White Hart (2 page)

Settled in the valley between the Red Peak mountains in the south, and the Waerg Woods which stretch northwards towards Cyne, Halts-Walden is a self-contained village. With a small mill over the river, and a couple of farms on the outskirts, we survive without much contact from the rest of Aegunlund.

We pass the farms and head deeper into the village, where the market is set up in the courtyard outside the Fallen Oak tavern. People bustle around, carrying armfuls of flowers or baskets filled with baked goods. The scent of fresh bread makes my mouth water and my stomach growl.

“What’s going on?” I brush hair, dirt, and wood dust from my eyes, and address one of the milkmaids. She wears a long tunic, brought in at the waist with a rope belt. Her skirts bustle beneath the tunic. She weaves fresh flowers­—bluebells, ivy, chamomile and rosemary, fragrant and sweet—through a wooden arch over the village gate. “Why are you arranging flowers?”

The milkmaid frowns at Anta before appraising my appearance with a raised eyebrow. “Been in the woods again, White Hart?” She tuts. “Robert, I thought you had better sense than to let your daughter roam around in that place.”

Father bristles next to me. “I need to feed her, don’t I?”

She mumbles something about getting a proper occupation years ago.

“The flowers,” I insist. “Are we expecting visitors?”

It seems I uttered the magic phrase, because her face lights up and her ruddy cheeks stretch with a broad grin. Her thin eyebrows raise high above her glistening eyes, moving swiftly with excitation. “The prince is coming for Ellen. It’s so romantic.”

Father and I share a glance. The king has been waiting for a craft-born to wed his son, Prince Casimir. They search far and wide for anyone who shows a sign of the craft—magic passed down through the blood of the Ancients—so they might restore magic to the realm and reignite the Red Palace. I know only rumours about the Red Palace, ones that speak of machines and contraptions that create light without a fire and make precious stones.

“Ellen is craft-born?” I ask. I know Ellen. She’s the miller’s daughter, and one of the prettiest girls in town with milk-white skin, black hair, and oval-shaped blue eyes. When we were six, she pointed and laughed at the holes in my boots, so I pushed her into a puddle. Then I got a lashing from the miller.

The milkmaid nods so quickly her chins waggle. “Oh yes. She darkened ivy with a touch.”

I fold my arms and roll my eyes. Father sniggers. “Who told you that?” I say.

“No one needed to tell me anything,” the woman says. She bends low and snatches flowers from her basket. “The whole village knows it.” She turns her back on us and pushes daisies into her display.

We know the conversation is over and move Anta away from the woman.

Father elbows me lightly in the side. “Looks like you’re off the hook.”

I nod. “It does indeed.” I run a hand down Anta’s snowy coat. It sparkles with my touch, like icy snow or stars.

“Not in public, Mae. Even after the prince has married the girl, you’ll have to keep it a secret. You’ll never be safe otherwise.”

“I know,” I reply with a sigh, wrapping an arm over Anta’s withers.

They call me White Hart because on the day I was born—the day Mother died—the white stag appeared at the window of our hut, just a calf back then, so Father says. He tried to shoo it away, but the stag kept coming back, staring through the window, watching me as a baby. When I could talk, I yelled,
Anta! Anta!
I pointed at the large, furry antlers from his head, standing tall and crooked like the branches in the Waerg Woods.

No one knows why Anta stayed with me, or why he let me tame him. I ride him, too, and he drags the cart of wood to market. They whisper behind us,
That’s no place for a white stag. What did they do to the creature? They have no right to own an animal like that
... and more than once Father has had to threaten those who come to our house late at night, desperate to poach Anta for his fur. I’d never let anyone hurt him. I’d kill anyone who tries.

*

B
ack at our hut, I remove Anta’s saddle, bridle and the cart. We never tie him up. He has a shelter if he wants it, and we trade for hay in the winter, but usually Anta roams back into the Waerg Woods, disappearing between the tall birches like the shadows. I pat his quarters, he snorts before trotting off between the trees.

