Never After

Chapter 1

Can He Bake a Cherry Pie?
LAURELL K. HAMILTON
The Earl of Chillswoth was a pervert, and everyone knew it. Elinore knew it, and the sensation of his age-spotted hand over her pale young one frightened her more than anything had ever frightened her before, because the earl, though a known abuser of every kind of vice, was wealthy and well connected at court. Her father was neither of these things, because of the small matter of a disagreement with the current king's father about a war. The war was long over, the king's father long dead, but Elinore's father longed to regain his standing at court. It wasn't just for himself, he reasoned, but for his two sons. The fact that the price for saving the family reputation was his only daughter's health, happiness, and body didn't seem to bother her father. Elinore found that... disappointing.
He'd never been particularly affectionate, except in that absent way that fathers have, but she had thought, truly, that he loved her as a daughter. The fact that he had already agreed to marry her to the aging earl, with his hungry eyes and wet lips and overly familiar hands, without so much as, I'm sorry, Elinore, had made her realize that to her father, she was not real. She was not a son, and thus was only something to negotiate with, to use as a bribe, like land, or a fine horse. She was property. Legally, she knew she was, but she hadn't realized that her own father believed it.
Her mother had been deaf to her pleas, and even now sat smiling at the other end of the huge banquet table. It was the celebration for midsummer. It was a time of games, dancing, bright colors, and looking the other way when some of the young girls and men went off by themselves. Many a hurried marriage followed midsummer. Elinore had always been a good girl. She had refused all those handsome young men. She had been dutiful, and pure, and everything a daughter should be. She had her mother's long yellow hair; skin like milk that had never known a hard day in the sun. Her eyes were the color of cornflowers - by far her best feature, so her mother told her. She had her grandmother's eyes - again, so she was told. Her grandmother had been a great beauty in her day, but sadly stubborn. Elinore was even named after that lost ancestress. She'd always been very unlike the dead grandmother. She had been pliable, and look where all that good behavior had gotten her.
The Earl of Chillswoth - "Call me Donald" - leered down the table at her. He was sitting by her father, not because he had the highest rank, but because he was the highest in favor at the distant court of the king. She did not wish to call him Donald, and she did not wish to have her father announce to all that she would be the earl's fourth wife. Or was it fifth? Two of them had been as young as Elinore, and they had not lived to see twenty-five. One had died in childbirth, but no one wanted to talk about what happened to the last one. She'd heard whispers that the old man was becoming unable to perform, and so his desire of the flesh had turned to harder things. She did not understand everything that was meant by that sentence, but she understood enough to know that she did not want to be the earl's fourth, or fifth, wife.
Elinore would rather have lived as an old maid, done her sewing, overseen the cooking, and done what a good wife does. Their keep was small enough, and the time hard enough, that she could actually cook, and sew, and do all the things that made a woman's world. Many noble girls were fairly useless. Elinore liked to be busy, and because her desires were all women's work, no one had ever objected.
She herself had helped arrange the tails on the peacocks, stuffed and cooked and brought lifelike to the table. The head cook had said, "Begging the miss's pardon, but you have a fine eye and hand for the kitchen."
Elinore had taken that for the high praise it was, and not been insulted in the least. She loved the big kitchen, and would have spent more time there if her parents had allowed. She'd been mostly forgotten until she was too old to be mistaken for a little girl. Then, suddenly, it was time to find a husband.
If only she had gone with Bernie Woodstock last midsummer. He had asked her first, but she'd refused, and now he was married to Lucy of Aberly, and they had their first child. Bernie was heir to a fine estate, not as fine as their own, but he and Lucy seemed happy enough, though the baby cried every time she visited. As Elinore watched her father call for silence, and begin to stand, how she wished, she so wished, she had gone off with Bernie last year. Once her father announced her engagement officially, it could not be undone without causing great disgrace to her family.
Elinore rose faster than her father, with his one bad knee from the long ago war. She stood in the silence, and her father said, "Elinore, it is not necessary for you to stand."
