Princess of the Midnight Ball (2 page)

“Oh, my weary, weary bones!”

Galen stopped trudging with a start as someone echoed his thought. On the side of the road, a bundle of rags rearranged itself into a very old woman in a tattered dress and shawl. She stared up at Galen with bright blue eyes, her back bent and humped.

“Hello there, young soldier!”

“Hello there, goodfrau,” he replied.

“I don’t suppose you have anything for an old woman to eat?” She smacked her lips, revealing very few teeth.

With a groan Galen took off his pack and laid it on the ground. He groaned even louder as he lowered himself to sit next to the old woman. “Let’s see, shall we?”

He didn’t feel, as some other soldiers did, that the rest of the country owed him something. They had fought a war, true, but it was their job. The civilians had continued their jobs as well. Seamstresses had sewed, blacksmiths shod horses and made nails, those farmers not pressed into service had continued to farm. And Galen’s parents had instilled in him a deep respect for women and his elders, and the ancient creature before him was both.

He rummaged in his pack. “I’ve drunk the last of my water, but I do have a swallow of wine here in this skin,” he said, laying it before them. “I have three hard biscuits, a wedge of old cheese, and a packet of dried meat. I also have some late berries I picked this morning.” He felt a pang at offering these up: he had been saving them as a special treat. But he would feel even worse if he denied this old woman something that might give her pleasure as well.

“Not enough teeth for the dried meat, or the biscuits,” she said, grinning to reveal even more gaps than Galen had noticed before. “But I wouldn’t mind a little cheese and wine, just like the fancy folks in the palace feast on.”

Galen had two of the hard biscuits, and wished afterward that he had not. He had no water, and the old woman
swallowed the wine in one gulp. Then she ate the cheese with much eye rolling and lip smacking, until he found himself smiling at her gusto.

Arching one eyebrow, the crone looked at the berries. “Care to share, dearie?”

“Of course.” Galen pushed them closer to her. She took a handful and slipped them into her mouth one at a time, savoring them as she had the cheese and wine. Glad that she had not taken the entire bag for herself, Galen scooped up his portion and ate them with equal pleasure.

“Returning from the war, are you?” Now that her hunger was sated, the old woman looked Galen over.

“Yes, goodfrau,” he said shortly. He didn’t want to know the name of the grandson, or great-grandson, who had been lost to an Analousian bullet.

He rewrapped the remaining biscuit, folded the cheese cloth and the berry bag, and stowed everything neatly in his pack. He put the wineskin on top, hoping to beg a swallow or two at the next farmhouse. “I was on the front lines.” Galen wasn’t sure why he added this, but it was his one source of pride. He had been to the front lines, and he had survived.

“Ah.” The crone shook her head sadly. “A bad business, that. Worse than it needed to be, you know.” She laid a finger alongside her crooked nose, winking.

Galen shook his head. “I don’t understand.”

She just sucked her teeth and nodded wisely. “Just you remember: when you make a deal with them as lives below, there’s always a hidden price.” She nodded again.

“I see,” Galen said in confusion. “Thank you.” He didn’t see. In fact, he thought the crone was quite senile, but it was hardly any of his concern. “I’d best keep on while there’s still daylight,” he said, standing up and shouldering his pack.

“Indeed, indeed, for the nights are cold,” the old woman said, clambering to her feet as well. She shivered and wrapped her thin shawl about her shoulders. “The days are cold, too.”

Galen didn’t hesitate. He unwrapped one of the scarves around his neck and offered it to her. It was blue wool, and very warm. “Here, granny, take this.”

“I could not deprive you, poor soldier,” she said even as she reached for it.

“I’ve another,” he said kindly. “Plus wool and needles, should I wish to make more.”

Holding the scarf up to the weak sunlight, the crone admired the tight knitting. “Make this yourself, did you?”

“Aye. There’s time enough between battles to knit a dozen scarves and a hundred stockings, as well I know.” He gave a little bark of laughter.

