After I finished eating, I looked out the window several times in hopes that I would see Tristan somewhere down in the courtyard. Where was he? Even if Princess Margaret hadn’t told him that I wanted to talk to him, you’d think he would have at least stopped by to see me.
On my third window check, Lady Theodora told me the draft would make me worse, and if I didn’t stay in bed she would be required to call the physician to attend to me. So I went back to the pallet and pretended to sleep. I didn’t want anyone coming near me with leeches, or worse yet, knives that had never been disinfected.
Finally the door opened, but it wasn’t Tristan. Princess Margaret breezed back in to change clothes as her gown had grown too hot. She completely ignored me, but spoke with Theodora about a Sir William of Burglen. He’d sent word he was coming to the king’s celebration early in order to challenge the Black Knight. He hoped that Princess Margaret would give him a token of hers to take with him into battle.
Theodora thought this was “exceedingly romantic,” whereas Princess Margaret declared he was a hairy red bear and she would have nothing to do with him. “The Black Knight will give him tokens enough of his battle—bruises and scars, if he lives at all.”
Her words sent shivers through me. I’d been so busy dwelling on my kiss with the Black Knight, I’d forgotten he was dangerous. Perhaps he was as brutal as Princess Margaret just suggested, and he had me in a bad situation. If I said the wrong thing at the wrong time, my tongue would burn out of my mouth. I shuddered as I thought about how that would feel.
Theodora rebraided Princess Margaret’s hair, and I hoped she would say more about the Black Knight, but instead they went on to discussing Sir William’s purse. Apparently, instead of betting any of his own wealth, he planned to slay the ogre first, and had asked King Roderick to give him a reward for such since he already held the title of knight.
He’d killed a different ogre in his own land and so felt confident he could dispatch this one as well.
I wondered if Tristan knew about this. And then a worse thought hit me—if he did, then he wouldn’t have stayed here at the castle waiting for me to get better from my faked illness. He would have left as soon as possible to go try and kill the cyclops before Sir William arrived.
He wasn’t going to come check on me at all—he was already gone.
Perhaps because they thought I would sleep for a while, or perhaps because Princess Margaret had found something more important for Theodora to do besides guard me, they left the room together.
I waited for a few minutes to give them time to reach wherever it was they were headed, then I slipped out of the room and went down the stairs myself. I barely cared that there wasn’t a banister to hang on to now. I just needed to get away as quickly as possible.
I’d go out to the stables and ask them to get my horse ready, then ride back to the inn. Princess Margaret would be upset, no doubt, that I’d left without her permission, but hopefully she had enough people here at the castle to torment that she wouldn’t think it was worth her while to find me.
Once I reached the main floor, I looked cautiously around. No sight of the princess or Theodora. I made my way toward the main doors. I walked by washerwomen with baskets of linens and a boy lugging buckets of water in each hand. Then, thankfully, happily, I was outside.
I paused before heading to the stables. Not far from the castle door was the wizard’s wagon, and a man in maroon robes bent over the wares inside of it.
The wizard would know about truth potion. Perhaps he could sell me a cure, or wait—had that enchantment been switched to the Black Knight when he kissed me? Hopefully the wizard could tell me.
As I walked up to him, I said, “Pardon me, sir—”
The man turned around and I stopped short. It wasn’t the wizard and it wasn’t Simon either. A freckle-faced boy who couldn’t have been more than fourteen faced me.
“Oh,” I said, and then, “I thought you were the wizard.”
“Not yet,” he said with a nod. “I just was advanced from assistant to apprentice. The wizard is inside showing Prince Edmond his wares.”
A goat that was tethered to the side of the wagon bleated and walked toward me. The rope around its neck had tangled around the bottom of the wagon wheel, and it bleated another noisy protest.
I suddenly wondered if this was a different wizard’s wagon altogether. Maybe they all had similar-looking wagons, like police departments had similar cars. I couldn’t remember his name. “Was he here two days ago?” I asked.
