A Captive of Wing and Feather

by Melanie Cellier

  Three white birds swooped around me, although it was hard to tell which ones in the near darkness. They honked and bugled, circling me, and it didn’t matter that I couldn’t understand them the way they understood me—it was clear they were both scolding and urging me on.

  But it was the others that drew my attention. One of them—no doubt Shadow—had swept through the trees only to issue a loud, challenging honk, and the remaining three followed her, gliding past me and the three birds issuing their admonishment.

  Despite the need for haste, I paused, looking back to see what had attracted their attention. The white feathers caught what little light was left, brightening our small patch of forest, but their bulk also blocked my sight.

  All four of them reared up, stretching out their wings and hissing. I took a step back toward them just as a voice spoke.

  “Steady on, there! Adelaide?”

  I gasped. Gabriel.

  Whether the birds took exception to his call or to my gasp, something caused them to lunge forward, attacking him with their wings—or in the case of Shadow, with her beak.

  The prince shouted, and my ears caught the sound of a blade being wrested from a scabbard.

  “No!” I called in a long honk. “He has a sword.”

  Shadow snaked her head around and hissed at me, as if rebuking me for questioning their courage. I glared at her.

  “Time is running out. We need to be moving. Leave him.”

  With a rustle and flap of feathers, the birds pulled back, coming to join the three already with me. Together they surrounded me with a bevy of curved necks and orange and black beaks. Their movement revealed the prince, one arm still raised to protect his face while the other held the now drawn sword partially raised.

  “Adelaide?” he repeated, staring at the spectacle of me and the swans.

  He had followed me. How had he followed me? He must have been lying in wait somewhere, hidden. Had he gone to the castle at all? I could barely make out his face now in the deepening night.

  Pain flared across my body. I had momentarily forgotten its imminent arrival, and I gave a soft cry.

  A swift streak of movement, more heard than seen, shot down from the sky and nipped at Gabriel’s arm. He shouted and leaped forward.

  Eagle. I really was distracted if I’d failed to notice that the one black member of my wedge was missing.

  “Eagle! Stop it!” I managed to squeak out the words, and the seventh swan swooped toward me. When she reached me, she butted at me with her head, and I didn’t need any further prompting.

  Ignoring Gabe, who called my name, I took off running through the trees. The pain was growing worse, leaching the strength from my limbs, but I knew I had to push on. I kept both arms raised, my forearms protecting my face as I careened through the darkness. Only two years of familiarity with this path kept me from colliding with the now invisible trunks, and twice I tripped over roots or fallen branches and went sprawling across the ground.

  The second time I fell, the pain kept me glued to the ground, my head spinning. My swans had taken to the sky, but when I didn’t get up, one of them came flapping down to peck gently at me. She grasped my cloak in her beak and pulled, trying to get me moving again.

  Tears dripped silently down my cheeks, but I managed to haul myself up with a groan, resuming my stumbling run. Ahead of me, I glimpsed light between the trunks and leaves. A final burst of strength propelled me forward through the last of the trees.

  With a deep, trembling sigh, I sank to the ground and pressed my face to my hands. The pain was gone, but tremors shook my wrung out and exhausted body.

  Long seconds passed as I recovered my equilibrium. The moon shone on seven elegant shapes gliding down from the sky to land gently in the smooth waters of the small lake in front of me. All seven of them paddled in my direction, but I raised a weak arm and waved them away.

  “I’m fine. I promise.” My voice came out croaky, and I tried to remember how many nights it had been since I bothered to talk to them in the hours of dark. There seemed little point when my words came out in a language unfamiliar to them.

  Although they didn’t understand me at night in the way they did during the day, my gesture and tone must have conveyed something of my message. Four of them broke off with soft honks, up-ending themselves immediately in search of food.

  But Snowy and Sweetie continued in my direction, heaving themselves from the water to come and lie beside me, their hot bodies and soft feathers pressing gently against my still-shaking body.