“I thought soldiers spent their idle time dicing and wenching.” She gave a surprisingly girlish giggle.

“Dicing and wenching is all very well, but it doesn’t do you much good when there are holes in your socks and snow falling through the holes in your tent,” he said grimly. Then he shook off the memory. “Wear it in good health.”

Galen wished that he had a shawl to give her, for the one she wore had great snags in it. But the only shawl he had ever knit had been given to a general’s daughter with soft brown eyes.

“You have been very kind to an old woman,” she said, “very kind.” She wrapped the scarf around her neck with the ends hanging down to protect her thin chest. “It is only fitting that I repay your kindness.”

He shook his head, bemused. What could
she
possibly give
him
? “That’s not necessary, goodfrau,” he assured her as her gnarled fingers fumbled under her shawl.

“Oh, but it is,” she said. “In this cruel world kindness should always be repaid. So many people passed by me today and yesterday, without a gentle word or a morsel of food. And you have a look about you that I like.”

She tugged at something behind her back, and his mouth gaped open. He had taken her for a hunchback, but now she pulled a bundle of cloth out of the back of her dress and held it up.

It was a short cloak, not unlike something an Analousian officer might wear. But instead of the green of the Analousian uniform, this was a dull purple color. It had a high, stiff collar and a gold chain to fasten it. The crone shook it, and Galen saw that it was lined with a pale gray silk.

“You should wear this yourself to keep warm,” he said.

The crone cackled. “What, and be run over by a farm wagon? It’s madness to travel in such a thing!”

Galen pursed his lips. The poor old woman really was quite out of her head. He wondered if he should help her to the next village. Surely someone would recognize her; she couldn’t have wandered far, at her age.

She leaned forward and said in a loud whisper, “It’s an invisibility cloak, boy. Try it.”

He looked around helplessly, but there was neither cottage nor barn to be seen in any direction. “I really shouldn’t—Perhaps we should find your family.”

“Try it!” She shrieked like an angry crow and flapped the cloak at him. “Try it!”

He held up his hands in surrender. “All right.” He took the cloak from her gingerly and threw it about his shoulders. It caught on his pack and he pulled it free impatiently. “There! How do I look?” He held out his arms. As nearly as he could tell, he was not invisible.

Rolling her eyes, the crone shook her head. “You must
fasten
it.”

Not wanting to upset her again, Galen took the dangling end of the chain and fastened it to the gold clasp on the collar. He made to flourish the edges of the cape for dramatic effect but gave a yell instead. He couldn’t see his arms. Looking down, he couldn’t see any part of himself at all: only two footprints in the dust.

The old woman clapped her hands in delight. “Wonderful! It fits like a dream!”

“I’m invisible,” Galen said wonderingly. He walked in a circle, watching his footprints in the dust.

“So you are, but listen to me, boy. It’s dangerous being invisible.” For the first time she sounded truly lucid, following his footprints with her eyes. “You can be trampled by horses
or countless other things. This cloak is not to be used lightly, but only in times of real need.”

Galen unfastened the cloak and watched his body ripple into view. With great reluctance he tried to hand the cloak back to the old woman. “I couldn’t take something like this from you, goodfrau,” he said respectfully. “This is a magical treasure of some kind. You should guard it carefully, or find a magician or some such to sell it to. You could buy yourself a new dress, a cottage even, with the money from something like that.”

The crone slapped him before he could duck. “The cloak is not for sale, no matter if I starve to death. It’s to be given to the one who needs it most. And that’s you, soldier.”

He shook his head to clear away the sting from her slap. “But I have no need for it,” he said, trying again to give it back. “I’m just a soldier, as you say, or at least I was. I don’t have a home or a sweetheart or even work.”

