Heartless Read online

  She clutched her journal close to her side and licked her lips. “I . . . I could ask the same of you.” She had not spoken with him since the evening of Gervais’s departure. On a few occasions he had made some polite attempt at conversation, but true to her vows, she had snubbed him. The memory of Gervais’s sudden departure and her subsequent embarrassment was still too fresh in her mind. She raised her chin and tried to speak grandly. “I mean that this is my father’s wood. What are you doing tramping around in it? Does my father know?”

  Aethelbald beckoned again. “Please, Princess Una, come off the bridge. This is not your father’s wood, and I need no permission. But you – ”

  “It is too,” she snapped, backing away from him. “It grows in his kingdom; therefore this is his wood. I have every right to be on my father’s land, haven’t I?”

  He glanced at the forest on the far side of the bridge. “Have you crossed over?” he asked.

  Una blinked. “Over the Old Bridge? Of course not.”

  The Prince let out a long breath. “You remain on the near side?” His hands were outstretched, as though he wanted to pull her off. Afraid that he actually might, she stepped from the planks onto the leafy bank.

  “No one crosses the Old Bridge,” she said.

  “Good.”

  She looked down at the dirt and grass clinging to her wet toes. Aethelbald stepped closer to her. She wanted to ask him why he was there, what he had been doing on the far side, the far side that no one went to – but for some reason the words would not form in her mouth. She could not ask, no matter how she might wish to, and she chewed on her tongue, frustrated.

  Yet Aethelbald was visibly relieved. “This side belongs to your father,” he said. “Stay over here, princess. But, tell me, do you often come to this place alone?”

  “Of course I do,” she said. “I told you, this is my father’s wood and perfectly safe.”

  “You’ve never met anyone here?”

  She glared at him. “Not until today.” She paused, then added almost as an excuse, “Felix comes with me. Sometimes. He used to.”

  “Ah,” Aethelbald said. He cast one last glance back across the Old Bridge, pursed his lips, and looked at her again. His gaze lit upon her journal, and he half smiled, indicating it with a nod. “You come here to read?”

  She hugged it closer. “No.”

  He noticed then the pencil in her right hand. “To write, then? Are you a writer?”

  “Sometimes,” she admitted.

  “Stories? Poetry?”

  “Poetry.”

  “I did not know you were a poet.” He spoke with a smile that surprised her with its warmth and interest. She looked down at her feet to avoid it. “Do you seek to follow in the footsteps of the great Eanrin of Rudiobus?”

  “Lights above, no!” she said quickly. “I wouldn’t dream of comparing myself to his genius.”

  “Well, that’s a relief in any case,” said the Prince, and he smiled again, though she, glancing up, couldn’t quite read his expression.

  He asked, “Perhaps you would one day recite a piece?”

  She did not answer. Deep down inside Una wanted to. Other than Felix, who didn’t count, no one had ever inquired about her poeting attempts before; none had ever been curious to read her pieces or asked her to perform them.

  But she kept her mouth tightly shut.

  Aethelbald looked at the ground at her feet, his jaw working as though he was trying to say something. At last he said, “May I – ”

  “If you’re thinking to ask about my hands again – no, they’re still not burned.”

  He blinked, and all trace of a smile left his face. “I was going to ask if I might escort you home.”

  Shame scratched at the back of her mind. How could she be such a shrew? But she drew herself together and shook her head.

  “You will stay here alone?”

  “Yes.” And as an afterthought she added, “Thank you.”

  “It grows late.”

  She shrugged, which wasn’t a particularly elegant gesture, but for the moment she didn’t care.

  He sighed and took a few steps uphill toward the gardens, then paused and looked back at her. “Don’t cross over.”

  The next moment Aethelbald was gone.

  Una blinked at the spot where he’d been. Strange. For though she knew he had simply disappeared among the foliage and trees, part of her thought he’d vanished into thin air – one moment present, the next moment not. Her brow wrinkled as she tried to recall their encounter. She knew they’d spoken of poetry. Was there something else? It was muddled in her memory, probably due to her fluster at speaking to him after so many weeks of silence. How awkward to meet him out here!