Father and I live on the edge of the gloomy forest; close enough to smell the leaves, hear the rustle of animals, and sense the dangers within. Darkness hangs below the knotted canopy of branches. I stand and watch in awe, following Anta’s hoof-prints. It’s late. The sun sets. The grey of dusk descends over Halts-Walden with the threat of rain in the dark underbelly of clouds. The prince may well be greeted with mud and rain in the morning. The thought makes me feel rather gleeful. I imagine some pampered, puffy prince on the back of a regal horse, riding into the village in search of the red hair of maidens, quaint flowers, and those who bend the knee to him.

“Come in for stew, Mae,” Father says. “You should have a bath, too, if the prince is arriving.”

“I thought the whole point was to make sure the prince wouldn’t want me,” I reply, shooting him a glance.

Father sighs. “That’s true. But this is still a momentous occasion for the village, and you should look the part, or you’ll attract attention. Do you know the last time we had a royal come here?”

I shake my head.

“Well, it was before my time. Your grand-papa talked of it sometimes. King Aldrych the First came when he was still a prince. He thought we were enchanted, because of where we live. I suppose the kings always do.”

We’re under Aldrych the Second’s rule, now, a man I know little about because of how isolated we are. His reputation is one of greed. The only thing I know is that he wants his precious Red Palace to make his gems. Apparently the craft is needed for that. I don’t know how it works. Part of me would love to see the castle, to discover what makes it so special.

“Well, Ellen is craft-born, after all.” I snort. She’s got about as much craft in her as the muck in Farmer Black’s pigpen.

“Are you complaining, Mae? You’ve wanted nothing more than to avoid Ellen’s fate. Ever since...” He trails off.

Ever since I realised I have the magic in me. To finish his sentence, I lift a hand and click with my thumb and index finger. The butterflies that usually hide away between our flowers reveal themselves in the garden. There are dozens of them fluttering through the sky of all colours: red, yellow, blue, patterned with eyes that stare out like rubies. They fly to me and cluster around my hand.

Father shakes his head, but he laughs. “If only your mother could see you.”

A bold butterfly with wings the colour of sapphires lands on my nose, tapping me with its antennae.

“I just wanted to call you,” I say. “There’s no job for now.”

The butterfly leaves my nose sharply, as though in a huff. The others follow, flapping their tiny wings, disappearing back amongst the flowers.

“You shouldn’t call them whenever you feel like it,” Father warns. “Nature doesn’t exist to serve you and your every whim.”

I’ve heard this speech many a time, so I clap my hands together to prevent a long lecture. “Stew it is, then!”

Father puts an arm around my shoulders as we head back to the hut. “Rabbit stew, in fact. With carrots and mint. I need to fatten you up—I can feel your ribs!”

I pat my tunic. “Really?” I am small for my age.

He chuckles as we walk through the doorway. I help him up the stone step. “You’re still growing. Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll be a few inches taller by your sixteenth birthday.”

I lift his arm from my shoulders, and it drags dark curls in front of my eyes. I push them back behind my ears. “I doubt it.”

“Sit down and eat your meal.” Father points to the table, laid out with a bowl of food. It’s barely enough for the two of us. “Tomorrow will be a big day. We’ll see the prince, and when he takes Ellen away, we’ll never have to worry again about you being sent to the Red Palace.”

I like the sound of that. As I shovel down the rabbit stew, my shoulders lighten. For years we’ve worried about my powers. We know little about craft and the craft-born, except that the magic within me seems to allow me to call on nature. I don’t know why it makes me powerful or how it would benefit the realm, I just know that I don’t want to be a princess and I never have. I can’t think of anything worse than flouncing about in fancy dresses, cooped up in the Red Palace forever, forced into marrying someone I don’t even know. I certainly don’t want to use my powers to help the king become even richer.

But there is something in me that longs to find out more about the powers within me. Sometimes I fantasise about disappearing from Halts-Walden and travelling Aegunlund in search of answers. I want to be in the woods with the birds and the butterflies. I want to climb trees and ride Anta ’til my arse-cheeks are sore. I don’t know why I’m craft-born, and I don’t really care. All I know is whatever the reason, it has to be more than sitting pretty on a throne. There must be more to life. There has to be freedom and adventure in this world. I want to find it.

I
wake to drizzle filtering through the thinning thatch above. It plops on my nose like tears from the sky.

“Blasted roof.” Father limps into the room, his short curly hair dewy from the rain drops. “I’ve brought a bucket. You’ll have to move your bed for tomorrow.”

