Born to Rule (11 page)

But then, as the moon rode high in the sky, she yawned, and her eyes began to feel heavy. She sat up straighter against the great mass of pillows. She needed to stay awake. She needed to find out if indeed there was a ghost, a spirit that was somehow linked to the bird. Why would it come back now, for a little mute songbird? She had to know. But eventually the words began to blur on the page, her head drooped, and her chin touched the lace flounce of her nightgown. She was asleep.

“Rats!” Alicia muttered as she sprang from her bed. How had she fallen asleep? It was still night, she noticed, as she pulled back the covers and got out of bed.

She went to her window. All the turrets and towers of the castle wore snowy peaked hats. “Winter again.” She sighed. The drawbridge was up, but she could see that the moat had frozen over. There was a brilliance to the night. A glistening white blanket of snow covered the fields. The Forest of Chimes looked as if it were made of lace. The path of moonlight across the snow blazed silver and seemed to beckon her.

Alicia thought about Princess Kinna’s remedy of finding a female weeb on a snowy night. I must go! I must! she decided. There was no choice in the Color Wars’ songbird contest. She was castled and might not be able to participate, but this was about much more than a contest. This bird had to sing, and it was not just so the Purple team could win. No, this was not about Color Wars and winning. This was about something she could barely understand, something she sensed somewhere deep inside of her.

It didn’t take Alicia long to gather what she would need. But like so many princesses, she had never really dressed herself. There were always maids to help with the many layers that a princess had to wear. It began with pantalettes, then went on to shifts and chemises and under-petticoats and over-petticoats and kirtles and gowns. Each had a different system of hooking, tying, lacing, or buttoning. It was impossible to do it alone. Most of these garments fastened up the back.

“Stupid clothes!” Alicia muttered. Her first decision was to turn them all around so she could see what she was doing. Who’d care if she wore the gown backward? No one would see her.

By the time she had pulled on her purple boots, she was sweating. She grabbed her snowshoes and a candle. Just before she was about to slip out of her chamber, she turned to the songbird and said, “I’ll find you a mate, I promise.” Then she turned, pulled up the hood of her cloak, and tiptoed out of her bedchamber and across the floor of the parlor, holding her snowshoes in one hand and a candle in the other.

Chapter 16

CHIMES IN A SNOWY NIGHT

From the South Turret, Alicia descended several flights of stairs. She passed a guard fast asleep at his post. She was walking quickly through the Portrait Gallery when she started to look at the paintings of queens and empresses who had attended Camp Princess.

The guard might be asleep, but not her mum! She could have sworn the eyes in the portrait of Flora Mathilda Elinora, once a princess and now Queen of All the Belgravias, were following her.

By the time she reached the Great Hall, her candle was flickering. There was only a minute left in the wick, maybe less.

Alicia raced across the Great Hall and pulled open the wooden door to the courtyard. As she stepped out into the cold air, the gleaming carpet of snow seemed to dare her to cross. She couldn’t leave footprints. She would have to edge around the courtyard to the blacksmith’s shop at a far corner. There was a gate that could be opened from the inside. This led to a passageway to the banks of the moat. During her swim classes, she had passed right by the door of this passageway. She could see it when she was swimming.

Cautiously she began her journey around the square of snow in the courtyard. Finally she reached the blacksmith’s shop. She went through the gate and then began to thread her way down the winding passageway to the moat. Once there she strapped on her snowshoes. In the blink of an eye, she was across the frozen moat and moving over the snowy field.

The new snowshoes were fast. Soon she was hearing the sound of the chimes. Now, where to begin? Alicia wondered. Where would a small songbird be on a cold, snowy night?

She entered the forest. She wondered if she should just wait and let the birds come to her. If she held herself very still against the tree where she now stood, maybe they would think she was just another part of the tree, just an odd branch to perch on. A very odd one with earmuffs!

The shadows of the branches cast a dark, lacy design on the moon-bright snow. A bell from above fell with a muffled thud into the whiteness at her feet. Alicia saw that the hood of the bell was as thin and delicate as a leaf, yet it had not shattered. What a strange and magical place this was!

As she continued to stand by the tree, Alicia’s vision grew sharper. She could make out the tiniest knotholes in a small tree a few feet away. Might a female weeb be roosting in one of these holes that was no wider than an egg? She peered at the tree. There were two knotholes side by side that looked almost like eyes—rather baggy eyes, at that. Then she noticed a kind of knob between the eyes that could have been a nose.

The bark of the tree moved! Alicia caught her breath as a figure stepped forward. Her heart skipped a beat or two. What in the world?

“Not in the world, my dear. In the Forest of Chimes. That is all. All one needs, some might say.”

Standing before her was a woman, a very old woman, garbed in a tunic of bark and leaves. She was wearing a cloak made of moss, and her long, white hair was caught up in a net of spiderwebs. A spider or two hung about her ears. On her shoulder perched a peregrine, a large bird with a black hood of feathers. Would this crone help her find a female weeb?