  Shadow followed behind more slowly, standing in front of me and honking assertively.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “It was an unsettling day, and I lost track of time. I guess I lost track of a few things if I let the prince follow me that far. None of you were hurt, were you?”

  She gazed at me, her head slightly cocked to one side, but clearly unable to understand me. I sighed.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t have any real explanation anyway. At least not one likely to make any sense to a swan,” I muttered, mostly to myself.

  Snowy and Sweetie’s calming presence worked itself gradually into my core, relaxing me. The pain—so searing and disabling only minutes ago—was already a distant memory, gone the moment I stepped into the clearing.

  I pulled myself up, stroking my hand against my friends’ feathers as I went, and walked over to the lake for a drink. The cold water sharpened my mind, driving my thoughts back to the prince. Was he stumbling around lost in the dark?

  I chewed on my lip. I didn’t want him to follow me here, but neither did I want him to die in the forest. Here in this small tranquil oasis we were safe but was the same true of the wider forest? I had heard rustling on my walk here, but it could well have been him from the beginning. I could only hope so—for his sake.

  No such sound presaged the tall, thin man who stepped into the clearing, shattering the illusion of tranquility. All seven swans responded aggressively, flapping their wings as they grunted and hissed. None of them offered him any violence as they had Gabriel, however. Instead they retreated to form a ring around me. Whether they were offering protection or seeking it had never been clear to me where this man was concerned.

  I drew strength from their presence, however, and straightened my back.

  “Leander.” I knew it grated him to hear his name without his title, and I relished the small act of defiance.

  “Surrounded by your avian handmaidens, as always, Princess, I see,” he said, with a smile that held neither warmth nor goodwill.

  I said nothing. I still hadn’t worked out if the swans were his doing or whether their appearance two years ago had taken him by surprise. Either way, there was no question that they neither answered to him nor liked his presence.

  “What do you want?” I asked, although in truth I knew the answer to that question.

  The knowledge that my tardy arrival would prompt a visit from him was almost as effective as the pain in ensuring I returned to this lake before darkness fell each night. Except for today. I sent a silent curse in the absent prince’s direction. Why had he arrived to upend my carefully balanced life?

  “It’s been a long time since you were late back,” Leander said in friendly tones that somehow reminded me of nothing so much as a coiled snake—oily and sleek and promising danger.

  “And what of it?” I asked, trying to keep my voice from giving away any hint of my roiling emotions. “I’m here, am I not?”

  I arched an eyebrow at him, trying to mirror the poise that always graced the memories of my long-dead mother.

  “Such elegance, my dear,” he said, strolling around the edge of the lake toward me. “In spite of your dirt-stained cloak. How the fools in that town fail to recognize you for what you are continues to astound me.”

  He stopped two steps in front of me, held back by the solid wall of feathers which pressed against me on all sides. I realized that no black broke up the monotony of white, and risked a single glance
around, my breath quickening.

  I only hoped Eagle remembered what had happened last time she tried to attack Leander. I’d had to nurse her for weeks.

  Leander continued talking, all his attention on me. “But then, they let you slip through their fingers, so they clearly are fools. I certainly don’t intend to do likewise.”

  I abandoned my surreptitious search for the missing swan and gave him the coldest look I could muster.

  “You may have me trapped here, Leander, but you don’t own me.”

  He gave a low chuckle. “Do I not, indeed? I suppose we shall see…”

  The silence between us grew to uncomfortable lengths, and it took all of my determination not to wilt before him. Eventually he gave another slight chuckle.

  “Really, you should be grateful, Your Highness. I only come to check on your welfare, you know—as I did that first time. Just imagine how terrible if you were injured on your way back and unable to complete the journey. No doubt you would welcome my presence then.”

  I clenched my teeth together and said nothing. I did remember that first night, when I still didn’t really understand or believe the enchantment he had wrought. I had run straight from the forest determined never to enter it again. Even when darkness fell and the pain began, I had tried to deny it at first. By the time I acknowledged I needed to return to the lake, I had been far beyond the journey back. I had barely managed to stagger a quarter of the way.

