Handbook for Dragon Slayers (17 page)

“That's enough, Judith,” Ripertus said. “You know Tilda better than that. She does her hurting on the inside, not the out.”

I was so grateful to him in that moment that I wept, face buried in my hands.

It was so unfair, so very unfair, for Judith to accuse me of this coldness, when it was Alder Brook and its inhabitants who had caused it; it was my duty to accept their fear and dislike.

Wasn't it?

The earthquake inside me started low in my feet and belly. The memories of all the bad things that had ever happened at Alder Brook were not in isolation; there was also the memory of all the times I'd been praised for a just decision or a wise notion. There were memories of all the people who had loved me and tried to make me feel better in the face of the ignorant and idiotic. Frau Oda. Father Ripertus. Judith's parents. Wortwin the Robust . . .

Judith.

It was hard to remember those times—hard to remember them and let them be as important in my memory as the hurts and slights. But I had to remember them.

And I had to accept that maybe my memory wasn't perfect. I couldn't even recall when I'd started calling Sir Hermannus “Horrible,” but I would always remember this day, the day I learned of the ordeal he suffered for the good of Alder Brook. I would remember it for the rest of my life.

I was born a princess, trained from my earliest life in duty and how to care for Alder Brook. Ivo's two good feet were no substitute for that training in how to rule, or how—or when—to curb his own ambition.

I lowered my hands.

“I'm sorry, Judith,” I said, and it was as clear and as simple an apology as I had ever considered.

“What does that mean?” she asked, her voice still raw with anger and tears.

“It means that it's time to go home to Alder Brook.” It was time to give up my wild ideas about freedom and writing a great book. It was time to save my lands and my people.

W
INTER WAS COMING
. I
COULD SMELL IT IN THE
air as we rode quickly away from Saint Disibod's Cloister. Heavy gray clouds in the west seemed to say, “All wise souls should now be home.”

It was just now dawning on me how unwise I truly was.

And how selfish.

I kneed Joyeuse parallel to Durendal. Parz was riding pillion behind Judith, but there was no hiding my selfishness from him, so I started to talk.

“I know an apology isn't enough, Judith. But I'm sorry. For everything. But especially for not telling you I didn't want to go back to Alder Brook. I'm going back to make it right.”

Judith looked straight ahead. “You don't deserve to be the Princess of Alder Brook.”

Parz's jaw dropped.

“I know,” I said. “But it's what I have to do, nonetheless.”

Now Parz looked everywhere except at me. Judith didn't take her eyes off Durendal's ears.

Judith said, voice low, “I wish you had felt like you
could
tell me. I never . . . I never knew you wanted anything else.”

I bit my lip against a prickling of tears. “You have to understand . . . I thought Alder Brook hated me. Wasn't it the right thing, to give them a chance to have a prince they could want?”

Judith turned. “No, of course not!”

I blinked. “How not?”

“You're the ruler that they want! They just don't know it. Yet.”

“Judith, I'm not even the ruler
you
want.”

She put her hands over her face for a moment. When she put her hands down, she tried to smile. “That's not true.”

“You just said I don't deserve to be the Princess of Alder Brook—”

“I spoke in haste, all right? It's not like anyone
deserves
it. It's just luck, the luck of how you're born.”

“It truly is,” I said, and tried a smile.

She smiled back.

Grinning now, I looked over at Parz. He met my glance with wide eyes. “I didn't hear
any
of that,” he said.

“You didn't?”

“Nope. Chivalry occasionally causes deafness.”

It wasn't that funny, but we all laughed, relieved to still be friends and in each other's company.

Behind us, Father Ripertus coughed. I flushed. I'd forgotten we weren't alone, for a moment. I thought back over my recent behavior, trying to pick out which things I'd said that were unsuitable or indelicate for a princess. . . . But then I decided: I was a princess anyway, whether I was occasionally poorly behaved or not.

T
HE NEXT DAY WE
reached the Rhine, exhausted and aching and hungry.

