Princess of the Midnight Ball (3 page)

Kathe’s mouth made a little O of surprise. Zelda grunted, looking him over with renewed interest. “I see.”

Galen felt a surge of embarrassment. Were his mother’s family famously disreputable? She hadn’t talked about them all that much. Maybe they were horse thieves or drunkards or some such, and here he had proudly said their name in this respectable shop.

Jutta gave a low whistle. “The
Orms
are your kinfolk?
Reiner
Orm?”

Kathe let out another snort. “Well, at least we can tell you for certain that they’ll have work for you. And a place to sleep.”

“Hold your tongue, girl,” Zelda said, frowning at her younger daughter. She nodded at Galen. “I know the street where Reiner Orm lives,” she told him. “Jutta can take you there. The house will be easy enough to find.”

“I could take him,” Kathe complained.

“You should go in the back and start cooking dinner for your husband,” Zelda snapped. “Jutta is less likely to gossip on the way there and dawdle on the way back.” The pastry cook went over to Galen and took his hand in hers. “You are welcome anytime, my lad. And should you see any of your companions from the war, tell them to come to the Weisses’ shop, and they will be treated to raisin cookies too.”

“Thank you, goodfrau … Zelda.” He stood, still holding her hand, and gave her a bow. “You have been very kind, and I haven’t tasted such fine baking… well, ever.” It was true: his mother had not been known for her cooking.

Zelda blushed and smiled, and told him again to come back. Then she hurried into the kitchen to take care of something in the oven, dragging her sulky younger daughter with her.

Alone, Jutta and Galen exchanged awkward smiles. He lifted his heavy pack to his back without embarrassing himself by groaning, and Jutta led the way out the door and down the street. They walked for quite a distance in silence, until they were within sight of the palace. The palace was tall and angular, with diamond-paned windows like the common houses of Bruch, but it was the size of four houses put together and the walls were of pink stucco, making it look like an ornate confection resting in the center of the city.

Finally Galen got up the courage to ask about the Orms. “Is there something wrong with them?” he blurted out.

“Wrong with whom?” Jutta looked startled at the outburst.

“With my mother’s kin. The Orms. Your mother—your sister—their faces when I said the name…” His voice trailed off.

Jutta laughed aloud, and then, seeing his continued discomfort, she stopped and put a hand on his sleeve. “There is nothing wrong with your family,” she said firmly. “It’s just that they are well known throughout Bruch. It was quite startling to have one of their relatives wander into our humble shop. I’m sure we all thought that you would say so-and-so, they own a tailor’s shop, and we would try to find out where they lived. But to be Reiner Orm’s nephew? Goodness!”

“But why are they well known?”

“They weren’t before the war,” Jutta said. She continued walking, then, so that Galen could not look directly into her face. “Their work was known, of course, known to all of Bruch, but the family itself was not that notable.” She softened this statement with a quick smile. “But then… well, something happened, and there was a great deal of gossip.”

Galen stopped in his tracks. He knew it! There was some scandal attached to his mother’s cousins. Well, he wasn’t sure that he wanted to get tangled up in it.

“It’s nothing that will affect you,” Jutta said, taking his arm and leading him on. She bit her lip. “I hate to carry tales, and heaven knows that I’m not privy to the whole story, but I can assure you that your family is not defamed.”

“Then what happened?”

“It’s not for me to say.”

And that is all she
would
say as they walked along in awkward silence. They passed a storyteller surrounded by a group of children and shared a smile as the man spun the tale of the Four Princesses of Russaka.

“The king and queen of Russaka had four beautiful daughters,” the storyteller proclaimed. “Their hair was bright as gold, their eyes like sapphires, and their lips like the ripest cherries. Wanting to protect them from any evil, the king and queen locked their daughters in a high tower, to which their mother alone had the key. No man ever saw them, and they spent their days singing and embroidering cloths for the church altar. Yet one dark, terrible night, wails were heard coming from the tower. The king and queen unlocked the door, ran up the thousand stairs, and entered the princesses’ chamber. There they saw their four sweet daughters, each with a black-haired babe in her arms. “What man has done this?” their father demanded. But the princesses would not say. Then a great shadow covered the moon, and when it had slipped away, the babes were gone. Gone to live deep below the earth, with the creature who was their sire, that black magician whose name is never spoken.”

