The Sleeping Beauty (6 page)

“I don’t know the first thing about horseshoes, or plowshares, or all those things farmers need,” he replied, sadly. “I’d be a middling blacksmith for those purposes, and I really don’t like it much. I like being a Hero and I’m good at it.”

The bird chuckled. “And modest, too, just like a real proper Hero. No wonder Cast-Iron Cleavage is trying to get you to wake her up.”

Siegfried shuddered. That last escape had been a very narrow one. “Where are we, anyway?”

The bird cocked her head to one side. “A rather nice little place,” she said. “I believe it’s called Eltaria.”

ROSA HAD NEVER THOUGHT OF HERSELF AS
being weak—in fact, she had taken a great deal of pride in being able to keep up with the most enthusiastic of the hunters, the most energetic of games players, in the Court. When her mother had given her all those lessons in commonplace tasks, nothing had ever been beyond her strength or endurance.

The few times she had given the idea any thought, she had been quite certain that she would have no difficulty whatsoever in being able to work side by side with any of the servants in the Palace, do their work, and be no more worn out at the end of the day than they were.

By her second day with the Dwarves she knew how wrong she was.

Even though she was doing the barest minimum that she could get away with, the work she was doing was hard, backbreakingly hard. It had never looked that hard when the servants were doing it. She was exhausted by the time the Dwarves went to their beds, and fell asleep immediately. She was tired within a few hours of getting up in the morning, and everything ached.

The Dwarves had produced more clothing for her to clean and mend today, hauling it out of chests where it had been so long that
the folds were actually stiff. She was listlessly spreading the boiled shirts out on bushes to dry, when something entirely unexpected made her look up, startled.

“Hello the house!” called a cheerful, slightly cracked voice. “Anyone here?”

For a moment, she didn’t know what to do. Then she answered. “In the back garden?” Her own voice was hoarse, and sounded strange to her; it was so rough and full of fear it sounded as if it belonged to someone else.

Around the corner of the cottage came a perfectly ordinary-looking old woman, one with a sweet and kindly face. She wore the sort of clothing peasants did: patched and worn, but very clean. She carried a basket over one arm—and Rosa could not for a single moment imagine where she had come from.

But when she spotted Rosa, her hand flew to her mouth, and her eyes widened in consternation. “Oh deary me!” she exclaimed, hurrying over to where Rosa was standing, dumbfounded. “Those wretched, wretched Dwarves! Wicked things! What have they done to you, poor child?”

“I—ah—”

The woman put her basket down, words pouring out of her in a perfect torrent. “I talk to my bees you know, bees, terrible gossips they are, but usually accurate, and today they told me, yes they did, that the Dwarves had a new servant girl, and I couldn’t imagine anyone serving the likes of
them
on her own, or at least not without being tricked into it, and they wouldn’t part with a groat so they couldn’t have
hired
a girl, so I hurried
right
over to see what I could see, knowing that she’d be all alone during the day, and I said to myself, ‘Maggie, you must see what they’re doing to the girl, if there even is a girl, and see if it’s a Dwarf girl or a human one, and how she managed to get tangled up with
those
Dwarves,’ so I did, you see,
and here you are and here I am and good
gracious
look at you, you poor thing!”

As she spoke she was fussing over Rosa, looking at her cut, bruised, and now-burned hands, patting her hair away from her face, tugging at her dirty clothing. “I…was running away and they grabbed me,” Rosa managed, finally, a certain alarm rising in her, for she thought she recognized this situation as a Traditional Path—but how could anything be worse than the situation she was already in? “I asked them for help, and told them I’d do anything—“

“Ah, and the horrible things called it a
bargain,
did they?” The old woman frowned. “They would, and they’ll use that to hold you here as long as they like. Well! I’m Old Maggie the bee lady. Aren’t I, my sweets? And good little things you were to tell me about this poor, poor little wench!”

While she had been speaking every bee in the garden had left what it was doing to come circle about her as if the old woman was some kind of enormous, fragrant flower. She held up her index finger, and one of the bees landed on it, vibrating its wings to make a buzzing that almost sounded like speech.

“You
are
my brave little workers, so you are,” she said tenderly. The bee flew toward the old woman’s face, making Rosa flinch, and touched its head to the tip of the old woman’s nose before flying off. The rest of the bees went back to their business.

