Gwenhwyfar_ The White Spirit - Mercedes Lackey [27]
It was sunset, and suppertime, by the time she limped back to the Great Hall. The servants had brought in the kettles of stew and the remains of last night’s feast, and people were settling onto the benches and tucking in. The Hall was nowhere near as crowded as it had been last night; at least half the guests had packed up and headed homeward this morning, and the rest would leave tomorrow. Gwen was not altogether sorry to see them go; she was already tired of being polite and always on her good behavior even when some of the boy guests behaved outrageously.
Her father and mother were already seated at the High Table—on the day after a feast, no one really stood on ceremony—when a shriek and a wail arose from the back of the hall where the bedrooms were, and a moment later Gynath and Cataruna came storming out of the room, the one angry, the other lamenting, with ruin in their hands.
“My best slippers!” shouted Cataruna, her cheeks aflame with rage.
“My belt! I just finished embroidering it! I only wore it once!” wept Gynath, consumed with grief.
The pretty leather slippers had, very clearly, been given to the dogs to play with. They were chewed to shapelessness, and the seams had come half unsewn.
As for the belt, someone had taken it out and trodden it into the mud until nothing of the bright colors that Gynath had so painstakingly sewn into beautiful patterns could be seen for the dirt and stains.
A sinking feeling in her stomach, Gwen walked slowly to the bedroom. She dreaded what she would find. Which of her possessions had been taken and ruined? Behind her, she could hear her sisters telling their parents how they had found their things—and Cataruna added shrilly that Little Gwen was nowhere to be found.
Little Gwen. Of course it was her. She’d wanted something, gotten it, and didn’t like it—so her first thought was to take whatever her sisters took pleasure in and ruin it. Gynath’s new belt had been the admiration and envy of the other girls, for Gynath was the best needlewoman in the castle. And Cataruna’s slippers had made her feet look very handsome indeed in the dancing; more than one young man had said something about them in ways that had made the blood rise to Cataruna’s cheeks last night.
“. . . it was no accident, Father!” Cataruna snarled. “The slippers were in my chest, on top of my kirtle, right where I put them last night. She took them and gave them to the dogs, then put them back!”
Gynath was sobbing too hard to be coherent. She had been working on that belt all summer. Gwen didn’t blame her for weeping.
But Gwen didn’t have to look far to find Little Gwen’s revenge on her. There in the corner where she had been left was Gwen’s poppet. Or rather, what was left of her poppet.
The doll had been torn limb from limb, scalped, and decapitated. Her clothing had been shredded. Mutely, Gwen gathered up the pitiful remains in both hands, and went out into the hall where her mother was trying to soothe a disconsolate Gynath, and her father to placate Cataruna with promises of a new pair of slippers even prettier than the ruined ones. She waited until Gynath’s sobs had quieted into sniffs and hiccups, and Cataruna had run out of names to call their sister. That was when the king and queen finally became aware that she was standing there. When their eyes fell on her, she silently held out her hands. It took them a few moments to realize what it was—or had been.
“Oh, no—” It was Gynath who realized it first, and it came out in a moan. “Oh, no, oh, Gwen, your poppet, your poor doll!”
Cataruna’s cheeks flamed anew. “That—that—” she spluttered. “Oh! I am going to shake that brat until her head falls off and her teeth fall out!”
Eleri’s eyes narrowed with anger. The king put up a hand. “You’ll not touch her. When she’s found, she will be whipped, and she’ll be living on bread and water for a fortnight,