of his sleeve, vulnerable. Cautiously, quickly, I drew the knife from his belt and cut his bowstring.

  But I woke him doing this. Lleu forced his eyes open and propped his head on an elbow, shivering, to sit up suddenly as he realized what had happened. He stayed frozen, apprehensive; then, shifting his weight slowly, he marked where my hand flashed with the glimmer of silver. He leaped at me and in our struggle I dropped the dagger, but caught it by the blade with my other hand.

  After a moment of absolute stillness Lleu reached down and seized my wrist. He threw all his weight against my arm, and when he had it pinned beneath him, he forced my stiff fingers shut around the dagger’s edge. Then he slowly but firmly wrenched the knife out of my hand—

  Ah, God, my hand.

  The blade cut through my glove, deep across my palm and the inside of my fingers. I gasped and pulled away from him, overwhelmed.

  Lleu said fiercely, “That hurt, didn’t it! You’re bleeding.”

  Malevolent, swift, I tore off the glove and dashed my hand across his face.

  He cried out in horror and hid his face in his sleeve. Then he drove the knife through the darkness until he held it against my throat. We both were still again, poised like that: I breathing through clenched teeth in short, harsh bursts, Lleu utterly silent. He held the knife there for a few moments, then flung it skittering away into the dark. “I’ve never killed anyone, any man,” he whispered. “I cannot do it.”

  “You have the skill,” I whispered in answer. I pressed my throbbing hand to my side beneath my other arm. “But you need more than skill, do you not?”

  Lleu sat dumb. He rubbed his eyes. “I don’t hate you,” he said stubbornly. “I don’t want to kill you.”

  “Death,” I whispered, “often has very little to do with hatred. When hunting one kills through need of food or else for sport and love of skill—never through hatred. When you hate something you do not kill u dto do it. You hurt it.” The pain in my hand made me mindless, and ruthless, and I was determined to punish him. I rested another moment; then with sudden strength I forced Lleu to the ground and held him there with one arm pinned beneath him, and drew my torn hand across his mouth and over his eyelids. Lleu screamed.

  My fingers were dripping. Lleu pushed away from me with his free arm, but I caught at him with my sound right hand, and held his gloved fingers so tightly they began to feel stiff. He screamed again, out of sheer desperation.

  “Wild thing,” I whispered. “I’d like to cut your hands off, burn you, blind you… I should crush your slender fingers. I could break all the bones in your hand if I closed my own around yours tightly enough. You are as pure and dangerous as an untamed cat; your beauty makes me sick. And oh, God, you have hurt me, you have hurt me…”

  I steadied my voice. “But I am afraid to risk my father’s trust in me, or what is left of it. I am afraid to kill you outright. I thought of ruining you in some irreparable way, so that you could never be king, though you’d still be alive and I’d seem blameless. I could deafen you; there’s a way to direct blows against your ears that will take away your hearing.” Lleu tried to pull his hand away, and my iron hold on his fingers grew even more impossible. “Do you doubt me?” I said. “Or I could half smother you; when you go without air for too long it damages your mind, though it need not kill you. And there are things I can do to punish you that you will find more dreadful than any hurt. Be still.” I bent over, my wounded hand in his hair, and pressing my mouth to Lleu’s warm, windburned lips, kissed him gently.

  He lay rigid, as though he had been scalded.

  “Your mouth is sweet,” I said.

  “God,” Lleu breathed. His hair was cold. He smelled of earth and snow and blood.

  “Lie still,” I said. “Lie still. Am I not well armed against you even without steel? I need no more than a few drops of blood, and this…”

  “Don’t,” Lleu said quietly. “Don’t, my lord.”

  He spoke without fear. In his voice I heard only authority and reproach. It was as though he meant to remind me how very much I had to lose.

  He struggled a
gain to escape my grip, but I held him fast. “What do you want, Medraut? The inheritance you would win from our father will never give you power over me, me; and I will never beg for your mercy, even though you try to drive me mad. I may be afraid of death, but I do not fear you.”

  “So you say,” I spat.

  He winced and turned his face away. “Then do what you will with me,” he choked. “You are just like your mother. You would gently ruin me if it served your ends; and in revengeful punishment you hurt and hurt and hurt. I wounded you in self-defense, I did not mean to do it! If I must pay for that with my sight, then put my eyes out! Is that just? Is that fair? Hurting me will not heal your hand, or make me regret that I tried to save myself. By that law you should have been buried alive for your mistake in the mines at Elder Field.”

