Ellen Datlow - The Beastly Bride

“Fräulein von Rothbart. Our fathers would have us dance.”

Elster turned around. She had been right about the uniform. Her heart ached to touch the dark-blue-like-evening wool, the gilded buttons, the medals at the chest, and the thick gold braid on the shoulders. A uniform like that would only be at home in a wardrobe filled with fur-lined coats, jodhpurs for riding with leather boots, silken smoking jackets that smelled of Turkish tobacco. The man who owned such clothes would only be satisfied if his darling matched him in taste.

She lowered her gaze with much flutter and curtsied low.

“I am pleased you wore my gift.” The prince had trimmed fingernails that looked so pink as to possibly be polished. He lifted up one section of the necklace she wore. The tip of his pinky slid into the crease between her breasts. “How else would I know you?”

She offered a promissory smile.

He led her near where the musicians sought to emulate the chirp of crickets at dusk. “So, I must remember to commend your father on his most successful enchantment.”

“Your Imperial and Royal Highness is too kind.”

Three other couples, lavish in expensive fabric and pearls and silver, joined them in a quadrille. As the pairs moved, their feet kicked up plumes of silk leaves. Despite the gold she wore around her neck, Elster felt as if she were a tarnished coin thimblerigged along the dance floor.

“I have an admission to make,” she whispered in the prince’s ear when next she passed him. “I’m not the sorcerer’s daughter.”

The prince took hold of her arm, not in a rough grasp, but as if afraid she would vanish. “If this is a trick—”

“Once I shared your life of comfort. Sheets as soft as a sigh. Banquet halls filled with drink and laughter. Never the need for a seamstress, as I never wore a dress twice.

“My parents were vassals in Saxony. Long dead now.” She slipped free of his hold and went to the nearest window. She waited for his footsteps, waited to feel him press against her. “Am I looking east? To a lost home?”

She turned around. Her eyes lingered a moment on the plum-colored ribbon sewn to one medal on his chest. “So many years ago — I have lost count — a demonic bird flew into my bedchamber.”

“Von Rothbart.”

Elster nodded at his disgust. “He stole me away, back to his lonely tower. Every morning I wake to find myself trapped as a swan. Every night he demands I become his bride. I have always refused.”

“I have never stood before such virtue.” The prince began to tear as he stepped back and then fell to one knee. “Though I can see why even the Devil would promise himself to you.”

His eyes looked too shiny, as if he might start crying or raving like a madman. Elster had seen the same sheen in Odile’s eyes. Elster squeezed the prince’s hand but looked over her shoulder at where she had parted with the sorcerer’s daughter. The art of turning someone into a bird would never dress her in cashmere or damask. Feathers were only so soft and comforting.

When Odile was a young girl, her father told her terrible tales every Abend vor Allerheiligen . One had been about an insane cook who had trapped over twenty blackbirds and half-cooked them as part of a pie. All for the delight of a royal court. Odile had nightmares about being trapped with screeching chicks, all cramped in the dark, the stink of dough, the rising heat. She would not eat any pastry for years.

Watching Elster dance with the prince filled Odile with pain. She didn’t know whether such hurt needed tears or screams to be freed. She approached them. The pair stopped turning.

“Your warning in the coach? Is this your choice?” asked Odile.

Elster nodded, though her hands released the prince’s neck.

The rara lingua to tear the swan maid’s humanity from her slipped between Odile’s lips with one long gasp. Her face felt feverish and damp. Perhaps tears. She called for Papa to take the swan by the legs into the kitchen and return carrying a bulging strudel for the prince.

As a long-eared pother owl, von Rothbart had hoped to intimidate the nobles with a bloodcurdling shriek as he flew in through a window. An impressive father earned respect, he knew. But with the cacophony in the ballroom — courtiers screaming, guards shouting, the orchestra attempting something cheerful — only three fainted.

Von Rothbart roosted on the high-backed chair at the lead table. He shrugged off the mantle of feathers and seated himself with his legs on the tablecloth and his boots in a dish of poached boar.

“I suppose the venery for your lot would be an inbred of royals.”

No one listened.

He considered standing atop the table, but his knees ached after every transformation. As did his back. Instead, he pushed his way through the crowd at the far end, where most of the commotion seemed centered.

He did not expect to find a tearful Odile surrounded by a ring of lowered muskets. One guard trembled so. The prince shouted at her. The king pulled at his son’s arm.

Von Rothbart raised his arms. The faux trees shook with a sudden wind that topped glasses, felled wigs, and swept the tiles free of silk leaves. “Stop,” he shouted. “Stop and hear me!”

All eyes turned to him. He tasted fear as all the muskets pointed at him.

“You there, I command you to return Elster to me.” The prince’s face had become ruddy with ire, his mouth flecked with spittle.

“Who?”

“No lies, Sorcerer. Choose your words carefully.”

The king stepped between them. He looked old. As old as von Rothbart felt. “Let us have civil words.”

“Papa—” cried Odile.

“If you have hurt my daughter in any way—”

A cardinal standing nearby smoothed out his sanguine robes. “Your daughter bewitched an innocent tonight.”

“She flew away from me,” said the prince. “My sweet Elster is out there. At night. All alone.”

Von Rothbart looked around him. He could not remember ever being so surrounded by men and women, and their expressions of disgust, fear, and hatred left him weak. Weak as an old fool, one who thought he could ingratiate his dear child into their ranks like a cuckoo did with its egg.

Only magpies would care for such shiny trappings, and they were sorrowful birds who envied human speech.

He took a deep breath and held it a moment as the magic began. His lungs hurt as the storm swirled within his body. He winced as a rib cracked. He lost two teeth as the gusts escaped his mouth. The clouds painted on the ceiling became dark and thick and spat lightning and rain down upon the people.

Odile stretched and caught the wind von Rothbart sent her as the crowd fled. He took her out of the palace and into the sky. It pained him to speak, so all he asked her was if she was hurt. The tears that froze on her cheeks answered Yes, Papa .

“Von Rothbart!”

Odile looked out the window. She had expected the prince. Maybe he’d be waving a sword or a blunderbuss and be standing before a thousand men. But not the king standing by the doors and a regal carriage drawn by snorting stallions. He looked dapper in a wool suit, and she preferred his round fur hat to a crown.

“Von Rothbart, please, I seek an audience with you.” Odile ran down the staircase and then opened the doors. The king plucked the hat from his head and stepped inside. “Fräulein von Rothbart.”

“Your Majesty.” She remembered to curtsy.

“Your father—”

“Papa is ill. Ever since. well, that night, he’s taken to bed.”