  She huffed a short laugh. It could almost have been a romantic meeting if he had been anyone else. But it would appear she was doomed for the prosaic.

  Una lingered in the forest, until she was quite certain Aethelbald was gone, before stepping back onto the Old Bridge to retrieve her shoes. Then, as the sun began to disappear behind the trees, she too made her way back to the tiered garden. Somehow she felt better than when she had fled from her room that afternoon. She couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but something had changed, something important.

  She smiled as she stepped from the trees into the lowest tier of the garden and made her way up the path. The sun was sinking swiftly now, and Nurse would be irate with her for staying out so long. But this evening she could look over her new verse and know she had accomplished something all her own. Perhaps life made very little sense, but perhaps it wasn’t all that dreadful either.

  She was up in the second tier, following the path close to the wall, when she heard a sound like rocks scrabbling against each other. Startled, Una glanced up and down the darkening path but saw nothing. She heard the sound again and looked up just in time to see a dark figure on top of the wall leap down on her.

  10

  Una screamed as both she and the dark figure tumbled into the garden path, the princess squashed beneath. Bells tinkled faintly, then a hand slipped over her mouth as an urgent voice hissed in her ear, “Oh, hush. I’m so sorry! I beg you, please, quiet!”

  She screamed again, the sound stifled by the hand, and struggled. The body on top of her shifted so that she was not so heavily pinned, and she got an elbow free and tried to make use of it. Her attacker dodged, still keeping his hand clamped over her face, and whispered again, “I say! Really, I’m sorry. I had no idea you were down here. Terribly rude of me, I know, but I can’t help making an entrance it seems, no matter how I try.”

  His voice sounded vaguely familiar, though she could not place it. It was not a threatening voice, so she relaxed a little in his grip. He let her sit up. “Are you quite calm?”

  She nodded, though her breath came in short puffs against his fingers.

  “All right, I’m going to let you go. Please – ”

  She leapt up as soon as she was free and whirled on him, her feet skidding on the gravel path. In the sunset’s ruddy glow she saw a strange yellow costume crisscrossed with gaudy stripes. He jumped to his feet as she did, and she opened her mouth, taking in a deep breath, more than prepared to scream for all she was worth if he moved one step toward her.

  But, to her great surprise, he took a look at her face and collapsed onto all fours at her feet. Una stepped back in alarm, but he spread his hands toward her, crying out in a choked voice, “Please! Can you forgive this lowly worm, O gentlest of maidens, for his unforgivable rudeness, dropping in on you, so to speak? Will you forgive him or strike him dead with a dart from your eyes? Oh, strike, maiden, strike, for I deserve to die – No! Stay!”

  He rose onto his knees, covering his face with his hands as she stared. “I do not deserve such a death!” he cried. “Nay! It would be far too noble an end for so ignoble a creature as you see before you, to die from the glance of one so fair! No, name instead some other manner for my demise, and I shall run to do your bidding. Shall I
cast myself from yon cliff?”

  He leapt up, and she gasped and backed away, but he sprang to the pedestal on which stood the marble statue of her many-times-over great-grandfather, Abundiantus V, whose head was turned to look over a marble shoulder. He seemed to glare directly down at the strange young man who wrapped an arm around his stone waist in a familiar manner, balancing beside the old king.

  “She says I must die,” the stranger told the statue, waving a hand toward Una. “Will you mourn for me?”

  King Abundiantus looked severe.

  The stranger turned away with a sob and looked out across the garden. “Farewell, sweet world! I pay the just price for my clumsiness, my vain shenanigans. My grandmother told me it would come to this. Oh, Granny, had I but listened to your sage counsel while I was yet in my cradle!”

  He made as though to jump but froze with one leg in the air, arms outspread, and glanced at Una. “Farewell, sweet lady. Thus for thee I end a most illustrious career. The siege of Rudiobus was hardly a greater tragedy, but then, Lady Gleamdren was not such a one as thee!”