And a thought managed to make its way up out of the depths of Rosa’s exhaustion-fogged mind.
No bee will abide in the presence of evil.

So whoever, whatever she was—this “Old Maggie” was a friend.

Rosa burst into tears.

About an hour later, for the first time in days, Rosa was feeling better. Old Maggie chattered nonstop, making it almost impossible to get a word in, but that wasn’t so bad, because it meant Rosa didn’t have to say anything herself.

As for the rest, Maggie had taken charge of the entire situation. She’d tested Rosa’s manacle and chain herself, said a very ladylike curse and pronounced herself “fair gobsmacked,” which Rosa assumed meant she was baffled. Out of the basket had come a lovely little loaf and end of ham, a pot of honey and the sort of salad that a woods-wise person can make if she knows what’s edible—a great deal of watercress, some crisp roots, a little sorrel, some tender goosegrass and a few edible flowers. That alone would have convinced Rosa that the old woman was what she seemed to be. She could not begin to imagine her Stepmother recognizing any of that, much less knowing it was good to eat.

Now all that food was inside Rosa; she sat combing her hair, working the tangles and knots out with a comb that Maggie had produced from a skirt pocket, while Maggie “Set the kitchen to rights.”

It looked almost like magic. Truly. Somehow Maggie had gotten the ancient mop, which was as stiff as wood, to soften. She’d gone into the cellar and returned with a dirt-encrusted box which she declared with glee had soap in it—and so it did. She had already scrubbed the table, the sink and the counter, and the grime had just dissolved away. It was rather hard to tell, because the wood and stone were so stained and blackened that they didn’t look much different, but if you touched them you knew the difference. Now she was doing the same with the floor.

“This soap is nasty stuff, my duck, strong but nasty,” she chattered. “Wonderful for floors, but not so nice for you, pretty. Old Maggie will just—”

Then she stopped, tilting her head to the side. A bee had just flown in the open door and was buzzing at her. Her face took on an expression of alarm.

“My land, one of those horrible Dwarves is coming!” She bustled over to Rosa, but Rosa was already on her feet, shoving the comb
into her pocket. Her mind seemed a thousand times clearer now, and it was obvious what she needed to do. She took the mop from Maggie, and Maggie whisked out the door.

A few moments later, Coward bumbled inside. He looked about and grunted, threw the morning’s catch on the table, shoved her roughly aside and helped himself to the remains of the porridge in the pot on the hearth. When he had eaten it all and scraped the pot clean, he went out again. A short while later, Old Maggie reappeared and took the mop from Rosa.

“You just get your poor hair unsnarled, pretty,” she said, head bobbing. “And you leave the rest of this mopping to Old Maggie, and after your hair is set to rights, I’ll be cleaning while you deal with those poor conies. Tomorrow I’ll bring you some
nice
soap so you can be getting yourself clean.”

Being clean again sounded heavenly; Rosa worked industriously at the tangles in her hair so that Old Maggie wouldn’t start cleaning the rabbits herself. The closer she got to her head, the fewer tangles there were, so by the time Maggie was about two-thirds done, she was at the butchering. And Maggie kept chattering.

“Trust me, my duck, we’ll work on getting that shackle off and getting you away. But that takes doing, and Old Maggie will have to be at some hard thinking, and you, too.” The mopping was done, and so was the butchering. The two of them added the meat to the simmering vegetables; after some consideration, Maggie threw in a couple handfuls of flour.

“That’ll thicken the broth so it’s more stew and less soup. Fill them up and make ’em less likely to beat you.” The old woman held out her hand for the comb, and with a sigh, Rosa handed it to her. “You might boil those shirts with that soap. They won’t look any better, but they’ll stink less. I’ll be back in the morning, ducky, yes I will. Old Maggie keeps her promises!”

The old woman moved faster than Rosa would have thought she could. She was out the door and out of sight around the front of the cottage before Rosa got into the garden.

Her throat got tight for a moment when she realized she was alone again. She might have cried…

But she fought back the tears and straightened.
Some
sort of help had finally come. It wasn’t a handsome prince, or a brave shepherd, or a wise hunter. But it was help, and it was welcome, and if Old Maggie was just a little crazy, she was also very clever. A handsome prince probably wouldn’t be able to beat the craft of her shackle, either, and would have done nothing about the floor, her hair or her empty stomach.

