The Princess and the Bear

by Mette Ivie Harrison

  To calm him, she offered: “It is the way of the world. One creature dies to give another life. The fish did the same, killing others to preserve its life. So long as you do not waste.”

  “I have never eaten a whole fish raw before,” Richon admitted, grimacing.

  “It is not your guilt, then?” asked Chala.

  “I will think of my guilt later,” said Richon. “For now, I will try to stay alive.”

  Which seemed sensible to her. Perhaps more sensible than the bear had ever been.

  But it was as if she now knew two different creatures, the bear and the boy king.

  She would have done anything for the bear. But for the boy? She felt as if she were starting all over again with him. She told herself that she should feel the same for him, no matter his form. Just as she thought he should feel the same for her, woman or hound.

  It was all so confusing.

  It had been different before, when she had taken the body of the princess. Then she had never tried to make herself accept the human form. She had known it was not her own. It had only been a disguise.

  But this—she had to learn to live with this. All of it.

  “You do not think less of me for eating the fish?” asked Richon, turning back when he found that he had started the journey down the mountain and left her behind.

  “No.”

  “You are sure?”

  “You did nothing wrong, of that I am sure. But I will have to get used to you as you are now.”

  “And I you,” said Richon, his eyes taking in her figure in a way that Chala thought was not entirely objective. He had always looked at her with kindness and compassion, but now there was something of possessiveness in his face that she was not sure she liked.

  “Your kingdom,” said Chala, trying to move his attention away from herself and back where it belonged. “It waits for you. Or do you not care about that anymore?”

  Richon flushed. “I care about it. I care about nothing else.”

  Not entirely the truth, but perhaps as much as he was willing to say aloud. That was the way it was with humans. They did not speak the full truth. They held it back always, so they could appear different than they were.

  But Richon the human was also bright and exuberant as she had never seen the bear. It was infectious.

  He still could not go long distances without a rest, but he told jokes along the way and laughed at himself more than anything.

  Somewhere inside the bear there had always been this human boy, hidden. She could see him try to hide that even now, to put on that older, more sober self. Both sides annoyed her in their own way. But perhaps in time they would come together. That would be a thing to see indeed.

  That would be a king who was worthy of the name.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Richon

  FOLLOWING STREAMS AND a few trails, they reached the forest at the bottom of the first foothill in three days’ time. Each morning Richon woke and followed Chala to get some meat for breakfast. Each morning he ate it raw as she did, and wished that he could show no distaste, as she did. Everything had changed between them.

  His old insecurities had returned to haunt him. He was useless as a king, and no better as a man. He could not believe that she felt anything but contempt for him. As a bear, he at least had been self-sufficient. More than that, he had been able to protect the hound against other animals that might have threatened her.

  But now he felt as awkward as he had at fourteen, when he had first been made king and realized that he had come to his father’s height without his father’s wisdom. He had walked for many months with his shoulders rounded, trying to make himself less noticeable, less like his father, as small on the outside as he felt within.

  But when his advisers, the lord chamberlain and the royal steward, told him that he looked like a criminal skulking through the palace, he had changed instantly. He had watched the wealthiest, vainest men at his court and copied the way they strutted.

  He had felt no better about himself, but no one else had known.

  Now he still did not know how to walk as a man. He could walk as a bear, but it was not at all the same.

  In some way Richon felt as though the wild man had tricked him.

  He had wanted to return to the past, yes. But not as the stupid boy who had pretended arrogance only because he had no other defense.

  Two hundred years as a bear, and he had learned nothing that could be used in this other body?

  Well, he was not here to make himself feel more like a man. He was here for the magic. And because he wanted to prove that he could be the king his father had meant for him to be, a man who thought of others before himself.

  It had been a long time since Richon had allowed himself to think of his father. He had pushed unpleasant thoughts away, telling himself as a king that his father had known nothing, and then as a bear that there was no purpose in raking through the past.

  He knew he was not a man of books as his father had been.

  Richon remembered that whenever he had gone to his father for advice, the answer had always to be found in a book.

  When Richon came to complain about the plain porridge that was served to him at breakfast each morning, his father had held up a finger.

  “A moment. Let me think a moment,” he said.

  Richon waited. And waited.

  Then his father leaped to his feet, and ran his fingers from shelf to shelf in the enormous royal library where he spent so much of his time. He climbed atop the ladder, mumbling to himself in words that young Richon could not understand. At last he reached the book he wanted. He opened it lovingly, then blew the dust from the pages.

  “My father read this to me when I was—” He looked to Richon. “Yes, perhaps your age. Perhaps younger. I should have read it to you before now.”

  Then he patted the place at his side on the sedan, and Richon slipped into it.

  His father read:

  “Once there was a man who ate the best foods at every meal. Sweets and pastries. The richest meats, of every kind. Butters and oils for dipping, and to follow, unwatered wine.

