by Jon Jacks
Her focus was purely on following the glittering light she felt sure must be the fairy.
Sandy worried that it was a light that appeared to be waning, until she realised with a sigh of relief that the light itself was after all undiminished – that it was, rather, the background that was increasingly sparkling with an equivalent intensity, as the trees and even the walls of the houses took on a silvery, glistening coating of ice.
Icy flakes began to fall around her, swirling into ever fiercer squalls.
Now, at last, Sandy knew for sure where she was being led.
*
The general invited her into the house with a gracious smile.
This time, there was no impatient wait within the room of paintings (although this time, ironically, Sandy would have been interested to see if the Russians had been the secret purchasers of her last painting). She was allowed to progress straight through to the ballroom, where the dancing was at its most vigorous, its most joyful.
There was no longer any bier lying in the dancefloor’s centre.
And yet the glorious light that had so entranced Sandy on her first visit here was still present. Now, however, it moved excitedly about the ballroom, suffusing everyone and everything nearby in its coruscating glow.
Even amongst the excited swirl of innumerable dancers, the czarina’s whirling veil of swan feathers meant she was instantly recognisable: and this was despite the fact that, once again, Sandy found herself facing a completely different girl.
*
Chapter 25
The czarina was so enraptured by the elated whirl of dancing that, at first, she failed to notice Sandy’s approach.
No one seemed surprised that the czarina was now not only awake but also taking part in the dancing with all the gaiety of a child, regularly swapping partners rather than restricting her enjoyment to any norms of decorum.
It was only when the approaching Sandy was almost upon her that the czarina turned and smiled in greeting.
‘Thank you so much for attending my leaving party!’ the czarina exclaimed joyfully, reaching out a hand to take hold of Sandy’s and pull her into the whirl of the dance. ‘You will dance with me, won’t you? I do so love dancing!’
Sandy was given little choice about joining the dance: the czarina had expertly brought her into the midst of the swirling throng, the glow of the veil cascading round them both as if it were a soft fall of brightly glistening snow.
‘Leaving?’ a bewildered Sandy asked curiously, as she almost unconsciously joined in with the flowing moves of the dance. ‘Why are you leaving now that you’re at last awake?’
‘Because, because…’ the czarina trilled teasingly as they twirled together around the dancefloor. ‘Because there is still so much more for you to accomplish: and so I must entrust my most precious possession to you!’
The whirling of their dancing was now impossibly, miraculously rushed. The feathers from the veil were fluttering free, rising up into the air like uncountable, endlessly glittering stars, like an infinite number of flashing snowflakes.
And as the glimmering feathers rose up and away from her, the czarina gradually lost her ethereal glow, her beauty undiminished but the all-suffusing sense of magic that hung about her dispersing, deserting her.
‘While it’s held in your trust,’ the czarina continued, seeing that a puzzled Sandy required further explanation, ‘I can’t advise my people here: and so I’ll return to Russia for a while, to see what it’s like in this age.’
Sandy could easily have imagined that the czarina had already departed for Russia, whisking her dancing partners along with her, for the swirling feathers now fell around them like thick flurries of snow. Even the czarina was disappearing from view in the blur of rapidly falling feathers.
The feathers were cold, as cold as ice. As they landed on Sandy, on her dress, they melted, like icy flakes.
They were no longer feathers, they were a swirling storm of snow.
In her hand she was no longer holding the czarina’s fingers but, instead, a card.
*
The ballroom, together with its dancers, had vanished.
Sandy was outside in the thickly falling snow once more, as if she had never, ever really visited the house.
As if she were still attempting to follow the glittering spark that had been the fairy.
But there was no longer any glittering fairy to chase after.
However, in her hand she held the card: a card that appeared to be drawing into it every flake falling about her.
The flakes rushed into the card, more and more of them disappearing into it without a trace.
With a last final surge, a last elegant whirl of massed flakes, the snowstorm abruptly ceased.
And Sandy was standing once most on a regular London street on a typically midsummer’s day.
*
There had been no bier lying at the centre of the ballroom, as there had been on all Sandy’s previous visits.
And yet now, pictured upon the card Sandy held within her hand, there was a bier of the most elaborate kind; one of the glass-topped caskets whole populations respectfully trooped past to pay their respects to a fallen king.
Far from displaying a corpse, however, the glass casket contained what could have been its sculptured headstone, a wondrously carved angel cocooned within her own stilled wings.
As before, her brother Frederick and his friends observed the card with bemusement, finding the meaning of its imagery every bit as elusive as any of the other cards. Once again, Sandy found she had no choice but to lie about how she had come by the new card, claiming that it had simply appeared within her room one morning, a possible replacement for the shattered stone that had now somehow completely vanished.
No one was aware of the swift disappearance of the seasons that Sandy had experienced. Indeed, stranger still, whenever they spoke of the past months, there was no indication that Sandy hadn’t been a normal part of their lives.
