The Black Swan (44 page)

Odile relaxed as soon as Odette was well away—and in a moment, she realized why she felt at ease, at long last. If her father had not wanted Odette to leave,
he
would have put spells in place to prevent it. Hence, either her father knew what was happening, or he had anticipated it would happen. Perhaps he had even done some scrying into the future to see Odette and Siegfried together.

Whatever had happened, she was no longer responsible for anything other than the safety of the flock. It could not be long now, before she was free even of that. And then—

She stretched, reveling in the feeling of new-won freedom, and tense muscles relaxed, knots caused by worry in her shoulders and neck released.

She settled in her favorite lakeside spot with her grimoire; it was too chilly to dangle her feet in the water, but she could move to another position among the gnarled roots, soak in the sunlight, and keep an eye on the swans from there.
Their
tension was visible from across the water; they would not trust in their release until the moment it happened.

And then what will happen to them, I wonder?
she thought, watching as they nibbled nervously at lake weeds.
Where will they go? I have no idea where their homes are, if they still have homes. By now they've been given up for dead; their families might well consider them to be apparitions or evil spirits. Or else they'll think the girls ran off with men. Either way, they'll never believe the real story, and never accept them back.

There should be some room for them in Odette's court, shouldn't there? Siegfried would be able to find places for all of them as ladies-in-waiting to Odette—and even the little swans, peasants though they were in origin, acted and dressed as nobility now. If no one revealed their secret, they would be accepted as the way they appeared, provided they weren't so foolish as to reveal it themselves.

Silly things; they just might give themselves away.
Well, that was hardly
her
concern. Let Odette worry about it.

Because she faced the island, for the first time since they had come here, Odile saw her father leave his secret lair and approach the shore.

Movement caught her eye at first, as she mused in the sun, her book lying neglected in her lap. She glanced over her shoulder at the island she had suspected to be his roost, and spotted the wide-winged, dark shape rising from it, heading straight for her part of the shoreline.

Although there undoubtedly were eagle-owls lurking in this forest, and although eagle-owls did hunt by day as well as by night, it was unlikely that there were any ordinary owls roosting on that island. True owls seldom used islands as their lairs, preferring the deep forest.

The owl drew nearer, and she made out its huge eyes, glowing with a yellow gleam against the darker plumage. It stared right at her; without a doubt, it was von Rothbart. She got slowly to her feet, and waited for him, one hand on the trunk of the willow beside her, the other holding the grimoire. The owl was in no hurry to get to the shore; with slow, graceful wingbeats he moved powerfully through the air, giving her plenty of time to prepare herself. As he drew nearer, she was caught and mesmerized by his enormous eyes, eyes which somehow still held the enigmatic force and concentration of the man behind them.

He wafted in above her head, near enough that the wind of his wings sent stray tendrils of her hair flying and drove her skirts against her legs. As with a true owl, there was no sound of wingbeats; he flew in an unsettling and ghostlike silence. He dropped down into the clearing behind her as she turned, and she averted her eyes from the blurring of his form as he transformed from bird to man.

When she looked back, her father waited, settling his feather cloak more comfortably about his shoulders, watching her closely.

“I trust you have a great deal to tell me,” von Rothbart said, as she moved toward him, then dropped into a curtsy before him. She raised her eyes to his, but saw no censure there, only expectation.

“I do, Father,” she replied as she rose. Clasping both her hands on her book, she gave him her verbal report, watching his face for clues to his mood. Would he be pleased that Odette had exceeded his demands and
still
won her freedom? Would he be angry that she had escaped him?

In the end, she couldn't tell; his mask never dropped, not even for a moment. She was left looking keenly into his face, no more certain of his feelings than she had been when she began.

“I think—Odette has truly earned her prince and her freedom,” she ventured at last. “Father—she has worked for this, she has proved herself repentant.”

Still, she could not read his expression as he pondered what she had told him. Finally, after a silence that reawakened her tension, he spoke.

“It would be fitting for you to see the end of the story, as you have seen the beginning,” he said at last, still with no hint that he intended to drop his mask, even to her. “I have in mind that we shall attend this fête, you and I.”

She did not trouble to ask if he had been invited; if von Rothbart wished to attend Prince Siegfried's fête, he would be permitted to do so. That was beyond doubt. Whatever von Rothbart was determined to have, he found means to get.

It was also beyond doubt that if he intended
her
to be there, she would attend with him.

She felt very uneasy from the moment he made the announcement, however. A strange, queasy feeling settled in her stomach, and all the tension that she had lost earlier returned, redoubled.

There was something wrong, some secret he still retained for himself and had no intention of sharing with her. He gave her no chance to question him—with an enigmatic quirk of his lips, too inscrutable to be called a smile, he gestured. And with that gesture, she found herself dropping to the grass, feeling her body twist and change into the familiar form of the black swan.

It happened too quickly for her to feel indignant. When she shook her head to clear her eyes, he was already back to the shape of an eagle-owl, fixing her with his enormous yellow eyes. With a jerk of his head, he launched himself skyward.

