The Summer Child

"I will, king."

"Then go. Wait for us at the river's edges. She will need looking after when it arrives. You are the man to do it."

*

The sun came up. It climbed, dipped and fell. The hours between the two men standing there in the forest, and a nervous Hunter letting his horse paw the wood of the bridge connecting the shores of the North and Summer land, might have passed in a matter of seconds. The king certainly could not account for the time; he rode his black charger, River, and breathed hard as if fighting the very air. No one but him could see the black tide, or how he, weak and thin compared to the fiends, persevered.

As for the girl, what would she remember that wouldn't seem the stuff of nightmares? A morning's walk, a sunny field, the flowers all around blown flat by the breeze of a dark war horse, a blight across the sun, an armored hand reaching down...

And then, hours later, an old wain rumbled to the road's end, to the only bridge that connected the brother kingdoms, one day and the other like night. Hunter met the driver.

"How is she?" he asked, and the driver shrugged. The escort—two riders on equally inky steeds, flanked the wain as Hunter dismounted. He went to the covered wagon, and put his hand to the covering. He hesitated. "Where is the king?"

"Coming along soon," said one of the escort. "He rode back to see if we were followed."

Hunter nodded. Then, deciding, he pulled back the covering.

So it was the knight who first beheld the work of the magic—the curse or blessing. For what lay in the wagon was not the child, but a youth passed maidenhood, well into woman years. Or so one viewing told him. When she raised her head, he realized she was still, in some ways, a child.

He caught his breath. The body was longer, would stand taller, was more of a woman's and less of a child's. The skin was pale as moon milk. But most telltale and strange, was the color of her hair: dark brown deepening to a loam like color, not at all like the sunny wheat that caught the haloed light the night before.

"What magic is this?" he breathed, amazed. Then, hearing hoofbeats on the road, he let the cover fall over the dazed captive, and signaled the wain on.

"What is it, Hunter?" The king asked a few moments later, when he came riding up on the midnight colored horse.

"It's the curse," Hunter said. "It's begun."

*

When they first entered the kingdom of Winter, it was snowing. Kyri would remember this, if nothing else from that day of nightmares. From the time the hand of the king touched hers, grabbing her arm as she thought to wave in passing, and throwing her across River's pommel, she remembered only darkness. Even Hunter's face, worried as it took in the change that crossing into winter had made in her, was vague. But snow...She had never seen snow, coming from the summer country, and she watched it fall soberly as a child. She was no child any longer though, the king noted when she was handed down from wagon to sleigh. A whip cracked, and the journey was a blur again—not of summerland gold, but icy white.

At the last of twilight, moments before Kyri would have frozen even under the furs, the sleigh drew nigh unto the castle. The girl-almost-woman gazed up at the towers shining with ice on stone, and the king spoke his first words to her as he guided the horses in through the tall double gates.

"Your new home."

She didn't hear the words then, only gazed up at the king, unseeing. She was taller now, he knew, and full blossomed into womanhood. Whatever magic, or curse had wrought this, the king could only guess. But she was now as black haired and buxom as her mother. It amazed him, though, how she still moved and thought like a child. She cried out when he went to draw her to her feet, and then moved awkwardly on legs with newfound height. But the magic was not done, and when her foot touched the snow bank further transformation came. It was subtle—a shifting of features, a new elegance to the chin, a new grace to movement. She stood uncertainly in the courtyard, shivering, but other than the involuntary look of confusion and flinching movement away from any guard's guiding hands, she was composed. Her hands where gathered at the base of her cloak's hood, holding it tightly around her face as if the snow would burn her if it touched her skin. When a house steward finally approached her and showed her, with a sweep of his hand, the way through the courtyard mud to the door, she regarded him regally, and strode toward the door without any assistance.

Once she had entered through the large iron barred doors, she stopped, less sure of herself. The castle was truly a fortress, built of stone and allowing little to warm its ice grey interior.

"This way, princess," the steward tried to guide her, but she paid him no heed. Uncertainty on her face, almost like a look of pain, the girl stepped towards the nearest wall. She put out her hand and touched the block. This time real pain did cross her features, and she drew away her hand as if the rock had burned her skin.