"I wish to make an announcement, Father, a traditional announcement for midsummer." She spoke hurriedly, afraid her nerve would fail her.
Her father smiled indulgently at her, probably thinking she would do the traditional maiden's toast for this time of year, for she was still a maiden in every sense of the word.
"I will go rescue Prince True." It was an old saying now, older than the war that had gotten her father in trouble. It was more fairy tale now than truth to most people, for it had been more than fifty years since he vanished. But once, Prince True had been heir to the whole kingdom. Yet as often happens in fairy stories, he had been arrogant and unkind to women. He had declared that women's work was worthless, and only men, and their work, had value. One day, so the story went, a witch overheard him and challenged him to come to her cave. She told him she would prove to him that a woman was stronger than a man. He laughed at her. She accused him of cowardice, and, being a foolish prince, he went to accept her challenge. He was never seen again.
Many men tried to rescue him, but finally a body came back with a note that read, "Only a woman's art can win the prince his freedom." For many years after that, noble houses that had two daughters, or more, would make one or two of them learn to be a man. They learned weapons, and riding, and hunting, and all the things that make a hero a hero. They would ride off in their armor, and never be seen alive again. You could go to the edge of the first moat and gaze down upon the armored skeletons, complete with horses, that had been dashed to their deaths on the rocks below.
No one had tried to rescue the prince in a long time, because his father was now dead, his brother on the throne, and there was an idea that even if a rescue worked, the current king might not welcome his eldest brother's return. But the idea that Prince True was held captive, young forever, tortured by the witch, would occasionally make some brave soul go out, and die.
Elinore had gazed upon the broken bodies once, with her brothers. She'd had nightmares for a week. But she knew the moment the earl cupped her breast with his horrible hand that she would rather die. She knew she could not run away, because her father would find her wherever she went, and anyone who helped her would be hurt. She'd learned that lesson from her cousin Matilda, who ran away once, and bore the scars on her back to this day. Matilda was married and the mother of three, but what had haunted Elinore was not the scars from the beating, but the death of the shepherd boy who had helped her cousin.
No, Elinore would endanger no one but herself, and a true suicide would mar her family's name. But if she went to rescue the prince, then she could die, not marry the earl, and not disgrace her family. It seemed a perfect plan, or as perfect as she could come up with on the spur of the moment.
"Elinore, sit down," her father said, in a tone that had quailed her since childhood. But that tone had lost its ability to frighten her. She had the earl to look at, and nothing her father could do was worse than that.
"I will rescue Prince True, or die in the effort, so I swear by my maid, mother, and crone. May the moon take me, if I lie, and the lightning of God strike any who try to prevent me from this most solemn duty." She said the last looking directly at her father, and for the first time ever, the look of her dead grandmother was on her face, and in the set of her shoulders. Elinore the Younger had found her backbone at last.
Elinore was not brave, but she was not stupid either. She turned from the banquet table and went for the door. She knew that if she did not go now, in front of all these witnesses, her father would stop her. He did not believe in the lightning of God striking the evil. If it did, or could, the earl would have died long ago. She would go now, tonight. It was high summer; the sun was still up, and would not set for hours. She would call for her horse, and she could be there by twilight, and be dead before dark. It was a plan, and it was the only plan she had, so she stuck to it. The trick about such plans is to keep moving, and not think too hard, because if she thought too hard, she might decide that life with the horrible earl would be preferable to death.
It became a parade. Other young nobles joined her on their horses, and in carriages. Her mother tried to dissuade her once, but Elinore gave her such a look that her mother dropped her hand away. Her mother had grown up with that look, out of those eyes, and knew that when the grandmother had that look, nothing could move her from her course. Elinore mounted her white horse, with its sidesaddle, and her mother began to plan the funeral of her only daughter.
