Princess of the Wild Swans

by Diane Zahler

  That night I slept restlessly beside Riona, unused to sharing a bed. I rose at the song of Molach the thrush and sewed on, pricking my fingers just a little. The day passed quietly; toward evening, Liam came back from Tiramore, where he had been doctoring a mare in labor. His face was somber as he hung his cloak, and he sat beside me and said, “Meriel, they are looking for you in town. The queen’s guards have marched up and down every street and knocked at every door.”

  I raised troubled eyes to his. What did the townspeople do? I asked.

  “They are your people, Meriel. They do not like the queen and seem to know she is not to be trusted. Some ordered the guards from their shops and homes, and none would speak of you. Nowhere were they given any aid at all.”

  Oh, I said in wonder. I had not spent very much time in Tiramore, and I did not know the people. I did not think they knew me. It was gratifying to hear that they esteemed me enough to protect me as they had.

  As the hour grew late, Brigh said, “Children, get your cloaks. I wish to show you something.”

  I looked inquiringly at Liam, but he shrugged. I laid aside my sewing, took my cloak from a peg beside the door, and followed the others out into the darkness. Our breath plumed in the cold air, and the full moon hung low, enormous and orange in the night sky.

  In silence we walked, and I realized before long that we were heading to Heart Lake. I hurried ahead and put my hand on Brigh’s arm to stop her.

  It is not safe, I warned her. The lake is fed with a spring from Faerie, and my stepmother has already summoned a merrow from its depths. She may have placed guards there as well.

  “I know, my dear,” she replied. “Riona told me of the merrow. But we will only be there for a short time and will stay far from the spring. It sounds for now as if the guards are busy in town. If we see them, we will turn back. I think you will be glad at what I have to show you.” She would not say more.

  We approached the lake as the moon rose higher, casting a silver trail across the water. Close to shore I could see the swans, grouped together. They swam toward the moon trail, and when the first swan was touched by moonlight, its feathers dropped away and the bird’s form lengthened and changed. As I watched in astonishment, I saw my brother Darrock standing before me, up to his booted ankles in lake water. Then Cullan changed from bird to man, then Aidan, Baird, and Druce. In an instant they were all there: my five brothers in human form, like phantoms in the mist. Could they be real?

  Riona cried out as I could not, and we both ran forward to the lake’s edge. I threw my arms around Darrock and felt his warm embrace. “Your courage astounds me, sister!” he whispered before handing me to Aidan, who squeezed the breath out of me. I hugged Druce and Baird, and they murmured praise, and next I turned to Cullan, whose arms were tight around Riona. I glanced at Brigh and saw surprise on her face. Then Cullan released Riona and grabbed me and twirled me about, the icy water splashing about our legs.

  “Well done thus far, little one!” he said, and my joy nearly overwhelmed me. But at that moment a cloud crossed the moon, and its silver trail disappeared. Without warning Cullan dropped me into the water. My brothers shrank and altered and were befeathered. All at once there were five swans swimming where just an instant before there had been five young men standing.

  Riona’s eyes filled with tears. “What has happened?”

  “It was the full moon, my love,” her mother explained. “At midnight on the night of the full moon, when the orb’s light falls on the enchanted one, the spell is lifted—but only for a moment.”

  “It is almost worse to see him again,” Riona mourned.

  “Oh, child,” Brigh said gently, “I did not know you loved him. He is a prince, and you are the daughter of a witch and a sailor. Is this wise?”

  Riona wiped her eyes and stood very straight. “The heart has its own wisdom, Mother,” she replied.

  Then suddenly a silken voice that nearly made my heart stop came from up the path. “And what better husband for a sailor’s child than a waterbird?” The clouds parted enough for the moon to show us the form of Lady Orianna, standing before us in a fur-trimmed green cloak. Behind her were two of her guards, their hands on their swords.

  I shrank back and Liam stepped bravely in front of me, but Brigh said calmly, “Welcome, Your Majesty. Have you come to see your handiwork?”