Pushing his hands away, the old woman cocked her head to one side. “You’ll need this, and more.” Again she rummaged among her rags, and this time pulled forth a large ball of white wool and a smaller one of black. “The black is coarse, but strong,” she said. “The white is soft, but warm and strong in its own way. One can bind, the other protect. Black like an iron chain, white like a swan floating on the water.” She pressed them into his hands, and he nearly dropped the wool and the cloak. “Black like iron, white like a swan,” she repeated, staring meaningfully into his face.

Without thinking, he repeated her words. “One can bind, the other protect. Black like iron, white like a swan.”

She turned and began walking in the direction Galen had just come from. “You will have need of it, Galen,” she said. “When you are in the palace, you will have great need.
He
must not be allowed above.”

“Who must not be allowed? And I’m not going to the palace,” he said to her retreating back, confused. “I’m going to find work with my aunt and uncle, they—” He broke off. “How did you know my name?”

“Remember, Galen,” she called over her shoulder. “When you are in the palace, you will have great need.”

Galen reached Bruch a week later. The city was much like an army camp: bustling people and mud and the smell of smoke and horses and a thousand other odors, all warring with one another. Unlike the lines of tents, however, the streets of Bruch did not run straight, and Galen soon became confused. Finally he stood in the middle of a street, turning around and around, trying to decide where to go next.

“Lost, soldier?” A stout woman in an apron had come out of a pastry shop nearby. She gave him a warm smile. “Care for a sticky bun?”

His stomach growled loudly, and a girl passing with a basket on her arm giggled. He looked at her, and she looked back boldly and winked.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” the pastry cook said, drawing his attention back to her. “Come in, come in.”

Blushing, Galen went. He didn’t want to yell across the street that he had no money to pay for a sticky bun, but the pastry
cook stopped him with a hand on his arm before he had taken two steps into her shop.

“I’d not take your money, even if you had any,” she said, her kind eyes twinkling at him. “My sons-in-law returned home safe two weeks ago. The day I saw them coming up the road I made a vow that any soldier who came my way would be welcome to eat his fill.” Her smile faded a little, and she brushed at some dust on Galen’s sleeve. “There’s many who have no mother or wife to welcome them open armed, as my daughters’ husbands did.”

Galen returned her sad smile. “That’s a great kindness, goodfrau. My name is Galen Werner.”

“I’m Frau Weiss, but you may call me Zelda.”

She sat him down at a little table and brought him not only a plate of sticky buns but also a cup of rosehip tea, a large wedge of cheese-and-onion pie, and a glass of cool milk. He thanked her profusely and tucked in, stopping only to rise and be introduced to her two dimpled daughters.

“Our husbands found work right away,” the eldest, Jutta, told him in between waiting on customers. “They’re repairing the cathedral roof. You’ll find something just as quick, I’m sure. It’s been hard, with all the able-bodied men gone to war.”

The younger sister, Kathe, sniffed. “We made do. I repaired the leak in our roof myself, if you recall.”

“And nearly fell to your death on your way back to solid ground, as
I
recall,” said Zelda, coming in with a tray of raisin-filled cookies. She slid three onto Galen’s plate and then put the rest in the window of the shop.

“Have you any family here in Bruch, Galen?” Zelda stopped by his table again. “Judging by the way you’re tucking in, I’d say that you haven’t reached home yet.”

Feeling guilty about his bad manners, Galen swallowed the rest of his cookie too fast and choked. Jutta pounded him on the back, and her younger sister brought him water.

“Afraid not,” he wheezed when he could breathe again. “I don’t have a home. I never did: my father was a soldier, and my mother was a laundress with the army. They’re both dead. But Mother had a sister in Bruch, and I’m here looking for her.”

“Oh, eh?” The widowed baker nodded her head. “What’s the name? I’ve lived in Bruch all my life.”

“If Mother hasn’t heard of her, she doesn’t exist,” Kathe said with a snort.

Galen gave her a little bow. “Then I’m very fortunate that I caught your notice, goodfrau,” he said. “Mother’s sister married an Orm—Reiner Orm. My aunt’s name is Liesel.”