The World Above (18 page)

Duke Guy started. “Celine,” he said in a tortured voice. “Celine Marchand.”

“Celine des Jardins,” I corrected. “Duke Roland’s wife and my mother.”

“No,” Duke Guy said at once. “I do not believe you. It is impossible.”

“Believe what you like, as long as you answer my questions,” I said.

“No!” Robin’s father suddenly shouted. “This is trickery, and I will have none of it. I am Guy de Trabant, lord of this realm. I will not be questioned like some commoner.”

“So it’s as I’ve always suspected,” Robin said. “Your word means nothing.”

“How dare you say so?” demanded his father. “Do you defend the very woman who betrayed you?”

“No,” Robin replied. “I defend our family’s honor. To the one who names me, three questions before the harp.
Three questions asked of anyone in the realm
. Was this not your own decree?”

“Yes,” Duke Guy said heavily. “You know it was.”

“Then honor your word,” Robin said simply. “How difficult can it be to answer three questions, Father? When they are over, you’ll still have plenty of time to decide what to do with all of us.”

“Ask your questions, then,” Duke Guy snapped. “But I warn you, do not try to be too cunning. It is not simply in the answers that the harp can detect a falsehood.”

“Here is my first question,” I said. “Duke Guy de Trabant, have you achieved your heart’s desire?”

Duke Guy opened his mouth, then closed it again. I thought I saw his throat work as he swallowed.
Is he swallowing down the lie he wishes to tell?
I wondered.

“No.” He bit off the single syllable.

At this, the harp sent up a melody, as pure and ringing as a church bell. And then, to my astonishment, even though I thought I knew what to expect, the harp sounded again.

“He speaks the truth,”
it sang out.

I heard a sound like the rush of the sea and realized it was the sigh of the crowd.

“Duke Guy de Trabant,” I continued, “do you love your son?”

From his position still kneeling at Robin’s side, I saw Steel’s head turn toward me.

“Ah,” Steel said on a sigh. His voice was so low that only Robin and I could hear it. “I see where you are going, Gen. How I have misjudged you!”

“I know my own name,” Robin’s father barked in an irritated voice. “You don’t have to keep spouting it at me.”

“Answer the question,” I insisted.
“Do you love your son?”

“It’s ridiculous,” Duke Guy sputtered. “You throw a good question away. Ask a different one.”

“And I say I will not,” I said. “I like this question just fine. But I am beginning to think you do not wish to answer it. Is it because you know you cannot lie?”

“Of course I love him,” Guy de Trabant snapped. “Why else would I place a bounty on his head?”

“He speaks the truth,”
the harp sang out once more.

The final leap of faith was before me now. Either it would carry Robin, Jack, and me to safety, or we would lose it all.

“If I can propose a way to give you back your son, a way to restore your honor in his eyes, will you take whatever bargain I offer?”

This time the answer came without hesitation.

“Yes,” said Robin’s father.

“Truth. He speaks the truth,”
the harp sent up its call.

“You have had your three questions,” Guy de Trabant said. “Now answer one of mine: What can you possibly have to offer that I will want to accept?”

“Peace,” I replied. “Peace for your heart and prosperity for your realm. Let your kingdom truly be united with that of Duke Roland’s. You took his lands by bloodshed, by betrayal, and by stealth. You won it all, but still you did not win your heart’s desire. But it is not too late. You can still make amends.”

“How?” Guy de Trabant asked, and in his voice I heard the torment of hope.
“How can this be done?”

“Marry your son to Duke Roland’s heir. Unite the two kingdoms not through deceit and bloodshed, but through love and honor. Join the two families together; earn the respect of your people; win back the love of your son.”

“Your words are fine, but they are nonsense!” Duke Guy exclaimed. He shot a glance in Jack’s direction. “I can hardly marry Duke Roland’s heir to my son.”

“As a matter of fact, you can,” Jack spoke up. “Gen is the true heir. She’s five minutes older than I am.”

A curious expression swept over the duke’s face. Despair and hope seemed to fight for possession of it. Then I saw his shoulders sag.

We have won
, I thought.

“And you, my son,” Guy de Trabant asked. “What say you to this plan?”

I held my breath. I had not told Robin what I intended to propose. I had said only that I would claim the bounty and use the three questions to secure our release.

“I will accept it,” Robin said without hesitation. But I could not read his voice. Did he accept the terms because there was no other choice? Or because in his heart it was what he wanted for himself?

“Then let it be so,” Duke Guy said. He raised his arms. “Hear me now, all of you,” he cried. “I hereby renounce my crown in favor of my son and Duke Roland’s daughter. May their union bring what I desired but could not achieve: prosperity, harmony, and joy.”

The crowd began to cheer with a huge upswell of elation. Duke Guy lowered his arms.

“I assume you will make some provision for me,” he said with a tired smile. “Come to the castle, all of you, and we will determine what must be done.” He turned to the soldiers, who stood, somewhat uncertainly now, around Jack. “Release Duke Roland’s son.”

The moment Jack’s bonds were cut, he leaped from the platform to catch me in his arms.

“So, Gen,” he whispered, as he held me close. “It looks to me as if you’ve had an adventure after all.”

“I’ve had all the adventure that I care to,” I said as I hugged him in return. “And it’s still all your fault.”