Well, the humans were exhausted, aching, and hungry, and so was Father Ripertus's horse. The metal mares, of course, were as lively as young chicks.

When we'd departed, I had not really considered money. We still had a few pfennigs. And I'd thought Father Ripertus would have some money, but he'd fled Alder Brook in the night and, when he found me, had assumed
I
would have money.

Our notion that we could pry a few jewels loose from some piece of the armor or tack proved false. The horses' possessions were practically indestructible. As for selling any of it—truth be told, we were all more than a little afraid to do so. We slept in barns and ate windfall apples, but the more apples I ate, it seemed the hungrier I became.

“We're going to sell the silver girdle today,” I said to the others as we rode into the town of Bingium Bridge. “That's just the end of it. We're selling it. To the richest person in town, because . . . well, there are a lot of jewels in this girdle.”

But when we inquired around the town, it turned out the richest person around didn't live in town. “You might try Sir Egin at Thorn Edge,” I was told.

Sir Egin! I remembered that name. He had offered to help us before. Surely he would give us a place to sleep, perhaps provisions for the road. I vaguely recalled Judith didn't like him, but she was too hungry to protest. We turned the horses north to Thorn Edge.

The sun was just setting when we climbed the mountain to Egin's castle. I had only to give my horrible fake name—Lady Agilwarda—to the porter, and we were invited in. Judith was sent to the kitchens to eat, while Father Ripertus, Parz, and I were given a brief tour of the castle—though I think we all wished we were lowborn enough to get sent to the kitchens, too, on that particular day.

Thorn Edge was beautiful. I had not expected it to be so, a toll castle perched high above the Rhine. The castle commanded a long view of the river both north and south. Across the river were vineyards and forests, and behind the castle, forest climbed the mountain to the sky.

But the true beauty of the place lay in the terraced gardens at the center of the castle. Even this late in the year, a few valiant flowers bloomed, sheltered from autumn wind and frost by the walls.

“Lady Agilwarda!” Sir Egin greeted me with a smile. “And her friends. It's . . . Lord Parzifal, is it? Such an unexpected delight! And I do not know you, Father.”

“Ripertus,” my old teacher said with a bow.

I stared at Egin, struck dumb by the changes in him. I had remembered him as so handsome and charming, but I could see that—yes, he was still handsome, by the letter of what handsomeness is—but everything about him repulsed me. There was a cold, fishlike deadness behind his eyes, and it made my skin crawl.

“I'm sorry,” I said, backing instinctively toward the stables where Joyeuse and the other horses patiently waited. “I think—I don't wish to intrude.”

“Nonsense! You came to me—you must have a reason!”

“I—we just . . .” I didn't know how to explain what we needed without appearing incredibly vulnerable, which, of course, we were.

“We have a long journey,” Parz said. “Lady Agilwarda needs provisions and a place to stay for the night, I'm afraid.”

I listened with despair to Parz's ramble of lies and truth, and stared at Egin.
How did I find him so lovely before?
I wondered. I remembered whirling about with him, and being interrupted, and the brief expression of dark anger that had crossed his face. And Judith's calm voice informing me that Egin had just buried his seventh wife.

I had forgotten all that, on the ferryboat.

How had I forgotten that?

“I assumed you would stay the night,” Egin said.

Father Ripertus and Parz eagerly agreed, before I had a chance to refuse.

“Good, good. Let me show you to Thorn Edge's private rooms, that you may refresh yourselves before supper.” We followed him into a squat tower, up a circular staircase. I struggled to keep pace up the curving stairs.

Egin showed Parz and Ripertus into a warm, wood-paneled room with a crackling fire, which they exclaimed over before he closed the door behind them. Then he guided me up another two turns of the tower stairs before showing me a pleasant-enough chamber. It held a low bed piled with soft silk pillows and fur covers, a well-appointed fireplace, a little table, and an ornately carved stool. A narrow window overlooked the great river.

I surveyed the place, then turned back, trying to smile.

“It's rather plain, I know,” Egin said.

