“I don’t want to go for a walk,” Jalb griped. “It’s nearly time to start dinner.”
Kapos climbed up on a stool where he kneeled and gave Katiyana a gentle hug and kiss. “He’ll be all right, Kat. You’ll see.”
“Thank you, Kapos.”
They all scattered, leaving Kurz to attend to the wound and Katiyana to look on in pain.
“It’s not the first time and it won’t be the last,” Kurz said, an assuring calm in his voice. “Don’t trouble yourself about it, you hear?”
“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Pokole chimed, bringing a smile at last to Katiyana’s face. “But the next time I see that stupid clumsy fellow . . .” Pokole used his good arm to jab at the air.
“Help me hold his arm steady,” Kurz said.
Katiyana held Pokole’s tiny arm in her gentle hand, her long fingers closing around him. Pokole relaxed in her grasp but jerked when Kurz pulled the linen cloth tightly up over his shoulder.
“Steady now while I tie the knot . . . and there. Good as new.”
Jalb came through the door muttering about the cold and how playing a game of stone toss is no fun with Corto and Arrapato cheating all the time. Duan also came in and inspected the wrapping around Pokole’s arm.
“Better give it a few weeks,” he said.
“And no more going to market,” added Kurz.
Both Katiyana and Pokole frowned. Pokole loved going to the market and Katiyana thrived on taking him.
“Now, now,” Duan said, trying to sooth their disappointment. “Let’s not go feeling sorry for ourselves. It is still winter after all. The snow could return and trap us all in again.”
“Yes, wouldn’t that be delightful,” Jalb muttered.
“There’s no need to be upset about not going to market when it’s such a rare occasion this time of year anyway,” Duan finished.
The others filed in as well. Corto and Arrapato got stuck trying to come in at the same time until Kapos pushed them through the door.
Even with the distraction of all the others, Katiyana focused on her dearest little friend.“I’m so sorry, Pokole.”
“Don’t be,” he squeaked in reply. “They’re all twice as nice and helpful when I’ve got a broken limb.” He winked at her.
“Now don’t go and get your hopes up of being spoon fed,” Kurz said. “That only worked until we learned you could use a fork with your feet.”
Pokole shrugged and the rest of them laughed at the little charmer.
Five knocks thudded at the front door.
“Who could that be?” Duan asked.
“Maybe it’s seven tiny women looking for love,” Arrapato joked.
“Nonsense,” Kurz said. “Nobody ever comes into the forest looking for us.”
Katiyana looked out the window. “Oh no,” she said.
Prince Iden stood on the outside. I wondered what he could possibly want until I saw him holding up a wind chime as a peace offering.
“Is it Jeremy Simkins?” Duan asked.
“Enough of all this pointless speculation. Let’s just answer the dumb door,” Jalb said, beginning a stiff waddle to the front of the house. He opened the door just wide enough to peer outside with one eye. “Who are you?” Jalb asked. “And what do you want?”
Iden tilted his head to one side, trying to get a better view of his inquisitor through the slender crack. “I only came to apologize. I’m to blame for what happened at the market today.”
“You forgot to tell me your name,” Jalb grunted.
“I’m called Trevor Blevkey.”
Duan went to the door. “Come in, come in,” he said, bumping Jalb out of the way, their fat rear-ends clashing. He seemed excited that a handsome young man—one not named Simkins—stood outside the door calling on Katiyana.
“Never even heard of the name Blevkey,” Jalb muttered after Duan invited the stranger in. “It’s probably worse than Simkins.”
Iden stepped in, inhaling a deep breath of air as he took in the sight of the tiny house overcrowded with tiny people.
“I’ve never seen a dwarf before, let alone several in the same room,” he announced with glee. “What a spectacle.”
Jalb leaned into Duan and whispered, “I hate him already.”
“And such a charming old house. Even the vines can’t help but come inside.” His tone had already switched to mockery. At last he held the wind chime out to Pokole. “I’m sorry, my little friend. Here is something to cheer you up.”
