One Century to Marriage. Prisoners of the Magic Kingdom

Thorns in the heart

When Conrad awoke, Medea Shai was not there. Even the bed was not crumpled where she lay. Her black dragon was gone, too. But the other two, the white one and the amber one, sat unobtrusively in the doorway. They did not interfere with Conrad as he left the bedroom.

Going through the castle in search of the queen was not the smartest thing to do. The enfilades of the hall resembled a labyrinth. After ten minutes, Conrad realized that he would not be able to find his way back to the bedroom on his own. Servants were nowhere to be seen, and the wattles of black roses that abundantly braided the walls and columns proved biting. Conrad almost lost an arm when he caught them.

All that remained was to turn down a dark corridor where there were no roses. True, he had to find his way through it as well. The chandeliers and chandeliers which had previously gnawed at him through the eyes of salamanders were gone. But the keyholes in the many doors let out a measured glow, now azure, now pink and emerald. Behind the doors one might have thought they had locked a rainbow. All of the doors were different shapes and sizes.

The end of the corridor spiraled into darkness and was lost in infinity. Closed doors of fanciful shapes stretched across the entire corridor.

«Let me out! Let me out! I already regret not obeying you.»

«Who are you?» Conrad leaned toward the door, pushing it open, but it was locked.

«Who are you?» Out of the keyhole flashed a frightened, bright red eye.

«I am a man!» The prisoner howled, either enthusiastically or disapprovingly. It was impossible to tell from his tone. «Bend your ear to me! I will whisper something secret to you.»

Probably out of curiosity, Conrad bent down, and immediately a sharp black claw nimbly peeked out of the crevice and nearly pierced his ear.

«Don’t listen to him! Come to me!»

This time the king did not yield, though the summons came from behind a very different door. It was of black metal, and its shape was that of a great sheaf of ears.

«The queen has us locked in here. She forbids you, too. Get out of here!»

He wondered if this was a dream. Conrad even pinched himself. The voice moaned in different ways, as if a whole regiment of different creatures were lurking behind the same door.

«Let us out! And we will tear the villainess to shreds!» The voices of all sorts of tones croaked and muttered.

And only one squeaky voice warned:

«Run for your life! Get away from her! Or you will be imprisoned, as we have been, for all eternity!»

Conrad looked at the fancy door. Were it not for the keyhole, it might have been a bas-relief of black spikes. In any case, it was too small to hold many prisoners, and he could hear a chorus of voices. One hoarse bass in the chorus was surely that of a giant. No more, no less!

Except that it was unbelievable that a crowd of creatures could fit into such a narrow space at once. Behind the door was probably a tiny storeroom, not a room. Conrad tapped the wall, checking by the sound to see if the interior was hollow. There was no echo. The door seemed to have a blank wall.

«Hey, mortal!» That same squeaky voice, apparently belonging to the dwarf, called. «The fairies’ queen has a soft spot. I can tell you where it is.»

Conrad already knew.

«It’s her heart,» he suggested, remembering the night before with Medea Shai. If she hadn’t fallen in love with him, there would have been a bloody battle between them.

«No, it would not!» Someone jumped at the door. «It is Honeydew!»

«What is it?»

«Not what is it, who is it!»

«And who is it?» Conrad scolded himself for having conversations with someone he couldn’t even see. But he was torn by curiosity.

«Honeydew is a living black flower. It can strangle you with its stems if you get close, or it can give you the key to a secret if you ask very hard. Speaking of keys…Medea Shai has a bunch of keys, each with a head the same shape as these doors. You couldn’t steal her key to the door where I’m languishing! It’s the one with the black sheaf notch.»

«Are you alone in there?» Why is the polyphonic chorus here? «It seemed to me that there were many of you inside.»

There was a wheezing laugh in reply.

«How stupid mortals are!»

Conrad took offense, reached for his sword, and realized he did not have his sword with him. If one of the fairies’ queen’s monsters attacked him now, he would not be able to fight back.

«It is at your service!» A voice at the door insisted. «I told you how to overpower her, and you get me the key!»

Conrad wanted to blurt out that he wasn’t a thief, but it would have been nice to ask something first:

«What were you locked in here for?»

There was a long silence on the other side of the strange door.

«So… A minor transgression! It was sorcery against her majesty’s charms. It was trampling her fields.»

«But there are no fields, only black wasteland.»

«This is Shai! You see only a black wasteland, and if the dragons of the queen burn your army, the wasteland will be covered with black sand from ashes like a blanket. The ash from your warriors will pile up into whole barchans. Medea Shai likes to sow her fields with seeds from human bones.»

