The Oddling Prince

by Nancy Springer

  Mother added, “And I know you both had better take off your boots if we are to go skulking about.”

  We did so, and after that, we three moved almost wordlessly as one. We gathered a supply of rushes from the floor, then felt our way out the door and down the stairs, single file, one hand to the wall. When, at the landing, we found a torch flickering in its bracket on the wall, we reached up to light the rushes, which burn not with a flame but with a slow smoldering glow, a whisper of light.

  By rushlight, then, we ghosted on bare feet down the tower stairs and along the passageways of the keep, hastening past torches and pausing in shadows, until we reached the great hall and neared the room where Mother thought our enemy slumbered.

  She was right, I could see that at once, for guards flanked the door, one standing on each side. From a shadowy corner, we studied them. Both had disobediently laid aside their helmets for comfort. Both stood leaning against the wall, dozing if not actually asleep on their feet. Albaric and I had our swords; we could easily have whacked the heads off the pair of them before they so much as squeaked.

  But I felt in myself, as much as in him, a shudder at the thought of more bloodshed.

  As I hesitated, Mother whispered, “Let me deal with them.” Motioning us to stay where we were, she herself padded forward. As if stealing toward the dungeon to see her husband, she slipped nearly past the two guards before she “happened” to brush against them with her shawl.

  That feathery touch startled them as if they had been awakened by a spook. One straightened with a hoarse grunt; the other nearly fell over. Mother gave a ladylike little cry and ran.

  “What—who—” croaked a guard.

  “The queen!” snapped the other one, and both of them ran after her. I felt Albaric’s fear for her.

  “She is enjoying herself,” I whispered to him. “She knows every secret turning and hiding place; she will make fools of them. Come.”

  Albaric and I darted to the door the guards had deserted. On the inside, I knew, it was barred; no mere key could give entry here. I jammed my sword through the crack, thought of my father in the dungeon below, and heaved the blade upward with all my might redoubled by the force of my rage. The wooden bar lifted and clattered to the floor. As Albaric stood by my side, the door swung open.

  Instantly, a hooded shadow, a man in dark clothing, I knew not who, shot out with such force that his shoulders knocked me and Albaric sideward in opposite directions. Before we could think or blink, he was running like a deer across the great hall, gone.

  And forgotten, by me at least, for within the room stood Lord Brock of Domberk.

  Apparently he had lit a candle from the embers of the hearth fire, set it on the mantelpiece, and there he stood in his nightgown, reaching for his sword. Such was his astonishment upon seeing my face that he nearly dropped it, scabbard and all.

  The usurping, would-be-murdering pig, I felt no compunction lest I spill his blood. “He’s mine,” I told Albaric as I lunged into the traitor’s room. It was an even match; like Domberk, I had a sword but no shield, no helm, no armor; indeed, I remained naked from the waist up, like a wild man. Certainly, at the sight of him, I felt like one. “Defend yourself, villain!” I barked, and as soon as he had drawn his blade, I attacked him with far more vehemence than sense. He was clever; he wounded my shield arm, which I had not so much as wrapped with a cloth, and he dodged behind furniture and snatched up a dirk in his other hand; now he had two blades to my one. Albaric had taken the candle to safeguard it, or without light I might have been lost. But in the end, Domberk could not best me; my sheer fury overpowered him so that I struck the weapons from his hands and drove him to his knees, the point of my sword at his throat.

  “Yield!”

  “I yield.” He said the words with distaste but no hesitation. He was no warrior, Domberk, just a greedy vassal eager to seize an opportunity.

  “Hands behind your back. Albaric, can you find something to bind him?”

  The rope tassels from the bed canopy served nicely. Knotting them, Albaric said without looking at me, “Aric, you’re bleeding.”

  Barely feeling the wounds, I grabbed up some sort of garment, Lord Brock’s smallclothes perhaps, and wrapped it around my left arm for Albaric’s sake. “To the dungeon with this one!”

  One on each side of Brock Domberk, with swords drawn, we marched him down the stairs, and the guards he had posted shrank away without needing to be warned; I think my face spoke for me: if anyone interfered with us, Domberk would die.

