Deerskin - Robin McKinley

It will be better when she is married and gone.

"The princess, as I say, is to be married!" And the king gave a high-pitched giggle as he said it; and then all the court truly was uneasy. "It is high time she was married, for she is a woman grown!" And he stroked her arm in a way that made many members of the court look away, although they would not have admitted why, even to themselves.

"The princess, furthermore, is to be married very soon; the sooner the better."

The king's voice, too loud, boomed out over the heads of his people. The candles flickered, as if in response; people's gazes flickered, the expressions on their faces flickered. "I have set a great machinery in motion today, this morning, to have all this great land in readiness for the most magnificent celebration any of us has ever seen! I decided upon this thing last night, at the ball, as I beheld the princess for what seemed to be the first time; and I realized there was no time to waste. And so I set about the work this morning before dawn."

A sense of dread had settled on the company no less profound than that which lay upon the princess, who still stood silent, facing her father's people, suffering his hand upon her arm.

"For in the princess's face I have seen a thing more glorious than any I have looked on before in the long years of my life: I have seen my youth returned to me, something no man ever thinks to behold, something no man-ere now-has ever been granted. In three days' time we shall celebrate the wedding of our beautiful, beloved princess, Lissla Lissar-but it is not only your princess's wedding you shall celebrate, but your king's as well-for I shall be her bridegroom!"

Lissar fainted. She swam back toward the light again, fleeing from the roaring of invisible monsters who seemed to press close around her. She thought briefly that one of them had seized her right arm-the arm her father had held-which ached fiercely. But as she opened her eyes she realized that it was only that she had fallen on that side, and bent the arm painfully under her; and she noticed further that her shoulder ached, as if wrenched, and she guessed that her father had not wanted to let her go.

For a moment she could not move. It seemed her trapped arm held the rest of her captive; she was twisted in such a way that for a moment there seemed no way to begin the untwisting. She lay, blinking, her mind, still confused by the roaring of the monsters, failing to make sense of what she saw; the rippling of hems and the strange, abrupt, unconnected motions of shoes and boots bewildered her.

Very near her eyes was a narrow dark shape with a slightly irregular outline, like a table-leg, perhaps; she had the sense of something suspended over her, something not too high or far away, and of the presence of more legs similar to the first. But they could not be table-legs after all, for the one directly in the line of her slowly clearing sight was . . . hairy. And then the rest of her consciousness returned to her in a rush, and she perceived, at the same moment as she understood that it was a living leg braced in front of her face, that it was Ash's leg, and Ash who was standing over her, that she was lying on the floor of the dais, and that the roaring in her ears was not of invisible monsters any longer, but her father's shouting voice:

"Kill the damned dog! Where are the archers? Kill it! Oh, my darling, my darling!

And I not wearing a sword!"

Beneath his voice, another sound, much nearer her ear: the sound of Ash's growl, echoing through the deep fleethound chest. She sat up at once and grabbed Ash around the neck; no one would dare harm her with the princess clinging to her-said a tiny voice in the back of her head, but it did not sound certain. Or perhaps the archers will come, and will dare to shoot, and perhaps their arrow-points will fall away just the width of a thread, just at the moment of release....

And then her father's voice drowned out the tiny voice. "I will not have a dog about me that behaves so! Kill it! I care not for what you say! I am the king!"

"No!" Lissar climbed shakily to her feet, leaning on Ash, who had stopped growling. Almost. But her ears were still pinned back, and her usual gentle expression was replaced by an intent, almost longing look that every hunter in the room might have recognized; and perhaps everyone but Lissar recalled that the prince Ossin's hounds were renowned for their hunting prowess-and for their loyalty to the person they accept as their master.

"Ash is my best friend! You will not take her away from me!"

The court was startled again, in this morning full of shocks, by the strength of the princess's voice, that little weak creature who could barely stand on her feet, saying such words, and about a dog.... They noticed too that for the moment she was not pale either; her cheeks were flushed and her hazel eyes flashed.

The king, blustering, reached out to lay possessive hold upon his daughter again, but Lissar shied away from his touch, and the tall dog moved not a whit, nor shifted her steady, baleful regard, and the king's hands dropped to his sides again, empty.

"You have three days to say good-bye to your childhood pet, then," said he at last, and there was no love nor gentleness in his voice. "For you shall have it no longer, after the wedding--after our wedding!" He cried the last words like a herald declaring a victory, and struck himself on the chest with a blow so fierce it must have hurt.

"For with the wedding, you shall set aside all childish things and enter into your womanhood, and the devotion you have learnt-and I do not say it was ill learnt-shall now be centered upon me. Upon only me!" And again he smote himself on the chest.

"No," whispered Lissar, and the color drained away from her face again. The roaring returned to her ears, and she staggered a little, but her watchful dog was as still and steady as a marble dog might be. The tall slim fteethound with ankles more slender than the princess's own wrists, and a chest barely more than the princess's hand's-breadth wide, stood as unshakeably as a round stone tower, and Lissar clutched at her, and stood, and did not lose consciousness again.

Beleaguered as she was, Lissar was slow to comprehend the reaction of the court to the events that overwhelmed her. What finally attracted her attention was the lack of archers nocking arrows to strings, should the king change his mind once more and reject a foolish leniency. He had been shouting for archers when she came out of her faint, and the king's commands were acted upon immediately.

Kneeling beside her, she leaned across Ash's silken shoulders as she looked, that she might dispose herself best for her dog's protection. The king had changed his mind; but he had called for archers, and archers should have appeared, if only to be dismissed. But no archers had come. Even his body-guardsmen had failed to draw their swords.

She drew a sharp breath and risked a more complete look around her, turning her head away from her father for the first time, but warily, as if in certain knowledge that she did a foolish thing, that her father was the sort of enemy to attack if watchfulness failed. But because she was herself again now, she recognized what she was seeing: the court was paralyzed in horror. Their faces were blank with shock; but as her eyes sought to catch theirs, their eyes slid away, and horror began to separate itself from indeterminate shock. She saw them begin to decide what to think, and she did not dare to watch any longer; for she feared their decision.

She turned her eyes back to her father in time to hear him say, "Do you,understand me, Lissla Lissar? Three days. On the morning of our wedding, the dog goes into the kennel with the other hounds-where she should have been all along. I have been lax. If there are any complaints of her before or after-then I will have lirr shot after all. You should not be distracted by a dog on the eve of the most important day of your life."