The man who spoke chuckled like a madman. Maybe he is insane.

«What is going on here? Who are you talking to?» Medea Shai walked down the corridor, rustling her black and scarlet skirts. A living candlestick flew ahead of her, rustling with notches in the shape of golden wings.

Conrad noticed that the train of the fairies’ queen’s new outfit was woven of thousands of black butterflies. It stretched across the carpet, rustling unpleasantly. The butterflies looked as if they had been captured. They also adorned the neckline and sleeves. Conrad couldn’t tell if they were alive or dead? They seemed to be moving their wings, as if they wanted to warn him about something. But he was no longer willing to listen to warnings. The beauty of the fairies’ queen captivated him once more. One look at her face, at the black curls tangled in the shoulders of moths, and he couldn’t think of anything but love.

«I’ve heard that when people start talking to emptiness, it means they’re going crazy.» Medea Shai brushed some butterflies off her sleeve, and they encircled her forehead in a living hoop. «I have a tincture for insanity. Would you like some?»

As Medea Shai approached, the voices outside the door fell silent, as if they were not there at all.

«I heard the ghosts…»

«Believe me, if there were ghosts nesting here, I’d be the first to hear and see them. I love taming ghosts and genies. It’s been my favorite pastime for centuries.»

«Is it several centuries?»

Medea Shai nodded. How old is she? She looks young and beautiful. Conrad had heard that time flows differently for fairies than it does for mortals. Humans tend to grow old and die in a century. Fairies, on the other hand, live forever and never grow old at all. That’s why they are called magical creatures.

«I’m older than you… by a couple of millennia,» Medea Shai noticed his embarrassment and began to calculate her age. «But that doesn’t mean anything. If I like someone very much, I can give them eternal life. And there are still conditions not to go outside of my realm, or you will grow old and die despite my charms. Only within Shai can you live forever with me.»

Forever enjoying the love of a true fairy! How tempting that sounds! But Conrad remembered his responsibility for his people. Even though his kingdom is made up of humans and not immortal creatures, he is responsible for them. And he also has a fiancée! How can he tell Medea Shae about this? Or is it better not to say anything at all? How about forgetting the stunted princess Araminta for the sake of the beautiful black-haired fairy?

Medea Shai reached out and kissed him. She didn’t even have to stand on tiptoe, even though Conrad was taller. She simply flew over the rug and touched his lips.

«Who would have thought I would like a mere mortal so much!» She frowned.

«I am a king, not a mere mortal,» Conrad corrected.

«Kings and peasants are mere mortals to the Fairy people,» Medea Shai told.

Morals are complicated! The aristocrats were considered special in Aluar. They belonged to the upper classes.

Something jerked at the door. Conrad looked around quickly. It felt as if a force imprisoned within was trying to tear all the doors off their hinges.

«Who’s locked in here?»

Conrad counted on an honest answer, but the fairies’ queen pretended not to understand him.

«What makes you think there’s anyone locked in here?» Her graceful eyebrows rose in surprise.

«It looked so to me. Is this place like a dungeon?»

«Are dungeons ever this grand?» Medea Shai grinned.

Indeed! The doors are all shaped like works of art.

«What lies behind them?»

«There are rarities from distant lands, treasures and wonders.»

«And are they not prisoners? Say, punished subjects?»

«I don’t lock up my subjects. They’re loyal enough,» the fairies’ queen jangled a bunch of keys hanging from her belt. They all had whimsical shapes, like the sun, elephant, mermaid, crown, moon, month, sickle, apple, heart. And even a sheaf of ears! The voice at the door was not lying.

«Would you have locked me in here?» He decided to test her.

«Why would I lock up someone who already belongs to me?»

«Someone who loves you,» Conrad corrected. «And how do you feel about me?»

Medea Shai turned on her dragon. He muffled and crawled away resentfully.

«What do you feel for me, not your dragons?» Conrad insisted.

«I love you,» she said, her voice indifferent, but her dark eyebrows rose in surprise.

What’s the matter with her? Can’t she understand her own feelings? And he can’t dare tell her about his fiancée. Or does she already know? They say fairies can read people’s minds.

Medea Shai touched her hand to his chest, and his heart was pierced with pain. When the queen of the fairies took her hand away, a rose with black and red petals was left on his skin. A moment and it dissolved into his skin, but he felt the thorns of its stem pierce his heart. It was painful and sweet at the same time. It was strange that he had survived. After all, if you pierce the human heart with something, people die. Unless, after the nights he spent with the fairy, he got a piece of her immortality himself.