Elinore rode at the head of the parade. They sang behind her, the old songs about the other princesses and noble princes who had died trying to rescue the true prince. There was the Lament of Prince Yosphier, very dirgelike. There was the bawdy drinking song of Princess Jasmine. That one always implied she'd run away and joined a circus, Elinore thought, though as she grew older she wasn't entirely sure that Jasmine was performing in a circus, after all. Then there was her favorite, Yellen's hymn to the prince. Yellen was a minor noble daughter, but she had gotten the farthest and pronounced the prince handsome and still young as the day he vanished.
Elinore listened to the musicians and the singing, and hoped they wrote something pretty for her. She made sure she sat the horse well, and let her long yellow hair free of its ribbons so that it flew out behind her, with her horse's white skin, and her pale yellow cloak that she had dyed herself. If she could not be brave, she hoped she made a pretty picture.
They came upon the bridge that crossed the first moat just as the sky was darkening, just at the beginning of twilight, as she had hoped. Elinore had always been a good judge of distances on horseback. If it had been more lady-like, she would've ridden more. Now she wished she had. She wished she had ridden her lovely white mare out in the sun, until her pale skin tanned like a peasant's, and men like the earl would have seen her as headstrong and not worth looking at. Oh, she had so many regrets as she dismounted her white horse at the edge of the bridge. She did not think it possible to have accumulated so many regrets in but seventeen short years, but she had assumed there would be time, so much more time than this.
Servants began to bring up torches to sit at the edge of the drop, and she could see the skeletons far below, by the light of the dying sun, and the coming torches. She actually had turned from the sight of it, her nerve failing. Surely, life was better than this.
Then her father was there, whispering, "You have disgraced me, Elinore, before the earl. If you go to him tonight, before the wedding, then he will forgive all. He will marry you and our family will rise at court."
"You once told me, Father, that to rescue Prince True was another way of saying you would rather die. Well I would rather rescue Prince True than go to the bed of the earl tonight."
He struck her then, laid her low in front of them all. She tasted blood in her mouth, and the world swam for a moment. When she could see clearly again, she looked up at her father, and called out, in a loud ringing voice, "I will rescue Prince True or die in the effort."
"You are a selfish, foolish girl," he said.
"Yes, Father, I am all those things." She got to her feet, a little shakily, for she had never been struck in the face. Whippings, yes, but never this. She straightened her cloak, settled her skirt, resisted the urge to touch the blood she could feel trickling from the corner of her mouth, and said, "Good-bye, father."
She turned with no other word, and went straight for the bridge. She did not look down from the dizzying height to where her body would soon be lying. She did not look at the skeletons and their skeleton horses on the razor-sharp rocks below. She kept her eyes front, her back straight, as a well bred woman should.
Her father called, "Elinore!"
She did not answer, for she had said her good-byes. She was strangely calm, calmer than she had ever been outside of the kitchens. The bridge was wooden, and had no rails, but it was solid and wide enough to drive a large carriage across. She got halfway, when she felt the bridge move. She was already looking at the far end of the bridge, and the small watchtower that marked the end of this moat and the beginning of the second. She did not have time to look up, or look down, or be surprised. She saw the giant step out of thin air, and come striding toward her. He held a huge club the size of the great oak back home. It was just like the songs and stories. The first danger was a giant with a club, and when you fought him, he would smash you to the rocks below.
The bridge swayed and pitched, and she knelt, not out of fear of the coming giant, but because she did not want to fall off the bridge. It seemed important somehow that she should die by the giant's club and not some silly fall. If this were to be the last thing she ever did, she would die well, and, if possible, in such a way to make her father regret his actions. Yes, seeing her fall would be horrible, but seeing her beaten to death by a giant, that well served her father right.
The giant thundered toward her, bellowing. He raised his great club, and at the last moment Elinore closed her eyes. She closed them for a long time, it seemed. She opened them, cautiously, and found herself staring at the giant's ankles. They were very big ankles, big as barrels. She looked up from the ankles and found the giant looking down at her. His club was at his side.
They stared at each other for a moment or two, the girl and the giant. Elinore noticed that the giant's eyes were brown, and the size of serving platters, but they were not unkind, those eyes. They were certainly kinder than the eyes of the earl.