“Aye, but he only talked to Prince Hugh then. Prince Edmond thought his brother dismissed my master too speedily, though, and called him back. A good thing too. Master Pergis was getting ready to pack up and leave the region altogether.”
Pergis—then it was the same wizard. The goat pulled on the rope again. He gained a couple of steps, but bumped into the apprentice in the process. The boy absentmindedly pushed the goat away and returned his attention to me. “If you haven’t got business with my master, I don’t suggest you be about when he comes out. He’s in a powerful foul mood.” The boy’s voice dropped to a whisper. “He sold his only switching potion and now is wishing he could offer it to the prince.”
“Oh.” It didn’t seem like a good idea to volunteer the information that I’d been the one who’d bought it. Still, I wanted to find out about truth potion and I didn’t know how else to do it. “Switching potion,” I said, as though I found it an interesting subject. “When a person uses switching potion, do all of their enchantments switch or just one?”
“All of their magical enchantments.” The boy tilted his head as though unsure why I was asking. “But as I said, the master has no more of it.”
“Magical enchantments?” I asked. “Is there any other kind?”
The goat tried to butt the apprentice out of the way. The boy pushed him back angrily, and yelled, “Stop it!” Then he turned back to me. “Aye, there’s all kinds of enchantments.” As though reciting a lesson he rattled off: “There’s the enchantment of wishing stars, and ancient wells, of droughts and potions, of a mother’s love—”
“Potions?” I asked. “What about truth potion? Would that switch?”
He shook his head. “Truth potion changes a person’s tongue. The only way to change it back is to take the antidote— blood of a politician.”
I put my hand to my chest. “Blood?”
He laughed at my expression, clearly pleased to be the expert. “Only a few drops, and it’s not like we have to kill them for it. They sell it quick enough. The problem is it won’t keep longer than a day or two. It’s something Master Pergis would have to make special for you.” He cast a glance toward the castle doors. “I’m not sure how much longer he’ll be, but if you want to wait, that’s fine by me.”
The goat pulled on the rope. His hoofed feet pushed at the ground, straining, but all he managed to do was knock into the boy again as he tried to get past him. The boy shoved the goat away. “Let off, Simon, or I’ll give you to the next kitchen boy that passes by.”
“Simon?” I repeated, and gave the goat my full attention. “Wasn’t that the name of the wizard’s last apprentice?”
The boy looked around, saw we were alone, and said, “Aye, he’s one and the same. Master Pergis found out that Simon had been helping himself to his wares and changed him into a goat.”
Simon bleated loudly and bared his teeth at the boy.
“Oh, all right,” the boy grumbled. “I’ll untangle the wretched rope. Even as a goat you think you can order me around.” He bent down by the wagon wheel and took hold where it had knotted. “It was stupid, really,” the boy said, and I wasn’t sure whether he was talking to me or Simon. “The master wouldn’t have noticed if some of the potions weren’t quite filled to where they’d been before, but Simon took an entire bottle of poison. The whole thing.” The rope was almost untangled and the goat took a few more bleating steps toward me.
I looked at him with horror. Co
uld this animal really have once been the person I talked to yesterday? I couldn’t detect any traces of a man in its narrow, fur-covered face or bulging eyes. Was the apprentice just teasing me?
The boy still worked on the rope, his hands loosening the tangle. “Even then, the master might not have noticed one missing bottle, but Simon should have known better than to pinch his divining mirror.”
I took a sharp breath. It was my fault then. I’d insisted that Simon give me the mirror—but what about the poison? He hadn’t given me that. It had been some sort of love potion.
Then I remembered what the wizard had said when I’d first approached him. He’d told me he was out of love potion.
So what had Simon given me?
I took a step back, my heart beating hard. Why would Simon want to poison me, a virtual stranger? It didn’t make sense. He must have accidentally given me the wrong bottle.
The rope came free from the wagon wheel and the goat lunged toward me. I only stayed out of his reach by stumbling backward. He strained toward me, bleating, then stuck his tongue out trying to lick me.