  Rounding the corner to the dungeon, though, I nearly smiled, for there stood Mother kissing Father through the prison bars. Guards surrounded her as if to seize her but hesitant to touch.

  They jumped back as I entered with my captive. I put my sword to Lord Brock’s throat. “On your knees to the King and Queen of Calidon, every one of you!” I ordered.

  As they complied, “Aric!” Father cried with more heart than I had ever heard in his voice.

  “I told you,” Mother chided him happily, “but you would not believe until you saw.” She looked around her at the kneeling soldiers. “Who has the keys?”

  The captain did. No keys make such a harsh clangor as dungeon keys, but their sound was sweet to my ears as my father stepped out of the cell, and Albaric and I shoved Domberk in to take his place. Father embraced me. “They told me you were dead!”

  “Albaric saved my life.”

  “Then I am grateful to him.” Nearby, Albaric had taken away the weapons of the kneeling men and stood with his sword drawn, on guard, silent. And although his face remained hard, in his silence, I began to feel something like soft-footed shadows, gray cats of despair, creeping into his spirit. No wonder, for despite what Father had said, he gave Albaric not even a glance. Instead, he asked me, “What of Garth?”

  I pulled away from my father’s embrace. “He may indeed be dead.” I faced him, the king, without ceremony. “Too many have died. No more. I have a plan.”

  CHAPTER THE NINTEENTH

  “AND IT IS THIS.” I turned to address the glowering vassal in the dungeon. “Lord Brock, order your men to march home to Domberk immediately.” The light of dawn showed through the bars of the dungeon window high above his head; his army could get an early start. “You shall remain where you are. A small force, no more than six, of your people shall return here, bringing with them your daughter Marissa as a hostage for your release. If she is willing, and if you will swear to keep the peace thereafter, I shall marry her. Her son, your grandson, will grow to rule Calidon, as has been your ambition.”

  My mother gasped. My father stiffened. Of all concerned, only Lord Brock Domberk seemed not to be shocked. He stood stroking his beard, as if he had a choice in the matter.

  Father growled at him, “I would rather kill you like the treacherous dog you are.”

  Domberk’s eyes smoldered, but he spoke to his captain. “Carry out Prince Aric’s orders. Go.”

  Silently, the defeated soldiers rose and filed out, with Albaric at their heels—dangerous for him, one on guard over many. I sprang to go with him.

  “Aric,” Mother cried after me, “you’re wounded!”

  “Later,” I called back.

  But not too much later. Within moments, as my fury abated, my strength finally gave out. Father had gone to release and rally the forces of Caltor, and I dimly remember being back in the throne room, by daylight now, overseeing the transfer of Lord Domberk’s clothing down to his new and less pleasant quarters. Albaric was saying, “I wonder who it was that so desperately ran away when we stormed the door. For an instant as he came out, I thought it was King Bardaric. There was some resemblance.”

  “Bah. Probably just a manservant saving his own skin,” I tried to say, but the words slid together, the world began spinning, and as I clung to Albaric's shoulder, everything went black.

  I awoke in my own bed, my own room, to candlelight, a confused mind, a parched throat, and an empty belly. “What, it’s
night already?” I said—to no one, as it turned out. Sitting up to open the bed canopy, I found I was alone in the chamber. My wounds had been bandaged, and someone had put on me a knee-length tunic, soft and comfortable from long wear and many washings. But I could not stay in bed, could not go back to sleep, because I felt famished. When had I last eaten? Had it been the oat bread and berries from the frightened peasant woman? Getting to my feet, I felt lightheaded and, thinking only that I must eat, I made toward the kitchen, carrying the candle to light my way.

  As I trod the stone passageways, no one seemed to be about, giving me an eerie feeling of not quite knowing what was real, and I began to think that I had been killed and was a ghost, because clash of swords and blood of combat, evidenced by the bandages on my arm and the bruises on my body, seemed dim as a dream, a memory from another life—but as a ghost, I felt lonely, incomplete. How could I be a spirit when I knew not how to sing? I was a person of earth and daylight things, sun on my shoulders and a comrade’s whack on my back—without Albaric, I felt incomplete. He was my spirit, my soul, my song, my brother; how could I be parted from him, even in death? Did the dead hunger as I hungered, weakness making me hold onto the walls as I walked? Wobbling without that support, I started to cross the great hall—

  A voice cried from the shadows, “Aric!”