Pokole stuck out his tongue and did not accept the gift.
“The only thing that would cheer us up would be for him to leave,” Jalb muttered under his breath to Kurz.
“What did you say your name was again?” Duan asked in an effort to distract the prince away from the prevailing rudeness.
“Trevor Blevkey.” He clasped his arms behind his back, puffing his chest out.
“Are you all right?” Kapos asked Katiyana. “You look so pale.”
Katiyana touched her face, then noticed how white her arms and hands were. “I must not be feeling well. I probably just walked too far today and need rest.”
Concerned, the dwarves each crowded around her.
“Maybe you should lie down,” Kapos suggested.
“I agree,” added Duan.
“You’re so cold,” Corto said as he and his brother both held on to her arms.
Duan offered to get her a drink and slice of bread and Jalb glared at their guest, as if he suspected the boy brought about the phenomenon. In the center of their anxious eyes and questions, the color in Katiyana’s flesh began to return to its normal color.
“Well, maybe I should get going,” Prince Iden—disguised as Trevor Blevkey—announced over the hubbub, frowning ever so slightly. I imagine he seldom stopped smiling, even in dire circumstances.
“Yeah, maybe you’d better,” Jalb agreed, sending him one last glare.
Iden opened the door, taking a single backward glance at the princess of Mayhem and her little men.
He walked slowly back to the market, ignoring the first signs of spring: buds waiting anxiously to open, birds gathering twigs and leaves to make their nests, bees flying about in search of early flowers. He had the look of someone stuck in the caverns of his own thoughts; how distracted he seemed! His head occasionally slanted to one side as he mumbled indistinguishable one-sided conversation. Suddenly he stopped, staring straight ahead, eyes wide. “She’s the princess,” he pronounced loud and clear. Iden resumed his amble, talking in an effort to make sense of it. “She’s the princess of Mayhem, daughter of Queen Radiance.” He grabbed hold of his hair with both hands. “The mirror! That was her in the mirror!”
I wanted to applaud myself, positive my efforts to show the boy pieces of Katiyana’s life through the mirror had been a success. It had worried me that the effects of my spell seemed reserved for whenever Prince Iden came around. But he couldn’t murder the princess, now that he knew her true identity. He wouldn’t. I felt she was safe again, at least from Prince Iden, who I decided was not nearly as dumb as he looked.
^-]
Pokole’s arm healed slowly. Over the next several days, winter gave a final sigh, cooling the air once more and sending a few helpless flurries from the sky. Then finally, it rested. I believed it had more to do this time with the seasons actually changing rather than the ranting of the queen.
Corto and Arrapato grew restless. And who can blame them? With the temperatures warm enough for Jalb to insist Katiyana no longer cook inside, the princess prepared to take the conjoined dwarf brothers to the market for a performance. In years past, men, women, and children all throughout the village would stop to watch their miniature antics.
“I still think we should try one of our magic tricks,” Corto said as the three walked to the market.
How funny the
y looked walking in synchronized strides. Even Katiyana stepped in unison with them.
“Nonsense,” said Arrapato. “We haven’t had enough practice yet.”
“Well, how about the juggling then?”
“Nonsense, brother. Nobody wants to see two people juggle who can’t even stand across a room from each other.”
“We could just throw our objects up high in the air. That would be something to watch”
“And what if one of us has to jerk to the side to catch a badly thrown juggling object? He’d pull the other one with him so that he couldn’t catch the object he was waiting for. Disastrous,” Arrapato finished, silencing his brother.
Katiyana strolled along quietly. She hadn’t spoken much at all since Pokole’s injury. I suspected her gloom had more to do with feelings of sympathy and guilt rather than having to bid winter farewell. I hadn’t seen her so forlorn since leaving Barney’s, and I hated to watch her sorrow for what had happened.
When they reached the market, Katiyana borrowed a crate from one of her favorite shop owners. Corto and Arrapato sat upon it while Katiyana stood next to them, calling out to all the market goers within reach of her voice.
