Princess of the Midnight Ball - Jessica Day George [54]
Galen frowned. “But when the queen died, wouldn’t her bargain have become void?”
“Not as far as he is concerned, it seems. If she’s not there to pay, then her daughters will.” Walter hesitated. “So they are dancing for him?”
Galen nodded. “They danced from midnight to dawn with twelve tall young men. I believe they are his sons.”
The older man gave a low whistle. “So that’s his game, is it?” he said thoughtfully, staring into the distance. “Perhaps he meant to have them all along.”
“Walter,” Galen said, feeling almost hesitant about asking. “How do you know all this?”
The old man looked at him. The news that the King Under Stone had a hold on the princesses had shaken him, and he looked immeasurably old suddenly. “I have not always been a gardener, Galen Werner,” he said drily.
“Then tell me how to stop this.”
“Alone? And with twelve sons to aid him?” Walter shook his head. “It will take time.”
“We don’t have time,” Galen argued. “Rose… Little Pansy … They don’t have time, Walter.”
“I did not think Maude had gone so deep,” Walter was muttering, to himself more than Galen. “And you say its every night now…. He must need them more, or is preparing for something. There aren’t enough of us left to put a tighter seal on his prison….”
“Walter!” Galen shook the old man’s shoulder gently. He lifted his lapel and showed Walter the wilted sprig of nightshade. “I’m going to need more nightshade, at the least. There is a sleeping spell laid over anyone who comes into the princesses’ rooms at night,” Galen explained. “But it did not affect me as it had the princes.”
“Ah!” Walter nodded sagely, his eyes coming into focus again. “So that’s how the princesses slip away from their minders.” He frowned. “But weren’t the girls suspicious? And how is it that you could follow them?”
“They were suspicious at first,” Galen admitted. “But then I feigned sleep, and that satisfied them. As to how I was able to follow them … that’s a secret.”
Walter nodded again. “It’s good to have secrets.”
Together he and Galen gathered up the basket of leaves and set off for the gardener’s sheds. Galen dumped the leaves in the mulch pile and put the basket away. Then Walter beckoned, and Galen followed him to the herb garden.
Walter picked another sprig of nightshade, to replace the wilted one. Then he broke off a sharply scented sprig of dried basil and gave it to Galen as well.
“Nightshade will clear the enchantments from your eyes, and enable you to see the truth. And basil wards off evil,” he explained.
“Thank you.” Galen tossed his wilted nightshade aside and carefully pinned the new sprig in place. Then he put the more brittle basil in the breast pocket of his coat.
As he fumbled with his clothes, the pouch at Galen’s belt swung forward and one of the silver twigs sticking out caught on his shirt. Cursing, Galen freed the twig and tried to get it to fit better in the little drawstring bag.
“What are those?” Walter squinted at them.
“A little something that I took from the forest of silver,” Galen replied. Checking to make certain that they were alone, he pulled the twigs out of the bag and showed them to Walter.
Turning them over in his gnarled hands, Walter pursed his lips. “Interesting,” he said. “These weren’t part of his realm, at least not in the beginning.” He gave them back to Galen. “Interesting.”
“How do you know what his realm is like?”
Walter merely echoed the words he’d said to Galen earlier: “It’s good to have secrets.” Then he paused. “But I will say this: silver has power, and so do names.”
“Names and silver…” Galen studied the twigs himself. They were long and straight, and the place where they had broken from the larger branch showed little silvery fibers that were some strange hybrid of metal and wood never before seen in the mortal world. “I should have broken off bigger pieces, to make arrows.