  The queen’s face was hidden beneath her hood. I imagined her scowl, though, and her annoyance was clear in her voice when she answered, “I do not know you, woman, but I see my stepdaughter by your side. We have been much concerned over her absence. Come, Meriel.” She beckoned to me, and the moonlight glinted off the ruby ring that my father had given her.

  I will not! I told her, silent but defiant.

  “I say you will.” Lady Orianna stepped forward, seeming to grow taller and more menacing as she approached. I felt rooted to the ground; my legs would not move. On the water my brothers began to flap their wings wildly, and the queen was momentarily distracted by the commotion. When her attention wavered, I was free to turn, and I sprinted away, back down the path. I could hear footsteps following me and hoped desperately that Liam and Riona were following me, not the guards. Then I heard two voices, Brigh’s and the queen’s, raised in anger, speaking strange rhyming words that I knew were spells.

  As the path curved away, I glanced over my shoulder. Liam and Riona were just behind me, and above the spot where the two witches stood hurling incantations, an unearthly greenish light glimmered in the sky and was reflected in the water. Sparks flew from it and landed, hissing, on the surface of the lake.

  My shoe caught on a root and I pitched forward. Liam caught me just before I went down, and he kept a firm grip on my arm as we dashed down the dark lane and turned off onto the path to the cottage. But another light glowed there, and it was not the cheery radiance of candles in the window. It was the crackling glare of fire.

  “Our cottage!” Riona cried out in despair. Liam let go of me and raced ahead, throwing open the front door and disappearing inside. “Liam!” his sister screamed. “Come back! Save yourself!”

  I sank to the cold ground, shaking, my hands over my mouth. Riona ran up to the door, but the blaze pushed her back. She darted from window to window, trying to see inside, but there were only smoke and flame.

  I have brought this on you, I thought, weeping. I have killed Liam! Oh, forgive me! But Riona did not hear me or chose not to answer. She ran around to the back of the cottage, and I scrambled up and followed her.

  As we reached the garden, a beam in the cottage gave way, and with a groan and a crash the roof fell in. Sparks soared upward like a thousand fireflies, as they had flown above the two witches at the lake. Again Riona screamed in horror. I thought she would collapse and reached out to hold her up.

  And then we saw him amidst the brown and wilted garden plants—Liam, alive and unburned. His face was streaked with ash, and his hair was singed, but in his arms was Catkin and on each shoulder a trembling bird. The stunned faces of Coinin and Easog, the rabbit and stoat, peeped from a sack he carried. All living, all unharmed. We stared, unbelieving, and then Riona did faint, falling in a heap before I could grab her.

  I crouched beside her and patted her cheeks gently to rouse her, and Liam knelt too, the birds clinging to him fearfully with their claws.

  “Sister!” Liam said, his voice hoarse from smoke. Riona’s eyes fluttered open, and reassured, he joked, “You have become quite the lady, fainting at every little thing!”

  She stared blankly at him, as if she could not believe he was truly there. Then she smiled with relief. “Yes, Brother,” she replied, her trembling voice belying her calm words, “you are right. A battle with a merrow, and my childhood home burned to the ground—mere inconveniences. I shall have to toughen up!” She struggled to her feet and then bent to pet Catkin as we gazed at the remains of the cottage, utterly engulfed now in flames. The heat was intense enough to force us backward into the garden.

&
nbsp; Forgive me, I said again numbly.

  Riona turned to me. There was no anger or blame in her expression. “Oh, Meriel,” she said sadly, “this is not your fault. It was the queen’s doing, I am sure of it. And everything of real value was saved, thanks to my brother’s recklessness.”

  “Recklessness?” Liam repeated, offended. “I showed the courage of a hero of old! You should bow before me!”

  But I did not smile, for Riona’s words echoed inside me. Everything of real value was saved. The animals, yes, and Liam, thank goodness. But the shirts that I had struggled so to make were still inside, and they were now nothing more than ash. The thrush and crow, the rabbit, stoat, cat, and Liam were alive, but the shirts were burned, and so my brothers all were doomed.

