The Princess and the Hound (19 page)

T
HE NEXT MORNING
Marit and Beatrice came out of their tent later than usual, Beatrice standing taller and straighter than ever and Marit hardly noticing the small bandage on her back as she strode toward the breakfast fire.

No one asked what had happened the night before.

George walked around as though he had a stone in his throat, blocking the passage to his lungs. He struggled for every breath and felt his heart pounding in his head, as if it had swollen to ten times its normal size.

He worked hard to focus on his food, on the daily tasks of the morning routine: feeding Ass, rolling up his blanket, and then coming back to where the lord general stood, to discuss the day’s journey.

“So, now we are just out of Kendel and into Thurat. Do we go farther, Prince?” asked the lord general. “Or do we stop here and wait for the physician to come to us?”

George turned to Beatrice.

“To the next village,” she said coldly, her eyes looking beyond George.

The lord general bowed with some irony and said, “As you command.”

That day Beatrice contrived to keep at least one other rider between her and Marit and George, with little difficulty. George noticed that the guards hardly showed her more respect than the lord general did.

They stayed with her if commanded. They brought her food when commanded. They cared for her horse when commanded. Otherwise they kept their eyes from her and their thoughts as well. She might as well have been a ghost riding with the company.

As for Marit, they treated her worse than a stray cat. They did not even offer her little bits of food from their plates. Instead, they kept away from her as if she had some disease. As if she had the animal magic herself and were not the victim of it.

It made George furious. Yet he could say nothing aloud. It would only make it worse for them.

If only he had done as he had planned. Marry the woman and feel nothing for her. Not try to love her. Not even try to know her.

It would have been so much easier.

But he could not wish it for very long.

When they stopped for lunch, George ate with Henry. The guard seemed to sense how upset George
was and tried to distract him by telling George about his childhood in the smallest village, he claimed, in Kendel. It was so small it didn’t even have a name until Henry’s younger sister decided she couldn’t keep calling it “that” and officially named it Georgeville.

“After you,” Henry added.

From anyone else, George might have taken it as an attempt at flattery, but not with Henry. “What does your sister know of me?” asked George.

“Only that you are the prince and that she wanted our village to sound important. She is very proud, my sister. My father says no man will ever have her.”

“And why is that?” George asked politely.

“Because she is as loud as a chicken and as stubborn as an ox.”

George could see the love for his sister shining in Henry’s eyes. He wondered what he had missed, never having had a sibling. His father had been urged over and over again to marry a second time, but he had always refused. George had always thought it was because his love for George’s mother had been too immense to allow another in her place. But what if there was another reason? What if his father had not married again because he had been protecting George? If another son had been born, one without the animal magic, would he have felt obliged to set George aside as heir?

“You have other sisters?” asked George.

“No,” said Henry. “Just the one. And she is plenty.”

They stood as the lord general declared it was time to ride once more.

“Do you wish to marry Princess Beatrice?” asked Henry suddenly. As soon as he spoke, his face went crimson, and he bowed his head. “I’m sorry, Your Highness. I should not have asked such a bold question.”

“And what will you think of when choosing a wife?” asked George.

“Oh, the most important thing is how she smiles when she looks at me,” said Henry with certainty.

“How she smiles?” echoed George.

Henry nodded vigorously. “And how she smells, like lavender and wood pine. And how she dances barefoot in the woods when she thinks that no one sees her. Or how she holds the hand of a young child when the wind blows in a storm.”

“You know her, then, the woman you wish to marry?” asked George, though it was not really a question anymore. The look on Henry’s face told all, except for her name. She must be a girl he had left at home, in “Georgeville.”

Henry’s open face seemed to close as George watched. “No, Your Highness. Not at all. Why should you think so?”

George said no more, but wished he knew enough of Henry to offer help in some way. He should have happi
ness. He deserved it, far more than George did.

They rode again for a time, until they came to a hill. At the top George could see the lord general and the others waiting. George slowed his horse to let Beatrice and Marit catch up, but Beatrice was too stubborn to allow it and went more slowly still.

When he reached the top, it was nearing sunset, and the lord general asked permission to set up camp. The evening seemed to stretch on for a long while. George watched Beatrice go into her tent alone, watched as stew was brought to her to eat, watched as she went out alone with Marit to hunt for fresh meat.

When she came back, it was dark, but George was still as far from sleep as the night before. She motioned to him, and instantly George was out of the simple blanket he had insisted on and hurrying toward her.

He said nothing and stood before her tent flap. Marit was inside and did not deign to come out.

“Lady Fittle,” said Beatrice shortly.

George started at that old awful name.

“That is the name of the woman he said he would take his revenge upon. Lady Fittle of Thurat.”

Lady Fittle? George had never thought to hear that name again.

“We should ask after her, for I’m sure that if we find her, he will be close by,” said Beatrice.

“Yes,” said George. It was all he could get out.

Beatrice squinted at him. “Do you know the woman?”

“She is…a hunter,” George said, “of those with the animal magic. I thought once that she was hunting me.”

“Ah,” said Beatrice.

What if Lady Fittle accused George on the spot, in front of the lord general and the other guards? In front of Henry? There would be more than rumor then. It would come down to a full trial, and George did not know if he could withstand it. He was sure that his father, in his current state of health, could not. The judgment day so long ago had nearly killed him. Now this?

No.

But what was more important? Finding Dr. Gharn and having the hope of forcing a cure for his father—and Beatrice and Marit? Or hiding the truth of his animal magic?

He knew what he had to choose.

“I shall tell the lord general,” said George.

Beatrice nodded and returned to her tent.

Their conversation after that was limited to a few formal greetings in the morning and at night.

For days they went from village to village in Thurat, asking for a Lady Fittle, for a hunter, for information about animal magic. George would go with one guard or another, or the lord general would go, never all together and never under their true identities.

