Page 7

Rose and Thorn

The following mornings found Rose rubbing beauty cream onto her face and brushing out her hair for longer than usual.

“He is nobility,” I reminded her. “And you are a cottager’s daughter. Why do you want to attract his attention? What do you think he will do—bring you a white horse so you can ride off and marry him?”

I meant to be sarcastic, but Rose’s eyes glowed.

“Lords marry ladies,” I added. “Not peasant girls. At best you are deluding yourself, at worst you might bring trouble to our door. Jory spoke rightly when he said that men of privilege think they can take what they please as much as ruffians do.”

“History is full of lords and princes marrying ordinary girls,” said Rose, giving a final brush to her glossy hair. “Mother has told a score of such stories.”

“ Stories .”

“What do you know?” Rose tossed her head like one of the nobleman’s party of sleek horses. She picked up a basket and a pruning knife to go into the front garden, where she might be seen by a passing lord.

“You’re just bad-tempered because Mother won’t let you go wandering about,” she threw over her shoulder.

This last part was true. I was wearied to my soul with being confined to the garden.

My only consolation was that the entrance to Faerie was thinning faster than usual this year.

Any day now it would open, and then all those pesky adventurers would be gone.

A week later the border would close for another year, and I would be at liberty again.

But it irked me that Mother still went out, doing I knew not what, and telling very little of what she had seen. There was a lot Mother did not speak of.

These thoughts passed through my mind as I watched Rose saunter away to make herself conspicuous. “I’ll tell Mother!” I called after her.

“If you do,” floated back the reply, “I will tell her you’ve been going to the tree for the past three days.”

This also was true. And I went again that morning, running over to the tree to climb up and glower at what those usurping brothers had done to my treetop den since my last visit.

A cooking pan and fishing net littered my domain. Clothes had been washed in our stream and draped over branches to dry.

“They’ve turned it into a launder’s room,” I told the squirrels on the branch above. “How do you like that?”

They ignored me.

“Still feeling hospitable to them, are you?” I asked the tree as I looked around at the blankets and darned socks sullying the place. I got a mere shaking of leaves in reply.

I peered toward the road in the distance to see if any more parties of adventurers were coming. There had been a handful of stray riders or walkers over recent days, but no large groups.

I ran home again but was dismayed on my return to hear Rose’s voice just beyond the wild cherry trees.

I made my way stealthily to the nearest tree, dreading to see Mother there.

But it was not Mother whom Rose was speaking with—it was the tall young nobleman with his fair hair and his riding cloak embroidered with gold.

“May I come in?” the man said, his hand on the garden gate.

Surely Rose would not be so foolish as to invite a man into the garden when she was alone? I was ready to dart forward and shout out a protest. I could feel the rippling of air, as the rose stems quivered, ready to spring to my sister’s defence.

“ Away ! Away !” cried the jackdaw, hopping up and down on its branch.

“No,” said Rose. “You may not. I perceive you are a gentleman as well as a nobleman. You would not come in without my mother’s leave.”

“Certainly, I would not,” said the man, removing his hand from the gate. The roses stilled, but their magic thrummed in readiness.

“I must not remain,” said Rose, turning gracefully, as though to leave, but moving slowly, giving her admirer time for a good, long look at her.

“Wait!” called the man. “Only tell me your name?”

“Why do you ask?” said Rose, looking over her shoulder at him with a wide-eyed look of innocence.

The man put a hand to his chest. “That I might know whom it is that has captured my heart.”

I rolled my eyes .

“I think you are toying with me, sir,” said Rose. “For what can a nobleman want with a cottager’s daughter?”

“No cottager’s daughter looks and speaks as you, my lady. You are a priceless jewel unearthed in a remote cave. You are a rare flower, never before seen, blooming in an isolated place.”

Rose glowed, and I groaned.

“So you would put a pickaxe or a gardener’s knife to me, sir? I would be better left in my remote cave or isolated place, would I not?”

“No, indeed! You should be fitly set in gold or planted in a royal garden!”

“As a trinket? An ornament?”

“As a treasure.” His voice lowered. “As one beloved.”

I knew all my sister’s expressions by the tilt of her head or the lines of her figure. I knew she was delighted by these sickly-sweet words.

“I shall not submit to being beloved by any man save my future husband,” she said in a maidenly voice.

She glided to the door before he could answer.