“Come one, come all, to see the amazing Corto and Arrapato, whose mother died birthing them.”
I sensed it took a great deal of effort for her to be charismatic, given her prior solemnity, but she pulled it off.
“Why does she always have to bring that up?” Arrapato asked in a whisper to his twin seated beside him.
“Shhhhh,” Corto answered.
People already began to gather around them. “How would it be, stuck to somebody else for your entire life? You think plowing the field is hard? Try it while attached to another. Have trouble sleeping at night? You know nothing of the difficulties of sleep, for Corto and Arrapato cannot move a muscle in their body without disturbing the other.”
“Speaking of which,” Arrapato began, leaning his head closer to his brother’s.
“Shhhhh,” Corto said, throwing an elbow into the chest of his twin.
I had watched the act several times in the weeks before the cold kept them from coming. Some days this interaction was deliberate; people paid more to see the two quarreling or trying to hurt each other, as brothers often do. But on this first adventure after a long winter, it appeared the two were sincerely annoyed with one another, and their behavior soon drew a large crowd. Katiyana lifted the shirt of Arrapato, and then the shirt of Corto to prove they actually were stuck, which drew a chorus of oooooohs and ahhhhhhs.
“Only a grebice for a peek,” Katiyana said, taking coins left and right and securing them in the pouch hanging around her neck.
Suddenly, I caught sight of Prince Iden. He had seen Katiyana and her little friends. He watched her from a distance—the girl he now believed was the princess of Mayhem—as the audience formed a line to each get a close up look of the anomaly being presented to them.
“Smile at the nice people,” Corto slurred through his teeth, encouraging his brother to put on his show face.
Arrapato turned to look at his brother’s profile. “Sometimes I wish you’d keep your mouth shut.” He said it in a booming voice, causing an outburst of laughter from those in the first half of the line.
Katiyana forced a grin, peering at the brothers out the corner of her eye.
“I mean it!” Arrapato reinforced. “I am so sick of you telling me what to do all the time.”
A look of concern crossed Katiyana’s face as Corto turned his head in rebuttal. “I do not tell you what to do all the time. And I’m sick and tired of your smell.”
“What smell?”
“Why don’t you two show them some of your tricks?” interjected Katiyana, but it was too late. Arrapato slapped his brother across the face. Stunned, Corto stood defenseless while Arrapato twisted as far as he could and put his hands around his brother’s neck.
“Let go of me,” Corto insisted, trying to loosen the choke hold. When he failed at getting beneath Arrapato’s hands, Corto punched his brother in the eye. How comical they looked, trying to fight when they could barely even face each other.
“Stop,” Katiyana urged, trying to break them up. But there would be no breaking them up. They fell backward off the crate and rolled around in the dirt.
Iden had apparently decided to take action. He approached them.
“Here, let me help you,” he told the princess. “I’ll grab this one’s arms. He seems to be the feistiest.” He knelt down and pinned Arrapato’s arms to the ground.
“No, don’t do that. You’ll hurt him!”
“Do you have any other ideas?” Iden was now taking some of Corto’s blows. “They’re going to kill each other if we don’t intervene. Help me out.”
Katiyana knelt beside Corto, but as she tried to restrain him, his arm flew straight into her nose. She covered it with her hand and moments later blood started to trickle down her arm.
“Now look what you’ve done,” Iden scolded the still grappling dwarves.
Both brothers calmed down to look at their beloved friend.
“Oh, Kat. I’m so sorry,” Corto apologized.
“This is all your fault,” scolded Arrapato. He spit at his brother, but it landed on Katiyana’s arm instead.
“Enough!” yelled Katiyana. “I ought to leave you both here tonight to sleep outside.” The crowd stopped their snickers, their jovial faces changing into tense-looking expressions as they all began to dissipate.
“That was some show,” Iden remarked, letting go of his captive dwarf and smirking at the princess.
