“Morton! Towbart! Get away! Get away there!”
He waved his arms at them and, though his purpose was commanding, he still spoke with a note of affection in his voice. He loved those dogs. The thought struck her, for she could always tell the intentions of a person toward an animal. Still, he was a hunter. Wasn't he? Didn't that count for something?
The dogs reluctantly left, but seemed to lose all interest when the young helper threw them a hunk of meat. The sheer scent of the blood was enough to knock her over. Her stomach turned in revolt at the carnivore's delight. She wobbled on her legs and the hunter jutted out a supportive arm to wrap around her. He smelled like pine, the way that her home had always smelled, like the welcoming boughs and pine needles that she slept on. Coffee, brewed strongly over a campfire, hung on his breath.
“Can you stand?” He tried this question instead, when she'd not answered what her name was. The deer, who was now a girl, nodded. He reached his hand out to her. She blinked at him. He obviously was waiting for her, but for what reason? He folded his fingers around her own and gave a pleasant nod, one of reassurance as though he pitied whatever terrible tragedy had befallen her and caused this creature to shake in fear. She felt the warmth from his hand shoot through her newly formed arm and move through the trunk of her body. It was a curious sensation, this spreading of warmth from a human. She was used to lying beside her sister deer in the glen, but not of a masculine presence at her side. She was still too young for the bucks to take any notice in her. Always, she had remained apart, somehow different. Even special, perhaps? This though, this was too strange to be true.
“Come along, we'll get you to the palace in no time.”
Chapter Three
Auroa
“You're a hawk,” I said, not at all understanding, “But you're here, standing in front of me.” He nodded.
“Yes, that's right.”
He smiled, as if nothing were amiss. Birdbrain came to mind, but he was far too kind and intelligent to be called that. Yes, he was intelligent. I could see it in his eyes, but more than that, I could feel it. Each time he looked at me, there was something in him that called out to me.
“I thought I dreamed you,” I said, trying to understand how he was in front of me now.
“You did,” he said and still he smiled.
“But, if I dreamed you, how are you here now?”
“You were in the dream and you are here,” he said as if it were the most logical thing in the world. And, I supposed, it was. It was logical and also strange. It was almost as if I were –
“I'm still dreaming,” I said now.
He looked at me, nearly through me again,
“Are you?”
I nodded.
“I'm not awake. I'm asleep. I always have been.”
“Not always, Princess,” he said gently.
“Since I've known you, it has been always.”
“Is it such a terrible thing?”
“What?”
“Being asleep. Being here with me.”
“Of course it's not. Only, it is. Because I don't belong here. I belong awake. I'm not part of this world. I'm meant to be – ” Here I cut myself off abruptly and swallowed, for I had nearly said “with Midnight.”
And if I'd said with Midnight, then Midnight would have appeared and had she appeared, well, that would have been disastrous! For having summoned my sister, I'd be unable to send her back. Worse still, what if I were tricked into thinking that we were both awake and so lost all hope or desire to want to send Midnight back?
“With them,” he said.
“Yes,” I said, but added quickly, “Only, but don't say it!” My hand flew over his mouth to stop the fount of words. My hand melted against his mouth, as though my hand were kissing him. That was the thing about dreams. Sometimes one didn't want to wake up.
“You're a curse,” I said, my eyes gone wide, “To keep me here.”
“What do you mean?” he said. The smile faded slightly. Even hawks turned into men couldn't keep a smile plastered on their faces, it would seem, when they had just been called curses.
“I want to wake up. I want to wake up! I want to wake up!” I repeated it to myself, letting my hand rip away from him. As I repeated the words, they strengthened in intensity
But wishing was doing no good. I was trapped. I knew I was asleep, but I had none of the power to hack away at the vines of sleep entangling me. There was no sword that could cut through the bonds of a wish. Perhaps, if I could not escape it from within, at least I could rise above it.
Lifting my bow, I fixed my arrow steadily and then aimed and fired at the moon. A silver rope strung itself from my place in the dream up to the moon's face. Twilight shimmered on the earth. As I climbed higher, ascending the rope, washes of darker blue, like those in a water color painting, came over the scene. Rising through colors, I surveyed the ground below. All was as I had left it. From this height, I could see the colors magnified, their shimmer all the stronger, like glitter, like the potion that we'd put on our –
Stop, Aurora, Stop!
I pushed the thoughts away and clung to the rope, ascending higher, each pull at a time, leaving the danger behind. Now as I neared the moon, though, I held all the more tightly to the rope.
It can't be. I'm seeing things. Just concentrate, Aurora, concentrate.
Already, the palace was looming on the horizon though. Not just any palace, not one made of clouds and dreams, but my actual palace, the one where all of us lived. I couldn't let this happen. How had I? I'd been so careful! My, how I wanted to watch them! To look at it, to see all of them! It was far too tempting. If I just climbed down the other side of the rope, I could be with them. Father would hold me to him.
“My little Briar Rose, how I've missed you!”