  He gathered for another spring but stopped himself, catching hold of King Abundiantus’s white fist. “I don’t suppose my end could be put off until tomorrow, could it?”

  “I – ” Una began.

  “No!” he cried. “For you and your wounded dignity, I must perish at once. Go to, foul varlet! Meet thy doom!” With a strangled cry, none too loud but bone-chilling, he flung himself from the pedestal, somersaulted across the path, and lay still at Una’s feet. His left arm twitched.

  Una gaped.

  The stranger raised an eyelid. “Satisfied, m’lady?”

  Una, much to her surprise, laughed.

  His name, he told her, was Leonard, and he was an out-of-work jester.

  “A jester?” Una said.

  “Yes.” He, still lying on the ground, waved a hand in a grand, sweeping gesture. “Singer, storyteller, acrobat, and clown. Also known as,” he coughed modestly, “a Fool.”

  Una shook her head, smiling with a wrinkled brow. “You may get up if you wish, Fool.”

  “Thank you, m’lady.” Leonard sprang up and began brushing gravel and dirt from his already much-soiled costume, ringing a dozen silver bells as he did so.

  Una looked him over. Her heart still raced from her scare, but it was difficult to remain fearful of such a funny-looking creature. “What possessed you to jump on me from the wall?”

  He grimaced. “Yes, about that . . . I’m sorry?”

  “Is that a question?”

  “I suppose so. I’m trying it on for size. Usually I find that ‘sorry’ isn’t enough, so I don’t often bother with it anymore. You seem like the forgiving sort, however, and I thought I might risk it.”

  Una covered her mouth to hide a giggle. “Why were you climbing the garden wall?”

  “They wouldn’t let me through the gate,” he said.

  “They don’t let just everyone through, you know,” Una said. “Not through Southgate. You can come through Westgate every third and fifth day of the week if you seek an audience with the king. They wouldn’t toss you out then.”

  “Ah, but I’m not some commoner coming with a petition. I have special papers on me, a letter of recommendation from King Grosveneur of Beauclair himself.”

  “You’re come from Beauclair?”

  “Indeed, m’lady, directly from Amaury Palace, whereat I did most brilliantly entertain the monarch of said kingdom!”

  He twirled his hand elegantly as he spoke, but Una did not notice, for she was studying the buckles of her shoes. “Did you see anything of the prince while you were there?”

  “Prince Gervais? No, I believe he is not currently, uh, welcome at Amaury, though I am not privy to the details.”

  “Oh. Certainly.” Una shrugged, still looking down at her shoes, but the jester went on speaking.

  “I have ventured here from the court of Beauclair to seek employment with the king of Parumvir,” Leonard said, “if he will hire me.”

  “Hire you to clown?”

  “That and sing and spin stories and perform acrobatic feats of wonder; though my singing I would wish on few, my storytelling has put many a mighty lord to sleep, and my acrobatic skills are feeble at best. But my clowning . . . Ah! Do not so soon dismiss the talent that lies therein, O ye maiden of doubt! There, in the masterful arts of tomfoolery, lurks the full measure of my genius.”

  He swept her a bow, catching the strange, bell-covered hat from his head so that his dark hair stood on all ends about his face and nearly touched the ground as he bent double. When he straightened again, he caught up something. “Is this yours, m’lady?” He held out her journal.

  “Oh yes,” she said, taking it. “Thank you.”

  “A book of sonnets perhaps?” he asked, smiling winningly. “Stories of romance and adventure?”

  “Oh no,” she said. “It’s just, well . . .” She smiled back, surprised at how easy she found it to talk to this strange character. “Actually, it’s my own work. I . . . I write verses now and then.”

  “Do you indeed? Excellent!” he cried. “I’ve written a song myself; it’s not a very useful piece for my line of work, however. Jesters aren’t supposed to sing melancholy bits.”

  “I like melancholy songs,” Una said.

