A Tale of Fur and Flesh

~The Tale~

Chapter One

Many years ago, good King Galyn and gentle Queen
Gwladys led our righteous land.  The queen’s great and glorious beauty was
known across the territory and in nations beyond.  She was adored by all she
encountered, and deeply loved by those closest to her.  The pinnacle of her
splendour was a cascade of luxurious hair that shone like strands of gold.

“What a troll!” Lally said to herself as she read. 
Her pensive longing to know more about mother was interrupted by the thought of
these words being written by Offal, her father’s devil of a councillor.  Where
did he plan to record her many competencies?  Yes, Queen Gwladys had been
beautiful, but beauty was hardly an accomplishment.  What of her peace-keeping
efforts in times of war?  What of the ties she established with neighbouring
nations?  Her mother had been much more than a pretty woman with long golden
hair.  If councillor Offal wished to compose a history of her parents’ reign,
was it too much to ask that it be accurate?

Before reading on from the unfinished manuscript, she
peeked out into the stone hallway.  She hadn’t heard anyone afoot, but last
time Offal caught her rifling through his private affairs, she felt the lick of
his boot against her backside.  She couldn’t be too careful.  Of all the
castle-dwellers, he was the cleverest and thus the greatest threat.

King Galyn doted on his fair wife and loved her all
the more upon the birth of their only child, Princess Lally.  Lally was a
gleeful girl whose great fortune it was to have two deeply caring parents.  The
royal family was often seen walking together through the vast forests of their
kingdom.  It was a custom of both mother and golden-haired child to fill their
baskets with small objects of interest.

“Buttercups,” Lally recalled. “And acorns, and
mushrooms…”

On the afternoon of Sunday
May the Ninth, the beloved queen, the king, and their princess daughter went
searching the forest for edible fungi.  Stricken by a springtime cold, Queen
Gwladys was congested and her vision blurred.  She plucked a seemingly harmless
mushroom from the base of a Larch tree.  Dusting it against her skirts, she
sunk her teeth into the mallow top.  Soon after, her stomach began to burn. 
The queen felt quite incapable of supporting herself.  Her loyal husband,
perceiving his wife’s illness, lifted her from the spongy soil and carried her
home.  There, the ailing queen was put to bed.

Gwladys summoned her pretty daughter, aged only eight
years.

“My darling Lally,” said she.  “A most fortunate
mother am I, to have such a worthy daughter.  Caring and curious, generous and
gentle, you deserve all that is good in this world.  Pray, do not forget that I
love you.”

All conjecture, of course, unless Offal had been
hovering in the rafters of mother’s bedchamber during that private moment. 
Lally still remembered the blood her mother coughed into her handkerchief.  She
envisioned the scene from outside herself now: golden-haired child throwing
plump arms across her precious mummy’s waist, wiping her tear-stained face
across the down duvet.  She tried so hard to be a brave girl until mummy got
better.

“My cherished daughter, there is something I wish for
you to have,” mummy whispered.  It was a secret only for them to know.  In
Lally’s little hand, she placed an enchanted walnut.  It looked just like any
other walnut, but contained a secret that could only be revealed when the
perfect time arose.

“But when will it open?” Lally whined.  She hadn’t
realized the immensity of the gift, nor the severity of her mother’s illness. 
“I want the secret now, mummy.  Please show me what’s inside.”

“I can’t, my darling,” her mother replied.  “The
secret gift is yours now.”

Lally hated this memory.  Its persistence goaded her,
like a crowd of hecklers urging one toward a precipice.  How could she not have
seen what was coming?  Yes, she was young, but she should have known.

The blackness of death
hovered over the queen’s bed, its foul stench penetrating the chamber.  Queen
Gwladys called her husband to her side and whispered to him, “I am a most
fortunate of wives.  How worthy a husband have I!  You, who have sat at my
bedside and spoken kind words to me.  Galyn, my love, you deserve nothing less
than the best of all things.  I bid you promise, if you ever wish to marry
again, take only a wife who possesses my great beauty.  Take only a wife who
has just such golden hair as I have.”

Foul rumour!  Her mother was never so vain; she
wouldn’t have said such a thing.  Lally didn’t believe it for a second.  At any
rate, how could her father ever grow to love another as he loved his queen? 
Impossible!  Unthinkable!

Grasping his wife’s
enfeebled hand, the king vowed to abide by her final wish, for he was resigned
never to marry again.  And when the promise was made, the queen closed her eyes
and beckoned the blackness of death to sweep her from this earth.

Lally cried when her mother departed.  She cried
until the days turned to weeks.  She cried until pain was a bleak recollection
and sensation closed its doors.  Numbness took over.  Had it ever released her
from its icy grip?

For ten long years, the king could not be comforted. 
In his bedchamber, he sobbed inconsolably.  He refused to emerge.  His very
heart was torn and bleeding for the love he had lost.   In that time of
unending sorrow, the kingdom was run by Galyn’s capable attendees, most notably
a councillor by the name of Offal.  The household was run by servants. Princess
Lally, though fed by Cook and clothed by Nurse, was quite alone in the world. 
For many years she was despondent, but children are resilient creatures.  In
time, she moved through grief.

As much as Lally mourned her mother in those days,
she missed her absent father equally.  And yet, King Galyn never emerged from
his chamber.  One Sunday morning, when she was twelve years old or thereabouts,
Lally tapped at her father’s door.  “Pray, let us journey out to the woods as
we did when mummy was with us,” she suggested.  The fresh air would do him
good.  Lally spent a great deal of her free time in the forest.

Within her father’s chamber, there was no sign of
life.

Lally tapped again. “Pray, father, let us journey
out…”

“Leave me in peace, my pet,” father moaned.  “I am in
no mood to see you.”

In no mood to see her?  His own daughter?  Confusion
boiled in the princess’s twelve-year-old blood, rising up her legs, all the way
to her pounding temples.  Her fingers curled into fists until her nails pierced
her palms.  In that one moment, four years of sorrow transformed into rage as
fierce as fire.

When dinner was
over-salted, she hurled her plate at the cook.  If she erred in her needlework,
she cast it out the window.  In the village, she pushed small children in the
street.  Their silly smiles mocked her, she claimed, and the little monsters
were always underfoot, begging for food or gold.  The Kingdom of the South grew
to despise the petulant princess.  The servants of her castle feared her.  As
the years went by, Lally’s unpredictability increased. The kingdom never knew
what minor mishap might set her off.

Despite his accuracy, she hated to see her childhood
spelled out in the letters of Offal’s hand. Even in adulthood, the rage flowed
through her.  “How dare you?” she howled, tearing the pages from their
binding.  Tears welled in her eyes before splashing against the pages.  “You
presume to judge the actions and emotions of an orphan?  Of one who is so
uncared-for her own father will not look upon her?”

She ripped out every page so he could write no more. 
She broke his quills.  She spilled his ink.  What gave him the right to record
her life for all to read?  What did he know of her?  When it was replete of
pages, Lally hurled the book’s leather casing across Offal’s chamber.  It
struck an unlit oil lamp, which fell to the ground without hesitation. Its
crash resonated so loudly she paused in place, sensing a set of eyes fixed on
her from the entryway.  He was there.  She knew it.

Trying to pry the malicious smirk from her lips, she
turned on her heels.  There he stood, as predicted, in the centre of the
doorway.  Her blood ran cold as she watched him slowly cross his arms in front
of his chest.  Physically, he was a pale and stringy sort.  Nothing to fear. 
So why did she always seem to crumble in his presence?  Summoning her courage,
she spoke to him with innocent sweetness.  “Good day, councillor Offal.  Tell
me, how fairs your manuscript?”