On the whole…if The Tradition had finally elected to do something for her, it could have done a lot worse than Old Maggie.

Rosa went and got a spoonful of that harsh soap, stirred it into the kettle outside and put the shirts back in as the old woman had suggested.

Siegfried von Drachenthal stood over the remains of a boar roughly the size of a horse—or rather, leaned against the spear that was still sticking out of said remains. As Heroing tasks went, it had been an average one, but that didn’t mean it hadn’t been a tough fight. He was looking forward to a big flagon of mead and a slice of this fellow, nicely roasted and served with applesauce. And a bath. Definitely a bath.

The peasants whose lands had been ravaged by the Black Boar of Brimsdale approached with commendable caution. They hadn’t really believed it when Siegfried had promised he would kill it.

The astonished looks on their faces were quite gratifying.

“You slew the beast!” the village mayor said, gaping at it, then him, then it again.

“I said I would.” He shrugged. “It’s what I do.”

“How can we ever repay you?” blurted an old woman whose fields had been ruined. “You’ve done what the King would not!”

“Could not, Mother Crey,” the mayor admonished. “The King can’t be in two places at once, and there’s war a-brewing again. He’d have come if he could. He’s done so before, and you know it well!”

Now Siegfried straightened, and let go of the spear. This was news to him, and truth to tell, good news. Here he had been doing this King a disservice by assuming he was just a neglectful monarch. But a war—that meant more work for a Hero. And it was a good reason for the King to be busy. “War, you say?”

Many heads nodded. “We’ve greedy neighbors,” the mayor said bitterly. “They’d like nothing better than to swallow us whole—”

He looked as if he was going to make a good long speech, but Siegfried raised his hand to stop him. “Then this is what you can do to repay me. Give me a good meal, a soft bed and provisions, then set me on the road to the King’s hall. And tell me about this war while we eat.”

The peasants gaped, as if they couldn’t believe they were getting off that lightly. The mayor especially had a look on his face like a stunned calf. “But—”

Siegfried patted him on the shoulder. “There’s a good fellow. I am a Hero. This is what I do. And right now, I am a hungry Hero and one in great need of a bath, as well. So let’s have a feast and you can tell me about your land and its troubles. Besides—” he laughed “—Kings can afford to pay better than farmers. I shall tell him about the Boar, and let
him
reward me.”

Now he was speaking words they understood; well of course he was going to claim a big reward, but it would be from the King and not from them. With a shout of approval, some went for a cart to carry off the Boar, while the rest carried Siegfried off in triumph to the Inn where the bird waited, perched on the rooftop, singing happily.

The next day, as soon as Coward left for his rounds, Rosa went out into the garden. This time Old Maggie was preceded by a veritable
cloud of bees that swarmed around the garden and through the cottage before vanishing. Maggie appeared a moment after they had left.

“They’re my little clever guardians, ain’t they, then?” Maggie said triumphantly. “And if they
find
some nasty old Dwarf a-lyin’ abed, well! All
he’ll
think when he sees bees is that they’re a-swarming, and all he’ll think to
do
is to hide himself under the blanket lest he get stung!”

She cackled, and Rosa managed a laugh, herself.

“Now!” The old woman had a much bigger basket this time, strapped to her back. Out of it she pulled an old, threadbare, but immaculately clean shift, which she handed to Rosa, and a chunk of pinkish-purple soap. “Off with them clothes, pretty, and put this on. Into the cauldron with them and a piece of this—” She handed Rosa the soap. “No need to boil, just get the water warm, like, and then we’ll stir, stir, stir.”

Rosa scrubbed and rinsed, scrubbed and rinsed; wished she could wash her hair, too, but at least it wasn’t matted up like a wild sheep’s wool. Finally, as she put the shift back on over skin so clean it felt new, she asked, “Have you heard any news? I heard that the King has a new wife—”

“I only hear what the bees tell me, and they don’t care for Kings nor Queens, no more what they do,” Maggie said dismissively. “Nor should you. Kings and Queens and their doings ain’t for the likes of us.”

Disappointed, Rosa agreed rather weakly. The two of them got to work on the minimum that the Dwarves were likely to expect, which was finished in plenty of time for them to take the slightly damp clothing, mend the tears with needles and thread that Maggie produced from her basket, and for Rosa to put it on again before Coward made his lunchtime appearance.