  I also remembered how long it had taken him to appear—how long he had left me to suffer to drive his point home. And almost as unsettling was the memory of what it had felt like to be carried in his arms, pressed against his chest. I suppressed a shudder. He had carried me as gently as if I were a baby, but I had still felt the need to scrub myself three times in the lake before I felt free of the lingering sensation of his nearness. There was a darkness in this man, and it rode all too close to the surface.

  “As you can see, I am not injured,” I said. “You are not needed here tonight.”

  “Pity,” he said, and his smile made my skin crawl. “I do so like to be useful.”

  “It is late,” I said stiffly, “I need sleep.”

  “Very well, then, my dear. I wouldn’t wish to disturb your rest.” He gave a mocking half-bow. “And after all, I know where to find you.”

  “Indeed,” I hissed. “You’re the one keeping me here.”

  He chuckled to himself again as he strolled away, and for an unthinking moment, I longed to pick up a stone from the edge of the lake and hurl it at his disappearing head. Sometimes it was as unnerving that he left me here mostly undisturbed as it was that he had trapped me in the first place. What exactly were Lord Leander’s plans for me?

  At times, not knowing felt like the worst torture of all.

  A soft flutter of feathers alerted me to the presence of my missing friend. I turned to glare at Eagle just as Leander disappeared into the trees at the same point he had appeared, a short distance around the lake.

  “Where have you been?” I asked the bird, not expecting any answer. “I was worried.”

  “I think she must have sensed you were in trouble,” said the prince, stepping out into the clearing behind the bird.

  I swayed, my eyes flying to where Leander had just disappeared. So close!

  “I didn’t hear everything,” Gabriel continued in a grim voice, “but I gather you have a problem this fine bird thinks I can help you solve.”

  I blinked and his strung bow appeared in one hand, the other hand sliding over his shoulder and retrieving an arrow. I blinked again, and he had already taken several strides in the direction of the departed lord.

  My scrambled mind grasped his intent just as he broke into a faster pace.

  “What? No. No!”

  The swans honked, bumping against each other as I pushed through them, racing forward and launching myself at the prince’s back. He stumbled and crashed to the ground, my weight dragging him down.

  Chapter 4

  For two full seconds, I lay there, stunned. And then I realized the entire length of my body was sprawled over Gabriel’s back, and I scrambled to my feet. For several more seconds I stood frozen while the prince lay unmoving on the ground.

  Had he been hurt? I stepped toward him again, concern overriding my reluctance to approach him. Before I actually reached him, however, he pushed himself up with his arms, and slowly rose to his feet.

  In the moonlight he looked faintly flushed, and I examined him closely for any sign of injury. When I could find none, I took another step back.

  “What did you think you were doing?” I demanded, keeping my heated voice low in case Leander were somehow still in earshot.

  Gabriel raised both eyebrows. “So, you can suddenly speak.” His eyes bored into me. “And you do not, in fact, wish to be rescued from that…gentleman?”

  “Of course I want to be rescued,” I snapped. “But not by you, Gabriel!”

  The prince looked injured, although I couldn’t tell if he meant it seriously or not.

  “You wound my manly pride, Addie! I assure you, I’m an excellent rescuer.” He grinned, answering my question about the seriousness of his feelings—or lack thereof. “And I could have sworn you used to call me Gabe.”

  “We were children,” I said stiffly.

  “Childhood friends. Exactly my point! And of the same rank, too. I think nicknames are entirely appropriate.”

  His easy smile remained, but I noticed a more serious gleam in his eye as he watched me. Perhaps he wished to see if I would repudiate his acknowledgment of my identity. I said nothing, however. What was the point out here? He clearly knew me, and my swans didn’t care who I was.