  “You are right,” I said slowly, letting go of him and struggling to my knees. “But you have never been held accountable for anything you have ever done.”

  He sat up also, savagely wiping his mouth, and began to say, “You thr#x2beeow this in my face as though—”

  “No,” I interrupted. “I mean, you are going to atone for what you have done to me now. You are going to stitch shut my hand.”

  “I am not!” he cried.

  “By God, you are,” I said fiercely. I had grown accustomed to the dark, and I could see the strip of white linen at Lleu’s wrist, and beyond my reach the silver gleam of the brooch that should clasp his cloak. I felt for the cloak and bound it around my hand, trying to stanch the bleeding. It would not stop. “Now, damn you: there. There by the fire, the lantern’s lying there.” I prodded him in the right direction. “I don’t know what you’ve done with the flint and tinder, but there’s needle and thread in the black leather bag. You must pass the needle through a flame first, to cleanse it. And you’ll have to clean the cut, too; you can use snow for that.”

  “Do it yourself,” Lleu said desperately.

  I answered with equal desperation, “I can’t.”

  He found the lantern and set about lighting it with trembling hands. He dropped the flint in the dead fire at first and had to search for it in the hot, feathery, gray ashes; but at last he was rewarded with the scratch and spurt of a tiny new flame, and he lit the candle in the little lantern and opened the grated door so that as much light as possible spilled from it. I sat bent over my hand, and glanced up at Lleu impassively. “Ah, little brother, don’t cry.”

  Lleu rubbed his eyes angrily. “I’m not It’s the light.”

  “There’s blood on your face,” I said. “And in your hair, too, it looks.”

  “I don’t care,” Lleu said, and went to collect clean snow.

  Eventually he held my torn palm between his hands, needle at ready. He bre

  athed deeply for a few moments but did not move, apparently lacking the courage to begin the operation. Again I underestimated him. Without warning he stabbed viciously at the deep slash across my palm.

  I yelped in surprise and pain and snatched my hand away. Lleu said credulously, “I thought you couldn’t feel anything in those fingers.”

  “You cretin,” I gasped. “Give me the needle, I’ll do it myself.”

  “I’ll do it, Medraut,” he said quietly. “I’ll do it. But I will not let you take me.” This time he bent to the work with patience and gentleness. And it was bitterly cold.

  XIV

  The Year’s Turning

  LLEU TOOK A LONG time, for he worked meticulously and carefully. When it was over we sat in the gray predawn in silence, both of us drained beyond speaking, or even moving. At last Lleu bandaged my hand and then began to gather and fold the blankets. When he had done I rekindled the fire and heated the last of the wine for us to drink with what was left of the dried fruit and bread. While I worked, Lleu sat by the fire with his face in his hands, and when I offered him food he shook his head.

  The morning was cold and clear, breathtaking, brilliant. The splendor of the sun was almost unbearable after so many continuous clouded days. The brightness of it seemed to hurt Lleu; he winced, squinting, when he finally raised his #x2be of tface from his hands, and for a long time he kept a shielding hand over his eyes. He could not stop shivering. But when I held his cloak to him he shuddered and said, “Burn it.” It was filthy with my blood. I tossed the cloak on the dying fire and then threw the blankets on top of it. They smoked and smoldered, disintegrating.

  We set out once more through light, powdery snow and trees with branches sparkling where icicles were forming in the sunlight. We crossed into moorland and began to journey downhill. We walked miles without speaking, left the high moor and once more traveled through forest. But it was a different forest than the one we had left behind; here the trees were taller and farther apart. Lleu did not notice. After his scant few hours of sleep he no longer hallucinated, but he could scarcely keep his feet. He stumbled more and more often, and finally he stopped walking altogether. He stood motionless and waited for me to face him.

  I turned toward him when he halted. The fury and tension of the night still hung between us like a thunderhead. I knew that he had reached the end of his strength and that only a little resistance on my part would make him mine. I broke an icicle from a frozen branch to use as a weapon and dragged it across his cheek.

  He stood still and closed his eyes, but did not attempt to reach for the knives at his waist. I ran the ice over his throat, sharp as a hunting knife and even colder, held the crystalline blade beneath his chin and watched the reflected sunlight dancing there. “Even now you seem undefeated,” I whispered, “and though I might take you easily I do not really want your inheritance. It is your self, your soul, that I envy. More than anything I want your birthright without shame, your clean lineage.”