In the end, it was simple. Duke Guy accepted one of the remaining magic beans and agreed to go into exile in the World Below.

The day following the archery contest, Robin and his father set out early, to a place of Duke Guy’s choosing. I did not know where it was. But there, the man who had been responsible for my mother’s retreat from the World Above threw a magic bean over his left shoulder. Father and son remained together throughout the morning. The top of the beanstalk appeared in the World Above just as the sun was at its highest point in the sky.

The two waited until the beanstalk was tall enough and sturdy enough to take Duke Guy’s weight. Then, like my mother before him, Robin’s father swung himself onto the beanstalk and disappeared from view, on his way to an uncertain future in the World Below.

“It’s almost as if he was relieved,” Robin said, late that afternoon. We were walking through the Greenwood once more, on our way to the Boundary Oak. Making this pilgrimage had been my idea, but Robin had agreed to the expedition at once.

Robin and I had not seen much of each other since our victory. He had spent much of his time with his father in private, or conferring with Steel and his father’s councillors. Robin was Robin no longer. He was Duke Robert de Trabant now.

“My refusal to live life on his terms changed my father, I think,” Robin continued slowly, as if he was still sorting the whole thing out. “When you posed your questions, he could not deny that you were right: He had not achieved his heart’s desire. He’d done just the opposite. He’d killed the man he loved like a father; he’d alienated his only son. And then, when I saved his life . . .”

Robin shook his head, as if he still couldn’t quite believe all that had transpired.

“How did you know? How did you know what to ask? How did you know my father better than I did myself?”

“I knew you, or at least I hoped I did,” I answered simply, though I felt my legs quiver, as if I were stepping out onto uneven ground. “I saw that you loved your father. I simply gambled that the opposite was true, that he loved you as well. That the bounty on your head was more than just a punishment. It was a way to bring you back to him.”

I would do almost anything to bring you back, if I believed that I had lost you
, I thought.

“Well,” Robin said. “It’s clear that you were right, for here we are. Though I must say, I’m not quite sure I feel ready to rule a kingdom.”

“Surely not all of your father’s ministers are corrupt,” I said.

“Some, but not all,” Robin agreed.

“And you still have Steel. I’m so sorry to have caused him pain. Sorry there was no way to explain what I intended to do ahead of time. But I didn’t conceive the plan until you and I were at the Boundary Oak, and by then, Steel had already departed. How long do you think it will take before he fully forgives me?”

“Not as long as it takes him to forgive himself for having doubted you.”

“I owe you an apology as well,” I continued, my words coming out in a rush. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the full extent of my plan ahead of time. I knew what I hoped, but even I couldn’t be entirely sure of how things would turn out. If your father had answered the first two questions any other way . . .”

“Are you trying to say you do not wish to marry me?” Robin asked quietly.

“No, of course not. I’m trying to say
you
don’t have to if
you
don’t want to,” I stumbled on. “You could just be duke all on your own. The people will follow you. They love you, Robin.”

“But you don’t. Is that what you’re trying to say?”

“Stop putting words in my mouth! I haven’t said that at all.”

“So you do love me, then,” Robin said.

“Don’t be silly, of course I do,” I said. “I just—”

Robin turned then and pulled me into his arms. “Gen des Jardins,” he said, “be quiet. Do you want to marry me or not?”

“Robert de Trabant, make up your mind. I can’t be quiet and answer your question all at the same time.”

“Yes, you can,” Robin said. And then he put his lips on mine.

Jack had said I’d had quite an adventure, and he’d been right. But I can tell you that the first kiss that Robin and I shared was the biggest adventure of all. For it was a promise of the future that lay before us, all the adventures that were still to come.

“That’ll teach you to call me silly,” Robin murmured against my hair when the kiss was over. “And for the record, I’m not. You are. Of course I want to marry you, you impossible girl from the World Below. I want to marry you because I love you with all my heart. I think I may have loved you from the moment you fell off that sorry excuse for a horse.”

“So that’s it, then,” I said. “This is happily ever after?”

“This is it,” Robin answered. “Today and all our days to come. Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to see the Boundary Oak.”

Hand in hand, we approached the rise.

“Look!” I cried. “Oh, look, Robin!”

The Boundary Oak was no more. Overnight the great tree had split in two. The two halves had toppled and lay in opposite directions on the ground. But from the center a sapling had sprouted. Its green leaves shimmered in the late-afternoon light. Autumn was not usually a time of year for new things to grow. Still, there was something magical about this little tree.

“Even the oak knows it is a new beginning,” I said softly.

“Yes,” Robin agreed. “And the tree no longer marks a boundary, for now our two lands are truly one. Wherever he is, I hope my father makes as good a new beginning as this.”

“And so do I.”

We camped beside the young tree that night, one last night spent under the stars. Then, in the morning, we returned to the de Trabant castle and our own new beginning. The happily ever after of one day, and then the next, through all the days of our lives.

A good plan is like a well-wrapped present. Self-contained, even if it doesn’t always get tied with a pretty bow. Still, part of being self-contained is having no loose ends. And even though Robin and I ended up together, which was a lovely conclusion to my adventure, I have to admit that the story as I’ve just told it does leave a few things out.