«I propose that we unite,» Medea Shai proclaimed. «You are the ruler of Aluar. I am the lord of magic, dragons and fairies. Together we can build a great state where mortals and immortals can learn to get along together.»

«But you must be my wife to do so…» Conrad shrugged. «I have already tried to make an alliance with one empire.»

«Is it by marriage?» She guessed.

He nodded.

«But you are not married yet.»

«But the wedding has been arranged, though we must hope for Araminta’s frail health. Her physicians said she would not last more than a year.» The illness was a mysterious one, contracted on the magical moors on the road to Aluar. Araminta was summoned from the mire by strange voices, and after that she fell ill. It was said that only a fairy could heal the king’s bride. Fairies were searched all over Aluar and found none. And so, as soon as he met a real fairy, he realized that he no longer needed a bride.

«Don’t be worried!» Medea Shai brushed an unruly lock of hair from his forehead. «I can be your co-ruler without being your wife. Besides, your wife would die in a century, and you yourself could have eternity.»

She added the last sentence coquettishly, but the dragon grumbled unkindly behind her back. Steam billowed from its nostrils and wafted down the corridor. Behind the doors someone sighed, sobbed, whispered:

«As soon as she gets tired of him, he’ll join us!»

But Conrad no longer believed the voices. Nor did he believe that humans and fairies could become one people, but on leaving the castle he discovered that his warriors were already getting along with the monsters of Medea Shai. The monsters were teaching the knights to play a strange game similar to a golden checkers. Purple tents and shawls with witchcraft emblems woven on them were reminiscent of palace luxury. They were displayed on the black field by Medea Shai’s servants. The tents themselves were already populated by slender fairies, and not only black-winged ones. Conrad had seen silver fairies, gold fairies, rainbow fairies, and even those with wings like rose and peony petals. Some of the fairies wore exotic oriental robes.

«It’s peri!» His marshal whispered to Conrad. «They were sent to entertain the warriors. The queen of the fairies turned out to be generous.»

Above one of the tents it rained gold coins. They fell to the black soil with a melodious ringing. The rank-and-file warriors eagerly collected them. Their eyes became enchanted, seeing nothing but the glitter of gold. A little more and they would have a fight on their hands.

«We shall have to pay for our gifts in blood,» remarked one of the Councilors sullenly. «Considering that they may give a lot, they’ll ask for something impossible to return, like some ancient faerie relic from the sea floor.»

«The queen of the fairies and I have a deal,» Conrad brushed it aside. He wasn’t so sure of that himself. The strange voices at the door might have seemed like a nightmare, but they warned of danger.

Only now Conrad remembered that he had not obeyed the request of the invisible adviser and tried to take one of the keys from Medea Shai. Though he could have! She was standing beside him, and on her belt were as many keys as pendants on a Christmas tree. He could have discreetly taken one off while she was kissing him. Someone at the door was waiting for his help, but he didn’t give it. Probably no one would help him at the crucial moment, either.

Against his puny mortal army, the fairy queen’s monsters seemed like giants. So far they had treated humans as if they were amusing toys and entertained them with magic. Surely the queen must have told them to be nice. And what would happen if she told them to attack? Such an outcome is best not even thought of.

Roses’ charms

Araminta will have to be married, even though she’s ill. The King’s physicians are swarming around her night and day. They use every potion they can get, even from across the sea, but her skin grows ever greyer, and her strength dwindles. She will not live long. You can wait a year or two and she will die a natural death. There is no need to hurry. But Conrad so desired the fairies’ queen that he didn’t care.

He had been foretold that he would die by the blade of a conspirator, by an enemy tyrant king, by a contagious epidemic, but never by unhappy love. There was no such thing in the prophecies. His love for the fairies’ queen made him feel even sicker and weaker than Araminta did. When he returned to Aluar, he realized that he could not go on without Medea Shai. Separation from her was like torture, and the thorns in his heart were becoming knives. It was not for nothing that the fairies over the battlefield had foretold him trouble.

Now they were hovering outside the window over the sunny garden, but no longer fighting, but arguing in a half-voiced voice.

«He will not do it!» The white fairy insisted.

«Yes he will!» The red one objected.

«Love was supposed to ennoble him,» the white-winged fairy sighed almost in despair.

«Passion rules him!» The red fairy protested. She clutched at the hands of her snow-white either rival or girlfriend. The bodies of the two fairies intertwined in flight over the garden, and suddenly disappeared, while the petals of red and white roses rained down like fireworks over the garden.