  10

  The Apothecary:

  And How He Helped

  As I stood in utter despair, I did not hear Liam at first over the roar of the fire. “Look, Meriel!” he shouted, and then even louder, “Meriel, look!” He scooped the rabbit and stoat from his sack and pulled out a length of cloth, then another and another, and at last my two finished shirts. “I have them!” he crowed, his triumphant face lit fantastically by the dancing flames.

  I could not speak, even silently. I reached out and touched the rough fabric, and then I reached farther and clutched Liam to me. The birds fluttered from his shoulders to the ground, squawking with dismay as I burst into tears again.

  I do bow before you! I said, sobbing, and started to release him to do just that. But he held me tighter.

  “No, this will do very well,” he told me. My thoughts raced wildly in my head. His arms are very strong, I thought, and How can he joke when his home is destroyed? And absurdly, I must look a terrible mess! When at last his grip loosened, he gazed down at me and smiled.

  “You look fine for a girl who has been chased by a witch,” he said. I hiccupped and wiped my face with my sleeve.

  You, on the other hand, do not appear entirely fresh, I pointed out. The bandage on his hand was dark with soot, and his shirt had half a dozen holes where embers must have landed. But he was every inch the hero to me.

  “Children, children, where are you?” came a frantic call from the darkness, and Brigh emerged into the firelight. Her face was drawn and anguished. When she saw us, though, she cried out with joy and ran to pull all three of us into her warm embrace.

  “My darlings, when I saw the flames . . . ,” she began, but she could not go on.

  “We are all right, Mother,” Riona assured her. “Liam has rescued Meriel’s shirts—and all the animals as well.”

  “Oh, bravely done, Son!” Brigh exclaimed, planting a kiss on Liam’s filthy cheek. Even in the dimness I could see his face flush.

  “But the queen, Mother—what has become of her?” Riona pressed.

  “I did my best,” Brigh told us. “I held her off and wore her out, but she will come back as strong, or stronger. And she had the power to do this while we battled.” She indicated the wreck of the cottage. “We must go away from here. She must not find us.”

  “Where will we go?” Liam asked, pushing my shirts back into the sack and looking around for the animals.

  “To town,” Brigh replied, “and quickly. We have friends there—they will take us in and hide us.”

  We were nearly too exhausted to stand, but Brigh herded us through the meadows to Tiramore. We did not dare take the road. We climbed wearily over stiles and fences and crossed fields crusted with frost. The horizon began to lighten as we approached town, but the inhabitants still slept.

  Tiramore was encircled with a high stone wall, built in the days when Castle Rua was a stronghold against invaders. Its front gate, once made of thick timbers and watched by two soldiers, was unguarded now. The lane from the castle ran into town through the gate and became the high street, leading to the market square in the town’s center. From there other smaller streets radiated outward in all directions, so that the market square was like the center of a wheel and the streets like its spokes. After checking to be sure no one was about, Brigh urged us through the gate and along the high street, and we stopped before a small apothecary shop near the square. A brightly painted sign showing a mortar and pestle hung above it, and in the many-paned front window there were glass balls filled with red and blue fluids.

  Brigh knocked lightly on the door, two quick raps and then three more. In a minute we saw a light in an upstairs window, then heard steps on the stair. The door opened to reveal a red-faced, jowly man wearing a nightcap and carrying a candle.

  “Madame Brigh?” he said, his voice sleep fuzzed. “It is very early for a consultation, you know!” Then he took in the sight of us and stepped back quickly. “Come in,” he urged. “Goodness gracious, whatever has happened? You look as though you’d been to war!”

  “We very nearly have been, Master Declan,” Brigh said wearily as we passed into the shop. The candle’s light revealed a long wooden counter that ran from one end of the shop to the other. There were scales and weights of brass and silver on it, and behind the counter were shelves that rose to the ceiling. I gazed around in wonder. The lower shelves held beautiful blue and white porcelain jars, each with a label. Bottles and flasks filled with liquids in every color lined the next shelves. And still higher up were large glass vessels with strange, terrible objects suspended in cloudy substances—objects that I could not identify and did not dare to guess at. The smell of spices sweet and hot, fresh and musty quite overwhelmed the senses.