I roll from the straw and push it away from the leak. Father bustles around, trying to position the bucket and hold his cane at the same time. He drops the bucket and swears.

“Let me—” I say.

“No, no. I can do it.” He leans down to pick up the bucket and groans with the extra weight on his bad knee.

“Now then, old man,” I chastise. “Are you letting your stubborn pride get in the way? Let me put it in place. No arguments.” I hold up a finger as he opens his mouth. “You cut the bread for breakfast.”

His face breaks into a smile, and his shoulders soften. He places a hand on the side of my face. “You’re a good ’un, my daughter.” His eyes suddenly glisten, and I drop my gaze to the floor. He sniffs and his back straightens. “Something in my eye, I think.” He shuffles off to sort the bread.

With a chuckle, I dump the bucket beneath the leak and move our things away from the sodden ground. What a sentimental old thing he is.

After breaking bread and drinking down milk, we set out into the garden to check on the vegetables. The crops are coming along nicely and will give us a decent trade in a month or so. The rain will help. Rain and sun. I lift my face to the sky and feel the lukewarm water against my eyelids. It’s a good day to ride Anta. Stupid prince ruining my fun.

“You should wear a dress.”

I open my eyes and fix them on Father. “A dress? But I don’t own any.”

“There are dresses in the chest belonging to your mother,” he replies, the corners of his mouth turning up in delight. He’s enjoying my discomfort. “I’d love to see my only daughter dressed nicely for a change, rather than scampering around in dirty tunics. Wash your face, too.”

I throw down my trowel and stomp back to the hut. How can I refuse him when he mentions Mother? I try to ignore the small part of me longing to wear her clothes, to feel what she felt, to look how she looked.

The chest sits in the far corner of our hut, alone in the darkness.
Like she is in death
. I clench my fists. It isn’t right to think like that. I exhale and relax my hands. Maybe this is what I need. I need to be closer to her. With my eyes fixed on the chest, I rush forward so quickly I almost trip over my feet. In seconds I have the lid open, and Mother’s skirts and dresses lie in wait.

She didn’t own many clothes, and most are almost threadbare from wear and tear. I hold up a long red gown with wide sleeves and embroidery on the bodice. It is soft to the touch, and there’s a lingering scent beyond the must and mould, a lemon citrus scent. I give it a shake and lay it down over the chest while I undress.

The dress fits me quite well, although the sleeves and hem are too long. There’s no time to make amendments now, not that I’d know how anyway, so I lift the skirt and fold it at the middle, using the belt from my tunic to hold it in place. Father comes into the hut to find me smoothing out curly hair between my fingers.

He gawps at me. “You’re... you’re the spit of her.” His voice is a rasp, and his eyes are wide. “You really are.”

He disconcerts me with his tender gaze. There’ve been quite enough emotional pauses for one morning. I slap him on the shoulder. “Let’s go meet the bastard prince then, eh?” And then I belch.

Father’s illusion is shattered. “Can’t you let a father enjoy a special moment with his daughter?” He frowns at me, but I ignore it and take his arm to help him out of the hut.

“Come on, old man. Let’s go and curtsey to the prince,” I say.

“You’re all grown up, Mae. Where has the time gone?”

“It’s gone to hell, with us cutting up wood and getting splinters for our trouble.” My boot sucks into the mud as we take a right outside the hut and follow the path towards the village market. “The prince will love getting dirty. I hope Ellen is worth it. I’m sure she’s wearing something fitting for the occasion.” Crass and gaudy, no doubt.

“Of course he thinks Ellen is worth it,” Father replies. “He thinks she is the craft-born, the one in a generation with a power centred on nature. When the magic of the craft-born is alive, it spreads throughout the realm, meaning others can wield its power.”

I hang my head. Father has mentioned it before. It makes my chest heavier knowing that such responsibility rests on my shoulders. All I have to do is reveal my powers and use them to bring magic back, but I don’t know if that’s the life I want. It’s too much pressure. I find myself withdrawing back into my dress. Danger is one thing, but responsibility is completely different.

Father notices my silence and adds in a hushed mutter, “That blasted miller will be puffed up like a peacock. Unbearable man.”