Strangest of all, Sandy was shocked to discover that she had already begun work on her next painting, The Beautiful Wallflower: a portrait of a girl once possessing an otherworld beauty who has now accepted a more earthly existence – a picture of carnations, of incarnation, of a goddess made flesh, her amber necklace one of beads of solidified sunlight.
*
Chapter 26
A Misplaced Trust
At a point where the borders of the Thrice Ten Kingdoms are supposed to meet, there actually lies another land, one called Labudledian, or the Virgin Land of Swans. Being a country so small it is virtually indistinguishable from the other countries surrounding it, you won’t be surprised to hear that it consists mainly of a large lake, Rosamore, or Dewlake, the source of its waters apparently being nothing but Selene’s tears.
Naturally, then, the waters of this lake possess magical qualities. No matter how beautiful a woman is, she emerges after bathing in the water more gorgeous than ever.
Unfortunately, this lake is so cut off from civilisation that few people are aware of its existence, let alone its wondrous effects. And so when the smith and hunter Wayland came upon it purely by chance, he naturally didn’t know anything of its magical powers.
He had been gone from home for well over six months, tracking down wolves and bears to collect their pelts. Of course, he also hunted smaller game for his food, and so when he had seen a flock of ducks flying too high to bring down with an arrow, yet obviously swooping lower towards a hidden lake, he had followed their course and arrived at the very edges of Rosamore.
As he looked out across the great expanse of water from his hideaway amongst the bushes, he heard another fluttering of wings pass directly over him, a louder beating this time, of vaster, more powerful wings.
A small flock of swans, seven of them, gracefully alighted upon the lake’s almost motionless waters.
Notching an arrow to his bow string, he sighted upon one of the smallest and prettiest swans; then almost let that ar
row fall from his grip as he gawped in amazement. The swan had transformed into the most beautiful girl he had ever seen.
The other swans, too, had changed into gorgeous young women, completely naked now that they held in their hands diaphanous veils. They casually cast the veils towards the beach, letting a breeze catch and take their magical guises towards the golden sands.
The veils drifted languidly in the air just above the slightly rippling waves of the lake, briefly taking on for themselves the image of graciously hovering swans. Then they fluttered lightly towards the ground, resting upon the sands like sparkling pools of spilt milk.
And from his hiding place, Wayland watched, entranced – fearing that he might even be bewitched.
*
Who were these delightful girls, who sang with all the sensuousness and allure of sirens, yet took on the forms of swans, not beasts?
Unfortunately, there are variations in the relating of their history, their birth.
The one believed by many to be the most believable concerns Zeus and Leda, Queen of Sparta.
It’s nonsense, of course: but whereas the truth of the matter is known only to a chosen few (and therefore, bizarrely, is presumed by many to have no real base in truth), Greek myth is so well known and admired that using it as basis for our tale will have to suffice for the moment.
Leda had been granted the power of shape-shifting, her favourite form being that of a mare, her second that of a swan. Now Zeus appropriated these powers for himself, appearing before her as another swan, the result being two eggs; the god-like Polydeuces and Helen of Troy being born of one, and the mortals Castor and Clytemnestra from the other.
Not surprisingly, the people of Sparta (who, surely, must be given the benefit of any doubt, possessing as they do first-hand knowledge of this affair, and worshiping in particular the twins Castor and Polydeuces) beg to differ on a certain detail of this tale.
For them, you see, Helen is indeed born in this way, such that she herself becomes a swan maiden. And indeed, the girls of Sparta would celebrate this fact by crowning trees with garlands and embroiled veils and naming them Helen Trees.
So is it any wonder that the nymphs cavorting at the edges of the lake possess an exceptional beauty?
They are the children of the most beautiful woman in history!
*
Whatever the truth (for the swan maidens, of course, are trusted to keep the secret of their birth secret), I’m sure you will trust me when I say the girls being secretly observed by the hunter Wayland were the most beautiful and entrancing women he had ever seen.
One in particular had caught his attention (some say she was called the Princess Maria, although Wayland would come to know her as Allwise): perhaps because she was the one he had first seen transform from elegant swan into graceful woman; perhaps because it was her veil that had drifted closest of all towards him as he had watched them from his hideaway amongst the thick bushes.
The veil was gossamer thin, itself like a sheen of fine flesh, of milky substance.
What, he thought, if that veil were to blow away in a malicious breeze?
Would she then have to remain here, unable to fly away?
Shouldn’t he keep it in safe keeping for her?
Stealthily, utilising all his skills as a hunter, he silently moved forward from his covering of bushes. He grabbed the very edges of the veil, pulling it towards him as he once again slipped back into the concealing undergrowth.
He crammed the veil into a casket, which he erroneously believed would keep it safe and untouchable.
Then he placed the casket in the pack he carried upon his back.
*
It had already been late evening when Wayland had begun his tracking of the ducks he had intended to transform into his supper.
