The Black Swan (39 page)

Another touch of magic surrounded her with a shell of warm water, and she stopped shivering as she waited under the ledge, clinging to the rock to avoid making any noise, breathing slowly and quietly, listening. She wondered what the young man was thinking right now; from his point of view, she had all but vanished, and he must feel terribly foolish to have been outwitted by a mere female. She
had
considered taking her swan form, but the memory of that crossbow prompted her to forget the idea. He might not shoot at her, but then again, he might. True, she was warded against the steel of the arrowhead, but she wasn't so certain of those wards that she cared to test them in a manner so potentially fatal.

Better to hide and wait for him to go away. It was annoying that she was losing all this study time to him, but what could she do about it?

At least my book is still safe, and he can't possibly get into the tree.
The book had gone back to its place on the shelf within the tree house, and she'd followed her usual precaution of shutting and hiding the door when she left. She'd had no intentions of letting this upstart get his hands on it!

The crashing of brush neared, and stopped just over her head. She heard him muttering angrily to himself; too far away to make out the words, but there was no mistaking that tone. She smiled wryly. Little enough actual magic had been used in her escape, but
he
didn't know that, and presumably he had been impressed, and perhaps even a little frightened. Clearly, though, he had not been frightened enough to take himself off; he still wanted to get his hands on her to interrogate her about Odette.

If he actually sits down and thinks, he'll realize that I could have hurt him, and didn't,
she thought.
Right now, though, he's just angry that I managed to deceive him. What could he expect? After all, he threatened me, and I was perfectly within my rights to escape.
She heard him blundering off again, and wondered how long it would be before he gave up and left.

It had better be soon, or I'll have to make myself invisible in order to get out of the water.
She had no intention of spending hours under this ledge until her fingers and toes were withered as a dried grape, but she also didn't want to waste magic if she didn't have to. Besides, being invisible didn't imply that she would be undetectable. There would be a “hole” in the water where her body was, she would leave footprints, and as water droplets fell from her body, they would become visible again. If he was at all intelligent and saw any of those signs, he would have a target for that crossbow.

At that moment, as she waited for him to go back to where he came from, she was torn between amusement at her situation and anger at being put into it.

Men! Jesu!
she thought with exasperation.
Stubborn, unruly, quick to anger and slow to think! Why on earth does Odette want to bother with these creatures? Why would anyone want to bother with them? It's easier being a swan!

“. . . so I looked for about an hour, but there was no sign of her,” Benno concluded ruefully. “My own stupid fault for threatening her, of course. I lost my temper and as a consequence lost a source of information we can hardly do without.”

Siegfried rubbed the side of his nose with his finger and sighed. This wasn't the worst thing that could have befallen, but why had Benno acted so precipitously? If he had simply treated the girl without threats, they might have learned all manner of things. “She must have been one of the other girls I saw with Odette—but why was
she
there, and not the princess? I would think that they would all be swans at the same time, but she clearly implied that Odette was still ensorcelled.”

Benno shrugged. “I can't even begin to fathom all these magical goings-on. She was wearing black, and didn't you say that the girls you saw were all in white? Maybe the black ones are swans by night and girls by day, and the white ones are the opposite. Maybe
she's
the one that put the spell on them. Your guess is as valid as mine. I'm just angry at myself for letting her escape like that.”

The prince was impatient to plan his own journey to the lake, and didn't really care to hear any more about Benno's. “I'm still meeting Odette at moonrise,” Siegfried declared, with a look to Benno that warned his friend not to object. “Nothing you've told me is changing that.”

“And I'm still going with you.” Benno's answering glare was just as stubborn. “I trust the woman even less now than I did before. And she had better have an explanation for that
other
girl and why she wasn't a swan.”

Siegfried tapped the table with his finger as he thought, suppressing his irritation with his friend. After all, Benno hadn't seen Odette; to him, the swan-maiden was not a great deal different from the maid he'd met this afternoon. How could he realize that? “You know, this Odile might not
be
one of the swan-maidens at all!” he exclaimed. “Wouldn't they need some kind of keeper or herder? What better and safer guardian than another maiden?”

“I suppose—but that would make her a good candidate for the one who put the spell on them in the first place,” Benno pointed out. “And that is what strikes me as wrong. She didn't act that way; if I had seen her at a court, I would have said that she was a functionary of Odette's, not a captor. It was as if I spoke to your mother's seneschal, not to the queen herself. I did not have the feeling that Odile was the one responsible for what was going on, although she clearly knew a great deal about it. She has power, and she might be in league with someone far more powerful, but I think she is to that person what the seneschal is to your mother. She may be able to perform some magic, but she's not the witch who cast the powerful spells.”

Siegfried saw this as a good way to change the subject; neither of them knew enough to make any valid conclusions about either girl, and until they had more information, the horse that Benno persisted in beating would remain just as dead as it was when he started. “Are you implying that my mother is a witch?” he asked, grinning.

