Cruel Beauty

We were almost to the square when old Nan Hubbard bore down on us from behind. She was a stout woman with a missing front tooth who had once been Tom-a-Lone’s bride herself, and now was not only an herbwoman but the closest thing the village had to a priestess for the hedge-gods.

“And what are you doing unveiled, hussy?” she demanded of Astraia. Ribbons hung from her gray curls and jiggled in her face.

“I’m sorry!” she said. “It was just such a pretty night, I wanted to feel the breeze.”

“You’ll feel the weight of my hand if you keep the god waiting.” Behind her, I saw a trio of young men hefting the straw man.

I smiled. “I’ll get her ready,” I said, and dragged Astraia back around a corner into the shadows. “I think she suspects,” I added under my breath, once we were out of sight.

Astraia shrugged. “Probably, but I’ve been bringing her fresh herbs every day for two weeks.”

“You’ve been bribing her?”

“If it works, why not?” She snatched the veil out of my hands and draped it over my head. “You’d better blush, or everyone will know it isn’t me.”

“Astraia, I don’t believe there’s a thing in the world that could make you blush. And I’m wearing a veil anyway.” I grasped her hands. “You just stay hidden.”

Between the dim light and the gauzy veil, I could just barely make out her smile. “Good luck.”

Nan Hubbard gave me a sideways glance, but she said nothing as she led me to the bonfire at the center of the square. A great cheer went up when I was led in and seated at the main table, for now the festivities could begin. A group of girls linked hands around the bonfire and sang: not any of the traditional wedding hymns, but the counting song that we always sang on this night.

I’ll sing you nine, oh!

What is your nine, oh?

Nine is for the nine bright shiners,

We shall see the sky, oh.

I knew the lyrics well, for the song was also a lullaby; Mother often sang it to us, before the sickness took her away, and it had always been one of my favorites.

Four for the symbols at your door,

We shall see the sky, oh.

But now the words made me shiver with nameless dread and half-remembered sorrow. As the girls worked through the verses, it only got worse. I could barely breathe, and then they came to the end of the song:

One is one and all alone

And ever more shall be so.

I knew I was being an idiot, that I had no reason to cry, but I couldn’t stop myself. I sat under my veil and sobbed like a girl who had lost her first love. The words echoed through my head, and though I had heard them a thousand times before, now they sounded like sudden and complete despair.

“Bring the bride forward!” Nan Hubbard proclaimed. There was another cheer. After a dazed moment, I got up and walked unsteadily to where she stood just in front of the bonfire, the straw Tom-a-Lone sitting up beside her.

She flashed me a smile. The light flickered over her wrinkled face, and I felt a sudden dread.

“Hold out your hand, girl.” I stretched out my right hand, and the cold, solid weight of the ring dropped into my palm. “Do you know what you’re taking up along with this ring?”

I knew what I should say: I take up the hand of our lord beneath the fields. But the words stuck in my throat. The ring was an old heirloom, a gift to the village from some long-forgotten lord. I had seen it put on the bride’s finger every year I could remember. But now I finally saw it: a heavy golden ring, carved like a signet into the shape of a rose.

I smelled crisp, smoky autumn air and I couldn’t look away. Somewhere a bird was singing—and as if from very far away, I also heard the sweet, breathy voice of a girl raised in song:

Though mountains melt and oceans burn,

The gifts of love shall still return.

I stared at the ring, golden and gleaming and utterly real, and I remembered.

I remembered being married to a statue while my sister sobbed her heart out back at home. I remembered being raised as a tribute and a weapon, and I remembered receiving this ring. With love.

I remembered my husband, whom I had loved and hated and betrayed.

There was a roaring in my ears and I thought I might faint. They love to mock, Ignifex had said, and they had. To leave answers at the edges, where anyone could see them but nobody does.

And they had. Everybody knew the story of the Last Prince, and everybody knew the story of Tom-a-Lone, and nobody knew what it meant.

Old Nan said, “Don’t you have a vow to make, girl?”

People said the Last Prince still haunted the ruins of his castle. That he would come if you called out his name. People said that Brigit let Tom-a-Lone out for just one night every year. To meet his bride.

And they are always fair.

I seized the ring and slid it on my finger, then pulled off my veil as I spoke the words I had said before, in a time that now had never been.

“Where you go, I shall go; where you die, I shall die, and there will I be buried.”

Then I bolted away into the woods.

26

Behind me I heard shouts and people running after, but I lost them soon enough. I kept running, though: I had to get to the castle by midnight. That part of the legend might be a lie, but I couldn’t risk it. I had lived all my life surrounded by the Kindly Ones’ mocking clues and ignoring them. I wouldn’t ignore them anymore.

Eventually I slowed to a walk, but I struggled grimly onward in the darkness, my legs aching as I climbed the slope, sweat trickling down my back. I was now following the road—it seemed safe enough, because who would expect me to run this way?—but there wasn’t much moonlight and I was terrified of losing my way.

Finally I reached the top. I paused for a moment, gasping for breath, then staggered through the ruined archway into the remains of the castle and collapsed to the ground. I was burning with heat from the climb and my legs felt like they were made of limp wool; I wanted to lie down in the grass and sleep, but I made myself sit up and watch.

All around me, there was nothing but darkness and the sound of crickets.

“Kindly Ones!” I yelled into the night. “Where are you? Don’t you always want to bargain?”

There was no answer. I clenched my teeth and waited. And waited. Drying sweat itched against my skin and I shivered in the cold. I began to wonder if I had gone insane and all my memories of that other life were only a delusion.

Or maybe it had all happened and I was deluded to think that they let him out of the box even once a year. I remembered my futile childhood vigil. That had been in the spring, but maybe it didn’t matter what night I waited for him. Maybe my only chance to save the Last Prince had been back in that house, and now that I had lost it I would never get another.