The children listening could be heard squealing with gleeful fright as Galen and Jutta turned a corner and came to a row of houses that faced the western wall of the palace grounds. These were tall, grand houses, with white stucco walls painted with flowers and birds. Halfway along the street, one of the houses stood taller than all the rest, with pink stucco the exact
color of the palace and bright green shutters. Window boxes full of white and red geraniums sat beneath each window, and there was a large brass knocker in the middle of the green door. Above the door was a garland of withered ivy twined with a black ribbon: there had been a death in the house. Although, judging by the state of the ivy, it had been some time ago. It was not an unusual sight on this or any other house, however, thanks to the war.

“This is the Orm house,” Jutta said, stopping in front of it.

Galen gaped at the imposing house, his stomach dropping into his boots. “Are you certain?” He was convinced that Jutta had made a mistake: his mother’s family couldn’t possibly live in a house that grand.

“The Orm family has special permission to use the same stucco that is used on the palace,” Jutta replied. She patted his arm. “I’ll leave you here, Galen. But you’re always welcome at the shop.”

Galen swallowed. “Thank you. And, er, my best to your husband.” Galen bowed.

Jutta gave him a dimpled smile in return and walked away. Galen stood on the pavement in front of the pink house, feeling more lost than he had been before Zelda had called him off the street.

He was about to turn away, to find a kind innkeeper somewhere who would take in a lonely soldier while he screwed up his courage to face his kin, when the green door opened. A woman in a brown dress and fresh white apron stepped out, a basket over her arm. When she saw him, in his blue army tunic
and with his pack on his back, she froze and her face went white.

Thinking that she might faint, Galen rushed forward. He took the basket and set it down, not sure what else to do.

“Oh, goodness! Oh, my heart!” She clutched at her ample bosom. “Oh, goodness gracious!” She gasped and then looked at his face again, searchingly. A flicker of disappointment, and of sorrow, played across her face. “I’m so sorry! I thought you were… you were… someone else.” Her eyes flew to the mourning garland over the door, and she swayed on her feet. Galen hastened to ease her down to sit on the top step.

“Take a deep breath, goodfrau,” he said, alarmed. “And another deep breath. I’m so sorry to have startled you like that.”

“It was not your fault,” she assured him. “It was only my own foolishness.” She let out a deep sigh. “Oh, dear.” Another sigh. Galen patted her hand weakly and she gave him a ghost of a smile. “If you could just help me up?”

Galen helped the woman to her feet and handed her the discarded basket. She seemed to be recovering: her face was no longer as pale, and her breath came easier.

“Please let me apologize again.” Galen wanted to crawl into a hole and die. This was probably his aunt’s housekeeper, and he’d nearly caused her to have an attack of apoplexy on the doorstep. He couldn’t possibly impose on the Orms’ hospitality now.

But now that she was on her feet, the woman wasn’t going to let him get away. She looked him up and down with frank
eyes, much the same way that Zelda had. “Just getting back from the war, are you?”

“Yes, goodfrau.”

“Where’s home, then?” She squinted at his face. “You look familiar,” she said slowly. “Are you the Bergens’ boy?”

“Ah, no.”

“The Engels’?”

“No.” Galen shifted his feet awkwardly.

“Who are your parents, then?”

Galen drew a deep breath. “My name is Galen Werner. My father was Karl Werner. My mother was Renata Haupt Werner.” He rushed onward. “They’re both dead. I came here because … because this is the only family I have left. I think.” He pointed to the pink house.

“Oh!” The woman threw down her basket and wrapped her arms around Galen. “I knew you had a familiar look! Renata’s boy! Renata’s only boy!”

Awkwardly Galen tried to pat her back. His upper arms were pinned to his sides and she was dragging his pack down with her fierce embrace.

“I’m your mother’s sister,” the woman said, pulling away at last. She wiped her eyes with a large handkerchief. “Oh, what a pleasure this is! What a surprise! I’m your Tante Liesel.”

Waves of relief passed over Galen. This was an even warmer welcome than he had hoped for. She hugged him again, and this time he returned it heartily.

The door opened, and a tall, broad-shouldered man stood there. He frowned at the scene before him. He had gray hair
and an impressive mustache that made him look like an angry walrus.