George was full of hatred. Of his own weakness and stupidity, of his magic, of the stubbornness and pride of Beatrice and Marit, and last of all, hatred of Dr.
Gharn, who had begun it all.

But the hatred swayed to pity. And then to hopelessness. And back to anger.

Every once in a great while, he felt a moment of peace, usually when he caught a glimpse of Beatrice and Marit together.

He had loved them both in different ways. But that could not be.

He turned away, and the cycle began again.

Henry tried to talk to him, to no avail.

One evening, the lord general made a joke about the prince needing a dip in some cold water to cure his bad temper.

George had his sword out to challenge the man before he could think twice.

The lord general took out his sword as well.

George thought of how badly he had been beaten by King Helm. And here was an opponent who was, if anything, more skilled.

Was he mad?

“I shall give you a chance to take back your challenge,” said the lord general.

But George only shook his head. His anger roared in his ears.

At the word from the lord general, George lunged.

The man was bleeding from his face in another moment, and George stepped back, ashamed of himself.

This was his own man. He could not do this, no
matter how angry he was. His father was right. He must think of others first. Duty first. Not himself.

He put his sword down. “I—” he began to apologize.

But the lord general held up a hand. He seemed pleased with George, and the blood dripping from his cheek. “First time I’ve ever seen backbone in you, my prince,” he said, and walked away.

George stared after him, speechless at the compliment.

How to think of all this?

But there had to be a solution. Once he had found Dr. Gharn, he would find it, wouldn’t he?

Would he give up the woman of his dreams?

Men had done it before him, surely. And would after.

But those dreams…

Finally, after going through the nearest villages in Thurat a second time, the lord general nodded toward a tavern and told George he would go inside and hear what gossip he could. George and the rest of the company were to stay outside and wait.

“And be quiet,” said the lord general, glaring at Beatrice.

As though she ever spoke too much.

“We will all be as silent as we can,” George said in her defense.

“It is the ‘can’ that concerns me,” said the lord general tartly. He had given George more respect since their
confrontation, but so far, that had not extended to Beatrice.

He gave George no chance to say more, for he kneed his horse and they were off.

The lord general had been inside the tavern for more than an hour when George saw a drunken pigkeeper careening toward them, holding a caged bird in one hand and driving a sow before him.

“The dove,” said a soft voice in his ear. Beatrice’s voice.

George stared at the drunken pigkeeper and held very still. Could this be Dr. Gharn at last?

“I’m going to get closer,” he announced softly. His heart beat so loudly that he could hardly hear his own words.

“I’m coming,” Beatrice said as George moved forward. She and Marit were as silent as George had promised the lord general they would be.

There was a small footpath that led away from the tavern and into the dry plains beyond. It wasn’t wide enough to be used by hunters or riders. The pigkeeper weaved this way and that along the path, often kicking at the sow.

It was the name he called her that made George shiver.

“Lady Fittle,” the pigkeeper said, kicking at her. “A fitting fate for you at last. Don’t you agree?”

Before the sow could grunt in response, Marit
attacked. One moment she was just ahead of George and Beatrice. The next, she had leaped into the drunken man’s path. She was big enough to pull him down with her.

George half expected that she would tear the man’s throat out and claw his remains until they were bloody shreds. But as soon as she was on top of him, Marit went quiet, only a low, gravelly hum in her voice as she waited.

The sow ran off, squealing. George had no interest in pursuing her. He had known Lady Fittle too well to feel compassion for her. Let her find her own cure—if she could.

“Get off me! Help! I’ve been attacked!” called the pigkeeper frantically. His hands worked to reach the dove’s cage, but it had been kicked out of his reach. He did not sound drunk any longer, and all trace of a peasant’s accent had disappeared from his voice. Now he spoke in the accents of a well-traveled, well-educated wealthy man.

Beatrice moved forward until she stood over him. “Dr. Rhuul,” she said.

The physician did not deny it. “Princess Beatrice,” he said, “and her hound,” with a disdainful tone.

George wanted to kick him. Instead, he picked up the cage and held it over the man’s head.

“Prince George.” George could now barely recognize the man who had taunted him in the tower chamber, who had been in the shadows in his father’s rooms
time and time again. He was a master of disguise, George thought, though it helped that he was very ordinary-looking to begin with.

At least he did not smell so pungent now as before.

“Dr. Gharn,” said George.

He did not argue with that either. In fact he seemed utterly unsurprised that he had been discovered.

“Change them,” George demanded. “Now.” He did not know when saving Marit and Beatrice had moved ahead of his father’s condition, but it had.

This was the moment of truth. George could hardly breathe for hope and fear. He could not even look at Beatrice or Marit as he spoke, for he could not bear to see what might happen to them if he failed. He could not fail them. Not again.

Yet Dr. Gharn’s eyes filled with tears, and Marit allowed him to sit up, his arms around his knees. “If I had the magic for that, do you think I would not have done it long ago for her?” he asked plaintively, pointing to the dove in the cage. What did he care about a dove?

“Her? The dove?” George asked.

“My daughter,” said Dr. Gharn harshly. “Surely you have figured out at least that much by now.”

“Your daughter?” echoed George. Not wanting to understand.

“The dove in the cage is my daughter,” he said bitterly. “Of course.”

“Your daughter is dead,” said George. Surely that
was the reason for this revenge plan.

“Her body is destroyed, yes,” said Dr. Gharn. “But she lives still, in the dove. I changed her when I saw she was dying. And now she will never forgive me.”

George stared at the dove in his hand. It appeared just like any other dove he had seen. Except—no. It was not ordinary at all. There was a human look in its eyes. Angry. But not at George. At Dr. Gharn.

At her father.