Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow - Jessica Day George [32]
The lass shrugged. “It makes about as much sense as her waiting on me. I’m only the daughter of a woodcutter.”
“Yes, but you make a much kinder mistress than the selkie would ever be. Believe me.”
“Oh?” The lass arched an eyebrow at him.
The isbjørn gave his rumbling, growling laugh. “Her kind delights in singing to sailors so that their ships run aground on the rocks.”
The lass shuddered. “Oh, I see.” She reconsidered her idea of courting Fiona’s friendship. “Is the person who enchanted you the same person who brought the servants here?” She blurted out the question quickly, hoping to take him off guard.
The bear reeled back, one massive paw waving in the air. “What?”
“Is the person who enchanted you the same one who brought the servants here?” she asked all in one breath.
“Yes!” The word sounded like it had been wrenched out of him.
They sat in silence for a while.
“Are you happy here?” The isbjørn almost shouted it.
“What?” The blurted question aimed back at her took the lass by surprise.
Rather than running all the words together, as she had, the bear repeated his question more distinctly. “Are you happy here? Do you like it?”
“Well, yes. It’s beautiful, and I’ve never had such wonderful food.” She gestured at her awkwardly tailored gown, which was of peach silk embroidered with gold. “And I’ve never had such fine clothing.”
“Do you miss your family?”
The lass froze, one hand still smoothing her silk skirt. The first few days at the palace, she thought that she would be sick with longing for Hans Peter and her father. She told herself over and over again that they were well, they were safe, they were rich, the isbjørn had promised. And then the excitement of exploring the ice palace and refitting the beautiful gowns had captured her attention. While she still missed her family and their little cottage, the pain of it had faded to a dull ache that she mostly ignored.
“Do you?” the bear pressed.
“Yes,” she said in a halting voice. Guilt that she had not thought about Hans Peter all day made tears rush to her eyes. “My brother Hans Peter most of all.”
“I’m sorry,” the bear sighed. “I will see if arrangements can be made.”
“What kind of arrangements?” For a moment, a flutter of hope rose in her breast. Would he bring Hans Peter here to stay with her for the rest of the year?
“I will try to have letters sent to them, and from them to you,” the bear clarified.
“Oh.” The lass felt her elation ebb, but consoled herself that letters would be better than no contact at all. And she had been in the ice palace for a month now. There were only eleven months left of her stay here.
The bear lumbered away. “I will see you at dinner,” he said over his shoulder.
Moody, she got to her feet and wandered over to poke at the fire with the silver-handled poker that hung from the mantel. While she jabbed at the half-burned logs, she rested her free hand on the carvings of the mantel. It felt like her dress: slick and slightly cold. Something about the pose stirred her memory, and for a moment she had a strange doubling sensation, as though she were simultaneously in the bear’s palace and back at home in the cottage.
The fingers holding the poker felt numb, and the lass dropped the heavy instrument with a clatter. She stumbled back from the fireplace, not wanting to catch her skirt on fire in her dizziness. She half sat, half fell into the chair, and when her head cleared she rubbed her face and looked up at the mantel.
The ice mantel felt exactly like the mantel back in the cottage. She got to her feet and moved closer, squinting at the greenish white patterns on the mantel. It showed more of the same angular symbols that graced the support pillars of the great hall and ran in bands around the white parka.
“It doesn’t just look like the carving on our mantel at home,” she mused aloud, her breath misting the air a little because her nose was only inches from the mantel. “It’s an exact copy of the mantel at home. Or rather, the cottage mantel is the copy.”
Two years ago Hans Peter had said