  “Do you? Then you would adore this piece. Composed in the immortal spirit of the great Eanrin himself, it is bound to bring tears to your eyes! A pity I am a jester. If I were other than I am, I would sing it for you.”

  Una narrowed her eyes. “Well, aren’t you presently out of work?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you aren’t a jester. You are an unemployed gentleman and therefore free to sing melancholy songs, yes?”

  The jester nodded and rubbed his chin. “How deftly the lady wields the double-edged sword of logic!” He slapped his knee. “For that, fair one, I give you this most melancholy of melancholy carols ever caroled in these parts.” He struck a pose. “ ‘The Sorry Fate of the Geestly Knout.’ ”

  Una giggled, but he raised a hand to shush her and, his face drawn as though in great pain, he sang:

  “With dicacity pawky, the Geestly Knout

  Would foiter his noggle and try

  To becket the Bywoner with his snout

  And louche the filiferous fly.

  “But to his dismay, the impeccant Glair

  Would kibely watch from the Lythcoop.

  Our poor little Knout felt her pickerel stare,

  And allowed his own delectus eye droop.

  “Ah, sad Geestly Knout! How he’d foiter and bice,

  But his noggle wouldn’t nannander right,

  And that impeccant Glair, like bacciferous ice,

  Feazeled his snout with a single bite!”

  Ending with a flourish, Leonard wiped a tear from his cheek, and Una laughed out loud. He raised an eyebrow. “The lady laughs! Ah, what a world in which we live when the innocent laugh at the sufferings of Knouts, geestly or otherwise.”

  “Whatever does it mean, though?” Una asked.

  The jester looked still more affronted. “If art must be explained, it is hardly worthwhile, is it?”

  Una laughed again heartily. When she recovered her breath, she shook her head. “Sir Leonard the Jester, the hour is late and I must return home. Why don’t you join me? My father would welcome you, I am certain, and a bed for the night might be found for you. Unless, of course, you have somewhere else you must be. . . .” She blushed at her boldness and was almost relieved when the jester shook his head.

  “I fear I must decline your offer, sweet maiden, for tonight I seek the home of the King of Parumvir himself, Fidel by name.” He swept his hand up to indicate the palace looming above them on the top of the hill. “His fools of guards – and I say fools in the basest sense, for I defy you to find a sense of humor among the lot of them – refused me admittance, but I hope to present my reference papers to a steward or housekeeper this evening and p
erhaps gain an audience with the king on the morrow. It is high time I found employment again, for my raiment is threadbare and my stomach empty. So you see, fair one – ”

  “Oh, but King Fidel is my father,” Una said. “Yes, and I’m sure he’d give you work if you want it; we don’t have a jester at court.”

  “Your father? Then – ” The jester looked her up and down, taking in her simple day dress, the leaves in her hair, the dirt on her shoes. Then he looked again at her face, and his own face lost all trace of jesterliness. “Your Highness! Princess! I must ask your forgiveness in earnest now. I am an oaf and a clod. I should have seen from your eyes, your manner, that you were royalty.” With those words, he bowed a real bow, and a graceful one at that.

  Una felt the red blotches appearing on her nose and was glad the light was dim. “It’s quite all right,” she hastened to say. “No, how could you have known? Think nothing of it whatsoever.”

  He smiled a sweet smile, not at all flashy. In this attitude, despite his garish clothing, Leonard seemed almost normal. “Does your hospitable invitation still stand, princess?”

  “Of course. Please, do come,” she said.

  “In that case” – he offered his elbow – “allow me to escort you home.”

  11

  Servants and courtiers stared as Una led the outlandish young man through the palace, but she ignored them. “This way,” she beckoned to Leonard and hurried through the corridors. She realized that she must be far too late for supper, so she escorted the jester to the sitting room, where her father usually retired for a few minutes of peace in the evenings. But Fidel was not there.

  Frowning and a little embarrassed, Una bade the jester stay put while she hunted up a servant. The first man she came across was the palace steward, a somber fellow without a hair out of place. She caught him by the sleeve. “Where is my father?”