I took another step back while the apprentice laughed. “Well, look at that. Simon seems to have taken a fancy to you.”
Suddenly I understood why. Simon knew if he licked me we would switch enchantments. I’d become a goat and he would be free.
I didn’t bother to say good-bye to the apprentice. I turned and ran from the wagon, the goat’s bleats still ringing in my ears. My feet slipped on the uneven slope of the land but I didn’t slow my pace.
What if Simon got loose? How fast could goats run? I sprinted the rest of the way to the stables.
I reached the doorway and leaned against the inside of it, gulping in air even though it smelled of manure. The stable boy approached me tentatively. “M’lady?”
I peered around the door. Nothing was pursuing me, at least not yet. “Will you get my horse ready? I need to leave at once.”
His eyebrows drew together and he gazed past me to see what I’d been looking at. When he didn’t see anything out of the ordinary his attention returned to me. “Will Tristan be leaving too?”
So he hadn’t left yet. Still, I didn’t have time to look for him.
“Not right now, but after I’m gone, I’d like you to find Tristan and tell him I left. I’ll wait for him at the place where we first met. Can you remember that?”
He nodded.
“Hurry with my horse and Tristan will double whatever money he usually gives you.”
The boy’s eyes lit up at that, and he gave me a quick bow. “Yes, m’lady.” He left me in the doorway while he fetched the bridle and took it to my horse’s stall.
I moved farther inside the stable. I was hidden to the outside, but certainly Simon and the new apprentice had seen where I’d gone.
The stable boy led my horse out of the stall, put a blanket on his back, then heaved the saddle on top of it. In my mind the words “hurry, hurry, hurry” tumbled over each other.
He adjusted the saddle, then worked on tightening the straps. Honestly, horses took longer to get ready than teenage girls.
If Simon managed to escape from his rope, he’d dash into the stable looking for me. How could I fend off an animal who only needed to lick me in order to transform me into a goat?
I grabbed a riding stick off the wall, held it out in front of me like it was a sword, then went and peered out of the door again. I could see the wagon plainly enough, but I didn’t see the apprentice or the goat.
“M’lady?”
The stable boy’s voice made me jump. I turned and he peered at me with a questioning expression. “M’lady, why are you holding the riding crop so?”
“Just in case I’m attacked by a goat.”
His eyebrows drew together but he didn’t speak.
“I have a fear of goats,” I said.
The stable boy proved not to be the Black Knight, because my tongue did not burn out of my mouth. Still, as I climbed onto my horse—it was finally ready—I chastised myself for slipping up and lying. I had to be more careful about that.
My horse trotted out of the stable and across the ground toward the gate. As I passed by, I looked over my shoulder at the wagon. The apprentice was nowhere in sight, but Simon stood by the side of the wagon, the rope in his mouth and his jaw going in circles. He was trying to chew through it.
I knew he wouldn’t be able to catch the horse, and I was too high up for him to touch anyway, but I wanted to be as far away from him as possible. As I rode out of the castle I became more and more convinced that Simon had given me the poison on purpose.
Chapter 18
I didn’t let my horse stop and meander along the trail this time, and perhaps the horse sensed my urgency, because I only had to spur her on a few times. Before long the path led us into the forest. When I’d ridden through last time, the trees had seemed fresh and welcoming, like a national park or a summer camp. Now the birdcalls set me on edge. I kept thinking of how Tristan had held his sword across his lap as we’d ridden, and the way his eyes scanned the trees.
I scanned them too, unsure of what I was looking for. The wind through the trees set off hundreds of leaves that whispered in my direction.
Eight miles, I kept telling myself. It was only an eight-mile ride. It had taken us about two hours to travel the road before, and that was partially because my horse kept stopping for snacks. I’d be able to make it back faster.
