Princess of the Wild Swans

by Diane Zahler

  As I threaded my needle, though, I noticed that Catkin was acting oddly. She stalked across the floor, the hair on her back standing straight up. As she walked, she hissed. It was just what she had done the other day, when the queen had come in.

  Oh no, I said mutely.

  “What is it?” Mistress Tuileach asked, alert at once. Riona and Brigh woke at the sound of her voice.

  The cat—look at her. She behaved this way when the queen was here before. I fear she is close again.

  “We must remain quiet then,” said Mistress Tuileach, “and guard your thoughts well, child.”

  I tiptoed to the top of the stairs to listen. Master Declan was helping a customer who needed a remedy for a stomachache, and Madame Eveleen waited on a mother whose child had developed a rash. I could tell there was someone else there, for I could hear footsteps as someone paced around the shop. As the person approached the stairs, Catkin arched her back and hissed, and I shuddered. As the steps faded and moved away, the cat relaxed a bit, but her hair still stood on end. Catkin looked at me, and I saw my own knowledge reflected in her amber eyes: it was the queen who walked below.

  Then I heard the shop door open, and Davina’s high, fluty voice floated up to me. “Papa!” she cried. “We are back, and we have bought ever so much. Do you know, in the shops everyone was talking about Liam and Princess Meriel, and how they ran from the guards? Only they did not tell where the princess was, and I didn’t tell either. I was so quiet, wasn’t I, Ennis?”

  There was a terrible silence that seemed to go on and on. Then the queen spoke in her quavering, old lady voice. “And where is the princess, little girl?”

  “Why, she is . . . ,” Davina began, but her voice trailed off. It was clear that she had remembered she was not supposed to talk about me. “I do not know where,” she improvised. “I could not imagine. I don’t know anything about the princess myself, you know. I have never even met her.”

  I groaned silently.

  “Davina!” Madame Eveleen commanded. “Go upstairs with your brother this minute. Can’t you see that we have customers?”

  “Yes, Mama,” Davina said meekly. “Sorry, Mama!” She came running up the stairs, her arms full of packages, and stumbled into my arms, weeping with dismay and fear. Ennis was just behind her. I put my finger across Davina’s lips, telling her to stay quiet, and we listened to the conversation downstairs.

  “So you are back, Mistress, as you promised,” Master Declan said to the queen with false jollity.

  “I am, Master,” the queen replied.

  “And what can I do for you today?”

  “I am looking for something very particular,” said the queen.

  “What is that, Mistress?” Master Declan inquired, his tone cautious now.

  “It is not a what, but a who,” the queen said.

  “A who? I am sorry, Mistress, but I don’t understand you.” At the top of the stairs, Brigh and Riona pressed against me as if to share their strength, and the others crowded around.

  “I think you do understand me, Master Apothecary,” the queen said, and all at once her voice was smooth and imperious, her real voice. “I think there is a girl upstairs who belongs to me.”

  I gasped. I have to get out, I said in desperation to Riona. But this was a mistake. The queen heard my thoughts from the shop below, and she laughed.

  “No, you will not get out, Princess,” she called. “Come down to me now.”

  Wide eyed, I looked at Riona, but she did not speak.

  “You cannot go to her,” Ennis whispered, and Liam said, “I will not let you go to her!” But I realized that days ago Riona had told me what I needed to hear: And what of Master Declan and his family, who risk their own lives to help you? I could not put these good people in more danger by refusing to obey.

  I must, I said silently to Liam. And you must stay here, and keep the others up here as well. I am the one she wants. You will all be safe if I go down.

  “No, Meriel!” Liam protested, but he looked at Davina and Ennis and knew that I was right.

  Quickly I gathered my sewn shirts together, the last one still unfinished. Liam tried to wrestle the pile from me, but I pulled it back, my mouth set grimly. Riona found a little sack for me, and I stuffed the shirts in. I did not look at anyone—not Mistress Tuileach, nor Brigh, Riona, Liam, Ennis, or Davina, who still hiccuped with tears—as I started down the stairs. My bundle of sewing was hidden in my skirts, and my heart was fluttering in my chest like the thrush with its broken wing. And then I was in the shop, and the queen stood before me, shape-shifted back into the lady Orianna I knew and loathed in all her fearsome beauty.