Benno looked alarmed for a brief moment, then caught his expression and grinned back. “No. Why? Is she?”

Siegfried mimed a blow at him, and he ducked. “That's a fine thing to say about your queen!” he chided. “I suppose I ought to report you for treason, but I like you too much. You will, however, be happy to hear that my day was just as fruitless as yours. I didn't even get to hunt properly; only one of the princesses ever courses with hounds—Honoria, of course—so naturally all the rest of them stayed in the camp, and since I had already spent sufficient time with Honoria, according to Mother, so did I.” He made a face. “We spent the entire afternoon listening to Uwe and reading poetry aloud. Uwe is pleasant enough to listen to, and at least he's acquired a few new tunes, but unfortunately Uwe didn't get much chance to play.”

“I thought you liked poetry,” Benno objected.

“I like
good
poetry,” he countered, “Not the drivel that passes for poetry in their circles.”

Benno's eyes lit with sympathy and understanding. “Blessed Saint Joseph!” he exclaimed with mock horror. “Don't tell me they all trotted out scrolls from their pet troubadours and read them!”

He groaned and nodded. “Worse than that, their ladies trotted out paeans of praise to the princesses. It was so bad it was very nearly comic. Blue skies/ blue eyes, lady fair/silken hair, angel's face/fairy grace, moon/June—”

“Loon, buffoon,” Benno laughed at his mournful expression. “I prefer my wild swan chase to your afternoon! I think I would rather wade through another couple of bramble thickets than have to listen to that much bad poetry and smile through it all.”

“I was hard put to keep from laughing—when I wasn't fighting to stay awake,” Siegfried nodded, but kept his next thought to himself. Benno would hardly approve.

The only thing that made it tolerable was that I knew I would never have to endure another afternoon like it—for I have no intentions of wedding any of them.
They could all take their bad poets to whatever poor fellow did marry them, and he pitied the man if he had to listen to such drivel on a regular basis.

He would not, could not confess this to Benno, not yet, but he woke this morning knowing with the certainty of the sun rising that he would never be able bind himself to anyone but Odette. The mere prospect of taking anyone else to wife made his heart grow cold. It was insane, of course, but it was a glorious madness, and he would die before he sacrificed it on the altar of duty.

After all, the queen had pledged him that he could wed where he willed, and as soon as he secured Odette's consent, he had every intention of holding his mother to that pledge. No matter if it cost him his throne, he would woo and wed Odette, the swan queen.

And that was another thing that Benno did not yet need to know.

Odette unexpectedly encountered another knot in Odile's wet hair, tugged it too hard, and apologized. Odile shrugged. “Pull away, it's my own fault for being too lazy to braid it in the first place. It wouldn't be a mess now if I'd just braided it.”

“Well, you couldn't have known you were going to find yourself diving into the lake, could you?” Odette continued her self-appointed task of combing out the snarled, wet hair and braiding it into a neat coronet. She'd found Odile sitting beside the lake in the moonlight, dry and wearing a new gown, but trying without success to get the tangles out of her long hair. Odile was frustrated to the point of tears, and just about ready to cut her hair off entirely. Odette immediately took the comb from her and without being asked, took over the task herself. Odile, both surprised by the kindness and touched, thanked her profusely.

“It never occurred to me that your visitor last night might have told a friend about us.” That was noncommittal enough, and kept her from betraying that she had spied on every moment the two spent together. “It should have, though,” Odile continued, with a grimace Odette couldn't see. “Men call
us
gossips, but they tell more tales to each other than we ever do.” Still feeling spiteful toward the importunate young man who was the cause of all her current difficulty, she added. “The young fool probably thought he'd find a veritable harem of loose women here! He probably thought we were pagan sylphs or gypsy witches, trying to seduce every man coming along with our bodies!”

“Oh no, no—” Odette said hastily, “I am sure Siegfried would never have said anything that would give him
that
impression!” The abrupt silence that followed her outburst led Odile to think Odette had spoken without thinking. After a moment, the princess added lightly, “I wish I could have seen his face when you dove into the water, though!”

“So do I,” Odile chuckled, feeling a little better. After all, she had outwitted the young man, trounced him thoroughly, in fact, and that was some comfort. If she'd just braided her hair, she wouldn't even be undergoing this inconvenience.

“There! You're done!” Odette had finished while she'd been thinking, and gave her hair a little pat of approval.

“And just in time, too, unless I miss my guess—” Odile caught sight of one of the others running toward them, skirts held high in both hands, presumably to warn Odette of Prince Siegfried's approach. White silk fluttered behind her in an echo of swan wings. Odile turned to glance at Odette, and saw her face take on a brief pallor that had nothing to do with the moonlight.

“Odette—” the maiden said as she reached them, dropping her skirts to gesture behind her.

“I should go—” Odile said, and before Odette could object, she leaped to her feet and ran off into the darkness beneath the trees.