It was not so easy for her to take to the air; for all its apparent size, the eagle-owl's body was light for his wingspan. Her body was a much heavier load for her smaller, narrower wings. She plunged into the water, as he circled overhead, waiting for her. Spreading her wings, she plowed the air with them as she first paddled, then ran across the water, gaining enough speed and momentum that she was able to tuck up her feet and achieve true flight.

At last, she soared into the sky to join her father. He waited only long enough to see that she was following him, then without a backward glance, he set his course.

He also set a pace that required all of her effort to match as he drove his way through the sky. She was glad that she had been keeping up her flying exercises, or she never would have been able to follow him.

There was no question in her mind why there was so much urgency in this journey; Odette had left much earlier, which implied that the palace was far enough away that if they meant to arrive in time for the fête, they had to move swiftly.

She wondered where
he
was getting the strength for so swift and prolonged a flight. From the moment she had transformed, she'd been aware of a steady drain of energy; despite the exercise, despite that she was fit and rested, this was hard, grueling flying, and took more out of her than she had expected.

We must be working against a headwind,
she thought, when she had breath to think. She wished fervently that it was a tailwind instead; every wingbeat was labored, and her wings felt as heavy as if her bones were lead.

They passed over a patchwork of farms and villages, with intervening stretches of forest; this was, by far, the most populated section of country she had ever seen. There were farmers working in the fields, children at play in the yards of their homes. A few folks with donkeys or horse-drawn carts crawled along the roadways, their shadows stretching out before them in the light of the setting sun.

This was already more people than she had ever seen.
How many people are going to be at this celebration?
she wondered, and felt a twinge of alarm penetrating her weariness. Until she'd met Siegfried and Benno, she had never seen
men
other than her father. Tonight there would be many people at the fête, at least half of them men. How many strange men and women would she be forced to confront?

If she could have, she would have called to her father and begged him to let her go back to the lake. How could she possibly stand before all those strange faces, face all those alien eyes staring at her?

It was too late at this point. Over her right shoulder the sun touched the horizon; in the distance, the gray-white walls of what could only be the palace rose above the trees like a marzipan subtlety at a feast, softly touched with rose by the last rays. Only now did Odile have some sense of how prominent Siegfried and his family must be; this was an enormous edifice, several times larger than her father's manor, with seven multistoried towers rising far above the walls of the main building. Surrounded by a moat, enclosed with triple walls, this was the dwelling of a king of the first order.

People swarmed the courtyards and gardens, tiny, brightly colored creatures, all very busy. Her initial thought was that she and her father would probably land and transform somewhere within the grounds, but the presence of all those people precluded any such thing.

Once again, her father apparently had something in mind; he swerved off a little to the side, and led her over the turrets of the palace itself. Their wings cast shadows on the palace walls, and the windows of the highest tower gleamed at her as they passed a few feet below her. On the other side of the palace, within the third wall, was a horse-pasture, but oh! it was a pasture for the horses of a king, and no less. With ponds and meadows, wood-lots and fine fences, any horse would consider it heaven-on-earth. On the palace side lay stables as extensive as her home manor. Beyond it, the pasture stretched rich and lush across an expanse that dazzled her. Some of those acres were out of sight of the palace altogether, and at the moment, the pasture and stables were devoid of any sign of people—who were, presumably, all very much in-volved in preparations for the fête.

Von Rothbart led the way to the plot of trees nearest to the stables. They landed next to the woods in the last fading light of sunset; rather than landing in a tree as a real owl would have, von Rothbart landed on the ground and waddled into the shelter of the shadows. Odile followed, flaring her wings and dropping lightly down onto the grass. She walked slowly under the boughs, finding it easy going, for the horses had grazed and trampled away the underbrush. The owl waited for her, just far enough into the shadows that it was not immediately obvious where he was.

He transformed as soon as he saw that she had landed safely; she made her own change, and stood beside him, a little dizzy with exertion. He looked her up and down, and shook his head, clucking in disapproval.

“This will never do—so plain a gown, for such an important fête? You are an important personage, a lady of rank, not a simple knight's daughter. We will have to clothe you in something more festive.”

She hesitated, one hand on her throat, not certain what he meant for her to do. She had no idea of how to clothe herself for a grand court, much less for a great occasion at a grand court! Where should she begin?

He laughed shortly at her expression; he evidently read it correctly and knew her confusion. “Never fear, daughter. I have experience enough in such things for both of us. I shall see to your festal garb.”

He gestured briefly, and she felt a tingle running all over her body, as if thousands of butterflies were beating their wings frantically against her. She glance down in startled amazement, seeing her gown as a black blur about her, a mist of shadows that billowed and swirled exactly like storm clouds, obscuring her body as it roiled around her.

Then it stilled, and settled into the folds of the most incredible gown she had ever seen in her life. In heavy black silk-satin, embroidered all over in a pattern with a suggestion of feathers, encrusted with jet beads and tiny black gemstones that reflected light in a million minuscule facets, this was nothing like the simple gowns she had grown so accustomed to. Beneath the heavy overgown with its long, elaborate train and divided front panel, was an underdress of black gossamer silk, and beneath
that
were so many black silk petticoats, each as light as a breath of air, that she wondered how long it would take to put them on naturally.