I glanced at the lush tapestry on the wall over the bed. “It's quite lovely.”

“It needs a woman's touch. The whole castle is in need of a proper mistress.”

I blinked. He had just buried his seventh wife. How much of a mistress did it need?

“Well,” I said, “it looks fine to me.”

“No, no—the only true ornamentation in this room is—you.”

It was just too much, but what could I do? “It'll be fine for one night,” I said, hoping that if I implied that I agreed with him, he'd leave off the conversation.

Sir Egin looked stricken. “Just one night? I had hoped you might grace Thorn Edge much longer than that!”

I frowned. “I have urgent business.”

“Oh, how urgent can it be? You are such a young lady. You can't have any great responsibilities yet.”

I wished.

But I thought it would be unwise to let him in on my true identity, so I just smiled. “I do not mean to be rude, but perhaps I could have a little something to eat?”

“Of course!” Egin said. “I'll leave you to freshen up, then come on down to dine.”

“Yes, I should like to change my clothes,” I said. “Can you send my servant and my bags?”

“I'll send a servant right away.”

A
SERVANT CAME, BUT
not Judith; she carried a stack of lavender-scented clothing, but not my saddlebags.

She introduced herself as Frau Dagmar and told me that she had been the handmaiden to the previous lady of Thorn Edge. Then she said little more, except to insist she would help me change my clothing into what Sir Egin provided.

Frowning but trying to remain gracious, I changed into a soft robe of orange-tawny wool. Frau Dagmar removed the long necklace that Parz had made for me, feeling it did not go properly with the outfit, as I needed a brooch to close up the neckline of my dress.

I laced on the mantle. Then, for the first time in weeks, I donned a circlet over my veil. It felt strange to have something resting on my head. By rote, I went to arrange my braids, and had to pause when they were not there.

Frau Dagmar led me downstairs to a hall that should have been full of retainers but held only Sir Egin. He bowed to me, and I thought,
Perhaps he looks best in candlelight
, for it seemed the full force of his handsomeness and charm had returned.

I couldn't remember why I'd thought him uncharming upon my arrival, in fact.

He explained that Father Ripertus and Parz had elected to dine privately in their room. “But we shall not feel their absence, I'm sure,” he said.

Supper was elaborate: pressed venison, spiced pike, meatballs presented as golden apples, and tiny roast piglets stuffed with bread, eggs, nuts and currants. For sweets, there were yellow jellies and eggshells blown out and stuffed with marzipan. A bowl of almonds and a bowl of coriander sat before our shared trencher, supposedly to taste between courses, but I abstained. They called coriander “dizzy-corn” because it made the head spin, and it seemed my head was already doing plenty of that, between Sir Egin's fantastic stories and even more fantastic compliments.

He asked me to tell the story over and over, of how I “trapped” the metal mares and faced down the Wild Hunt. The telling and retelling and retelling the sequence of events made me dizzy as well, until the details started to blur together.

Egin walked me to my bedroom door and bent to kiss my cheek good night. I entered the room and shut the door behind me.

The quiet
snick
of a key turning gave me pause.

I'd been locked in.

T
HE STRANGEST PART OF BEING LOCKED INTO MY
tower room was that I didn't care.
Oh, it's probably to keep me safe
, I thought, untying my mantle and falling into bed.

In the morning, after I washed and dressed, I tried the door again and found it locked.

Right. It had been locked the night before, too. Hadn't it?

I shook the door harder, in case it was just sticky. But no, it was well and truly locked.

I sat down at the little table and waited.

Not much later, a key rattled in the lock, and Frau Dagmar came in, accompanied by a pair of younger handmaidens. I sat still as they emptied my night pot, aired my bedding, and built up my fire.

“Where is Sir Egin?” I asked finally.

“Around,” Frau Dagmar said, shaking her keys at the handmaidens, as if this would make them move faster.

“Can I see him?”

She jangled the keys slower, peering at me over her nose. “What for?”

I blinked at the keys, considering. “Isn't . . . isn't it odd that my door was locked this morning?”