  Instead, I turned my head and looked across the water. I let my eyes roam over it in the almost unnaturally bright moonlight, trying to see the clearing as he might see it. It couldn’t have looked more different from the surrounding forest. Here colorful flowers had been blooming for weeks—soaking up the sweet water of the lake and the rays of the sun that had free access to the ground around its shores.

  There was no denying that even in the dark it looked like an idyllic paradise—at least in contrast to the rest of the forest. While I watched, a plump rabbit hopped up to the edge of the water to drink, clearly unafraid of any lurking predators. And it had no reason to fear. No dangerous creature had ever accosted me here—I had never so much as seen one come seeking refreshment of its own from the lake’s waters.

  Gabe must have followed the direction of my gaze because his next words were quiet and awed.

  “What is this place?”

  “Cursed,” I said, noting the brusqueness of my voice but making no apology for it.

  “It doesn’t look cursed.”

  I could feel that his eyes had returned to me—no doubt full of far too many questions—so I kept my own turned resolutely away. He let the silence draw out, filled only with the splash and flap of the swans, who had mostly returned to foraging in the lake.

  Eventually he must have realized that I didn’t intend to offer any answers because he spoke again.

  “I still can’t quite believe I’ve actually found you. I’ve been looking through every village and town in the forest since winter first loosened its grip. Well, all those on our side of the border, at least. Dominic already searched those on his side last autumn.”

  I stiffened at the mention of my brother, and suddenly I was the one full of questions. I managed to keep them locked inside, however, as Gabe continued to rattle on.

  “There have been strange rumors from this region, and Dominic has been desperate to follow up any hint of you, however ambiguous. I would have come looking myself back in the autumn—once Jon wrote explaining the situation and asking for my help—if not for the various excuses and delays that my family invented to keep me in the capital. But after being stuck there with them all winter, I assure you I would have gone mad without an escape.”

  He paused to shake his head. “So I rem
inded them of all the benefits to the kingdom if I was the one to find you, and rode off before they could come up with another reason to keep me there. So, really, I should be thanking you.”

  He gave me a courtly inclination of his head and shoulders, his eyes inviting me to share in his humorous tone, but I had barely heard his last couple of sentences. My mind whirled with confusion. His comments about my brother had been confusing enough, but I could make no sense at all of the rest of the tale.

  “Jon?” I asked. “As in, Prince Jonathan of Marin? Jon asked for your help in finding me? Whyever would he do that?” Palinar and Marin were trade partners, certainly, and there was no bad blood between us—or there had not been when I left five years ago—but we didn’t have an especially close connection either.

  Once upon a time I had been friendly with Jon’s sister, Princess Lilac, but we hadn’t seen each other regularly enough to develop a close friendship. While her rank made her an acceptable enough companion for me in my father’s eyes, the duchy of Marin could not be compared to Palinar—mightiest of the kingdoms. My father had not considered anyone worthy of a close connection—no doubt the reason my brother and I had always turned to each other.

  But I quickly pushed my mind away from Dominic. It would do me no good to linger on thoughts of him.

  “He did it for Sophie, no doubt,” Gabe said. When I gave him a blank look, he continued. “I’m guessing Sophie spoke to Lily, and Jon would do anything Lily asked him.”

  When I still looked confused, a look of disgust crossed his face. I fell back several steps. But his next words suggested the disgust wasn’t directed at me.

  “Look at me, acting the utter fool! Of course you don’t know who Sophie or Lily are. You probably have no idea what I’m talking about at all.”

  He shook his head, shifting his weight from foot to foot restlessly. “I keep forgetting how long you’ve been gone. So much has changed. It’s a long story, I’m afraid. But the short version is this: the High King has lifted the storms that blocked the way to the Old Kingdoms. A delegation arrived in Marin just in time to be caught up in Dominic’s Princess Tourney. One of the foreign princesses—Sophia of Arcadia—won and is now married to your brother and queen in Palinar. And Sophie has a twin sister, Lily, who has married Jon. Thus your sister-in-law is also sister-in-law to Jon.” He laughed. “And, as I said, that’s the simple version.”