  Before I could even think, “It is Albaric,” my heart swelled almost beyond bearing. As he ran to me, I pitched toward him and hugged him with all the small strength I had left, laying my head on his shoulder as if I were a child, tears in my eyes from sheer love of him.

  “Aric, you oaf, get off!” he said, resisting the clumsiness of my embrace, “What are you doing? It’s not yet dawn.”

  “Looking for something to eat.” Which, I realized, meant I was far from being a ghost yet. I tried to let go of Albaric but had to hold onto him or fall down. “What are you doing?”

  “Looking for. . . .” His eyes widened, gazing over my shoulder and upward. “Confound the fickle thing, there it is,” he breathed.

  Considerably muddled, I turned to see what he was staring at. Amid the carving of the vaulted ceiling, I seemed to glimpse something glimmering, but with my eyes blurred by weakness, I could not make it out.

  “For some reason, it wants you, my brother. It would not show itself before you came in. Here. Sit on the floor.” He helped me do so. “Stay where you are. I will bring you food.”

  Taking the candle, he hastened toward the kitchen. Left in darkness, I eyed the small presence overhead, recognizing its glow as Elfin glamour. There was only one thing for which Albaric could have been searching in the night. The ring, apparently, had been hiding on a coign of the wooden vaults since Lord Brock had flung it off his hand.

  After what seemed a long time, Albaric came hurrying back, arms loaded, carrying with evident difficulty the candle in one hand and a bowl in the other. “Take the soup, Aric, please, before I spill it on you.”

  Shaking from hunger, I reached up for the bowl and, without waiting for a spoon, drank from it. The liquid within was hot, for the stock-pot simmered night and day; I burned my lips and tongue but gulped the mutton broth anyway for the sake of its warm strength flowing into me.

  Setting down the candle and other things, Albaric laughed at the mess I was making. Rarely had I heard his laughter, as musical as harp strings. “Aric the barbaric,” he teased as he sat cross-legged, facing me, “take a napkin and try to behave.” He handed me the square of cloth, a spoon, then a wedge of cheese, some light bread, and a pastry oozing strawberries. “Slow down,” he said, watching with amusement as I devoured everything. Not until I had licked the last sticky crumbs of strawberry turnover from my fingers did I speak.

  “Is it still the same day?”

  “Same day?” Albaric repeated. Even now, time had little meaning for him.

  I tried my question another way. “How long have I slept?”

  “After your wounds were dressed and bound, you slept through sunset and far into the night.”

  Yesternight at about this same time, then, he and I, dripping wet and half-drowned, had climbed the tower to Mother’s chamber. Instead of giving me satisfaction for the good we had done since, the memory jolted an anxious qualm in me. “Bluefire?” I demanded. “Has anyone seen—”

  “Our bonny blue horse is in the stables, terrorizing the grooms just as before. At ease, Prince Aric.”

  From something in his being with me, beyond his words, I knew he had ridden out to find Bluefire and bring him home. At the same time, I sensed his amusement at me, and his happiness in my company, and also that something had made him unhappy—the same old something. Worse, he was desperately weary. “Albaric,” I asked, “have you not slept?”

  “I am not so battered as you. Yes, I slept for part of the night, but thoughts of yon contrary thing pestered me.” He pointed up at the ring. “I came down here, and in the silence and shadows, I could feel it was yet in this room, which comforted me, for I had feared someone might have made off with it. Yet I could not find it! But now all is well.”

  “Indeed? How will you get it down from its perch?”

  The moment I said this, the ring rolled off the coign of its own accord and fell—no, flew gently down like a firefly, glowing, to land on the stone with a sound like the ringing of a distant bell.

  Albaric got up, went over, and brought it back carefully in the palm of his hand. Together, we studied its disposition. It glowed a mild, limpid gold, as peaceable as sunrise.