"Who built this place?" she asked.

"My lord did," the steward said.

Just then the winter king swept inside, followed by his guard. The black look on his face and the rigid backs of the men told the steward that some mistake had been made. He swallowed hard, hoping it was not his.

But his lord barely saw him, barking an order for his horse to be cared for, along with his raiders.

"Bring hot wine," he said.

"My lord," the steward began, and then realized his first blunder. Eyes like flint turned on him. Again he swallowed. But the king was looking past him, towards his new ward.

"How shall I treat our guest?"

"Take her to the east chamber," the king ordered. "Keep her there until I send for her."

"Under guard?"

A tight nod from the king. Two of his own retinue stepped apart and went to stand beside the young prisoner. She barely noticed them, looking as she was up at the snow streaked window. There was no expression on her face as she gazed into a grey winter sky. Her forehead was white as winter sable, but cheeks burned as if with fever. Even as the king was watching, she shivered.

"Will that be all my lord?" the steward inquired.

"No," the king hesitated a moment. "Keep her warm." And the winter king moved on.

*

The east chamber was made of stone, but at least there was a fire. She was unwrapped from the furs, and left to move as she would, knowing full well that the two men in black armor who waited by the door were there to stop her escape. The steward offered her hot wine, and she shook her head, moving with grace towards the fire. The hearth was a place of love for her, where her mother and she would sit for hours... Here there was only bare stone—cold and barren. The wood of the fire was strange, twisted and old, burning along with some black substance.

She was about to sink onto what she thought was a fur rug, and then it rose to greet her, tail wagging.

"His name is Circ," the steward said from the door, as the beast surged forward to sniff and lick her face. It stood nearly as tall as she. "He's the king's favorite," the man said dryly, before exiting the chamber to send for food. By the time he returned the girl had been long asleep before the fire, head on the great dog's back, tears dried in the fur of the silky ears.

*

The sun continued to shine down on the land of summer. Nothing marked the trip of a child, a mere girl, across the river, but the sadness of a flock of tan youths who had lost a playmate. And, of course, a long, moaning cry of mother's loss, passing through a black mourning veil and continuing with the throbbing heartbeat of sobs. But the Summer king, hearing of the loss, waved his hand casually to the messenger. "Send word to all corners of my kingdom," he shifted idly on his throne, "Oh, tell my brother, too." Nothing more was done, for who marks the endless weeping of a mother, or her fierce insistence that wrong has been committed? Does anyone really notice when a small farm in the exact center of a country slowly loses its matron, as she grows mindless with grief and eventually, fades away?

Time passed, and second harvest came to the land already blessed with bounty. Workers went out into the fields daily; the men stripped of their shirts until sweat licked off of bronze muscles. The same sun, hot as a furnace, sank over the snowy northern hills, carving a black silhouette of a horse and rider, laboring through the land. The horse was black and called River, after the surest boundary line between paradise and hell. The king rode as always with a face of stone, pausing only moments at the tattered communities lining a tributary.

"Doing any planting?" he asked a husbandman out fixing a fence post. A surprised look arrived on the hard bitten face, and the man shook his head. The king dismounted, coming to ask about seeds and different types of wheat. The answers he got were stunted, lifeless as the few stalks in the field—killed by late frost. The peasant kept his eyes lowered, and finally ended, "This is not the land for growing." A lowing from the barn urgently called the farmer away. The king almost smiled.

"New calf?"

The man's face was still grim. "Aye. My best milker dropped the calf mid-storm. Barely saved him in time."

"But he sounds alive," the king said.

"But his mother—" the farmer shook his head and turned away. "Begging your leave, my lord."

With a wave of his hand, the king gave it, and watched him go. Then, with heavy movements, he swung up onto River, and rode on.