  13

  The Battle:

  And What Burst Forth

  Standing before the queen, somehow I felt my fear fade away. There was only anger in its place—anger that she had taken my father and my brothers from me, anger that she had harmed my friends and destroyed their home. A wonderful strength coursed through me, and I stood very tall and straight and waited for her to speak. Behind the counter, the apothecary and his wife watched us with worried faces. The other customers swiftly completed their purchases and departed, looking nervously behind them as the door closed.

  The queen gazed at me and said, “So, Princess, I have found you at last.”

  I stared back, defiant.

  Her dark eyes narrowed. “Did you think you could hide from me? I sensed you when I was here before. I only needed to be certain.”

  And here I am, I taunted her. What will you do with me?

  She pursed her lips. “Well, that is the question, isn’t it? I had underestimated you. I did not think you would stand in my way, once your brothers were gone.”

  You were quite mistaken, I pointed out. In fact, you have been very sloppy. Did you not see that my father had five sons when you married him? Surely you could have chosen a childless king to enchant and torment, and saved yourself the trouble of eliminating us. It would have been far easier to set your plan in motion with another man.

  She scowled. “You alone were in his thoughts when I met him. A daughter did not matter to me, for you could never rule his kingdom. He did not think of your brothers, and I did not ask if he had other children. You are quite right—it was my mistake indeed. But I will not make another.”

  It pleased me greatly that I had been uppermost in Father’s mind, but I concealed this thought. Instead I said, Father will soon see you for what you really are. Then he will be done with you, and you will be vanquished. You will never open the door to Faerie.

  She laughed. “I think you underestimate me, my dear. The door is already opening. And your father is mine, well and truly. Whether he is under a spell or not, he will stay with me.”

  I did not believe her. I knew that Father could never truly love her, not if he knew what she had done.

  “And what is that in your bag, little Meriel?” the queen asked me in a cunning voice, moving toward me.

  It is nothing, I said, stepping back.

  “Nothing? Nothing spun from nettles, woven and sewn? I know what you have been doing, you silly girl. Give it to me,” she demanded.

  I clutched the sack to me and shook my head. How I wanted to shout at her, to tell her that I never would obey her!

  “Give it to me,” she repeated, and again I refused. Her eyes flashed with anger, and the fear that I thought I had conquered returned in full force. I could feel the pull of her power, coiling around me as the tendrils of fog had when the merrow appeared at Heart Lake. I fought to stay still, not to go to her, not to hand her the shirts as she insisted.

  As I silently resisted, her fury grew wilder, until it was too much for her to contain. Suddenly a jar on the lowest shelf behind the counter exploded, sending shards of blue and white porcelain flying through the shop. I ducked as the sweet smell of anise filled the air. Madame Eveleen, frozen behind the counter with Master Declan, shrieked in terror as another jar exploded, and then another. Flying pieces of earthenwa
re careened through the air, and odors of herbs and tinctures filled the shop. Master Declan pulled his wife from behind the counter, and they fled to the examination room as the glass flasks broke open and then the large jars on the upper shelves burst, spilling their dreadful contents. Colored liquids cascaded down the shelves, red and yellow and purple and blue mixing together to form a putrid brownish waterfall. The air was thick and noxious with fumes; I could barely see the queen as she stood amid the swirling gases.

  I felt someone grab my arm, pulling me toward the front door. It was Liam. I took his hand and followed him, ducking below the foul vapors. When we reached the door, I tried to pull it open, but as my hand touched the knob, a blast of wind blew through the shop, pushing against the door. I pulled as hard as I could, but the wind was stronger.

  I cannot open it! I cried to Liam. He could not help me; he was overcome with coughing from the fumes, his lungs still weak from his illness.

