The Goose Girl Page 7

  Part Two

  Goose Girl

  Chapter 5

  Ani rode. She did not see the trees that dashed by her and the branches that moved like executioner axes just above her ducking head. There was no purpose to the direction the horse ran—except away. For all she knew, she could be riding a circle, and suddenly she would see the campsite before her and leap the horse over slain guards and dodge the survivors’ grasping hands. Whenever the horse showed signs of slowing down, Ani spurred him on with a hard heel, expecting at any moment to hear the rhythmic thuds of Ungolad’s bay close behind her. Sometimes she thought she saw yellow braids in her periphery.

  She rode hard, and the horse’s neck was matted with sweat. At each beat of his heavy gallop, a bit of foam fell from his mouth. The reins were wet from her hands, so she clutched at his mane. The grip of her legs loosened, and when his hooves met turf she came down hard in the saddle. When a low branch struck her shoulder, she was knocked easily from the saddle and did not realize that she was on the ground until the horse had galloped away without her.

  She sat still for a long time, breathing. If Ungolad was still following, he would just have to find her and kill her quickly, for she could not move. She thought she heard a twig snap as though it cracked under a foot, and she sprang to her feet to run, but her first step brought her hard back to the earth. She lay still, hugging the ground and waiting for her doom.

  Ani awoke much later and realized that she was cold, that she had fir needles piercing her cheek, and that she was confused.

  Falada, she said.

  She bolted upright. The forest was so dark, she knew that her eyes were open only from the sensation of blinking. An owl hooted, and she jumped. It hooted again, and she wrapped her arms around her chest and tried to think. She must have been asleep, but before that? She was running. She sought to remember more and saw Adon rushing forward to protect her and a bloody sword tip parting his chest. She shivered and lay down again, covering her face with her arms, and tried to sleep away the darkness.

  At dawn Ani began to walk. The forest looked the same in every direction, and she realized that she could be just a few leagues from a town and yet wander the woods for days. The canopy-dimmed sunlight gave little indication of direction, so she chose what she hoped was east and strode forward.

  Her stomach ached with hunger; she had never before, in her life of white marble and breakfast trays, missed a meal. But mostly she was so thirsty that she began to contemplate digging down to the tree roots to see if she could discover what they were drinking.

  Hours later, Ani heard water and thought it perhaps the loveliest noise in all creation. The sound echoed off many tree trunks and confused her senses until she finally found the stream by stepping into it. She drank from the stream until her belly warned of bursting and then walked beside it, reasoning that it must run away from the mountains and so would meet the road. The road meant direction.

  Ani chased the stream for two days, only leaving its banks a short distance to search for mushrooms. She ate them tentatively, relying on dim childhood memories of her aunt’s brief lessons in edible plants. Some wild onions grew in the wet black soil on the stream bank, and she bit into them raw, her mouth burning and eyes tearing from their fierce flavor.

  On the third day, the stream stopped. It had thinned from waist width to a drizzle thin as a water snake and finally stopped in a green pond ringed with cattails. Ani circled the pond hoping for an outlet, then leaned against a tree and thought about crying. She did not know where she was, she had no skin to carry water in, and she had no stream to walk beside. She stayed the remainder of that day and the whole of the night beside the last bit of running stream. Thirst thrust into her dreams, coupled with the sounds of Ungolad’s heavy boots running behind her. She woke with a beating heart at every hoot of an owl.

  In the morning, Ani sat awhile near the stream, playing the water through her fingers. I wonder, she thought, if this creek ever touched the stream where I lost my handkerchief. If I hadn’t lost that, none of this would have happened. No sooner had she thought it than the idea was completely ridiculous, a bed-tale, a lie. She almost laughed at herself, but the laugh pulled tight in her chest and threatened to tug loose a tear before she stopped it. I thought it was magic. I thought I was so safe. A bird warned me by the waterfall. And Falada. And my own weak reason. She shook her head and beat her fist once against her chest. It was I who stood up to Selia, and it was I who didn’t run soon enough, not soon enough for Adon or Talone, or Falada.