Halfway through the forest, two men on horses appeared out of the trees in front of me. They stopped on the trail. I waited for them to pass or go ahead of me, but they didn’t. When they turned sneering faces in my direction, I realized with a sick thud in my stomach that they were waiting for me.
Each wore ragged gray clothing. One man had a nearly toothless grin, even though he couldn’t have been more than thirty. The other had a scar that ran from one eye to his chin, making his face look like it was creased and about to fold over.
“What ’ave we ’ere?” the scarred one said. “A lady without an escort. Foolish, indeed.” He took a long knife from under the folds of his clothes and held it up for me to see.
I pulled the reins, trying to turn my horse around, but as I looked over my shoulder I saw that another horse had come out of the forest behind me. Its rider, a man equally frightening and even dirtier than the first two, held onto a stick as thick as a baseball bat. I was trapped between them.
“You’ll be getting off your ’orse now,” the dirty one said.
Fear wrapped itself around me like a searing blanket. I couldn’t breathe. I just stared at the man while my horse whinnied and took nervous steps sideways.
The scarred man spit on the ground. “Off the ’orse. Be a good girl and we won’t hurt you.”
I didn’t believe them. Once I was off my horse I’d be powerless. I clutched my riding stick harder and tried to think of options. Then I remembered: I was invincible.
I hadn’t ever wanted to test the enchantment. Still, what choice did I have? I looked the scarred man squarely in the face. “Out of my way.”
He put the knife to his lips as though about to use it to pick at his teeth, then waved it in my direction again. “You’ll be giving up your saddlebags too. And your jewelry.”
I nudged my horse forward. “Out of my way!”
His expression twisted with anger. He leaned forward in his saddle, and pointed his knife at me as though about to thrust it into my chest. “Do as I say now!”
At that moment the world slowed, grew sharp. I could feel the wind blowing strands of my hair around my shoulders and insects buzzing above my head. As the scarred man came toward me, I could sense every breath he took. It didn’t seem difficult at all to knock the knife out of his hands with my riding crop. It was as easy as smacking a fly with a flyswatter.
It didn’t matter that the toothless man was coming at me with another knife. He too moved in slow motion, like a man walking through water.
I hit him on the si
de of his shoulder and he flew off his horse, screaming. He landed in the bushes by the side of the road, causing the branches to wave in leafy surrender.
I heard the man with the stick coming up behind me. I knew exactly where he was without even looking. I turned and saw the stick swinging toward me. I tapped it with the riding crop and it flew from his hands.
The man cursed, but he didn’t waste time trying to fight with me anymore. He turned his horse and galloped back into the forest. The scarred man only waited another moment before following after him. Even the toothless man, who’d just managed to extract himself from the bushes, ran after them. I heard him crunching and crashing through the foliage as the world slipped back into its normal realm.
The now riderless horse stood on the pathway in front of me and I reached over and grabbed the reins as I rode by. Because hey, who doesn’t want a free horse? I only regretted not knocking the other two into the bushes as well.
As I trotted off toward the inn, the forest once again seemed a warm and welcoming place. And better yet, I felt confident and powerful. I was invincible.
• • •
I arrived at the inn dusty, tired, and hungry. It was frustrating not to have cell phones, not to be able to call Tristan and say, “Where are you?” and “By the way, a goat is out to get me and I was assaulted by thieves in the forest, and now I have an extra horse.”
Then again, I couldn’t tell him about most of it. He might be just as eager as Simon to switch enchantments.
I shared some cooked eggs, cheese, and gritty wheat bread with the inn’s dog, then went to my room and looked out the window for Tristan’s horse.
He didn’t come.
Did he not care that I’d left? Did he want to stay at the castle fawning over Princess Margaret and telling stories at the king’s table?
I ordered a bath, gave the innkeeper’s wife my dress to clean, then sat in a big metal tub of steaming water. It felt luxurious against my skin but eventually it grew tepid and I had to get out. I pulled on my Snow White dress, combed out my hair, then went downstairs to try and dry it out by sitting near the hearth.