  “You must!” he gasped between coughs.

  I pulled and pulled, but it was no use. I was not strong enough. I sagged in defeat, and I heard the queen begin to laugh.

  Then I thought of my brothers, paddling helplessly on the freezing lake, and my love for them surged through me. Cullan! I cried silently. Darrock! Aidan, Baird, Druce! I am coming! I pictured them in my mind as I had last seen them in their human form, their beloved faces and familiar smiles, the way they stood and moved and spoke and teased. I heaved on the door with all my might, and it creaked open just enough for Liam and me to slip through.

  Out on the street we took great gulps of untainted air, and Liam’s coughs slowed and stopped. Then we began to run toward the lake. We passed clusters of townspeople, bewildered and amazed as they tried to see what was happening inside the apothecary’s shop, but the interior was utterly obscured by the billowing vapors even as the crash and shattering of glass and pottery continued.

  We ran so fast that I could not have spoken aloud, but silently I asked Liam, I haven’t finished the last shirt. What shall I do? But he had no breath to spare and only shook his head.

  At last we reached the lake. There was no sign of my brothers. We stood on the shore panting, our breath pluming in the frosty air, and tried to see if they were along the banks or hidden in the weeds. But there was nothing. All the other birds had gone; the reeds and grasses were bent and brown, wilted in the cold. It seemed that nothing at all lived there.

  Oh no, I thought despairingly. Where could they be? There is still open water; surely they have not flown off.

  “They must be at the other end,” Liam pronounced.

  But they know the danger! We’ve told them not to go! I protested.

  “Perhaps they had no choice. Perhaps they were summoned.”

  I was about to ask, Summoned by whom? But I realized that I did not want to know the answer. Instead I began to slog around the lake, slipping on icy mud and clambering over rocks. I kept my bag clutched tightly in one hand, though it unbalanced me. I knew that the shirts I had sewn were my brothers’ only chance.

  We hurried through the mist, and then it cleared as it had twice before, and we could see the spring from Faerie. There was no merrow there, nor any other horrific visitor from below, and my brothers swam placidly at the spot where the spring met the lake water. At our clumsy approach they turned, and I could see their eyes light up when they saw me. I hadn’t visited them in days. They looked thinner beneath their feathers, and I worried that they had been hungry, for the water plants they ate had withered and died. I waved, and they clapped their beaks with pleasure.

  And then suddenly came the sound I had feared: the voice of Lady Orianna.

  “Did you think to escape me, you foolish girl?” the queen said in a gentle, reproving tone. “Do you not know that I am faster than you, stronger than you, smarter than you?”

  Somehow, she had made her way to the lake’s end before we did, and she was standing on the same rock where the merrow had sat combing her long green hair. She towered above my brothers, and she was beautiful, her hair dark against her white skin and her black eyes flashing, her full lips drawn downward in a forbidding scowl. The swans did not flee from her; caught by her magic, they were simply treading the water with their webbed feet, staring up at her in mute obedience.

  Her quiet voice was more frightening to me than her wrath in the apothecary’s shop had been. It was clear that she felt no threat from me, even though she knew I held the shirts that could break her spell. I trembled before her, but I swore I would not show my fear. Instead I summoned all my own anger as I had in the shop, drew together all the spoiled rages and tantrums I had inflicted on family and servants over the years, and turned it on her.

  You evil creature, I cried fiercely, how dare you force your way into my family and hurt us? Do you believe we can’t see you for what you really are? You are older than dust, and your wickedness shows in the creases of your aged face!

  Without thinking, she brought a hand to her cheek as if to touch the wrinkles I had described. I smiled grimly. I had made her doubt her own disguise!

  But a moment later she smiled too. “Ah, Meriel,” she sighed, “you cannot best me. Your pouting is a tiny pinprick, no more. If you yield now, and hand me the shirts, I shall do as I promised—send you to school and then marry you off to a man who will tame you. You will not be harmed.”

  I looked at my swan brothers, their snow-white feathers and long arched necks, and in a fury shouted silently, No! I shall never give up!