  “Certainly, it is making a great show of behaving itself,” remarked Albaric. “I wonder why.”

  “So do I. Equally, I wonder why I feel that I must keep it.”

  “Because it wants you to.” Albaric cocked a quizzical eyebrow. “You know, brother, it is an oddling in this world, just as I am. Small wonder it takes refuge in you.” Albaric handed me the ring; gathered up crumbs, napkin, spoon, and bowl; returned them to the kitchen; then came back with the candle and helped me to my feet. Since eating, I felt both stronger and weaker, able to walk by myself yet uncertain in the area of my belly and feeling also a queasiness of mind. But that was due to the ring. As Albaric walked back to the bedchamber with me, I held the ring beneath closed fingers in the deep hollow of my palm and did not look at it until I laid it on the washstand.

  Yes, all right. It was still as golden and serene as dawn.

  From the neck of an outgrown jerkin, I pulled a leather lacing, strung the ring onto it, tied it securely, and slipped it over my head onto my neck, hiding the ring under my clothing. “Do not tell anyone, Albaric,” I said, “not even Mother, and especially not Father.”

  He nodded, giving his silent promise without asking why. If he had asked, I could not have answered. I did not know why the ring was now my secret.

  CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH

  ALBARIC SLEPT THEN. Lumped in the bed like a pair of tired puppies, we both slept until nearly noon the next day.

  When we finally got up, a manservant awaited me with word that Father wished to see me as soon as I was ready.

  I ordered luncheon brought to the bedchamber, for I required a great deal of washing, even my hair, in addition to many wounds to be redressed, and must needs do all things at once, accompanied by much pain and stiffness and grumbling. Albaric helped as I struggled in the hip bath, shaking his head and cleansing my various cuts with greatest care.

  “Some of these are deep and raw,” he said as he bound them afterward. “Take care of yourself, my brother, or you will be sick.”

  “Bah. Worrywart.” Young, strong, I had never suffered from a festering wound in my life. Now clean and dry, I ate a slice of kidney pie as I searched for clothing. Albaric perched in the window and strummed a harp—somehow, already, he had got himself another harp—remarking, “The king wants his report only from you. I offered yesterday to give him an account. He looked at me as if I were an odd sort of talking monkey and declined.”

  “Ah.”

  Yes, it wa
s indeed the same quiet grief, then, that I felt in my brother. He wanted his father. But his father did not want him.

  After I had put on good leggings and a better tunic, being careful to cover the thong whereby I carried the ring, Albaric added, “If the king does not want to know what I am thinking, it is just as well. I am worried about Marissa.”

  That gave me pause, standing there with a neck kerchief in hand. “Worried?”

  “Perhaps I do not much understand about this thing called wedlock. But Aric, should there not be some love?”

  “Oh. I see.” I knotted and draped the length of tartan. “You are wiser than most mortals, my brother. Of course there should be love; you are right. But when one is a prince. . . .” I shrugged, took a deep breath, willing him to understand. “I like her very much, and I can but hope that in time we might come to . . . love.” I tossed on a silk-lined short cape of white fur. “And as a lord’s daughter—she has no choice, but I hope—I believe she does not dislike me, at least. She is just a girl, not nearly a woman yet, so it will not truly be a wedding. She is yet innocent, and I would be ashamed not to let her stay a virgin for as long as she chooses. I will be her friend, and wait, and hope that maybe it will turn out all right in the end.” I sighed. “And if not, I will try to do what is best for her.”

  “But what is best for you?”

  “No need to worry about me. When I get rambunctious, as Mother would put it, there are wenches in the kitchen only too happy to oblige me.”

  Albaric missed several notes on his harp. Glancing at him, I saw his shock grow as understanding smote him, as he realized where I might have been any one of several times when perhaps he had noticed my side of the bed empty in the middle of the night.

  I spoke gently. “Do not the Elfin folk feel such needs, my brother? Certainly your mother did.”

  “But she is the queen.”

  “So?”

  “So—so I do not know!” He lifted laughing eyes to mine, amused at himself. “Perhaps I am an innocent like Marissa?”