  She leaned her head back to stop the tears from coming again and saw a brown owl in the pine opposite her, looking out at the morning with glassy yellow eyes.

  “Are you the one that kept waking me up?” she whispered. “I don’t know why your silly hooting makes me shiver at night. You look harmless enough.”

  She had once known the way to speak to the owls that kept watch in the stable rafters. It was long ago, and the memory awakened in her the empty confusion of homesickness. She brushed it away with an experimental hoot. The owl gave no reaction. If only he were a swan, she thought. Bird speech was all one language to her, yet with many different dialects, some more distinct than others, and it was swan she remembered best.

  She tried her greeting again, and his head turned slightly toward her, recognizing her presence for the first time. After a few blinkless moments he greeted her, and she leaned back on her hands with tired hope. Ani followed with a question about how he was eating, a polite sort of conversation among owls, and he said nice warm mice. She wanted to ask him directions out of the forest and stumbled on how to phrase it.

  Where is the place where the trees end? she said.

  The owl did not know or did not understand. Perhaps he would know a place where people lived, but she had no idea how to ask about streets or buildings.

  Where is the place where there is smoke?

  One flight against the morning sun, he said. Then he flew from his tree to another, and then another, creating a straight line in that direction. Ani thanked him, took a long drink from the stream, and set off, praying that one flight was no farther than one day’s walk.

  Ani labored to keep her course straight, focusing on one tree in the distance until she reached it and then picking another farther on. The work made her eyes sore. The air was stagnant and hung close to her skin, but the ground was dry, giving no sign of spring or stream.

  At first, she did not see the house. The walls were made of rough wood, and the roof was laden with branches still green with needles. Beside it stood a small garden enclosed with a stick fence. Ani noticed ripe apples on the trees and the lovely green fronds and orange tops of carrots pushing up through the earth. Her stomach made a noise. A brown goat was tied to a post outside the garden. It turned to her and said, “Neeee,” in an annoyed stutter.

  “What do you see, Poppo?” A woman came around the side of the house. She wore a red scarf tied on top of her head, a long tunic, and a skirt that hit above her ankles made of sturdy blue cloth. She spotted Ani and frowned.

  “Well, Poppo, this isn’t a badger or wolf, though it might want to eat from my garden like a common hare.” The woman’s short-voweled, guttural accent reminded Ani that she was in or near Bayern. Ani cleared her throat. The woman waited for her to speak.

  “Hello,” said Ani. She had spoken little in days, and her voice came through her throat like a fist. She cleared her throat again.

  “Hmm?” said the woman.

  “Hello. I’m lost.”

  “Yes, I see that.” The woman folded her arms and looked over Ani’s ragged, filthy dress. She blinked her eyes, waiting for more information. “It might help to know where you’re lost from, or where you’re lost to, if you see my point, and then I could push you in the right direction.”

  Ani opened her mouth and then closed it. I am, or was, crown princess of Kildenree, betrothed to your king’s son, what-is-his-name, I can’t remember, oh mercy, and half of my es
cort guard attacked the other half of my escort guard and attempted to murder me and replace me with my lady-in-waiting. It sounded absurd in her head. She began to wish for the comfort of the handkerchief in her bodice and reminded herself that she did not have it, and even if she did, it would do no good, and now she had to learn to rely on herself. That thought scared her as much as being lost in a strange forest.

  “Well, child, I’m waiting,” said the woman.

  Ani realized that she was extremely thirsty, that it had been hours since she had left her little stream, and that she was likely to faint from panic, hunger, and exhaustion. And as she thought that, thousands of tiny black dots rushed her eyesight until, thankfully, the woman, the house, and the goat were exchanged for darkness.

  Ani woke to a cottage window that looked out with a black eye on the night. She realized with a comfortable sigh that she was indoors and lying on a hay-stuffed mattress.