Katiyana glowered at him, still holding her hand over her nose. Her skin paled, but not so drastically as it had on their previous encounters. “What do you want?” she demanded, a look of anger cemented to her face “First you break Pokole’s arm. Now I’m bleeding.”
“Well, I’m not the one who hit you in the nose, am I?”
How smug Prince Iden sounded, and that arrogant smirk on his face—I wanted to give him a bloody nose.
“I really am very sorry about that, Kat.” Corto looked up at the princess, timid and remorseful.
“And I’m sorry for spitting.” Arrapato tried to get up, but Corto wouldn’t budge.
Iden and Katiyana both came to their feet, helping the attached little men off the ground. As Corto and Arrapato dusted themselves off, Iden stole a moment with the princess. “I just wanted to apologize again. For everything. If there is anything I can do for the child . . .”
“Well, there’s not,” she snapped.
Iden searched his surroundings like a drowning man. What did he think could help him out of his current predicament? His eyes fell on a lavender bush just beginning to blossom. He marched to it, pulling a knife from his boot, and cut off several stems. “Here,” he said, offering them to Katiyana. “Place some of the flowers inside his wrappings. It should help with the pain.”
Katiyana paused a moment, indecisive, then plucked the flowers from his hand and stormed away, retrieving Corto and Arrapato on her way out of town.
^-]
The lavender did not speed the healing, but over the next two days, it did greatly alleviate Pokole’s pain and discomfort.
“Maybe Trevor Blevkey’s not so bad after all,” Duan said one afternoon as he lingered at the table after a hearty meal of potato and carrot stew.
“Yeah, maybe we should have him for dinner,” Jalb said. The ornery look on his face matched his tone.
“That’s a great idea,” Duan said. “Why don’t you go to the market, Kat, and invite him over for dinner?”
Kurz sat by the fire with his arms folded across his chest. “I think Jalb meant we should eat him for dinner.”
“I bet he tastes bad,” Pokole said. And just as every other time Pokole opened his little mouth, they all laughed.
&n
bsp; But Katiyana did not have to go to the market to invite the prince of Mischief for dinner. Iden showed up at their door only a few short hours later.
“Would you like to go for a walk?” Iden asked Katiyana as soon as she answered the door. Her skin paled slightly, and it again caused me worry. I thought of Jeremy Simkins and how Katiyana had always been safe with him; and her skin had always remained its natural olive color—made even darker by constant sun—in his presence. It made me wonder what Iden’s intentions really were. Was he capable of killing her, even now he believed her to be royalty?
All of the dwarves waited for her answer. Pokole stuck his tongue out at the prince.
“I guess so,” Katiyana said, looking to Kurz. “If it’s okay with you.”
“You’re not the slave, remember?” he said with a tense smile.
Katiyana grabbed a light shawl to wrap around her shoulders and they strode out of the tiny home, prince and princess. As the door closed behind them, splotchy white began to cover Katiyana’s arms, face and legs, signifying to me that my spell still considered Iden a threat. This posed a serious problem, since they would now be in the forest alone.
Stormy Weather
Prince Iden wasted no time testing his theory that the girl he’d been commanded to kill was actually the daughter of the woman who wanted her dead.
“What is your name?” he asked as they departed from the safety of Katiyana’s seven little men.
“It’s Kat.” She pulled the shawl tight around her and took in a deep breath, raising her shoulders and then letting them fall back to their normal resting height. Bleak, gray rain clouds gathered above them, and a constant breeze sent Katiyana’s hair flapping and swirling about.
“Kat what?”
The princess looked to her inquisitor. “Kat Whyte.”
“Whyte?” Iden asked, his signature smirk ever present.
A clap of thunder roared above them, and a feeble rain found its way from the darkening clouds above, which by now completely veiled the sky.
“Yes. Why, is there something wrong with that?” She sounded annoyed, and I can’t say I blame her.
Snow Whyte and the Queen of Mayhem Page 12