  “You’ve never been in here before?” Liam asked, joining me as I walked about, peering at labels and jars of liniment.

  I have never gone to any shop, I told him. Princesses don’t. Dressmakers and cobblers come to me, and other items just . . . appear. And we have our own doctor, though he is quite useless.

  “Useless?” Liam asked.

  He can only bleed and cup his patients, which never seems to do any good. He would no more know that buckthorn bark cures gout than that—well, that nettles can be spun into thread.

  Liam grinned, his teeth white against his sooty skin. “In future, then, you should have Mother and Riona tend to sickness at the castle.”

  In future . . . I did not dare imagine the future.

  The apothecary led us upstairs to his family’s living quarters, where we met his stout, cheery wife Eveleen, and their children, Davina and Ennis, both light haired and blue eyed like their mother. Davina was a tiny thing, around six years old. When she saw Liam’s menagerie she was enthralled, and immediately she and Coinin the rabbit became fast friends. Ennis was nearly grown and very handsome, with blond hair that fell over one eye. It was clear that he was already well acquainted with Riona. More than once I caught him gazing at her with an expression that seemed far beyond friendship, and I wondered if he knew of her feelings for Cullan.

  Brigh described our plight to Master Declan and his family, with frequent interruptions of “Goodness gracious!” from the apothecary.

  “You and your children can stay in our examination room downstairs tonight, Madame Brigh,” the apothecary’s wife said. “The princess can have our chamber, though I fear it will not be very comfortable.”

  I shook my head insistently. Tell them no! I thought at Brigh. I shall stay below with you.

  Brigh relayed my wishes, and little Davina turned to me, her eyes bright with curiosity.

  “Why don’t you speak, Your Highness? Can’t you speak? Why not? I would like to know what it is like to be a princess. Will you tell me? Please?”

  Madame Eveleen flushed with embarrassment and tried to silence her daughter, but Brigh and Liam and Riona laughed, and I smiled too.

  “The princess cannot speak,” Brigh told Davina. “But you may sit with her as she sews, if your mother will allow.”

  “Oh, Mama, may I? Please? Do say that I may!” The child danced back and forth with excitement.

  Her mother granted permission, as long as Davina was quiet, adding, “But you must not tell anyone
that you have met the princess, or that she is staying with us.”

  “No, I promise, I will not stay a word!” Davina pledged, overjoyed.

  We washed off the soot from the fire and then slept for a bit in the family’s beds upstairs, while they opened the shop for the day and treated customers. When I woke, I began my sewing again, sitting with Brigh, Riona, and Liam in the comfortable main room beside the fire. I listened to the commerce below as I stitched. A bell attached to the door rang each time a customer entered, and patients described their ailments to the apothecary, from a sore toe to a rash, a dry cough to a toothache. For each Master Declan mixed a potion or created a tincture from the herbs and liquids on his shelves. From time to time he took a patient into the back room to examine. All received a treatment, and all left the shop pleased.

  His work is very like yours, then, I said to Brigh.

  “Yes,” she said softly, so we could not be heard below. “We often work together. Many of his herbs come from my garden. But I go to the places where there is no apothecary, or where the patient is too ill or too badly hurt to come here.”

  Davina ran up and down the stairs all day, whispering loudly to us of her doings. Ennis, who helped his father with the more practical business of the shop, came up at every opportunity to sit beside Riona and talk quietly. Sewing in the corner, I saw how his eyes never strayed from her face as they spoke. They’d forgotten that I was there when I heard Riona say, “But I did not make a promise to you, Ennis.”

  I almost forgot to breathe as I waited for his answer. It was long in coming and low. “It was understood. I thought it was understood.”

  Riona’s voice trembled. “We have always been friends. You never said—I—” She stopped herself and reached for his hand. “Ennis, I have grown to love another. I love you as a brother, but this man . . . it is different.”