Poul Anderson - A Midsummer Tempest

It was a tartane, sharp-snouted and bowspritted, rigged with a jib and a lateen mainsail. That made it less handy than the Dutch jachts Rupert knew; but a boom would have crashed onto an outsize crate near the middle of the mostly open hull. Boxes and casks of supplies left scant room for two men to stretch their mattresses. This was a noon-tide of white-streaked violet waves beneath a thrumming breeze and overwhelming sun.

Will Fairweather had the helm. At the port rail, feet braced wide apart, Rupert wielded an astrolabe. A sudden yaw nearly threw him. Canvas banged. “The Devil snatch thee bald!” he roared. “Three days o’ this, and still thou canst not hold her steady as she goes whilst I take a sight?”

“She be navigated to start with,” Will answered sullenly, “aye, gaited liake tha drunkest navvy thou e’er didst meet. There be hone o’ thic black magic thou maekest in thy tools an’ charts an’ almanacs an’ scribblin’ o’ logarhymes—there be none of it goin’ to do moare’n show us where we war. No tellin’ where this slut’ll be. “

“The fault, brute steersman, lies not in her spars but in thyself.” Rupert sighed. “However, I admit to a less than masterly job of placing us. Was there no modern equipment anywhere in Tunis? Had I even a decent timepiece, let alone one of those new-invented sextants—”

“What? General, I doubt anybody’s invented aught new in thic line zince Zodom an’ Gomorrah.” Will wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Three days we been faerin’? Three liafetimes, moare like.”

“I’d spend them if necessary—and if we had them. As’tis, we can take perhaps a month casting about, nigh sure to be futile, before the fall storms force us ashore.”

“Aye, zo thou’st zaid. An’ than we return to fiaght, eh? From what tha English ambassador’s butler toald me, our King’s cause won’t zelebrate another Christmas. Which means nobody can. How be liafe in Holland?”

“They’re tolerant of religion, if not of whatever might stand in the way of their merchants’ profits.” Rupert spoke absently, while taking the sun’s altitude and recording it together with clock time and compass bearing. “On that account, I fear the machines will overwhelm their land within few years.”

“Well, I hear it be flat, open, an’ even wetter nor England. I listened once to zome Dutchmen talk. Why be it tha French be called frogs? I swear nobody can hoot, hawk, an’ gargle thic language what ha’n’t got a built-in coald in his throat. Thus, small loss, a countryzide what never held any magic.”

“But it did,” Rupert said low. “It does to this day. The sorcerers bear names like Frans Hals or Rembrandt van Rijn—”

“Hoy!” Will shouted. The instruments clattered from Rupert’s grasp.

A flash overhead had become a boy, tiny but perfect, who skimmed on butterfly wings and chimed forth laughter.

Will let go the helm and grabbed for his sword. Rupert waved him to stay seated. It blazed from the prince: “What apparition art thou, and from whence? No angel, surely—we’re not worthy that—but know, if demon, we are Christian men. Yet if a messenger from Faerie land”—he lifted his arms—“behold the ruined lodestar which I bear. I freely own my fault, and to thee, elf, plead for my King alone, not for myself.”

“Art thou indeed Prince Rupert of the Rhine?” the sprite teased. “She called thee taciturn, a warrior. So dost thou boom like this for want of cannon?”

Rupert let his hands drop, empty, and said wonderingly into the wind: “She?”

“Jennifer Alayne—” the figure seemed to enjoy seeing them thunderstruck, but went on in a brisk tone: “who asked I seek thee when thou wert safely far from other folk, and bring thee to the island where she is. I’m Ariel, who once served Prospero.”

“Her?” Rupert choked. “Jennifer?” The fullness of wonder was more quick to break upon Will. “Thy luck ha’ turned at last—turned zouthward, for she’s ever been thy luck.” He sprang to slap his master’s roughly-clad back. “Let’s uptails all—whate’er one does on boats, liake bilge tha strakes, belay tha mast, rake yards, bound mains, whate’er will maeke this damn thing move! If zuch a girl awaited me, I’d faere on bugle winds, wi’ sheets o’ flaeme for zails.”

“Aye,” said Rupert. “Oh, aye… But we must render thanks to God.”

“First set my course and get well under weigh,” Ariel advised. “I’ll reappear from time to time to guide thee, although the zephyr’s fair and will improve. Tomorrow late thou’lt come unto the isle and Jennifer.”

Pointedly: “Why dost thou never smile?”

“How came she here? I thought her safe, I swear!”

“I promised, ere I soared into the air, no other lips than hers would tell thee this.” Ariel gave Rupert a long and thoughtful regard before he added: “A very unpretending kind of kiss.” Comet-like, he rushed high and ahead, pointing. “Steer yonderwards!” he cried.

“This time thou shalt not miss!”

A bay faced west to where the sea burned and shimmered with eventide. It was as if the forest behind the beach drank down those level beams and gave them back in a glow of its own. The heights further on were tinged lilac. Woodbine fragrances passed through salt freshness. Little save drowsy bird-voices broke the quiet. High overhead went a flight of wild swans.

Rupert’s boat could not be drawn ashore as readily as Jennifer’s. He cast anchor in the shallows, leaped overside and waded to her. Save for the mangled hair, she had cast off the marks of her journey. The boy’s garb was scrubbed clean, its darkness relieved by a wreath of marigold. Her hands were crossed before her and silent tears ran down her face.

Neither of them heeded hovering Ariel or squatting Caliban. Rupert strode to tower above her and whisper in his helplessness: “Why dost thou weep, most dear?”

“For pain of joy,” she said as softly and unevenly. “Too much of joy is riving me apart and kindling every fragment that it strews, to make me into stars and crown thy brow.”

“Nay, thou’rt my queen, and I a beggar come to ask thy healing touch, here where I kneel”—he sank before her—“in tatters of buffoonery and pride. If thou wilt cure me of my faithlessness, and then bestow the customary coin—thou canst well spare it, for thy treasury strikes endless burnished ones like it each day, and’Honor’ is the stamp—why, I will then begin to understand what’s royalty.”

“O Rupert, raise thy heart!” She stroked his bent head, over and over.”’Tis no more right that thou be humbled than the sun. Arise.”

“That burnt-out ring upon thy finger there burns me into the brain,” he mumbled.

“Pray, pray do not make me rip loose and cast away thy sign! The hand itself would come off easier.” She tried hard to laugh. “Though if thou must in truth reclaim this ring, why, take the hand therewith—and all things else.”

Then he summoned courage to stand and offer her his embrace.

Caliban growled. “Go easy,” Ariel warned. “She’s not for the likes of thee.”

The monster slumped. “I know.” Shyly: “She touched mine arm this afternoon. Right here it was. I’d brought her oranges. She smiled and thanked me, and she touched me here. I went away and bellowed for an hour. Yet… nay. I’m old and ugly and foul-humored. That is the strangest thing, this being trapped—not in this body or the rot o’ years—that doesn’t matter much; but in my soul.”

Will’s disembarkation took his mind elsewhere.

“Ha, ha, I’m not the only freak around!” he hooted. “Who’rt thou that walkest thin as sparrowgrass behind yon red cucumber of a nose?”