  “You’re awake, then?”

  The woman had removed her headscarf, and Ani could see she wore her thick black hair cropped to her shoulders. She was sitting on a stool and knitting by the light of the hearth fire.

  “You might’ve told me that you were thirsty and saved my boy Finn the trouble of carrying you in. I suspect you fainted on purpose just to get inside my house and onto a bed. Hmph.” Ani smiled politely because she believed the woman meant it as a joke. “I guess you may as well stay the night.”

  She continued to knit, and Ani watched the yarn pile up in knotted lines, back and forth, with a speed she had never witnessed before. The woman nodded her head to a dish at her feet full of carrot broth and a ceramic mug of water. Ani drank quickly and then ate in silence. She could feel the water and broth go through her chest and into her belly with a warm tingle.

  “So, girl,” said the woman after a few minutes, “tell me what you’re about.”

  “I was lost in the forest and need to get back to the road or on to Bayern.” As she spoke, Ani was mindful of the long vowels and distinct consonants of her Kildenrean accent and wished she had thought to try to imitate the Bayern way of speaking. She thought she could learn it easily enough in the same way she had first learned to imitate the sounds of the swans, but now it was too late to try with this woman.

  The woman laid her knitting down in her lap in a gesture of folding one’s hands and looked carefully at Ani. “You’re not from here,” she said. Ani shook her head. “You’re in some kind of trouble?”

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “Well, I don’t want to hear about it,” she said quickly. “The less I know, the happier I’ll be, I’d say. By the look of you, there’s some mischief afoot. You’ve got yellow hair. And long, isn’t it? Too long to be a wandering field-worker. Obviously not from Bayern, obviously noble, look at your soft little hands.” Ani tucked her hands into each other. “And, your accent, tsk, child, you sum up to a problem, and I’ve got knitting to do and pullovers to sell by market week. You understand?”

  Ani nodded.

  “Why don’t you speak more?” The woman leaned forward, waiting for an answer.

  “I am embarrassed about my accent,” said Ani, “and I’m so confused... I don’t know what to . . . “ Ani heaved a breath but could not stop the first sob, which was followed by another and a third. Her stomach tightened, and she bent over and cried hard. Her hair closed in around her face. She felt the woman pat her shoulder.

  “There, there, now. No more crying. It’s all wetness and no comfort at all.”

  Ani thought she was right, for she felt more miserable than before, so she put her palms over her eyes and tried to stop. Her breath pulled harshly at her throat, and she sounded to herself like little Rianno-Hancery after a tantrum.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I won’t cry anymore. I’m sorry.”

  “All right, child, all right. Now, just you tell me what I can do to set you straight, provided I don’t have to get involved.”

  Ani nodded and then realized that the woman was asking her to make a decision. She longed for Talone, her father, Selia (no, no, not Selia), Falada, the lost handkerchief (not that either), just one of her onetime advisers. What a child I am, she thought. She straightened her back, placed her hands in her lap, and stared at the fire. Even from a distance, its heat burned her eyes.

  Grow up. Think. What did she need? The road. But the road to where? The thought of going back to Kildenree on her own was absurd. She had no food or means, no horse, and on foot it would take her months, and the snows would arrive before then. Talone had told her to go to Bayern and find the king. It was possible that Talone and his men had defeated Ungolad, and if so, they would be with the king. Besides the king, there was the prime minister. She had met him once as a child—perhaps he would remember her face and act as her witness. And if Selia and her traitors were there waiting for the escaped princess? She could hear her heartbeat escape her ribs like the quick thuds of Ungolad’s boots behind her.

  Even so, were she offered a carriage back to Kildenree, passage paid, she could not go until she had found Falada and learned the fate of Talone and those faithful few. Bayern. It had to be her choice.

  “How far away is the capital?”

  “A day and a half in a wagon, but don’t you be thinking about walking it and losing yourself again in our forest until I find you facedown in my carrot patch a week hence with no more sense than you had when you left.”