  “You can never have that,” Lleu said, with his eyes closed and his head held still; though one of his hands had flown to his ashen face, almost accidentally, guarding his eyes. “How can anyone change that?”

  I trailed the ice across his gloved palm, then took him by the wrist and eased his arm back down. Lleu opened his eyes cautiously, dazzled by sunlight and the sparkling ice so close to his face. “I cannot change it,” I admitted, “but with you at my mercy I can make my father acknowledge that the fault was his. That I am no more a creature of my mother’s making than he is.”

  “Not her creature!” Lleu burst out. “Why else would you ransom my life to solace your own bruised pride? No one cares who your parents were! People admire you or despise you for yourself, for what you have made yourself. What have I to do with it? You do not envy my parentage, you envy me.”

  I stood gazing at him without any answer to give, feeling myself to be so base, so wrong, so ruined. My fingers were locked around his wrist as surely as steel. He said half wondering, “Ai, my brother, you are so strong and light in form, so wise and deft in mind, so gentle and true in semblance…”

  “So ruthlessly cruel in truth,” I finished, whispering.

  Now tears began to glitter cold and hopeless across his face.

  I turned his hand over and broke the brittle ice easily across his palm. There was hardly anything for him to feel: a touch of chill through his glove, then shattered crystals melting to nothing on his open hand. “It’s only water, Lleu,” I said quietly. “If I held such a thing to your sunlit face for much longer than two moments it would dissolve into air.” I brushed my fingertips across his cheek and smeared the tears there. He sank to his knees in the snow. The sunlsnoomeight was cold through the bare trees, and the ground was frozen and desolate. “Lleu,” I said softly, and reached for his hands to help him back to his feet.

  “I can’t,” he whispered. “I can’t, I can’t.”

  I knelt beside him. “Lleu, get up. You’ve no cloak. You’ll freeze.”

  “You’re going to kill me, anyway,” he whispered, too tired to raise his voice.

  I shook my head, speechless, desperate with remorse and self-hatred. He did not notice. Holding him steady with one hand,
I undid the clasp at my shoulder and took off my cloak, spreading its soft folds over my knees and the bright snow around us. I drew him close; and too frozen and exhausted to object, Lleu collapsed onto the warm wool and leaned against my chest, folded in my arms. He began to cry in earnest, sobbing with his face buried in my jacket, then crying uncontrollably in breathless, shrieking gasps that tore through his entire body. “Don’t,” I whispered. “Don’t.”

  When his sobs began to sound less like screams I rested one cheek against his hair and bent over him, cradling him like a child. He clutched at my jacket with cold, clenched, tear-wet fingers. I laughed a little. “You cling to me so—do you still trust me, after all this?”

  He said in a low, broken voice, “I have always trusted you.”

  Then of a sudden he stopped crying. He twisted around in my arms so that he could see me. “If you would kill me,” he said, “kill me now.”

  Having said that, his voice grew stronger. “Do it. Do it! Stab me and leave my body to whatever creatures roam this wood, and no one will ever know. No one will ever blame you.”

  I whispered, “I could not butcher you.”

  He was guessing, daring, with his life forfeit if he were wrong. But he knew he was right. “Then leave me here,” he said. “I can’t walk. I don’t know where I am. I would be dead of cold by evening, and again you could escape blame.” He choked, half weeping still, and burst forth, “I am your brother! You are my friend! You are the single person I have most admired and imitated and envied my entire life! If you hate me so for my heritage, then I do not want it, I cannot bear your hatred. So leave me here! Kill me!”

  “I can’t,” I gasped. “I can’t. I can’t kill you. I love you.”

  You see what it took to make me know this.

  I held Lleu fiercely, shaking, my face turned away, and lashed myself with degrading epithets: serpent, seducer, defiling deceiver, corrupted outcast, traitor and toad. But to revile myself did nothing to help Lleu. He sobbed a while longer, frustrated in his exhaustion, though he had triumphed over me in a way he could never have planned. His unconditional trust and love were prizes I never knew I coveted, infinitely more powerful and more healing than the fear I had tried to exact from him. He whispered at last, yawning, “You are not evil, but you are so torn! What drives you? If I became high king you’d have more power than any man in Britain, but you choose to follow Morgause.”