  She laughed then. “Child, child,” she said serenely. “I shall sweep you aside as if you were an insect.”

  Insects bite and sting! I goaded her.

  “Your sting will not harm me,” she replied.

  “Ah, but our stings might,” said a voice behind me. I spun around. There, close together, were Mistress Tuileach, Brigh, and Riona. Surely we would be more powerful together than the lady Orianna alone!

  “No, Princess,” Lady Orianna retorted, as if I had spoken aloud. She ignored the others completely. “You do not begin to match me in power. Now, give me the shirts.” Her gaze was cold on me, and I shivered again. As hard as I struggled, I could not control my feet as they began a slow, stumbling march toward her. Liam reached out to hold me back, and behind me I could hear Brigh call out something, but I could not stop. I tried to summon my wrath again, but it seemed a petty, meager thing against such a force.

  Then I thought of how I had found the strength to pull open the shop door, and I realized that anger could not vanquish a creature such as Lady Orianna. I recalled the terms of the spell the queen had cast. If the seamstress speaks before the task is done, each word will be as a knife in the victims’ hearts. Before the task is done—but I had finished, or nearly finished. I had done as much as I could.

  And so I found my voice again, the voice I had not used in all those long days. I put all the love I had into my words as I croaked, “Brothers! Come to me!” Then I squeezed my eyes shut, afraid that I had killed them all by speaking aloud.

  But when I looked again, they were still there, alive and turned toward me, their feet paddling furiously. The current from Faerie flowed stronger now, pushing them away, and they fought against it.

  “Darrock!” I screamed. “Come to me!” The biggest swan broke free of the current and swam as fast as he could until he was before me. I fumbled in my sack for the largest shirt and swiftly threw it over his swan head. The queen let out a cry of rage as the shirt settled on him and he began to change, just as he had on the night of the full moon. From head to foot his swan features—beak and neck, wings and webbed feet—transformed until he stood, a man again, in the water in front of me. He looked dazed, holding out his hands to see if fingers graced them, peering over his shoulder to look for his swan tail feathers.

  I had no time to greet him. “Cullan! Baird!” I cried.

  “Hurry, Meriel,” Riona begged. I looked briefly at her and could see a terrible strain on her face. Beside her I saw Brigh an
d Mistress Tuileach, their hands moving in arcs, their voices speaking strange words designed to keep the queen from me. As I watched, first Riona, then Mistress Tuileach were forced to their knees by the power of the queen’s witchcraft. Only Brigh remained standing, and I could see that she was weakening.

  And then, without warning, there was a great hue and cry from the direction of the town. I turned to see the people of Tiramore, led by Ennis, running toward the lake. I could recognize the cobbler and his wife, the blacksmith, the baker, and the cooper. Everyone I had met and seen, and many more I did not know, had left the safety of home and hearth to aid me.

  The shock of their appearance startled the queen, diverting her strength. Riona and Mistress Tuileach rose to their feet again, and I swiftly pulled two more shirts from my sack as Baird broke free of the current and hurried to me. The Cullan swan, though, held back and pushed Druce toward me. In a moment I had thrown the shirts over Baird and Druce, and two more brothers stood before me, restored and blinking with amazement.

  The queen, enraged beyond all measure now, called out something in an unknown language. To my horror, I saw that with her words the current from Faerie, which had been flowing into the lake, had abruptly reversed itself. Now it ran back into the crevice in the earth, and the two remaining swans, Aidan and Cullan, were pulled along with it.

  “Cullan! Aidan!” I screamed. “Come to me! Come to me!” They paddled wildly, but the current was stronger than they were and drew them closer and closer to the dread opening that led to the lands below.

  “Ennis, help them!” Riona cried desperately. I turned and saw Ennis, his face a map of terrible conflict. He looked at Riona, his feelings for her clear in his expression. Then he looked at the swans, and I knew what he was thinking. If he helped them, if he saved Cullan, he would lose Riona. If he did not . . .