“Liesel, have you taken leave of your senses?”

“Oh, Reiner! Only see: it’s dear Renata’s boy! He’s come home from the war!” She gave Galen a little shove in the back, pushing him toward Reiner Orm.

“How do you do,
meinherr,”
Galen said, bowing. “I’m Galen Werner; Karl and Renata Werner were my parents.”

“Dead, are they?” Reiner grunted. “Dead in the war?”

“Er, yes, sir.” Galen blinked a little at the bluntness of his uncle’s words. “My mother died of the lung sickness. Father was shot. My sister, Ilsa, was killed in an accident. Years ago, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, the poor darlings! Renata, dead? I never knew!” Liesel clucked and fussed around him, but Galen never took his eyes off Reiner.

Reiner, in return, never took his eyes off Galen. “So, you claim to be Galen Werner, do you?”

“I
am
Galen Werner, sir,” Galen replied, not all that surprised to be thus challenged.

“Prove it.” Reiner crossed his arms over his chest.

“Reiner, not here,” Liesel said, her voice suddenly sharp. She stopped fluttering around Galen and gave her husband a cold look. “The neighbors have talked about us quite enough.” She took Galen’s arm. “Come inside and have some tea, Galen, while Reiner argues with you.”

“Thank you,” Galen said doubtfully.

Reiner stepped aside so that Galen and Liesel could enter
the house. Liesel led the way into a well-furnished sitting room and showed Galen to a chair by the hearth. A small fire burned in the grate, and the room was lit with oil lamps. Altogether it was a bright, pleasant room.

Galen set his pack on the floor and took the seat he had been offered. Reiner sat across from him, in a chair that was almost a throne, still raking Galen from head to toe with cold blue eyes. Liesel hurried out and came back a few minutes later with tea, seating herself on a plump little pink chair that had a sewing basket beside it.

Balancing the fine china cup and saucer he had been given on one callused hand, Galen grimly faced his uncle. This was more the welcome he had been expecting, but now that it had happened he was at a loss. How to prove who he was? He had never met these people and his mother had spoken only rarely of her family, who had not approved of her marriage.

Inspiration struck. “I have my father’s rifle,” he said. He put his tea on a small table and went to his pack. He had wrapped the weapon carefully in canvas against the weather, as was customary on long marches. The bayonet was sheathed and stowed away with the powder and shot. He did not intend to fire it ever again.

The weapon was old and worn, but carefully polished. The burled oak stock had been smoothed by his father’s hands, and then his own, until it had a mirror sheen. And carved into the butt was his father’s name.

He showed the rifle, and the name, to Reiner. Reiner handled the weapon expertly, but with a disdainful expression. He
grunted and handed it back to Galen when he was done looking it over. “You might have simply stolen Karl’s rifle.”

“Reiner!” Liesel looked shocked.

“I also have this.” Galen rummaged around in his pack, putting his arm in up to the shoulder to take out a small pouch. In it were his parents’ wedding rings, simple bands of gold that could have belonged to anyone, and his mother’s locket and crucifix. He showed the locket to Reiner and Liesel. It had his mother’s initials on the back, and two pictures inside. One of his father, and the other of himself at age eight, holding his infant sister. The crucifix was small and silver, and had the date of his mother’s confirmation etched on one side.

Judging by the look on Reiner’s face, however, he still thought that Galen was nothing more than a very clever thief. Desperate, Galen racked his brain for other proofs of his identity.

“My mother said that I was named after her grandfather, Galen Haupt, who used to frighten you both by taking out his wooden teeth and hiding them under your pillow, Tante Liesel.” Galen thought of another story and blushed but decided to use it anyway. “And, sir, when you were first courting Tante Liesel, you used to slip into the kitchens and eat sweets, and you… were very… fat.” He finished in a rush. “Mother said she used to call you Roly-poly Reiner.” Galen put down his parents’ things and took a sip of tea, carefully not looking at stern, mustached Reiner Orm.

“So, you’re Karl and Renata’s son,” Reiner said, as if Galen had only just now showed up on his doorstep. He set his own
tea aside. “Get some wine, why don’t you, Liesel? We should celebrate the arrival of our nephew.” He didn’t sound as if he took much pleasure in the idea.