  “The man grew fatter each day, but what did he care? He was indulged at every meal and found pleasure in each moment that he ate. If a cook brought him a meal with vegetables or grains in it, he had her sent from the palace. Let her serve the peasants in the streets such fare, but not him.

  “Soon the man was out of breath merely from reaching for his food and he demanded that his servants feed him. But they could not feed him fast enough.

  “Then one of his servants, a wise old woman, spoke aloud the words that all had been thinking but had not dared to say. She had been his nurse since childhood, and his father’s nurse as well. Perhaps it was because she loved him more than the others or perhaps it was because she feared him less.

  “‘There is no pleasure in wealth if poverty has never been felt,’ she said.

  “And the man realized that she spoke the truth. He could not appreciate his rich food if he did not have the poor food, as well.”

  Richon’s father held the book open and said, “Well? What is the lesson here?” For there was always a lesson in his books.

  Richon creased his forehead and thought. “I must eat porridge so that I will enjoy rich food?” he asked.

  His father nodded and closed the book.

  Then, at last, he put an arm around Richon. “We love you. We want true happiness for you. That comes with self-discipline.”

  “Yes, Father,” Richon had said. Because there was no other response.

  Then King Seltar had let Richon go his way, which was most definitely out of the library.

  Now Richon wished dearly that he had spent more time in his father’s library. Perhaps if he had he would have saved himself a great deal of sorrow.

  But when he became king, the only thing he had seen the library useful for was to sell off its books for money to support his other habits, when the peasants had been taxed beyon
d their ability to pay more.

  All those precious books of his father’s were dispersed to other places, perhaps to other kingdoms entirely.

  And yet his father’s lessons were not the only ones he had ignored. He remembered his mother, Queen Nureen, beautiful on one side of her face but covered with a birth scar on the other. Yet she had never seemed self-conscious about it, had never turned her better side when speaking to others.

  His mother had told him once, as she pointed to her scarred side, that it was her obligation to show to others her true face. And her true face had both sides.

  “As all people have two sides,” she had said. “Even you, my little one.”

  Now Richon was startled into wondering if she had had some magical foresight that had shown her that he would become a bear. He had not understood what she meant then. He was only a boy who loved his parents, who loved to be loved and petted and pampered.

  But the tantrums—yes, his mother had had to deal with those. That had been the other side to her sunny boy.

  Richon could still be embarrassed at the thought of those. Whenever he did not get what he wanted, he had thrown himself to the floor and shouted out threats against anyone in sight: servants, nobles, his own mother and father. He would tell them what he would do to them when he was king.

  But his mother would put a finger to her lips and shake her head. And when that did not work, she would turn her back to him. She would motion to all others in the room that they should do the same.

  Servants, all.

  And no matter what he said or asked for, they would not respond to him until his mother had motioned that they could turn to face him once more. Which only happened when he had finished his screaming, and then his crying, and had turned at last to whispered pleas of forgiveness.

  Then his mother would turn around and point to each person whom he had hurt, and he would hang his head and offer apology after apology, then wait humbly until each was accepted.

  If only she had lived.

  Perhaps she might have made something of him.

  But she and his father had died in a carriage accident far from the palace. They had gone out to visit villages at the edges of the kingdom, a tour they took each year so that even those far villagers would feel a sense of belonging to the kingdom, and know that their king and queen thought of them.

  He had been told of it by the lord chamberlain and the royal steward, and had never thought to ask them deeper questions about the incident—where his parents had been traveling, who their driver had been, if others had died. He had believed the two advisers his friends then and thought they would tell him all he needed to know.

  Now he could see that they had never been his friends. They had told him whatever made him comfortable, even when he deserved no praise. They had never pointed out missteps or shortcomings, as Chala did, that he might better himself.

  During the day, he and Chala marched on, sometimes with her in the lead, sometimes with him taking it. But not side by side, and the pace was always so fast that he did not have energy to spare for talking.

  What would he talk about, anyway?

  Did she want to know how he worried about his weaknesses? Did she care about the trials that lay ahead for him as king?

  No, she expected him to go forward and face whatever came to him with courage and strength—two things that he had always lacked.

  Except as a bear.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Chala

  AFTER FIVE DAYS following Richon’s fallible sense of direction through forests and fields and over streams, they had at last come in sight of the border of Elolira, the kingdom that would become Kendel, though its borders were not quite the same and there had been many parts of the journey where Chala saw no signs of human civilization at all.

  Chala also noticed that animals seemed to give themselves freely to humans here. It unnerved her to see a rabbit pause in its tracks, then turn and look at her, waiting for a moment before it went on its way.

  As for Richon, she watched him one morning as he killed his own breakfast. His hand trembled as he stared into the eyes of a partridge, which had gone utterly still as he approached. No hint of ruffled feathers, no attempt to escape.

  Do it quickly, thought Chala.