The flowing form of River passed huts and smoking piles of debris, stripped from the logs the loggers would float once the thaw came with the river ice snapping and crackling loud as a whole forest of trees falling. But after thaw, too soon after, there always came another frost, worse than before. So the months had always continued—false spring, endless winter. River passed through the hills, blowing hard as he plowed through snow. The king visited mines, where iron made a cold harvest. Finally returning, he passed a low building on the edge of a small town, where the dead were brought out and dried, stiff to wait until the ground thaws for burial. Further north, the king knew, the ground never thawed and the people burn the dead in great stinking piles— unless the Vargs got to them. Too many died—young and old, though rare was a white haired man alive to see grandchildren. Most men worked in the mines or as loggers; the few who raise families and try to farm end up like the husbandman, at the bitter end of luck.

The turrets of the castle pierced the sky as River pounded home. The king's jaw ached from clenching it in anger. Returning the salute of the guards, he rode straight through the courtyard, and let River leap up the steps. They rode all the way up into the hall, to the foot of an iron throne.

"My lord," said a steward, magically appearing, with a page boy holding hot spiced wine. "I trust your journey went well."

The king dismounted, and took the hot wine to his throne. River looked around, seeming at ease in the throne room. He stamped and whinnied; snow and mud flew off his hooves. The steward wrinkled his nose, but the king was ignoring anything but the hot wine.

"The castle has kept well since your departure. A messenger arrived from the king your brother and the knight Hunter. The summer king announces his regrets that you could not attend the first spring hunting party, and inviting you to another. Hunter's message is this: as instructed, told summer court you were busy guarding your borders to the north from the Vargs. A second message was sent from Hunter in code: it seems the king is searching for kidnappers, and may soon request to cross the summer/winter border."

"Was that all?" the king's rough voice startled the steward's rote.

"Not quite, my lord," under the suddenly intense royal gaze, the steward tried to get back into his speech, "Ahem, the kitchen in lower south basement has flooded again, and the head cook—"

"No, no, is that all to my brother's message?'

"Why, yes, my lord."

"Good." At this, the king lapsed into thought. The steward opened his mouth and then hesitated. The king's iron profile didn't encourage any more reporting. He looked back at the page boy, who was no help, as he was also facing trouble, being nuzzled by a magically-colored, oversized warhorse. The steward was about to clear his throat, when the king beat him out.

'Where is she?" the king rasped.

The steward thought quickly, "She... does my lord mean the princess?"

"What did you call her?'

"The princess... well, no one knows if she is, but the women called her that and it did become easy to just say..." the steward's talk withered under the king's stare. "She is in the east wing, where you placed her. She is well enough, if cold. She rarely moves from the fireside...

"Yes, my lord." The steward sighed. He glared at the pageboy, who was trying not to whimper too loudly at the huge horse teeth near his right ear. River was getting hungry.

"Shall I send for men to take River to his stable?" The horse was now contentedly chewing on the page boy's collar.

"No, I'll take him myself." The king finished the wine to the dregs and stood. Melting pieces of snow fell on the floor. "But first..."

*

The princess' arrival, as those in the castle began to call her, was marked little in the land of winter. Few knew her, even fewer knew who she really was. Winter had left its mark on her; she had been the one who changed. But the east tower had transformed a little since her arrival, if mainly by the servant's hand. Tapestries with soft colors hung over the stone walls, and the fire was always built up to almost roaring. On the carpet before the hearth, Circ and the captive were a permanent fixture, often napping together as firelight played off the shining, dark hair and mottled fur, thick as a wolf's. Thus the steward expected to find them when he knocked on the door, discreetly.

"Princess, the king requests the pleasure of an audience with you." he called. Two faces emerged from the pile on the rug, but before they moved far, the door opened fully and the king walked in, the steward following behind, nearly bumping into his lord when the king stopped short.

"What is that?" Circ reared up onto his four paws and shook sleep off.

"Ah, yes," said the steward. "She's made friends with...the wolf."

"What?"

"You know, my lord, that half hound, half varg you whelped yesteryear..."

"Ah yes." The king held out a hand and called, "Circ." With a happy look of a horse-sized puppy, the half-wolf padded over to lick the king's palm. "Well, well. He's certainly big enough to fight off a legion, if any one comes for her. Well done." The king straightened from his first greeting and looked at the object of his second. The form rising in the firelight was taller than he expected—among other things. The profile under the fall of raven dark hair took his breath away.