  “May I go with you to the city for marketweek?”

  The woman considered. “Yes, that’ll do, and I’ll expect you’ll be wanting an oufit so you don’t stick out like a lightning tree. Finn’ll take you come next week’s end, and then we’ll be done.” She nodded and picked up her knitting.

  A boy in late adolescence entered the house and stepped up to the hearth to kiss his mother. The firelight lit up bits of white wool that were stuck to his sleeves and the hairs of his arms. He stuck out a hand to Ani and said, “Hello.”

  “Hello, Finn,” said Ani.

  The boy smiled and disappeared into a dark corner where his bed resided.

  “Go to sleep now,” said the woman, rising.

  “Yes, um, lady?”

  “Gilsa,” said the woman. “I’m no lady.”

  “Gilsa, when is next week’s end?”

  “Eight days. Hmpf, child.”

  Ani lay on her side, watching the black logs throb orange with the last life of the fire and thinking that she would never fall asleep. It seemed only the next moment that she opened her eyes to a room already silvery with dawn. The door opened and Gilsa came in with a handful of eggs, her hair uncombed and stuck with bits of hay and wisps of wool.

  “Oh,” said Ani, sitting upright, “this is your bed.”

  “Well, of course it is. Do you think I sleep in the shed every night?”

  “I didn’t think at all.” Ani stood and smoothed the blankets over the pillow. She had never had to wonder where other people slept. In a palace, everyone had a place. In her ignorance, she realized, she was thoughtless and selfish.

  “I’m sorry,” said Ani. “Thank you. You don’t have to sleep out there tonight.”

  “That’s certain. My charity lasts about one night on thin hay and then I get tetchy.”

  Ani resolved that for the rest of her stay she would not be a burden. The first day, while Gilsa knit ferociously on her stool, Ani tried her hand at preparing the noon meal. After the questionable results were painfully consumed, Finn returned to the cooking and Ani, chagrined, observed carefully.

  Gilsa discovered that Ani was quite good at finding the roots she needed for dyeing the yarn. Soon Ani was sent more and more on errands in the woods to keep her away, Ani suspected, from the delicate work. After one such errand, Ani made her way across the neat, dirt-swept yard with an apron full of roots when she heard the chickens croaking uncomfortably in their coop. Small feathers took flight as they left and reentered the pen again and again.

  A rat, a rat, they croaked. We will not stay, the ra
t stays still, there, under, under.

  “I don’t know what’s the matter,” said Gilsa, her hand on the coop door. “They’re scared, as if there’s a green snake in a nest or a fox underfoot. But I’ve cleaned out the coop twice and can’t find a thing.”

  “A rat,” said Ani. “A dead rat, under the floor, and the hens sense him.”

  Ani took the roots inside and was sorting them before she realized she might have to explain her comment. When she stepped back outside, Gilsa was directing Finn to remove the floorboard Ani had indicated. Underneath was a newly dead rat corpse.

  “How did you . . . ?” Gilsa looked at her sharply.

  “My parents used to raise chickens,” said Ani.

  After the first night, Ani spent the sleeping hours on the itchy wool and hay in the shed. She was restless at first, waking at every creak of board and whine of tree. Could Ungolad track her here? She did not know, but after her first night in the shed, Ani begged a board to lock herself in from the inside. Finn complied without asking questions.

  The night before their departure, Ani sat by the fire, rolling up Gilsa’s pullovers into tight bundles and fitting them into the packs. Finn prepared the travel food. Gilsa was finishing the sleeve of one last pullover, a vibrant orange with suns and birds floating on its breast and back. She hummed a tune, light and sleepy, a lullaby. It tugged at the lip of Ani’s memory, and she stopped her packing and watched the singer.

  “You aren’t done yet,” said Gilsa.

  “I know that song. Does it have words here? Do you say, ‘The tales that trees could tell, the stories wind would sing’?”