The moon, along with the very brightest of stars, had already been faintly visible in the darkening sky. Now, as the sun finally slipped away beyond the horizon, the sky completely darkened but for its snowflake-like glistening of stars.
The lake wasn’t dark in anyway, however, but glittered with a patina of sliver, as if the moon had graced it with her own garments, as if the lake itself emanated its own mystical, milky light.
All night long, the beautiful nymphs played, and laughed, and sang.
Wayland never slept, not wishing to miss even a moment of this wondrous entertainment.
Unfortunately, having her own affairs to attend to, the moon eventually began to slip away, just as her brother the sun had done earlier. And so now her sibling was slowly rising once again to take her place.
Seeing that their time at the lake was coming to an end, with a few final giggles and splashes of the water the young girls rushed through the waves lapping at the shore, searching out their veils that had been blown towards the sands.
But of course, there were now only six veils: six veils for seven swan maidens.
The youngest amongst the girls soon realised that it was hers that had somehow gone missing.
‘I thought it was here,’ she insisted unsurely, glancing uncertainly about her, ‘I must have misplaced it!’
Of course, she searched everywhere for it, her sisters helping her to look. But Wayland, being a clever hunter, had already moved deeper into the undergrowth, undetectable to anyone but the most suspicious of searchers: for naturally, all the swan maidens were all blessed with the most trusting of natures, failing to even consider that anyone might have stolen and hidden the veil.
‘It had been put in my trust too!’ the poor young girl wept, mourning the loss of her precious veil as she forlornly sat down upon the sands, ‘and it seems I was completely unworthy of that trust!’
For, at last, the dawn couldn’t be held back from ascending any longer: and so the poor girl’s six sisters had no choice but to sadly call out to her that they would have to leave.
Donning their own veils, they became swans once more – and languidly, miserably, rose into the sky, abandoning their unfortunate sibling to her fate, trusting that fortune would smile kindly upon her.
Naturally, the abandoned sister felt even more despondent than her swiftly disappearing siblings, flooded as she was by a complete sense of hopelessness. Slumping despairingly to her knees, she dejectedly watched the rinsing sun, realising she had little alternative but to place her wellbeing in the trust of the gods.
She jumped, her heart stirring with fright, when a large, rugged man with a copper beard seemed to appear out of nowhere as he stepped out from the veiling undergrowth.
She was naked, and all alone!
She ran for and nervously hid behind a large white stone protruding up from the beach. She knew, of course, that the man had already seen her, but she wanted to at least hide her nakedness from him.
‘I mean you no harm,’ the man insisted, trying not to startle her any further as he slowly took off his cloak and steadily drew closer and closer towards her, ‘please trust me.’
He reached out with a hand, offering her his cloak.
He grinned sympathetically: and so, recognising she had little choice but to trust him, she accepted the kindly proffered cloak with a wan smile.
*
The life of a hunter living alone in the wilderness is an arduous one that few people would find acceptable – and so for a beautiful girl whose life had previously revolved around magic, it would of course be intolerable.
Recognising this, Wayland immediately broke camp, and headed for home.
After all, he had acquired a prize beyond all imagining. A prize he trusted would delight his mother.
He was bringing back a wife.
Naturally, at this point the poor girl failed to realise that Wayland had already set out her future for her. Maybe if she had been aware of his intentions she wouldn’t have placed herself within his care so trustingly. Just as she wouldn’t have trusted him if she’d knon that he was the one responsible for the disappearance of her precious veil.
As it
was, however, she placed herself completely in his hands, trusting him to take care of her in this unfamiliar wilderness, this unknown world.
She wasn’t even sure how time worked here. Instinctively, though, she recognised that it must work differently to how it did in her own world.
Her sisters wouldn’t be returning to the lake tonight; not in the tonight of this world. Time progressed so much more slowly on this lower level of life.
Wayland couldn’t fail to see the misery etched upon her face: it aged her slightly, even detracted from her otherwise otherworldly beauty.
He tried to make her feel more cheerful about the situation she had ended up in by shaving off the immense beard he’d grown while living out in the wilderness, revealing the surprisingly young and even handsome man who had lain hidden beneath it. He also provided her with anything she desired, including the best and cleanest of his own clothes, and the tastiest titbits of anything he hunted and cooked.
Even so, by the time Wayland had reached his home, the harsh living and weather had naturally taken its toll on the young girl, such that his mother thought of her as being pretty enough, if not the ravishing beauty her son seemed to think he’d brought back with him. She trusted that the young girl’s looks would undoubtedly improve, however, once everyone had settled down to the far more comfortable life offered by their home.
‘If only she’d smile,’ Wayland’s mother thought to herself: ‘A young girl surely couldn’t always be so miserable!’
Still, her son insisted that he would marry this unhappy little wallflower of a girl. And more surprisingly still, this sad young girl, who didn’t seem at all suited to this way of life, accepted Wayland’s offer of marriage, trusting him implicitly when he assured her that he would do everything in his power to make her happy once again.