He had forgotten how she now looked.

The steward tried to pay heed to decorum. "My lord, this is the princess..."

"Kyri," said the woman. "That is my name. Did you know it before you took me?"

The king was speechless. There, in this new creature's face, was something of the sharp edge he could see in his own mirror. What more had Winter wrought in her?

"Well? Why do you stare now? You have been gone long enough."

"My lady, my absence was not meant to slight you."

"Oh, it didn't." The tone of voice said that she thought he hadn't been gone long enough.

"I came to see if you were well."

"Freezing slowly as a captive in a foreign land? I suppose I am well enough."

"Perhaps you need a cloak," the king said, concerned. On cue, the steward handed a woolen wrap to the king, who in turn moved forward to place it on the girl's shoulders. Kyri's expression was smooth as if she did not want to show fear, but a gasp slipped out when he touched her, and he remembered that she still, underneath all this, was a child.

"Please don't touch me," she said. "You're cold." Under the fear and helplessness in her voice there was a little irritation.

The king stepped back, a stern look on his face where, a fraction of a second ago, there had been a hurt look. Kyri tried to tell herself that no such hurt look was there, but she could still see it in the iron corners of his face, the bitter touches of pain.

I don't need to feel sorry for him, she told herself. If it weren't for him I'd be free.

"I know you hate me," he said as if reading her mind, "but I brought you here for a purpose. This land is cursed with never ending winter. My people are dying."

Kyri fingered the red wool carefully. "I don't know what you want me to do about it."

"You have the power to bring things to life. You can save my kingdom."

For a moment, the light from the fire crossed a young face, wistfully thinking of a return to the life she had led. But then the eyes fell on the stones, and the ice on the windows without, and froze. She said coolly, "I must thank you, my lord, for paying me a visit. I consider it not so much kindness, but the concern of a captor for his precious hostage. I am, despite almost freezing, still alive. You may leave, now that you assuaged your guilt." She turned her back on the king.

From the king's silence, she wondered if he really was considering. Then, suddenly, a hand was laid on her arm, twisting and pulling her back around. The furious face of the king stared down at her.

"You dare speak of being frozen in this heated room, with servants to bring you all you need, while my people huddle on the wastes dying? You who could save them?" He released her; she was too frightened to speak. Beside them, Circ whined anxiously while his tail lashed his hindquarters, but he was too obedient to intrude.

"Go and ready my sleigh," the king said to the steward. Then, turning back to the girl, "Get a cloak, or coat, or any thing you have to wear. Otherwise you really will freeze."

"Where are you taking me?" the girl said, terrified. All sarcasm was gone. The king nearly relented, then, and again, when the girl stepped outside, and cried out again, her tears turning to dots of ice. But the king remembered the bodies stacked, waiting for burial, and continued. He drove the horses into the woods, Circ following until the sleigh's speed left him behind. The princess watched his form fade into a black dot. The sleigh followed a road that plunged into the deep forest, going past black trees and white snow for miles and miles. The only sound was the hard blowing of the horses. Finally, the king slowed them.

"This is due north," he shouted. He stopped the sledge and then turned to see if she was still alive, for it was truly freezing. As for him, he felt no cold.

Under the furs, in her red wrap, the girl stirred. Her lashes were white with the frost of her tears; her lips blue. Silently, the king pulled her to her feet. This time, she did not protest his touch. Together they left the sleigh.

Around them the trees formed a circle, their trunks ending in mounds and mounds of white.

"This is my palace," the king said, throwing his arms wide. "These are my gardens, my blooms. This is my harvest," he bent down and, with his heavy gloved hand, fingered the powdery snow. "This, princess, is what you must change...this is what you must fix."

At last the lips chapped with cold opened. "I cannot. How can you give me this command? I am a child."

"You are no longer a child," he said, looking down at the dark head. It came nearly to his chin, now.

"Yes, because of you," she said bitterly.