Mother would put her arm around me, sing her gentle song of welcoming and all would be well again. It would be as if I'd never left. And as for Midnight, well, there could only be –
“Aurora, Aurora, Aurora.” As though someone were calling me from a long way off, I heard it. It tumbled over me, like the waves on a shore or else as if someone had painted my name on the wind and the clouds were unfurling it as they swirled around me. Painted on the wind. Yes. Painted on the sky. Yes.
Aurora. Aurora. Aurora.
Its song rose more intensely around me, as I realized what was happening to me. I'd climbed into the real Aurora Borealis, into the northern lights, and in them was power. It wasn't a figment of longing and imagination that stretched out before me looking like my home. No, on the contrary, it was really and truly them. I could do them no harm, for this was not my creation. It was my luck, magnified and flying through all the colors and dimensions of the sky!
On the other side of dawn, when dawn rose not in the morning, but at midnight in the painted expansive canvas of the night sky, I found my answer. Midnight's domain was night, the sky. That's where her power was. Mine had always been the dawn. But in this beauteous expanse, where day and night converged, I could meet with my sister.
Chapter Four
Edora
“What's your name?”
“Edora,” she said.
It was a funny thing, because she felt as if she'd not known that was her name until that very moment. The hunter nodded, smiling.
“Edora, how did you come to be in our land?”
This too was funny, for it had always been her land as well. She'd lived here all of her days, only not like this, not as a human, as a deer. And if he'd asked how she came to be in that form, she'd have no idea what to say. So, instead, she simply settled on the easiest answer.
“I have only just arrived.”
“And you traveled alone?”
At this she could only shrug, feeling a little helpless as the coldness of the word sunk into her. Yes, alone. She'd not seen any of the other deer and somehow, she didn't know quite why, but she doubted that any of the rest of them had changed. It was an odd sensation, knowing tha
t somehow she was different. People looked unique, but not deer. Sure, some had marks on their hide or different branching of their antlers but not enough to warrant individuality. At least, Edora had never considered such a thing before. It delighted her, sending a chill through her, in this odd confusion. But, it also terrified her. If she were an individual, it seemed that there was more room to make a mistake, a chance to be in danger. Oddly, she felt comfort for the first time in her life, from a hunter, as he smiled, patted her hand and said,
“Don't worry. You're not alone anymore.”
She was, however, alone only hours later. The hunter was not permitted in the portion of the castle that he'd deposited her in. She rather suspected that humans and deer were not so different after all and that, like the bucks, he had his own dwelling away from the human does. She had seen the king though. He was permitted here and so she'd not quite understood that. She'd not met “the royal family”, whoever they were. It was a grand name. Mr. and Mrs. Royal. Yes. It sounded nice.
“And with Edora here – ”
This she recognized at once! Not having realized that she was not alone, she darted behind the nearest pillar, unable to find a suitable tree indoors.
“Edora? Must she have that blasted name? It's infuriatingly close to Aurora. Aurora, my sister! The one whom all should be focused on now. The one who – ”
Edora stood behind the pillar, breathing in, her eyes flashing rapidly as they were accustomed to doing in the forest when running from the hunter. She'd meant the castle no harm, certainly not Asteria or her sister. Perhaps, her name was all wrong. Maybe she ought to change it. She tried to count, to steady her breathing, but it felt futile to do so. Everything screamed inside her lungs. Panic was not something she welcomed in any body. She squeezed her eyes shut tightly and saw nothing, not even pricks of light. But now her senses came alive, as she heard each tiny flutter of the leaves on the window pane, each beat of the moth's wing against the wooden chest. And then, louder than her beating heart and drowning out all of this, she heard the crash. So loud a sound surely would elicit screams, but none came. When she opened her eyes, tentatively, she expected to see the chandelier shattered on the ground or else, at the very least, one of the magnificent vases knocked to the floor. Instead, she saw only glimmering speckles, from a tiny crack,where Midnight had stood moments before.
Chapter Five
Midnight
“When worn by one with a pure heart, they are diamonds. But on any other, they will turn to glass.”
That message was buried in the tissue paper of the box where my glass slippers had been. I'd not seen that message on the night of the ball, but I saw it this morning and the words of the note replayed through my mind, as I looked at my shoes now.
I knew that I was being unreasonable and particularly nasty toward Edora. It's not as if the girl had anything to do with Aurora still being asleep. Worse still, she looked scared out of her wits half the time and, if anything, that proved she needed a friend. A friend. Aurora would be perfect for that. Everyone took kindly to Aurora and, perhaps more importantly, Aurora took kindly to everyone else.
It was odd, the color that infused my blood now. It was as if ever so briefly, the world were turned to emerald-tinged vision. I looked down in my hand, saw the necklace I had picked up from the dressing table, after Tilly had cleaned it. Sure enough, an emerald hung from the middle of the delicate silver chain. Jade, carved as tiny hearts and doves, alternated between the links. I turned it over, reliving a host of memories.
Aurora was nine. She got the new dress. I had wanted one. It didn't matter. None of it mattered. Only, my puppy had been lost and Aurora got the new dress.
I turned the necklace over carefully in my hand.
Aurora is by far the loveliest girl in the court.
