Orson Card - Hart's Hope

Urubugala somersaulted and sprawled on the floor between them. "There are limits on the life of a daughter and a wife!" he cried.

"I know that," Beauty said. "But when my power wanes, I will simply have another child. Next time, I think, a twelvemonth child. Find some wizards, Palicrovol. Have them study that in their books. She laughed then, and compelled Palicrovol to gaze upon her, throwing him into paroxysms of rapture until he sprawled on the floor, exhausted and retching.

As she laughed, a powerful-looking man strode boldly into the hall, carrying a sword and wearing heavy armor, though the helmet was cast away.

"Zymas, run!" cried Palicrovol.

"Oh, stay, Zymas," said Beauty. "Today would not have been complete without you."

Zymas did not pause to listen to either of them, just kept moving relentlessly toward Beauty, his sword rising above his head. He was nearly upon her, and they all knew a moment's hope that perhaps Zymas's direct action was the antidote to this sudden sickness that had come upon the world. But no. Suddenly his hair turned steel grey, his face went old and wrinkled, the sword dropped from gnarled, arthritic fingers, and he staggered feebly under the weight of the armor.

"Zymas, so bold, so brave, is dead," said Beauty. "In his place is the Captain of my palace guard. Craven, I call him. Craven, we all call him. Because he was such a coward that he was afraid of a woman."

Outside the city waited a few of his bravest men, who dressed his naked body and carried him away. A nun was there, and she prophesied that the man who killed Beauty would enter through that same gate. Because of that, Beauty had the gate sealed up, never to be used again.

Within a remarkably short time, the city of Inwit was back to normal and better than normal. All the laws of Palicrovol remained in force, and all the freedoms he had granted remained intact. Beauty ruled gently enough in her city that the people did not mind the change of rulers. And her court became a dazzling place, which the kings of other nations loved to visit. They soon enough learned not to visit Palicrovol's court themselves, for they found that if they gave Palicrovol the honor due him as King of Burland, they would develop the most uncomfortable infections. So they had to send ambassadors, who soon learned to revile Palicrovol whenever they spoke to him, in order to avoid the plagues that otherwise came upon them.

Beauty ruled in Inwit, and the exile of Palicrovol had begun. Yet as the years passed, she knew that her vengeance was empty and incomplete. For with all her abuse, she did not change you, and she did not change your three captive friends. Our flesh she could alter, our lives she could fill with misery and shame, but we were still ourselves, and short of killing us she could not make us other than what we were. We remained always beyond her reach, even though she had us always within her grasp.

The Captive King

This is how a man may be a slave, though he is free to go all places in the world but one.

The Torments or Beauty

Shall I catalogue the suffering of your exile for you, Palicrovol? The foreign ambassadors reviled you, or their bladders would burn when they urinated.

No matter how the cooks labored, all food served to you was covered with mold, all drinks were filmed with slime.

You fenced yourself with wizards, to give you a few moments' respite now and then; Beauty tore away their feeble barriers whenever she chose, and whatever wizard helped you was incapable of coupling from that moment.

You called also upon the priests, even though God had lost all power and was silent in the world; the priests that comforted and honored you all developed huge goiters and tumescences on the head and neck.

For a week she would make you strain at stool, to no avail; then for another week she would give you dysentery, and open your bowels in public places, so that you were forced to diaper yourself out of courtesy to those who kept you company.

You awoke itching unbearably in the middle of the night. You froze in summer, could not bear clothing in winter because of the heat she forced on you. For days terrible dreams would waken you; then for weeks you would doze off even as you sat in judgment, or led meetings of your generals.

One of her worst tricks was to trade vision with you. She would look out of your eyes and see whatever was going on around you, and at the same time you would see whatever she saw within the palace. She did not do it in order to spy on you—she had her Sight, and could sense the whole Kingdom of Burland at will. She did it so that you would be forced to see Weasel being beaten for some offense or other; Craven feebly carrying some burden, or leaning on a serving boy; Urubugala cavorting before a laughing audience of baronets and scions of wealthy merchant families. Your friends, suffering for your sake, and you helpless to save them. So you fashioned golden cups and covered your eyes with them, so that no light could enter at all. That was how you came to be known by one of your names: the Man with the Golden Eyes. They also called you the Horned Man, the Man Who Cannot Be Alone, and the Husband of Far Beauty. And your people were not fooled: You might be Beauty's toy, but you were a good King, and they prospered and lived mostly free, and paid your slight taxes willingly enough, and submitted to your judgment with trust.

Yet, ironically, her plagues did you good as well as harm. You knew if a man stayed to serve you that he was not with you for pleasure or honor, or even because he pitied you or hated Queen Beauty. Those who stayed with you in those hard times, who lived closely with you, and were privy to your inmost thoughts—you knew that they served you either because they knew your heart and loved you or because they loved good government and endured you and the life they had to live with you for the sake of the people of Burland. You had a gift few kings are ever given—you could trust everyone near you.

That good was matched with evil. With bitter injustice, your very justice made it all the harder for you to raise and keep an army—for whose heart stirred to oust Beauty from Inwit, when things went so well for Burland as it was? Only adventurers came to your army, and the Godsmen who hated her for silencing God, and the ne'er-do-wells who had no hope of any other trade. To fill your fifties and your regiments you had to conscript soldiers, which gave you an unwilling, weakish army, on the whole. It was enough to keep the enemies of Burland at bay, but rarely enough for you to hope to overcome the Queen herself.

Three times you brought your army to the gates of Inwit. Three times Queen Beauty let you hope for deliverance. And then she sent terror into the hearts of your soldiers, faced them with whatever they feared most in all the world, and all but the most resolute handful of them fled from your army, and you retreated from the city that you had won from her father so many years before, forced to begin again, ashamed again before the other nations of the world.

The Harts Hour

After three centuries and more of exile, on a day when you wore the golden cups over your eyes, there came a vision to you. At first you thought it came from Beauty, but in only a moment you knew that it did not. You saw the Hart, the great shaggy stag, the one that Zymas had seen. The eagle clung to his belly, holding closed the wound there. And the Hart stopped, and turned his heavy head to face you, and you saw that he wore an iron collar around his neck, and his hooves were also banded and chained, and he bade you follow him, and set him free.

I cannot, you said.

Come, he told you, though you heard no words.

It will do no good, you said. Beauty will see me, and thwart all my works.