“There is much to be done, girl, beyond finding you a songbird.”

On the bones of Saint George’s dragon, how does this crone—Alicia’s thoughts were interrupted by the words of the old woman.

“Now, now, girl, don’t be swearing on poor old Saint George’s beast and don’t be calling me a crone. So, you wonder how I know what you are thinking? It’s my gift, girl, my gift. With some it’s harder to read the mind than others. But you’re clear, girl. Clear as the clapper in the tree bells that chime. You’re true. That is why you were chosen.”

“Chosen? Chosen for what?”

The ancient woman stepped forward. She smelled like pine trees. She was very short—she only came up to Alicia’s chin. Her eyes were colorless but had a bright spot in them. Alicia quickly realized that it was a reflection of the moon.

“’Tis your fate, your destiny.”

“Destiny?” Alicia was completely baffled. “Who are you?”

There was a
kack kack
sound.

“Hush, Percy,” said the old woman. She reached up and stroked the peregrine’s feathers. “I am Berwynna of the Chimes.”

“Berwynna?” Alicia said.

“Think, girl, think hard,” Berwynna said.

Alicia opened her eyes wide. Could this be like…like…Merlin? She had barely even finished the thought when Berwynna shrieked, “Like Merlin! I am the sister of Merlin! But I am nothing like him.” The spiders quivering over her ears hoisted themselves up on their silken threads into the hair that was piled like a bird’s nest on Berwynna’s head.

“Merlin’s sister? I didn’t know he had one,” Alicia said.

“Nobody does. It’s always Merlin this, Merlin that!” Her voice was shrill. “It’s enough to drive one mad.”

Alicia collected herself. Merlin’s sister? Had she not wished for just this very thing? A Merlin!

“What is my destiny?” Alicia asked again.

“You think I’m going to tell you right off the bat?” Berwynna asked.

As if on cue, a bat flew out from Berwynna’s hair. “Yikes!” screeched Alicia, but she pressed on with her questions. “You claim there is much to be done. So what is it that I must do?”

“Look, my dear, you have proven your courage and your determination by coming into the forest on a cold night when you have been castled.”

So she agrees that it was perhaps wrong that I was castled, Alicia thought.

“Of course I agree. What do you take me for, a nitwit?” This time a very tiny insect crept out of her ear.

Holy monk bones, she’s got lice! “Oh, yuck!” Alicia muttered.

“I’m a friend to all creatures. If some decide to live on me, far be it from me to evict them.”

“But what is it that you want me to do?”

“Restless spirits lurk, my dear.” Berwynna stepped closer to Alicia and stood on her tiptoes. The reflections of stars now danced in her eyes. Berwynna smiled and then began to speak in a singsongy voice that scratched the night.

“Now listen closely to my tale

Though it may turn your pink cheeks pale.

There’s still a story incomplete;

Look closely and you’ll see, my sweet.

Two spirits must be put to rest

Until another dream is blessed
,

And then, when every stitch is sewn
,

Evil’s work is o’erthrown
.”

“What?” Alicia was completely confused.

Berwynna sank down from her tiptoes and rocked back on her heels. She folded her arms across her narrow chest and looked at Alicia with a smug little grin.

“Go figure” was all she said.

Chapter 17

A GHOST PRINCESS

When Alicia returned to her bedchamber, the little weeb looked at her hopefully. “I’m sorry,” Alicia said. “I didn’t find a mate for you tonight.” She sighed, and it seemed as if the bird sighed with her.

Alicia looked at the clock on her mantel. It was just before midnight. Not even an hour had passed, but it seemed as if she had been gone for at least three. How strange! Alicia took off her backward clothes, put on her thinking tiara, and slipped into bed. She pulled the covers up to her chin while she stole another look at the clock. Had it all been a dream?

She repeated the strange, tiny woman’s verse until it sang in her head. “Two spirits must be put to rest…when every stitch is sewn”…what could it mean? She looked across to the little bird and felt sorry for him. But a fat lot of good it had done her to sneak out on this bitter-cold night. All she had accomplished was to find a nutty old lady who spoke in nonsense rhymes.

Alicia picked up
Love Letters of a Forgotten Princess
. She had read some of these love letters over a hundred times and could recite many by heart. As she paged through the book to find her favorites, a few words in one of the letters caught her eye, as if for the first time.

“What is this?” she whispered to herself. As she read, Alicia felt her cheeks turn pale.

“Hidden in a turret the tapestry is lost, but its magic can be found between the seconds of midnight’s chimes.”

Alicia’s head seemed to spin with glittering fragments of stories—words, rhymes, verses that began to stitch themselves together with new meaning. Words came back to Alicia. The words of that strange creature made of bark, moss, and magic—Merlin’s sister, Berwynna! “And then, when every stitch is sewn, evil’s work is o’erthrown.”