Grandmother had said the words. I wasn't supposed to hear. They weren't meant for my little ears. I'd not heard that moments after I'd turned away, hurt, balling up my fists with angry tears in my eyes, Grandmother had said, “And our beautiful Midnight absolutely sparkles. She's really more of a little lady now than a girl.” Mother had told me that, years later, after Grandmother was gone.
Would Grandmother still have thought I were a lady if she'd known how I had envied my sister in that moment? It didn't matter. For Grandmother had never known my feelings and I hadn't heard Grandmother's remarks about me, until so recently. All I knew was that in that moment, brief though it had been, I'd hated my sister.
I'd regretted it for days.
“Midnight, you're looking pale. Are you feeling all right, dear?” Father had asked.
“Midnight, are you unwell?” Mother said, as she'd put her arm around me that afternoon.
“I'm fine, Mother. Where's Aurora?”
Mother had looked at me and I feared that she could see the guilt written all over my face. Mother knew when things were amiss. She could sense them in a way that left me with knots in my stomach. There was never any tricking Mother.
“Your sister is in the garden, beside her roses,” Mother had said.
Beside her roses. With that simple word, Mother had explained it all. There were things that were Aurora's and I could share them with her, but not take them from her. They would always be Aurora's roses. Somehow, though, Mother's tone had calmed me. I'd run to Aurora, seen my sister's peaceful face as she looked at each tiny rose and all anger had melted. It was only remorse that I felt, fierce protectiveness.
“Here Aurora, you'll prick your finger on the thorns. Let me help,” I'd said. Aurora had smiled,
“I'm fine, Midnight. Don't worry.”
“I'm fine, Midnight. Don't worry. I'm fine, Midnight.”
Aurora's voice replayed through my mind, drawing me back to the present. My sister had stretched out her charms over me, even now. Setting down the green necklace, my fear and hurt subsided.
“Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to walk in on you. I didn't know you were here,” Tilly said now, entering the room.
“It's fine, Tilly. I was just leaving.”
“Will you be wanting your necklace put away? It's a peculiar shade of green isn't it?”
“Thank you,” I said. I was distracted and hadn't committed one way or the other. As I left the room now, though, Tilly picked it up to put it away. She dropped it in her pocket and all was forgot.
Chapter Six
Edora
Edora swallowed, confused. She needed to speak to someone, to ask what was happening to her. But who could possibly know? Her mother had been taken by a hunter, years ago now. Her sisters were scattered, while her brothers and father stalked the mountain alone, the moonlight reflecting off their sturdy antlers.
No one in the palace knew. That much seemed certain. The animals that were her friends at home seemed equally unable to answer such a task.
“Of course!” Her eyes lit and hope kindled in her heart, from deep within this foreign body that was her own. An elf. That's whom she would ask, whom she would consult. An elf had all the answers of the forest and would understand what strange magic had happened to transform her.
“Edora,” the elf said, the moment he saw her. She blinked and deep recognition trembled through her body.
“You know my name,” she said.
The elf smiled and nodded,
“Yes, child, I know your name but I am not familiar with you in this form.”
At this her heart sank.
“I thought, I was – that is – I was hoping that you would be able to help me.”
“Of course, child,” he said. Elves called everyone child, for they were so much older than so many of the creatures of the forest and of the palace. Many said it was why they held the answers; they were the safe keepers of the knowledge of the mountain.
The elf moved through his cottage, adjusting his spectacles on the edge of his nose.
“Now, dear, oh! Where are my manners? You wouldn't be familiar with my name, as you've not had reason to use it before. I'm Fedderlin. Do
have a seat and here, some nice carrot broth for you to warm your insides. There's a chill in the air, isn't there?” She gracefully accepted the carrot broth that the elf gave her. Who else would have been kind enough to think to feed her such a comforting reminder of home? Indeed, who else could possibly know?
She nodded and took the bowl. The elf cleared his throat ever so slightly when she drank from the bowl, the way that she lapped water from the creek, instead of using the beautiful silver spoon that he had left beside her. But when he saw how hungrily she lapped at it and how the look of fear had at last abated from her eyes, he changed his mind and waited for her to finish before saying,
“Now, my d—friend,” He cut himself off abruptly here, not wanting to inadvertently cause her more pain by addressing her as that which she no longer was. She seemed not to notice, but sat near the fire, balanced on her chair with her legs folded awkwardly under her, not yet quite getting the feel of how these human limbs worked.
“How long have you – that is to say – when did you notice the change?”
She looked at him, trying to figure it out.
“Two sunsets ago, I think it was two sunsets, the hunter in the forest brought me to the palace.”
“My, that must have been frightening!” Fedderlin said, “how very brave of you!” He noticed how her lip quivered at the word hunter.
She nodded at him. Then a look of peculiarity crossed her face.
“Did I do the right thing?”
“How's that, child?”
“Should I have trusted him?”
“Was he kind to you? He didn't do you harm?”
She nodded and then shook her head. He understood her to be answering that yes, he was kind and no, he'd not harmed her. At least, he hoped that she had answered in the order that he had asked the questions. Because she sat there, without any fear in her eyes, he took solace that the answers must have been that.
While Aurora Slept- The Complete Trilogy Page 9