I could never glide, but she did it effortlessly.

She half-turned at the entrance, made a deferential curtsey, allowing her starry-eyed admirer one last look at her beauty.

All her brushing, braiding, and the smoothing of beautifying balm into her face had not been in vain that morning.

She whisked herself inside and closed the door.

The foolish fellow stood for an age at the gate. Would he never go?

“ Away ! Away !” screeched the jackdaw, flying at the man’s head, forcing him back from the gate. He slowly walked away, looking back hopefully, his silly hand over his silly heart.

“Does Lord Prosey come every day while Mother and I are gone?” I asked when I entered the house. Rose was humming to herself, but my words quenched the faraway look in her eyes.

“Do not call him names,” she said.

I mimicked him. “ Thou shouldst be set in gold, my treasure, my jewel, my heart’s delight !”

Rose tossed her head. “You’re jealous.”

I snorted.

There was a warning tap of thorns on the windows. I watched as my sister put petals from her gardening basket into a cooking pot to boil for rosewater. I saw a teardrop plop into the pan and felt a sudden rush of pity for her, stronger than my disdain for her simpering suitor.

“I’m not jealous, Rosie,” I said, calling her by her childhood name. “Mother says we must take care around fae and mortal men. Men can be even more dangerous than fae.”

“I know what she says,” said Rose in a tight voice. “But he is different.”

“How can you know? You have as much knowledge of the ways of men as I do. Mother says that charm can be—”

“I know what Mother says,” snapped Rose. “You don’t need to repeat everything like a talking jackdaw.”

I resolved to say no more. The border would soon be open, and the man would be gone—perhaps never to return, or to wander out again, looking not a day older while everyone this side of the border had lived through many years.

A roamer came by that afternoon, a sure sign that the opening into Faerie was imminent.

I heard the jangle and clatter of his goods before his rickety wagon came lurching past, pulled by a horse whose little horns and feathered hocks marked it as some unfortunate creature turned into a horse by enchantment.

I eyed the roamer as he passed our gate. He stopped, raised his hat to me, and bounded down from his perch.

“And what have we here?” he called, grinning over the gate at me. “A fair maid in a fair way to be made fairer. Lotions and potions for beauty have I, hoof of unicorn for silvery nails, flowing hair powder from mermaid scales, oil of—”

“You can cease your patter,” I called back, well aware of the enchantment in his rhythmic words. “Your magic won’t work on me.”

He scowled. I saw the telltale ripple over his face and glimpsed the sharp features beneath his glamour of youthful good looks.

His gaze fell upon the roses behind me. He sniffed the air, murmuring, “ Royal roses .” His green eyes gleamed. “How about a little trade, my knowing one? A mere pocketful of petals for a cutting of an everlasting pear tree?”

He held forth a little potted tree with tiny golden pears swinging from its branches. It was a pretty thing, and I took a step nearer out of interest. He held the pot out to me, moving it back and forth so the golden pears swung and gleamed.

For a moment, I could not look away. The little fruits glimmered entrancingly, their honeyed scent stirring a strong longing in me. I took another step closer.

“ Beware ! Beware !” shrieked the jackdaw.

The roamer scowled at the bird, and the moment of enchantment dissolved like a puff of smoke in a breeze.

I shook my head clear, stepping back out of reach of his persuasive magic.

I had no intention of taking anything from him—I could smell the underlying stench of stolen goods and the curses they bore.

“You cannot have so much as a petal,” I told him. “Be off with you. Go and peddle your wares elsewhere.”

His face darkened, and his covetous eyes lingered on the enchanted roses. I did not need to look back to see them quivering; I could feel their movement rippling the air. Their thorny stems swelled, bristling like a cat’s fur in warning.

The roamer took a step away from the gate, muttering oaths, then hastily bounded up to his seat and urged his creature forward. I watched him go, his goods swinging and clinking from their hooks.

“Was that a roamer?” Rose met me at the door of the cottage. “Why were you talking to him? Mother said—”

“I was telling him to peddle his nasty goods elsewhere.”

“Good.” She gave a little shiver. “I hope he doesn’t trick Sir Oswain into buying anything.”

I did not need to ask who Sir Oswain was.

“More fool him if he has more embroidery than brains and lets himself be taken in by such a one.”

Rose shot me a resentful look.

Jack came by later that afternoon.