  But it was not afraid.

  It waited patiently for death at Richon’s hands.

  He twisted its neck and there was a snapping sound.

  Chala let out her breath.

  “I hate this,” said Richon, nodding to the dead bird in his hand.

  “You hate eating?” asked Chala, confused.

  “No, I hate it that they die so readily. I do not deserve it.”

  “You do not deserve to be alive?” asked Chala patiently. She was truly trying to follow his logic.

  But he only rolled his eyes. “I don’t mean that, either. You know very well that I don’t.”

  Did he think she was playing a game with him? “Then what do you mean?”

  “I would rather chase them, I suppose.”

  “Ah. The thrill of the hunt.” That Chala could understand. That was one thing they had in common. Humans and hounds both loved the hunt.

  But then Richon confused her again, shaking his head vehemently. “No, I want no thrill from them. But when they give themselves to me, they remind me of my people. So vulnerable, expecting so much, and yet I know I must disappoint them.”

  “Ah,” said Chala. He felt fear, but not as a hound experiences it, in the moment. He felt fear from the past rolling larger into the future.

  “I used my own subjects so abominably,” Richon said. “Taxes ever higher, so that I could live in greater style. Laws to make them honor me. Laws to suppress their magic, simply because I had none and did not wish to be shown inferior to the rest.”

  “But they called for the wild man,” said Chala. “So they were not entirely helpless.”

  “There is that, I suppose,” said Richon. He gave her a twisted half smile. “But the animals have no recourse at all.”

  “You do not know that,” said Chala. “If you misused them, they might call for the wild man as well. Or simply stop giving themselves to you. Spread the word among the rest. That is likely why fewer and fewer animals give themselves in Prince George’s time. They do not trust the humans to care for the well-being of the whole forest and conserve for the future.”

  “And that is my fault as well,” said Richon grimly. Then he set himself to pluck the bird. He had a hunting knife in the clothing the wild man had returned to him with his form, and he cut off the head. Finally he took the carcass to the stream and washed out the innards.

  “I’d prefer to make a fire and cook it,” he said when he came back, then waited, as if expecting Chala to tell him no.

  She shrugged. “If you wish.” She was in favor of anything that made Richon eat more eagerly.

  Richon gathered wood, though he seemed to have no idea what wood would burn well and what would not. Chala had watched humans build fires before and remembered which trees were too pungent and which would burn more cleanly, but he must never have paid attention.

  Chala did not try to tell him what to do. After all, what better lesson was there than doing it wrong the first time?

  She knew that from her own experience as a hound, when she had first attacked a snake and thought it dead. While she had been crouched over it, trying to decide which end to eat first, it had revived enough to rise up and bite her in the face.

  She had stomped on it thoroughly afterward, decapitating it with the claws on her hind legs. Only then had she tried to eat it, though the taste was not what she might have wished for, and she could hardly open her mouth by then to chew. She had stayed away from the pack for a few days, until her face looked normal again in a stream, and refused to tell any of the other pups of her encounter with the snake.

  She knew at least two other wild hounds that had done the same thing she had and learned the same lesson, for they had stayed awa
y from the pack for nearly the same length of time and come back as quiet and sobered as she had been. None of them made the same mistake again, with a snake or any other kill. And it was her opinion that they became the best fighters in the pack. Later, when she became lead female, she made sure that she always had them flanking her in a fight, for they were the most vicious and the most sure.

  Richon would have to learn the same way.

  Someone had been protecting him from seeing the consequences of his mistakes. Not a parent, Chala thought. For a parent wishes a child to live long and healthy and to make other children, to continue the line. Those who wish a child to die early because they did not care about the future of the pack might choose otherwise, however.

  Chala would have to watch carefully when they returned to Richon’s people to discover who it was who had treated Richon in this way. There were advantages in having a hound at his side who looked like a woman. Chala could see that Richon needed her here.

  Richon had gathered a pile of sticks and started to build his fire with the smaller ones. He had found a rock to strike against his knife. It took him some twenty minutes until he had a spark large enough to catch his sticks on fire. He had not thought to get anything that would catch fire better than a stick, like bark or cattail.

  Even so, the fire smoldered, and he looked up at her, his face alight with triumph.

  She smiled back at him.

  He built the fire up too fast and nearly smothered it, but took some of the top branches off and blew on it to get it going once more. Then he added fuel more slowly the second time.

  Good.

  But Chala continued to hold back because he did not wait long enough for coals to form and instead put the partridge on a spit above the flames, so that the skin turned black and the partridge itself fell into the fire when the supporting beams to the spit were burned through.

  Richon swore, then leaped into the fire to pull the partridge carcass out. His eyebrows singed, he pulled off one of the legs. It was still raw inside, but he shrugged and ate it anyway. It was only halfway through that he seemed to remember that Chala was there. Sheepishly he offered her the last of the feast.