Conrad looked out the window in amazement. The whole garden was overgrown with prickly pink wattle and daub. They encircled the castle walls, the wrought iron garden fence, stretched along the borders of the fountains, braided the garden sculptures, even lay on the curtains. Earlier the garden had been filled with camellias and honeysuckle, but now red and white roses swarmed the place. Even the lilac bushes could not be seen behind them. The roses had very prickly stems, but they exuded a wonderful fragrance.

Either Conrad was imagining it, or there were quiet whispers coming from the roses:

«What would the king choose: passion or love? Is it the fairies’ queen or the mortal girl?»

Conrad’s sister Princess Marianne had already noticed the changes in the garden and asked the gardener for something. Probably that he cleared away the thorny wattles of her favorite magnolia trees.

«The elves have made a fuss,» she complained noisily. «The mischievous creatures threatened to eat my magnolias if they were not allowed to enter the Queen’s Cup. I told them the tournament was for men, not beasts. And now they’ve decided to get back at me!»

«They promised to turn your magnolias into toads, not smother them with roses,» her maid of honor objected judiciously.

The gardener obediently went to carry out the princess’ orders. Conrad shuddered at the sight of sharp garden shears. Somehow he was sure that cutting roses was the same act of villainy as killing beautiful girls. After all, roses are two slender fairies. He watched with his own eyes as the fairies turned into flowers.

The prickly twigs did not yield to the blades of the scissors. The gardener pushed hard, and the scissors broke.

«Take the axe!» Marianne commanded one of her knights, who shadowed behind her. He obediently rushed to please the princess, and suddenly the whips of roses coiled around his arm. The thorns bit into his skin, piercing the sturdy armor.

Marianne cried out and prudently retreated toward the garden’s exit. And the long twigs of roses, like boas, wrapped around the knight and gardener’s bodies, squeezing them a little, leaving only bloody relics in their grip instead of men. The roses sprouted on the remains of human bodies, as if on soil liberally sprinkled with fertilizer. Instead of two corpses, there were two sprawling rose bushes in the garden.

What a miracle! Conrad watched with his mouth ajar. Roses were suddenly his favorite flowers. They are more powerful than the might of knights! Fighting flowers! Surely they must be from the realm of Shai. He involuntarily remembered that the roses in the fairies’ queen’s castle were capable of drinking blood. But they had not attacked Marianne, even though she had been the one who had initiated the cleansing of the garden. Is it possible to cut roses like weeds! His sister had to be told off. But the princess was on his way, rustling her brocade skirts.

«I hate roses!» She muttered to herself, although her festive beige costume was embroidered with golden roses gracefully inscribed with the coat of arms of Aluar.

«There is witchcraft going on in the garden! Everything in it must be burned!» Marianne demanded.

«And where will the ladies of the court walk?» Conrad protested.

«Evil elves have taken up residence in the garden!» The princess stamped her heels angrily.

«How could you know that?» Conrad himself saw not evil elves, but two beautiful fairies.

«They sent a messenger to me while I occupied the throne in your absence and received ambassadors. When all the earthly ambassadors were gone, a horned creature suddenly grew out of a puddle of spilled wine on the floor. Quite pretty, but very angry. It claimed to be a messenger from the realm of elves.»

«Maybe it lied.»

«No, it didn’t,» Marianne was hiding something. Perhaps she had a conflict with the elves who wanted her attention. Conrad knew what a prude his sister was, and how capricious she was. Now two people were dead in the garden because of her caprice, and she blamed it on some elves.

«I didn’t want the elves on the guest list for the tournament, and they threatened to repay me by destroying my most precious possessions. The company of mischievous elves even began to sing frivolous songs under my windows at night. They keep me awake, and the archers are powerless to drive them away. The arrows do them no harm.»

«Perhaps it is because you have not slept that you are so irritable!»

«The smell of roses makes me ill,» complained Marianne. «It’s so luscious and heavy, like it’s a portent of misfortune.»

Conrad hurriedly wrapped his ermine-embroidered robe around his chest. He couldn’t let Marianne see the thorns in his skin where his heart was.

«So this whole argument is because they’re not invited to the tournament?»

«Yes!»

«So let them in and be done with it.»

«But that’s against the rules! Elves are not men. Their strength is greater than that of men. Our knights can be wounded and even killed, but elves are invulnerable. The contestants will be unequal.»

«Then in the first round let everyone fight only a member of their own race. And in the second, if elves and humans, weighing each other’s possibilities, agree with each other, then let everyone choose an opponent himself. Whichever one wants! Whoever wants, will measure his strength with elves. Whoever chickens out has the right to refuse.»