"What is your name?" the giant asked, in a voice like thunder.
She swallowed hard, and then spoke up, so that the nobles watching could hear she'd died bravely. "I am Elinore the Younger."
She got to her feet, carefully, making sure she did not trip on the hem of her skirt. There were still no rails on the bridge, and the giant was taking up a lot of room. She eased past him, holding her skirts up, delicately, wishing she had thought to change out of her dancing slippers and into something more serviceable. Dancing slippers were fine for quick deaths, but if it was to be slow, and there was to be a challenge, then there were other shoes she would have chosen.
When she was on the other side of the giant, and had more room to maneuver, she dropped him a perfect curtsy. "Thank you, giant."
He pointed with a finger the size of a young tree. "Go there, Elinore the Younger. Go there and meet my cousin. Your death at my hands would have been quick. If you fail the next trial, your death will be slow and fulsome."
She curtsied again. "I would rather die quickly, if it's all the same to you, giant of the kind eyes. Could you not kill me now, and save me a slow and fulsome death?"
"No, I cannot, because you have passed my test. Now go, Elinore; go to my cousin, and remember kindness may get you further than anger."
She curtsied again, frowning. "My mother says that it is easier to be kind to begin with, than to apologize later."
"Your mother is wise. Now go, while I keep the crowd occupied."
Elinore looked back where he motioned, and saw that some of the young men, growing brave, had started on the bridge. They were armed with sword and shield. Apparently they had decided the giant could not be as fierce as first thought, if Elinore could pass it so easily.
Elinore went to the other side of the bridge, and the wooden door in the gate. The moment she was off the bridge, the giant charged the noble young men, screaming and sweeping them to their deaths with his great club.
Elinore knocked upon the huge wooden door in the stone gate, to the sound of screams and fighting. She could not fight a giant, or save anyone foolish enough to try. She could only go on.
The door opened, silently, on well-oiled hinges. At first she saw nothing but a stony passageway. Then there was movement at the far end of the hallway. Something shifted in the shadows. She would have said something huge, but she had just seen the giant, and so the ogre seemed almost small.
"Where's your sword, girl?" the ogre cried with his mouth full of sharp fangs, tusks like the boar's head that hung on her father's study wall.
"I have no sword," she said.
"Then where's your ax?"
She frowned at the ogre. "I have no weapon."
"Then it will be easy to kill you."
She nodded. "I suppose it will be."
The ogre ran at her, with an ax that was bright and looked sharp enough to cut stone. Elinore didn't wait, but closed her eyes immediately. Somehow dying from a fall, or a club, had seemed less awful than being chopped about by an ax. She did not want to see it, and tried desperately not to wonder how much it would hurt.
She had her eyes closed for a very long time, but no ax came. She opened her eyes, and found herself staring into the hairy, warty chest of the ogre. His great, gleaming ax was limp by his side. He was staring at her, intently, out of eyes that were almost as blue as her own.
"Are you not afraid of me, girl?"
"Yes, I am," she said.
"Then why do you not fight me, or scream?"
"I am no fighter, and if I am to die this day, I will die without screaming."
He leaned forward with his tusks and teeth, and growled, "I can make you scream."
"Yes, you can. I'm sure you can."
"You say you are afraid, girl, but you do not act it."
"I am Elinore the Younger, and I have come to rescue Prince True or die in the effort."
The ogre gave a harsh snuff, and his breath was not pleasant, as if he'd eaten too much garlic for dinner, but it was not the breath of a monster, just of a very large man. His eyes were not as kind as the giant's, but they were not cruel either.
"You may pass me, Elinore the Younger. My aunt waits for you in the next room. I would have cut you up and eaten you for supper tomorrow. My aunt will eat you while you are still alive." And he leaned in close to add menace to the threat.
Elinore felt her pulse in her throat, because being eaten alive sounded even more awful than being cut up by an ax and cooked later, or knocked off a bridge by a giant, but she couldn't go back. She had to go forward. Surely, eventually, someone would kill her and it would be done.
