The Princess and the Bear - Mette Ivie Harrison [52]
She ought to have all the sweets she wished for, Richon thought. Now, when it was too late for her to be the child she should have been.
“She died because of the magic I used,” the girl said. “I made a locust dance on my hand. A man saw me and sent to the king for his reward. When the king’s men came, my mother insisted that it was her magic that had made the locust dance.
“And so she died in my place. Her last words to me were that she loved me and to remember that I was only a child. But at that moment I grew up. There are no children when a king like that rules over us.”
Richon suspected there were many more stories, just as bad.
In time, if all went well, he would invite these villagers to the palace to tell him the rest. And he would make what compensation he could to those who remained.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Chala
CHALA AND RICHON reached the palace on the tenth day after they stepped through the gap in time. The dust-colored stone towers were plainly visible against the acres of cleared land. There was no moat, but the gates were twice as tall as any human, with pointed spears on top to prevent incursions. There was a tower on either side of the gates, but the lookouts that should have been filled with guards were empty.
There was no one to be seen, however.
And when Richon pushed against the gates, they creaked open.
Was it possible that Richon had been king here only days ago? It looked as if the palace had been abandoned for months.
Why should humans wait to make a new leader when a pack of wild hounds would not?
“Perhaps you should wait here,” said Richon.
Chala growled low in her throat and did nothing of the sort.
Richon walked carefully on the overgrown stones and then through the gates. Chala followed behind, conscious for the first time of how little she looked like the companion to a king. Her hair was matted with sweat. Her skin was scratched and dirty. Her gown looked more gray than red.
Yet she kept her head high and walked onward.
The cobblestone path led to a courtyard faced on three sides by the palace itself. Inside the courtyard, Chala began to walk more easily, her breath steady in her throat, her feet light. Somehow the stained-glass windows and cut stone around them made Chala feel almost as if she were back in the forest, giving her a sense of peace and tranquillity.
When Chala looked more carefully, she could see that there were abstract figures of animals embedded in the center of each window. One had a deer, another a wolf, a third a bear.
Had Richon ever noticed them before? Had he seen how the palace was homage to the animals of the forest, and an attempt to re-create it here in a human way? Chala had never spoken to Richon about his ancestors, but this seemed to her clear evidence of the animal magic in those who had built the palace. There was love of animals and knowledge of their way of life in every stone here.
Richon walked more and more slowly through the courtyard, and then he ducked his head under an arch. Under the light was a garden, or the remains of one.
“This was my mother’s place,” said Richon. “My father cut it out for her and she came here nearly every day. Sometimes she brought me with her, and I sat and watched her dig in the dirt with her hands—she would not wear gloves.
“After she died, I kept this. So many reminders of my parents I destroyed or sold, but this I could not touch. I did not come to see it, but the cook made sure that the herbs were cared for, and she watered the bushes.”
His shoulders shook and tears streamed down his face; he knelt on the ground, his hands touching the dirt, his nose turned to the dead bushes.
When humans wept, what did other humans do? In King Helm’s court Chala had seen them laugh or make snide remarks. Or, if