«To be a knight is worse than to be killed!» Marianne grew indignant. «You would leave Aluar without knights at all if you allowed them to fight the elves.»

«I am going to invite more fairy knights from Shai to the tournament. They’re real monsters in armor. Even immortal elves would be sickened by the sight of them.»

«You are a villain!» Marianne clenched her fists.

«Didn’t you know that before?» Conrad pulled back the hem of his cloak and stalked away. He probably thought the ermine on his cloak came to life and squinted unhappily.

«I’m ashamed that you’re my brother!» Marianne’s angry words caught up with him.

And such scandals have run in their family ever since their parents passed away. Marianne, though younger, had decided to take on the responsibilities of a mother. Conrad tolerated her feisty temper as best he could. Never mind, Marianne would soon marry and leave Aluar for her fiancé’s small principality. To choose her consort-king she did not allow herself. Conrad unsuccessfully proposed one or the other to her. Marianne rejected all suitors: this one is too old, this one is too fat, this one is a tyrant, and this one is weak in character. In the end, she chose her betrothed based on facial beauty, not position. Conrad only had to accept her choice. It was unseemly for a royal sister to become a princess in a tiny mountainous country, but there was nothing to be done. He would have to help her future husband guard the borders against barbarian raids and nomads and demons from the same Shai. He and Queen of Shai are friends and allies now. With her they can negotiate, not fight.

With Marianne, there’s no bargain. She is more stubborn than a skittish young horse. She would never be at odds with the elves. She would make enemies who would come ravaging the Realm with a vengeance. Now she would have to apologize to them. And that’s not going to be easy. Probably some of the elves who sought her favor had already been turned away by her. Conrad noticed a pair of golden roses thrown near the throne. Usually golden roses symbolize elves’ love. Elves in love give such flowers to their chosen ladies. Bad luck for the one who tried to present them to Marianne. She tried to crush the golden flowers, but only cut her fingers.

Conrad picked up one golden rose. It turned out to be cast of pure gold, but it was alive. Its stem continued to grow, searching for a place to take root. In an instant it twisted around the king’s wrist like a bizarre, multi-layered bracelet.

«Oh, no! I’ve had enough of the rose in my heart!» Conrad gently released his hand, and a low sigh was heard from the golden rose.

A bright golden drop splashed onto the floor of the throne room. Where had it come from? A stately figure of a handsome elf with shoulder-length blond hair and a silver hoop on his forehead rose from the golden pool. He bowed to the king with one clenched fist to his heart.

Conrad stared at him in amazement. Such impertinence as to appear in his palace had never before been dared by elves. But Marianne, whom he had carelessly left to rule in his absence, had annoyed everyone. She was probably the reason every young man at Court Aluar had a crush on her. The elf now resembled an unhappy lover. He appeared before the king, fully equipped, with a quiver of arrows at his back, and a green cloak woven with elves’ coats of arms.

«So are you about the tournament?» Forgetting all etiquette, Conrad blurted out. «My sister was overreacting.»

«Lady Marianne is as beautiful as a summer flower, but her temper is hotter than a dragon’s,» the elf said impetuously, and then he blushed with embarrassment. Marianne must have hit him hard.

«She’s a moody girl,» Conrad said. «And she is not always sincere. I shall be glad to see your whole elves’ court at the tournament as honored guests.»

«But my Lady Marianne has expressly forbidden us…»

«I am king, not she!»

The elf still had his doubts. What had Marianne told him that he should be so bashful?

«I promise a kiss from my sister as a reward for anyone who wins the tournament, whether elf or mortal or a black knight from the realm of fairies!»

When the elf heard this, he glowed and shook his quiver of arrows with joy. Apparently, he expected to be the victor.

The envoy disappeared as magically as he had appeared. Conrad was left alone in the throne room. Only a pair of golden roses tinkled their petals beneath the throne. A low whisper could be heard in their ringing:

«It is a mistake! The king has made a fatal mistake!»

Conrad let the warning of the roses pass his ears. What mistake could there be. The elves are excellent allies, if their friendship can be secured. And the promise of Marianne’s kiss is worth far less than the traditional gold wreath that the winner of the tournament receives as a gift for his lady of the heart. Except that Marianne can be capricious and refuse the winner elf the prize. Then there will be no war. Conrad put his faith in luck and in the charms of the Queen of Fairies. Maybe something could be conjured up, so that the beauty of the elves would captivate even the grumpy princess.