She curtsied to the ogre. "Thank you, ogre. I hope you have a pleasant supper tomorrow, but I am glad it will not be me."
"You will not be glad," he called after her, "once you see my aunt."
Elinore went to the end of the stone corridor, and found a much smaller door. She hesitated with her hand above the curved metal of the door handle. She really did not want to be eaten alive. That seemed a worse fate than marrying the Earl of Chillswoth; didn't it?
She stood there so long that the ogre came at her back, and asked, "Why do you hesitate, girl?"
"I am afraid," she answered simply; "I do not want to be eaten alive."
"You can go back," the ogre said. "As you passed me and my cousin the first time, you may pass the other way."
She turned and looked at him, and she could not see that her eyes were very blue and very wide, and full of a trust that was rare in one her age. The ogre saw.
"I may truly leave, and you will not harm me?"
"I have said before, you have passed our tests. My cousin and I will not harm you now."
"But your aunt, behind this door, may eat me alive," Elinore said, and she did not try to keep the fear out of her voice.
The ogre nodded. "She will if you fail her test." He touched her yellow cloak with one dirty finger. "Who dyed this cloth for you?"
"I dyed it myself, with the help of servants, but I gathered the herbs for the dye."
Elinore wasn't certain, but she thought the ogre smiled around his mouth full of tusks. "Go forward, girl, if you have the courage. Go back, if you have not, but whatever brought you to us is still waiting for you on the other side of the bridge."
She nodded. "The Earl of Chillswoth," she said.
"I do not know that name."
"If I fail your aunt's test, will she really, truly eat me alive?"
The ogre nodded. "She will. She has. She likes her meat fresh and wriggling."
Elinore shuddered, and swallowed hard enough that it hurt her throat. Was marriage to the earl truly a fate worse than that?
She remembered his hands on her. The moment in the dance when he had not just brushed her breast, but held it, caressed it. Her father would have had any of the young nobles beaten for such liberties, or at least thrown out of the banquet. She remembered how her skin had crawled, and her very being had shrunk from the touch, and the look in his eyes. Was it a fate worse than death? Perhaps not, but Elinore had come to die rather than marry the earl. She would do it. Even if the death were horrible, it would last only moments, and then she would be free. Marriage to that man could last years. She shuddered again, but not from fear of what lay behind the door.
She wrapped her hand around the handle, and said, "Thank you, ogre. You have been kinder than I would have ever dreamed."
"You are welcome, Elinore the Younger."
She let go the door long enough to give him a curtsy; then she opened the door, and found herself in an empty stone room, where the only light was a great fireplace against the far wall.
She hesitated only a moment, then stepped through in her impractical dancing slippers. She closed the door firmly behind her, and faced the empty firelit room. Her moment of fear was past. She was calm again.
"Your nephew the ogre has sent me," she said to the emptiness. "I await your test."
"You sound very brave," said a woman's voice from the shadows.
Elinore swallowed hard again, and could not keep her pulse from racing, but she answered firm enough. She would die bravely for the song they would write about her. It would be a shame to have them write a laughing ballad like they had for the one princess who died screaming.
"I am not certain I am brave, but I am here for your test." She peered into the shadows, trying to see the woman, or ogre, for there was no room for a giant.
There was a shape in the dimness, but it was not a woman's shape. Elinore's eyes could not make sense of it, at first; then the voice's owner stepped into the firelight, and Elinore did scream. She clapped her hand over her mouth to hold in the sound, but never had she dreamt of anything like what stood before her. It was worth a scream, or two.
It was a great predatory cat, the color of ripe wheat, glowing and golden in the light. It padded toward her on huge cat feet. But it wasn't a lion, or even a cat, for the upper part of the animal had breasts and arms, and a woman's face with long, wavy brown hair. Her eyes were the yellow slits of a cat's, but if you hadn't seen the lower part, you'd say she was beautiful.
Elinore stood, her hand to her mouth, and watched the woman-cat pad toward her, in a graceful walk that reminded her of the kitchen cats.
"Do you know what I am?" she asked.